Joseph Kanon - Defectors

“But not yet. No connection. Take a look outside. See if there’s anyone—”

Simon half ran to the door, grateful to be doing something. The grounds were quiet, no Young Pioneers, no nuns, not even the groundskeeper, gone for a smoke or a siesta, leaving his wheelbarrow near the uprooted shrub by the red church.

“There’s a wheelbarrow,” he said, coming back.

“No. How do we explain it, if anyone comes? Grab his other side. Ever carry a drunk?”

Simon put one of Gareth’s arms around his neck and lifted, grunting at the weight.

“We just have to get him to the cemetery,” Frank said, beginning to move. “Did you see the sheds? Near the wall. We can put him there.”

“They’re still going to find him,” Simon said, hoisting the body against him, the feet still dragging.

At the entrance Frank stopped. “Check again. If there’s anybody. Lean him here.”

They backed Gareth against the wall. Simon stepped out, looking around. Still no one, a cloister stillness. He went back and slung Gareth’s arm around his shoulders again.

“Ready?” Frank said.

“What if someone’s in the cemetery?”

“He passed out. We’re getting some help.” He looked at Simon. “I don’t know.”

They stepped out into the light, the gate church just across a stretch of lawn, open, the shade trees all next to the church.

“Come on, quick,” Frank said, heaving the weight on his side, then stopped, turning his head, listening. Some voices coming from the cemetery. No, the same voice. Coming from the underpass now. They lugged the body back, not quite there when the voice came through the gate. The groundskeeper, carrying a heavy pair of gardening shears, drunk or just talking to himself. He looked up, as if he’d heard their breathing, but gazed at the other church, where he’d been working. A louder stream of Russian now, some private rant of complaint. In a second, they were back through the doorway, Gareth hanging between them. The Russian was still talking, crossing the lawn, heading right for them, swinging the clippers in one hand. Another step back, out of the light.

The groundskeeper stopped, a dog sniffing the air, and looked at the entrance, leaning his head forward, peering, his glasses catching the sun. Simon stopped breathing, his eyes fixed on the Russian’s glasses, little flashes as he moved his head. Could he see? What? Three men, holding each other up in the church’s gloom. A disturbance in his world. Something off. No sound. Another step, still peering.

And then, just as he was approaching the entrance, he gave it up and veered off on the path to the bell tower, behind the cathedral. Another minute, listening, then the sound of steady clipping, the shears attacking some unruly shrubbery. But where, exactly? Could he see the lawn? They looked at each other, panting under the weight of the body. In a minute another bus could arrive or someone with flowers for an icon, mourners in the cemetery, the whole complex come to life with people who would see them. Frank nodded and they hoisted the body again and started across the lawn. Out in the open. But no shouts, no voices disturbing the quiet, just their own heavy breathing, their ears filled with it. How could the groundskeeper not hear? When the bell in the tower started ringing, the clanging tearing through the air, they jumped, almost dropping the body, as if they had set off an alarm. They began to move faster, their breathing, any sound, covered now by the bells. Was anyone actually ringing them, looking out high in the tower? In another minute they had reached the gate church, Gareth’s shoes now scraping against the floor of the underpass. At the other end the cemetery seemed deserted, no widows paying respects. But for how long? Just to the shed against the wall. Their luck held. The caretaker had left it unlocked.

Inside there were tools, odds and ends, even slabs of tombstones leaning against the wall, loose cobbles to repair the paths between the rows of graves.

“Over there,” Frank whispered, nodding to the shadowy far end of the building.

They gave the body one last heave and dropped it in the corner, hiding it behind a pile of tools, the caretaker’s mess an unexpected cover.

“Wait,” Frank said, seeing Simon turning to go. He squatted, loosening Gareth’s belt buckle, then dragging his pants down.

“What are you doing?”

“Why he was here. Someplace out of the way. The Service is funny about people like him, they’d rather not know. If they believe it, they’ll cover it up.”

The pants down, Gareth’s white body exposed, caught in the act. Now his wallet, cash taken out and the wallet wiped for prints and thrown back, what might have happened. Frank went over to a pile of cobbles and picked one up, carrying it back to the body and raising it above Gareth’s head.

“What—?”

But the arm had already come down, a crack as it smashed into Gareth’s head, opening it.

“It won’t fool anybody if they really look—the marks on his throat, and the blood’s stopped. But they may not want to look. Disgrace to the Service.”

“And the police?” Simon said softly, looking at the body.

“The Service will take this over. One of ours. I’ll make sure.”

“What are we doing?” Simon said, a question to himself.

Frank looked at him, but said nothing, moving them to the door. He poked his head out. Still no one. Outside they took the path nearest the wall.

“Stalin’s wife,” Frank said, pointing to one of the graves. “You can tell Boris you saw it. The writers are down here.”

They were walking quickly, hurrying to the entrance. Out of the corner of his eye Simon could see a woman with a headscarf at the far end, kneeling at one of the graves, but she didn’t turn. They were still invisible.

“I can’t stay here,” Simon said suddenly. “I have to get out before they—”

Frank stopped, holding him by the shoulders. “Listen to me. By the time they find him they won’t be able to establish time of death. He said he lived down the street. This is just the kind of place he’d use—to meet people.” He gripped Simon’s shoulders. “No one saw us.”

“I can’t,” Simon said, light-headed, as if he were about to float away, held back by Frank’s hands on his shoulders.

“Yes, you can,” Frank said calmly. “It’s going to be all right. If you leave now, you’ll make it worse. For both of us. No sudden moves. Everything the way it should be.”

Except for the body in the shed. Simon saw the face again, the startled eyes. But what he heard was the calm excitement in Frank’s voice. It’s going to be all right. What he’d done all his life, maybe why he’d done it, the risk.

“I’m not going to jail, not here.”

“Neither am I,” Frank said, trying for a tentative smile. “I have an alibi. You. And you have me. We’re fine, if nobody gets spooked.”

Simon felt the hands like a grounding rope, pulling him back. But then he saw, a flash of horror, that Frank and he had become the scorpions. Both safe until one—

He nodded his head and Frank dropped his hands, then took out a handkerchief and wiped his forehead. “All that weight,” he said, the same hand he’d raised in the air with the stone.

“You have to do it soon,” Simon said. “We can’t stay here. I won’t.”

“I know,” Frank said, soothing, brushing Simon’s jacket as he spoke. “You okay?”

Simon took a breath. “Which one is Stalin’s wife?”

“Over there,” Frank said, pointing.

But when they told Boris they had seen it, his face clouded with disapproval, something inappropriate for Simon, any Westerner.

“Was it well tended?” he said, polite conversation.