Val Karren - The Deceit of Riches

I stepped to my door and spun the cylinder deftly and pushed the door wide open. Sergey stepped in behind me and guarded the door. The apartment was just as I had left it. Bloody jacket, ripped slacks and scuffed dress shoes atop the clothes that were strewn around the room. The broken windows closed but the room was drafter than normal, the table on its side, chairs broken in pieces, books with broken backs. I found my blue jeans and a few shirts, my felt cap and some lace up shoes, pajama pants and a tee shirt. I motioned to Sergey that I needed to move down the hall to the bathroom to collect my shaving kit. As I shuffled passed Natasha’s room in my sandals she opened the door with a start to see the back of me enter the bathroom.

“Pyotr, Pyotr. Is that you? Have you finally come home? Are you healthy?” her voice sounded worried and relieved as she entered the hallway to follow me to the bathroom. She did not notice Sergey standing silently at the end of the corridor guarding the front door behind her.

“Yes, Baba, it’s me. But I cannot stay. I must go back to America,” I replied from in the bathroom.

I found my bag of toiletries and put it in my backpack. As I turned to face her she froze in horror to see my face swollen up.

“Pyotr! Who did this to you? You must let me put ice on this. You come sit down in the kitchen!” she pulled me by the arm, with her back still toward Sergey in the hall. I looked to my guard with a question on my face. He gave a flick of his head to say ‘go with her, don’t cause alarm, the fewer people who know about this the better.’ I followed Natasha into the kitchen and sat on her stool. She pulled a frozen, wrapped piece of meat from her tiny ice box and held it against my face.

“Do you need some tea? Why are you dressed so funny? I’m glad to see you cut your long hair. Boys shouldn’t have long hair. Where have you been? Why did you leave without telling us? Yulia has been looking for you and is very worried,” she chirped and whirred through the kitchen.

“Baba, please, I cannot stay. I have to go back to America. My colleagues are waiting to take me to the train station in their car. I’m sorry but I don’t have time for tea.” I handed the frozen chicken breast back to her and smiled.

“You will be coming back, right? You’ll send us the photos from the award ceremony, right?” she did not want to hear that I was going.

“I’m sorry, but my camera was stolen. I don’t have the photos any longer. The people who stole my camera are the ones who did this to me.” I motioned circles in the air around my swollen face, “they are very powerful people and I need to leave so you and Yulia are not in danger.” As I said Yulia, I looked Natasha straight in the eyes, hoping she would understand to tell Yulia that I had shown up alive and was returning to America. “Please tell Yulia I will call her from America as soon as I can.”

Babushka started to cry.

“Give Raiya my best. But I have to go now,” and with a quick embrace, I hurried past her and quickly out the door. I tossed my keys onto the floor of my room, pulled the door closed and slipped out the front door behind Sergey.

My three new friends set up camp in my hotel room at the Rossiya overlooking the river without my invitation. On my request, Sergey sent Brutus to buy some fried chicken from Gordost just up the street. While we waited for the food, Sergey wrote down the telephone numbers for Del to use to call me back, if he ever would, and insisted I call again and leave a message.

The same recording in Swedish played. The message was clear: I had reached Swed-Invest Construction, leave my name and number, Beeeeeep!

“Hello, my name is Peter Turner. This message is for Mr. Del Sanning. Would ask for a return call at the following number. The matter is very urgent.” I read the sequence of digits Sergey had prepared, “I am in room 375… with a great view of the Volga.” I hoped Del would catch the message of which hotel I was held up in by the remarks about the river. Sergey wasn’t amused.

“If you do that again I will shoot off a toe,” he muttered at me angrily. “You say only the very minimum information on the telephone. Is that clear?”

“Listen!” I snapped back at Sergey, “Del and I talk to each other in a certain way. If I don’t sound myself, he won’t call back. I need him to call back so I can go home. If Del is a secret agent he didn’t tell me about it and I am not working for him. I don’t even expect he will call back. I’m not on a mission for him. He has no responsibility for me. So, I’m going to do everything I can to get him to call me back, otherwise, you will see that I go to Siberia. I don’t like that idea. I don’t work for Del or his government. I don’t work for you and your government. I just want to get out of this alive. Got it?” I was up in his face from across the table where he sat listening to my call.

“You will say only what I say you are allowed to say,” Sergey repeated slowly, alliterating his words carefully.

“Tell me then! What do I say to Sanning when he calls me back?” I hissed through my teeth.

“You tell him that you have to meet him as soon as possible,” Sergey commanded impatiently.

“Why, then? Because I miss him?” I shot back sarcastically. “I have no reason, I have no more business with Sanning. He doesn’t know that I know that he shot a man and stole a disc. How do I introduce the subject?”

Sergey did not have an immediate response and looked angrily into my eyes.

“Like I said Sergey, I want to get out of this as much as you want to get Sanning. It has to sound right, so let me do the talking. Are we going to trust each other?” I pleaded with him.

The evening dragged on late into the night. Sergey slept by the door in a chair. Brutus in a chair by the window and I got the bed that they made me pay for. I was not sleeping and neither was agent number one who had guard duty. From my perch on the bed, I watched the moon rise over the river at about one in the morning and shimmer on the river’s current. I watched a number of barges pass by quietly below. I thought back just twenty-four hours earlier with Lara on the back of the Zhukov watching the stars spin around the pole star, sitting next to her curled up in the blankets from my cabin. What a difference, twenty-four hours can make! Talking with her I was sure my plan would work. Now, my only hope was for that telephone to ring. I wasn’t sure it would.

At around five o’clock, the phone on the table buzzed and choked instead of rang. It was a ghastly noise that woke up those not on guard duty. We all counted to three…

“Hello, this is Peter,” I mumbled with sleep in my breath.

“Peter? Where are you kid?” it was Del, but he was smart enough not to say so on the phone. I didn’t repeat his name.

“I’m in a hotel in Nizhniy center.” I kept it short and exact.

“What happened? I thought you were gone,” he left out details.

“I was running from the same people and took a cruise to get away. Sailed with old friends who kept me safe for a week or so,” I watched Sergey’s face. He didn’t disapprove.

“Are you safe now?” he asked.

“Yes, but I need your help to get out of Russia.” I was not lying.

“Can you get to Moscow on your own?” he asked me. I didn’t ask if he was there.

“Yes. Something awful happened and so they aren’t looking for me anymore… I think,” I speculated.

“Can you meet me at Kyivskiy Station in Moscow this afternoon?” he proposed.

“No, sorry, I can only get the two o’clock from Nizhniy to Moscow later today.” I didn’t know any other way.

“Ok, meet me on Wednesday afternoon, twelve-thirty at the taxi stand at Kyivskiy Station. I’ll find you. We’ll do our best to help you get out quickly,” Del assured.