Orest Stelmach - The Treachery of Russian Nesting Dolls

She spoke with an enviable French accent, the kind that turned English words into hourglass figurines and bestowed upon her an illusion of superior femininity. But she delivered her words with the affectation of an evil godmother in the fairy tale of her own invention.

“Who are you?” she said, tilting her head to the side and studying me as though I were a visitor from a land unknown.

“My name is Nadia Tesla.”

“I know your name. I know what you do. That’s not what I asked you. I asked you, who are you?”

“Surely you recognize me,” I said.

“Really?” She brought her face so close to mine I could smell the frites on her breath. “I don’t think so. I’ve never seen you before in my entire life. But who knows? I may be wrong. Let me see the rest of you.”

She began to circle around me as though I were a sculpture for sale.

I guessed it was possible she really didn’t recognize me. She’d only seen me for a second beneath two red light bulbs in the dead of night before running away

“In the window,” I said. “In De Wallen . On Ouderkerksplein …”

She disappeared from my line of vision, and the knowledge that she’d slipped behind me unnerved me as much as it scared me. I wouldn’t have been surprised if she’d grabbed my ass or told her security guard to ensure I never followed her again.

“In De -who,” she said. “On Ouder -what?”

“The woman in the green bikini. The woman who followed you to the Porsche that whisked you away. That was me.”

A moment of silence followed, and then I felt her hand brush my shoulder. Her touch imparted a feeling of subordination, reinforced my relative powerlessness, and freaked me out. It also conveyed an unlikely bolt of sexual electricity and turned my attention to the matter that never strayed far from my consciousness. I wondered if this was what my husband had felt when his lover had first laid a hand on him.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Sarah Dumont said, as she continued circling and returned to my line of sight.

“In Amsterdam. Saturday night. At the anointed time. At midnight.”

“I haven’t been to Amsterdam in eighteen months. It’s not a place I visit anymore.”

“I’m here for Iskra,” I said. “By now you must have made an inquiry. You must know that she was murdered.”

Sarah Dumont faced me. She put her hands on her hips and straightened her lips, and if claps of thunder had erupted outside the church I wouldn’t have been surprised.

“You told my security that you wanted to speak to me about my son,” she said. “I have no children, I don’t know any Iskra, and I don’t like strangers coming to my home or following me around town. Now, I have one final question for you. Do you want to leave me alone, or do you want me to show you why you should leave me alone?”

I didn’t understand the origins of Sarah Dumont’s gall, but it couldn’t have been strictly a function of her personality. Someone of power was standing behind her lending credence to her threats, of that I was certain. I was also sure that the most prudent course of action for me was to tell her I was going to leave her alone and get out of town.

“He removed her reproductive organs, you know,” I said. “And cut her breasts off. This was after he crucified her to a wall in her apartment.”

Sarah Dumont stared at me. As the seconds passed, her expression gradually turned to one of resentment, as though I’d wronged her by sharing the details of Iskra’s plight. She looked away and back at me, each time with more anger. Finally, she exhaled and shrugged.

“The girl was just sex to me but if that’s what happened to her, that’s just wrong. Come, I’ll buy you lunch. You get an hour to ask whatever questions you want but after that, I’m done. And if you ever come snooping around my house again I’ll have you killed.”

She led me to the back door of one of the countless restaurants along the perimeter of the city centre. A note was taped to a side window.

“Due to the Swedish Barmaid falling off her bike pissed and the boss selling sexual favors in warmer climates, Café Bottoms Up will be closed for the rest of the week.”

The note made me smile on the inside.

“No, I’m not the boss,” Sarah Dumont said, with a note of disgust. “I’m the boss’s boss, if that’s what you were thinking.”

“Not at all,” I said.

She glared at me.

I shrugged. “I never thought for a second that you were the Swedish barmaid.”

“I hope not. I’m sure there’s some food in the refrigerator but I can’t cook.”

“I can.”

She cast a look of surprise at me. “Really?”

Five minutes later I was cooking a large omelet in a copper skillet atop a state-of-the-art range in a gleaming stainless-steel kitchen. While I prepared the eggs, she opened a bottle of chardonnay and warmed some day-old bread in the oven. I split the omelet in half and served the eggs on some smashing Villeroy and Bach plates with a farmhouse design. We sat down to eat in a cozy dining room with country French furnishings and contemporary impressionist paintings on the walls.

“How are my eggs?” I said. “Not quite as fluffy as you’re used to, I bet.”

Her hesitation confirmed I was correct. “They’re good,” she said. She looked down at her food. “How did she die?”

“The way I told you,” I said. “The way no human being deserves to die.”

“No. That’s not enough. I want to know exactly how she died.”

“Respectfully, I’m not sure there’s any benefit to that.”

She stared at me with the unblinking eyes of a woman used to giving orders and having them followed. Once again this surprised me because she was so young.

“Let me be the judge of what’s beneficial to me, yes?” she said.

I told her everything. Her reaction was in sharp contrast to the tear-stained and traumatized carriage of Iskra Romanov’s father. She was quietly respectful but showed no signs of grief.

“When you saw me in De Wallen on Saturday night,” I said. “You came because you thought Iskra was still alive, obviously.”

“It was just fun for me,” she said. “I’d never been with a woman before. The first time we fucked she put her lips on me and sucked me the way you’d suck a peach when you’re trying to keep the juices from running all over your mouth. She must have kept it up for… ten or fifteen minutes? I don’t know. I’m not sure how long. By the end I was barely conscious. It was this gentle, constant, excruciating suction. The pressure built up inside me… I thought I was going to come so badly I would die. Have you ever felt like that? Have you ever had sex so good you thought you would die from the orgasm?” She reached out and touched my arm. “I’m talking about really dying from it.”

I smiled because I didn’t know what else to do. I’d had plenty of thoughts of death and orgasms since I’d arrived in Amsterdam and taken on the case. In fact, I still had high hopes for those sea salt caramels at Puccini’s.

“That sounds like reason enough to want to know who killed her,” I said.

Sarah pursed her lips and nodded as though she’d come to a profound realization. “You know, you’re right. I may never have sex that good again in my life. I mean, I’m still young, but you can’t take anything for granted.” She turned her attention back to her food. “We only saw each other nine times. We always met at her office.”