Val Karren - The Deceit of Riches

I stood opposite No. 11 on the Upper Embankment street taking in the view of the flooded river below when I heard the resurrected church bells below chime eleven o’clock. With the chimes, I woke from my sun worship and cleared the blue and purple blotches from my vision and turned to look at the three-story 19th-century mansion villa behind me. The house was in the design of perfect neo classical symmetry in its architecture and looked to be right out of St. Petersburg. The exterior was stripped of all color, only a mono-brown sandstone, speckled with plaster and dried concrete greeted the passers-by. The gardens were surrounded by an old whitewashed stone wall. There was no view of the gardens at street level but one could see the handsome grove of birch trees standing taller than the walls, that shaded the house from the morning’s searching sunlight. Except for the scaffolds and building materials visible on the porch a half story above the street, pedestrians would be forgiven for assuming that the house stood vacant and abandoned, a relic of the exterminated bourgeoisie, but the same would be mistaken. This was the new residence of Igor Ivanovich P. and it was being restored from the inside out at breakneck speed.

Dean Karamzin had been successful to entice his old friend into an interview with a foreign academic, but not without a carrot for Mr. P. It was intimated, without so many words by the Dean, that the product of the research and the interview would be read by the governor and accepted as a policy recommendation concerning the future of entrepreneurial activities in the province. It was implied that Mr. P. by means of this independent academic research could help to subtly influence public policy without creating any impression of impropriety between his business activities and the offices of the governor. I suppose the Dean wasn’t lying, but like the forked-tongue beast of old who ruined Eve’s paradise, he spoke a deceiving truth.

It all seemed too easy for me to walk into the home of a mobster and ask him searching questions about his ‘biznis’ activities in the climate of the day. I began to be suspicious of the Dean’s motives. I hadn’t heard the telephone call between the two, maybe I was being deceived in the same way as I thought Mr. P. was being deceived. Els’ words of warning rang in my ear as I stood on the pavement looking at this riverside mansion and debated walking away. Why would he agree to this so easily? Perhaps he felt his local notoriety made him untouchable. Maybe he was in his breakthrough phase from the shadows into the public eye, into government and immortality, and the more legitimate press he could get would only help him. Maybe I was too late and my interest in writing about him would only help his long-term goals. The doubts in my head swirled around as I stepped forward and rang the bell at the door that was flush with the pavement at street level next to a driveway gated by two tall steel plates blocking any view of the curious pedestrian. I rang the bell half expecting a trapdoor to open up underneath me, dropping me into a basement dungeon where the bones of the local prosecutor were still chained to the wall. Instead, a loud buzzing came from the door frame signaling me to push it open and walk through, as a welcome guest.

The street level floor of the house was dedicated to screening visitors and giving access to the driveway to the right of the house. Upon entering through the heavy, decorated steel door I came immediately into a brightly lit holding cell. As the heavy door closed with a clang behind me I was startled and tried to open it again. It was held closed by electro-magnets and released from only behind the bars in front of me, where an older fellow in a proper security guard uniform was waiting for me. There were no bodyguards in Armani suits waiting to strip search me and beat me with rubber hoses. There was just a guard behind a barred window and another steel door.

After a brief explanation for my visit, a quick search of my book bag and a glance at my passport and student card I was let through. On passing the inner barrier the guard asked me to stand still and ran a metal detector wand around me, between my legs, up the crotch of my pants, my ankles, under my arms and around my back and belt. With nothing threatening found he wished me a good day and showed me to the staircase which led to the second floor and sent me on my way without a further escort. He returned to his chair and his camera monitors over the sidewalk and curbs in front of the house and paid me no further attention as I ascended upwards into the house.

Up the short staircase and through a swinging door I came to stand in front of a full-length glass window to my left which looked out over a commanding view of the river and the countryside. I wondered to myself how the view looked from the third floor. On emerging from the dark ground-floor I was met by a very attractive woman with long legs and long black hair. She was dressed professionally without any gaudiness in a formal business suit with a fitted jacket and skirt. She informed me that she was the personal secretary of Mr. P., that I was expected but would have to wait maybe ten minutes for my host to finish his current telephone call. She offered me a glass of champagne while I waited but I politely refused. She offered me a chair to wait in and asked me not to smoke. I took a seat and glanced out the long window to take in the view of the river again but felt my head turn to glimpse the other captivating view of the secretary walking back to her desk in the corner or the reception area. Russia’s beauty in the spring time is certainly worth the wait!

The floors of the first level were a beautifully polished, newly inlaid birch wood in a very intricate traditional Russian pattern like one would see in a royal palace’s ballroom. I felt as if I should have taken off my shoes and skated on the floor in my socks so as not to scuff it. I wondered how the secretary walked on it in high heels without gouging the floor with little pock marks. The interior was tastefully decorated with classical upholstered furniture in a tasteful Imperial style of the 18th century. The walls were painted a light yellow with moldings and door frames were painted in a stark plaster white. The columns on the porch outside cast long diagonal shadows across the floor and the furniture.

After perhaps fifteen minutes of waiting nervously, trying to look calm and collected, the secretary approached my chair in long graceful strides and asked if I would follow her to Mr. P’s office. We ascended another staircase, but this time we swept upwards, instead of climbing, to the third floor over plush, red embroidered carpets pinned to white marble steps with brass bars at the base of each step up. The house was appointed inside like a miniature palace with no details spared to replicate the grandeur of what it once was. To my right over the railing now at eye level hung a crystal chandelier which cast faint, dispersed prisms on the yellow wall on my left as I followed the Cossack beauty up the staircase to the third floor. How did she walk on this thick rug in those heels without even wobbling? She must have gone to finishing school to learn that trick! My mind seemed to be on anything but the interview that was about to start. I had to push out all the distractions of the environment and focus. I stopped watching the skirt and legs in front of me to get my thoughts together and watched my own dusty shoes shuffle over the shallow upward steps. I felt at once very underdressed seeing the frayed hem of my blue jeans although they were clean, sort of. At least I was wearing a jacket with a clean shirt under it. What else was a poor student supposed to wear? We had arrived.

As I entered the palatial office on the third floor Mr. P. rose from behind his large dark wooden desk and walked toward me with his stocky gate with his right hand extended to greet me in a very professional and warm way. As we shook hands he clasped his left hand on to my left shoulder, welcomed me to his home and invited me to sit down on a firm leather couch, one that might be found in the den of a British country gentleman. It was very comfortable. I set my book bag down, leaned up against the end of the couch. Notes would be taken later. His secretary who had been waiting at the door offered to serve drinks.