Stuart Kaminsky - A Fine Red Rain

In less than a minute the sweat began to flow, and Dimitri Mazaraki sighed a sigh that echoed like the voice of a satisfied lover.

Rostnikov was looking at a book when Sasha Tkach arrived at the Gorgasali brothers' bookstall just off Lomonosov Prospekt. The crowd, mostly students carrying their own textbooks or purses, was large. Since it was noon, some of the people browsing chewed on sandwiches they carried or ate ice creams. The woman behind the flat table of books watched warily to protect her wares from theft and food stains. Sasha looked for the little girl who had been standing next to the trailer the day before, but she wasn't there.

"Sasha," said Rostnikov in greeting as he put down the book and limped away from the small crowd. The inspector hooked his arm around his young colleague and guided him to an open space where they could look across the university toward the Lenin Hills. On a clear day one could see the ancient and modern towers of Moscow across the hills and the Moscow River. This day was warm and clear.

"You know the history of the hills?" Rostnikov asked, looking toward the city.

"Somewhat, from school." Tkach pushed his hah" back from his eyes. With Rostnikov he always felt as if he were a student about to learn some magical truth. He glanced through the crowd at the woman behind the tables to see if she recognized him, but she had no reaction.

"Look out there," Rostnikov said, biting his lower lip and shaking his head. "There's plenty of time. Some good will come of this day. I was following a young woman, thought I would not be able to join you, but she had no trouble eluding me. She was young like you, fast, a circus performer. You like the circus?"

Tkach looked at Rostnikov, whose eyes were fixed on the hills. If this conversation were going somewhere, its direction was a puzzle to Sasha, who wanted simply to turn and get their business over with. Rostnikov, however, appeared to be in no hurry and to have no interest in coherence.

"I haven't seen the circus since I was a boy," Sasha said.

"You'll want to take the baby there when she can understand, even before she can speak," Rostnikov said, sighing. "She may understand no more than the colors, the lights, the smells, but you will understand, will see the spectacle and see her wide eyes."

"I'd like that," said Tkach.

Rostnikov's eyes moved to the tall tower of the university.

"I would have liked Josef to go to the university," he said. "He would have liked it, too."

Sasha did not know what to say, so he said nothing as Rostnikov went on.

"The Lenin Hills used to be the Vorobyevy Hills, the Sparrow Hills, named for the village that used to be here. You knew that?"

"No, or if I did I didn't remember," said Sasha, looking back at the bookstall nervously.

"Patience, patience," said Rostnikov without looking at the nervous young man at his side. "A calm before we act. History has a calming effect. When I was a boy, I used to feel dwarfed by history, insignificant. I was nothing, a speck. That was what we were encouraged to believe and still are. I believed it. I still believe it. It frightened me as a boy, to be insignificant, one among millions and millions, lost in repeated history. And then one day, when I was almost killed by a drunk with a knife, I suddenly felt that the reason for my fear was the importance I attached to myself, my body, my thoughts. Are you following this?"

"I don't know," said Tkach.

Rostnikov patted him on the back.

"I've not gone mad. There's a point. Pay attention. I've not forgotten why we're here or why you think we're here. So, at the moment when I thought I was going to die I suddenly gave up any sense of the importance of my thoughts and body and I was set free. I was no longer bound by fear. Whatever I was, and I'm still not sure what that is, was, I knew, part of something far greater than I could understand. I was liberated by that moment, could smell, taste, feel, and not carry the burden of having to protect the fragile shell that, ultimately, I could not protect. And once I no longer protected, I could enjoy life. Food smelled better. My wife looked better. I loved my son without sadness. I could almost taste the iron when I lifted weights. Unfortunately, the understanding tends to fade a bit each day."

"I see," said Tkach with a nod.

"You mean you do not see." Rostnikov sighed. "All right. When I was sixteen a tank almost ended me and I had no revelation. Maybe it will come to you, maybe not. Let's go."

Tkach led the way around the book table to the rear of the trailer and knocked at the door.

"Who?" asked a quivering male voice.

"Police," said Rostnikov.

Another male voice inside the trailer muttered, "Oh, God. Oh, God," and the door opened. Rostnikov and Tkach climbed in and Tkach closed the door behind them.

The Gorgasali brothers were in approximately the same positions they had been in the last time Sasha had been in the trailer. The trailer seemed warmer this time, and Sasha was more aware of the smell of human sweat. He-wondered if this warmth was harmful to the tapes in the cabinets.

The hairy younger brother was wearing a shirt and pants. The shirt was flapping out on the left side. His hair needed combing. The older brother sat behind the small table near the rear of the trailer, light coming through the heavily curtained window haloing his white mane. The older brother's face was pale with fear.

"You are a policeman," Osip said, looking at Tkach. "I saw you at Petrovka."

"We just said we were the police," Rostnikov reminded him. Then he turned to Sasha to add, "This is a man who would never understand the very hills on which he dangerously thrives."

"What? What did you say?" asked Felix, who was dressed as he had been at Petrovka: shirt, tie, jacket.

"We are here to save your lives," Rostnikov announced. "You would like your lives saved?"

Osip touched his stubbly cheeks with both hands, and his mouth opened to reveal teeth that should have been much better considering the money he and his brother apparently had made from their videotape operation.

"We are working for an important member of the Procurator's Office," Felix said, pale, veined, pulsing hands flat on the table. "We are patriots doing an important service for our"

Rostnikov shook his head and Felix stopped.

"I have no time to play, no need to play with you," Rostnikov said, looking around the trailer. "Deputy Procurator Khabolov plans to become your partner, to share your profits, take home dirty American movies, and view them on the machines you will supply to him. When and if someone gets suspicious or he needs a success to save his job, he will turn the two of you in and you will be dropped into Lubyanka. No one will listen to your tale of betrayal. No one will believe it."

It was clear to Tkach from the faces of the Gorgasali brothers, particularly that of Felix, that this scenario was one that upset but did not surprise them.

Osip removed his hands from his face, hugged himself, and moaned as he looked at his older brother for help.

"I can't take any more," Osip groaned. "I'd rather be poor again."

"Why do you want to help us?" Felix asked, his voice thin and dry.

"Because if you go to Lubyanka," said Rostnikov, "my colleague here might go with you. Deputy Procurator Khabolov will need someone to blame for letting you operate after a report had been given. My colleague here would be the scapegoat, accused of being your partner."

"Now I understand," said Felix, blowing out a puff of air and reaching for a drawer. He opened the drawer and pulled out a half-full bottle of vodka. "Osip."

Osip nodded his head and for an instant didn't move. Then he roused himself and hurried to the front of the trailer, returning almost instantly with four glasses. He gave them to Felix, who began filling them.