James Church - The Man with the Baltic Stare

“You want both? Twenty-five.” The black bag swung provocatively.

“Listen,” I said. “When I need to kill myself, I’ll call you first. Meantime…”

“I know,” she said, “pork buns. Rua da Barra, not far. It’s a place called Mama Nhi’s. Pretty good.”

An older girl walked up. “Keep it moving,” she said, and looked at me. “Either buy or don’t buy.”

Mama Nhi didn’t have a box, but she did have a big shopping bag.

“Fill it up?” She put her hands on her hips. “That’s one hell of a lot of grease. You planning to sell the stuff? Tell me; I can get you more.”

I opened the door of the van. “These are for you,” I said. “Maybe we can talk.”

The next morning, I was at the luggage store in the Lisboa when it opened. None of the suitcases looked big enough for a body, not even for one of the skinny models waving from the photographs in the window.

“I need something large.” I smiled. “Let’s say I wanted to go on a trip. Let’s say for laughs I wanted to go in my own suitcase. You got anything?”

The clerk’s eyes opened for a flicker. “This is the biggest we have.” She went behind the counter and pulled out a Louis Vuitton, a two-wheeler.

“Nice,” I said. “But cramped. How about a Lancel? How about red?”

She shook her head. “Too bad. I sold the last one a few weeks ago.”

“Is that so? You remember whom you sold it to?”

“Sure. Some Russian woman, thin, very careful with the makeup. How come all the interest in red Lancels all of a sudden?”

All of a sudden, she said. I took a chance. “Luís was in last night?”

She shrugged. “You browse. Take your time.” She went back behind the counter. “I’m not going anywhere.”

I pretended to look around. So, Luís hadn’t followed the suitcase angle before. We all had blind spots. His were baggage and balconies. Senhor Penza hadn’t come with a red Lancel. A Russian woman had bought one and ended up floating in it a few days later. Luís hadn’t realized that before. He did now. It didn’t fit in my puzzle. Maybe it fit in his.

“This red suitcase you sold to the nice tourist lady, it had four wheels?”

“What if it did?”

“Lancel doesn’t make four-wheelers, not elegant enough. I checked. Yours must have been a fake.”

“So sue me.”

I picked up a carry-on. “How much is this?”

“Eight thousand Hong Kong. Too small for you. You’d have to cut off your legs.”

The immigration official in the Prague airport looked at my passport and then at me. Then he looked back at the passport-the fatal second glance. “You have taken an odd routing.”

The tickets had taken me from Hong Kong to Shanghai, then to Madrid, and then back to Prague. “Miles,” I said. “I have a lot of them. A few more and I get a free trip to Copenhagen.”

The immigration official looked closely at one page. He held it up in the booth for me to see through the glass. “You’ve already been to Copenhagen.”

“Sure I have. And I want to go back.” I winked. “If you know what I mean.”

“Don’t disturb the peace here in Prague.” He stamped the passport and handed it back to me. “We aren’t like the Danes.”

From the airport I took a taxi to the hotel where I’d stayed the only other time I’d been in Prague. It was a little more frayed than it had been back then, but so was I. The day was cool but clear, so I decided to take a tram to the river, walk across the bridge, and wander around. Kang-or somebody-went to a lot of trouble to get me here; they could go to a little more trouble if they wanted to find me.

An old man with a hat got on at the next stop. He sat in the seat behind me.

“Long time, Inspector.”

It was Kang. The voice was older, but it was still tough.

“Don’t turn around. We’re getting off soon.” He spoke in Russian. None of the other passengers looked up. The tram swayed around a corner and then stopped. “This is it,” he said. “Walk with me.”

We climbed the stairs to an apartment house that looked like the one next to it, and the one next to that. They all looked the same. The door opened before Kang could put his key in the lock.

“Christ on a cloud, Inspector! You haven’t changed.”

“Neither have you, Richie.” The stick figure in the doorway was nothing like the man I’d met in this city fifteen years ago. That man had been burly, self-assured, filling the safe house with his presence. This man was wasting away. He was dying. I searched for something to say. “You still have that little silver tape recorder you used last time we saw each other? It didn’t work very well. I’ll bet half of what I told you was lost.”

“Maybe, but we don’t use that stuff anymore. We read brain waves.” He shook my hand. His grip was fragile like one of Colonel Pang’s ancient cups. “Come in and have some tea. I can’t remember-with milk or without?”

Another man stepped into the room. I try not to be judgmental, but he was Russian in the worst way. Put together from ugly discards, and none the happier for it. He stood next to Richie.

“Kulov here is my batman. Kulov, meet the Inspector.”

Kulov extended a meaty hand. “A pleasure, I’m sure,” he said in a low, cultured voice.

A tremor of pain passed over Richie’s face. Kulov watched silently until it passed. “Next time,” he said, “you’ll take the pill when I give it to you. Sit on the sofa. I’ll bring the tea.”

Richie sat down. “Kulov is not full of sympathy. That’s all right; sympathy is the last thing I need. Maybe a week at the baths would do some good. What do you think, Kang?”

Kang was on a stool that looked like it had been shoved into the corner as an afterthought. “How about trying some food now and then? That might help, too.”

“Food I need even less than sympathy.” Richie put his head back and closed his eyes. “So, Comrade O. Glad you made it. We weren’t sure you’d come. Welcome back to Prague.” He meant to smile, but there was nothing left, just the prospect of the void.

They must have pulled Richie from his deathbed for this. Did they think it would make me more comfortable, being welcomed by a near corpse? For some reason, they decided that they needed him to take the lead, even though there was no doubt that this was Kang’s meeting. “How did you know I was in the Nam Lo?”

“It’s a cinch you weren’t at the Lisboa. How did you like it in Macau? I was there once, about thirty years ago.”

“It’s all right. They could use a few chestnut trees.”

“Did you happen to get to the maritime museum?”

“It wasn’t on my itinerary.”

“There used to be a good restaurant in the neighborhood. Past a street called Rua da Barra. I never drove, so I never knew how to get there exactly. Just wondering if it’s still in business. Maybe I’ll go back one of these days.” That didn’t ring hollow; it didn’t ring at all.

“You called me halfway around the world to ask about restaurants?”

Richie started to laugh, but then he coughed. “It’s over, Inspector. All done, finally done. Time to choose. That’s why we called you halfway around the world.” He coughed again, a long, painful, desperate effort for air. “Kang said we should give you a choice.” Kang and I waited while Richie caught his breath. Kulov brought a glass of water from the kitchen. Richie waved him away. “Get me some whiskey, you bastard.” The Russian put the glass down on a table and disappeared into the kitchen.

I turned to Kang. “And you? Where have you been all these years?” The odds were he would never tell me, but it never hurt to ask. Sometimes even a short answer led somewhere. Not this time.