Taylor Smith - Guilt By Silence

“What a beautiful child!”

Mariah turned away from the antics across the room and found herself facing a woman who was watching Lindsay, bewitched, it seemed, by the copper curls and laughing dark eyes. She had apparently sidled up next to them at some point during the song. She looked to be in her early thirties, a few years younger than Mariah herself, short and on the pudgy side—the typical result of a starchy East European diet. She had a round, pleasant face and wide-set, pale blue eyes under overpermed blond hair. Her smile, as she glanced over Lindsay’s head at Mariah, was the hesitant gesture of the shy and lonely. The eyes dropped quickly, back to the child.

Lindsay looked up, a flicker of self-consciousness crossing her features before the giggles overtook her again. “That’s my dad,” she said, pointing at the group across the room. “He’s so crazy!”

The woman smiled once more, her eyebrows rising as she followed Lindsay’s finger. “Which one? Mr. Hewlett, who is leaving us?”

“No, the one with the harmonica. He’s a really good player. He taught himself. He can play anything, but he likes the blues best,” she confided.

“Oh, I see. So you are Dr. Tardiff’s little girl. What is your name, sweetheart?”

“Lindsay Bolt-Tardiff,” Lindsay said, holding out her hand, very grown-up. “And I’m eleven—well, almost.” They shook hands.

“Please excuse me,” the woman said, her expression appropriately serious. “I meant to say ‘Dr. Tardiff’s fine young lady.’ I am very pleased to meet you, Lindsay Bolt-Tardiff. I am Tatyana Baranova—you must call me Tanya.”

“Hi.” Lindsay glanced back at Mariah. “This is my mom.”

“Mrs. Tardiff. How do you do? You have a beautiful daughter.”

“Thank you,” Mariah said, smiling as she took the woman’s hand. “Call me Mariah. Do you work with the IAEA, Tanya?”

“Yes, but I have only been here a few weeks. I do not know many of my colleagues yet.”

“How are you finding Vienna?”

“It is very beautiful. Very expensive,” she added, rolling her eyes. “There are so many things in the shops—my goodness, I can hardly believe it—but not many bargains.”

“That’s for sure.”

“In Moscow, the shops have nothing. Here, it is the opposite, but expensive! How simple people live, I cannot imagine.”

“There’s a lot to see and do that doesn’t cost a fortune, once you find your way around.”

“I’ve seen the Lippizaner stallions three times!” Lindsay proclaimed proudly. “They dance!”

Tanya smiled warmly at her. “Just like your eyes, lovely one. Tell me, where did you get your beautiful hair? Your papa’s is black and your mama is fair, but you—so beautiful, this hair!” She ran her fingers lightly across Lindsay’s curls.

“I don’t know. Daddy says I’m a throwaway.”

“Throwback, Lins,” Mariah said, laughing. She looked up at Tanya. “My grandfather had red hair. I’ve never met a redhead in David’s family, but he says there were a few somewhere on the family tree, so I guess he must be carrying the gene, too.”

“Why would Daddy carry his jeans? And what’s that got to do with hair, silly?”

“Not jeans—genes. G-E-N-E-S,” Mariah explained, spelling out the word. “The kind you inherit from your mother and father that determine if you’ll be big or small—have brown eyes or blue. Red hair is uncommon because the gene is recessive. It hides, unless both parents pass it on.”

“I knew that,” Lindsay said, sniffing. “I was just testing to see whether or not you did.” She turned to Tanya. “I have hockey genes, too.”

“Hockey genes?”

Lindsay nodded. “From my dad and not my mom ’cause she comes from California and she hasn’t got any winter-sport genes in her at all. My dad’s teaching me to play hockey.”

“You don’t say. Well then, Lindsay Bolt-Tardiff, we have something in common, because when I was a little girl, believe it or not, I used to play on a girls’ hockey team at my school in Russia. We had a small league, but we were very good—at least, we thought so. I played goalie.”

“My dad plays center. I don’t play any position here because they don’t let girls on the teams. It’s not fair! I have to just skate around with my dad and we pass the puck. But I’ve got a killer slap shot,” she added. “I bet I could get it past you!”

“I am certain you could,” Tanya said, laughing. “I have not played in many years. Now, I just like to watch.”

“You could come and watch Daddy’s team play on Saturday. Mom? Couldn’t Tanya come with us?”

“Yes, of course. We’d love to have you join us. David’s team is just a bunch of guys from some of the foreign missions. Your embassy has a house team, too—David and his friends often play against them. But they’re playing a team from a local factory on Saturday morning. It’s not professional caliber or anything, but it’s fun. Why don’t you come and watch with us?”

“Oh, you are very kind, but I don’t think—”

“We could pick you up,” Lindsay offered helpfully, checking with her mother. Mariah nodded.

As she watched Tanya searching for a response, Mariah saw in her eyes that sudden fear—the fear born of dire warnings from KGB officers about what lies in wait for those who consort with capitalist enemies. And as Tanya’s eyes fell, Mariah saw regret, and then a flash of something else. Anger? Defiance?

“I would love to, really. But I do not think I can make it on Saturday. Thank you for asking.” Tanya looked at Mariah, hesitating, and then she turned and smiled at Lindsay. “I should be going now. I very much enjoyed meeting you, Lindsay,” she said, giving her a kiss on the cheek. “And you, Mrs. Tardiff.”

Mariah had unobtrusively scribbled something on a piece of paper. When Baranova held out her hand, Mariah pressed the slip in and left it there when she withdrew her own. “I wrote down the name of the arena,” she said quietly. “It’s near the Alte Donau U-Bahn station, in case you find yourself free on Saturday, after all. The game starts at nine. It was good to meet you, Tanya.”

The Russian woman held her gaze for a moment, and then turned and walked away.

In the end, Mariah recalled, Tanya had shown up that Saturday, somehow managing to shake the KGB watchers that kept tabs on all Soviet diplomats. And that was the beginning of it.

The hockey game was the only time, apart from the IAEA office party, that Mariah and Tatyana Baranova had ever met on open ground. But as the list of references on the computer indicated, they had met eight times again over the next fourteen months.

Then Tanya had disappeared and CHAUCER appeared to be wound up. Not long after that, David and Lindsay’s car was wiped out in front of the American School.

Mariah highlighted the first reference to CHAUCER on the screen, hoping against hope to find a back door into the file through her personal log. But when she hit the Enter key, the same stern message appeared: “RESTRICTED FILE. ACCESS DENIED.”

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