Taras shrugged his shoulders and stopped talking.
It was then that the young man lifted his hand from his jacket pocket and showed Taras a hammer.
“I am in Bitsevsky Park,” said Taras.
“You are.”
“And you are the Maniac?”
The man did not answer.
“Once, not many years ago, I was tall and strong and I would have taken that hammer from you and shoved the handle down your throat. Now I am shorter and weak. And I am drunk, but I will fight you.”
“You think you can beat me?”
“There is not a chance that I could, but I want to live.”
Taras pulled the coat around him. A cold wind had suddenly been brought to life to dance through him.
“You are very drunk,” the man confirmed.
“Well, I will still fight you and try to get that hammer from you. This is probably the last few minutes of my soul in this almost worthless body. Until my death this had been a very good day for me.”
Taras lunged toward the man, swinging the wine bottle at his head. He missed by at least two feet and landed facedown on the cold, wet grass. He thought about crawling away, but he knew that effort would be of no use. Instead, he reached into his coat pocket and managed to touch the watch.
Akardy Zelach lay on his bed in the living room. In the lone bedroom of the apartment he could hear his mother cough, a moist, rattling cough. She had gotten home from the hospital that morning. He was afraid, afraid of losing her, afraid of being alone. There was nothing he could do. He did not know if she was awake and he did not want to wake her at this hour to offer her tea or medicine.
She coughed again and again, and through the door he could hear her sitting up. He got out of his bed and went to her bedroom. He knocked gently.
“Yes, come in,” his mother said hoarsely.
Akardy entered.
“Would you like some tea?” he asked.
“Do we have any brandy left?” she asked.
“I think so.”
“Raspberry tea?”
“Yes.”
“Tea with a little brandy,” she said.
“Yes,” he said. “Anything else?”
“Are you tired, Akardy?”
“No,” he lied.
“You could perhaps read to me a little while.”
“Yes,” he said. “Tea with brandy and a book. Which book would you like?”
“I’ll get it. You make the tea. Make a cup for yourself. I’ll read the leaves.”
When he had finished making the tea, Akardy Zelach carefully brought it to his mother on a wooden tray. He had also made himself a cup of tea, but he had added no brandy to his.
Her eyes were closed, but when she sensed him in the room they opened. He placed the tray carefully on the table next to her bed.
“Thank you.”
She touched his cheek when he sat on the bed next to her.
“Don’t look so frightened. I’m going to be fine.”
He nodded and smiled, not knowing what to say. He had no gift for words and he knew it. This may have been the reason he was so drawn to those who could create words, poets, novelists, politicians, rock musicians, and rappers. He took the book she held out and he opened it to a place she had marked with a red feather, all that remained of a hat she had worn once almost thirty years ago.
Zelach read the poem by Anna Akhmatova she had marked.
He loved these three things.
White peacocks, evening songs,
And worn-out maps of America.
No crying of children,
No raspberry tea,
No women’s hysterics.
I was married to him.
“The tea is good,” she said, patting his hand.
“I’m glad.”
“Have you finished yours?”
“Yes,” he said.
“Let me look at your leaves.”
She took his cup and held it at a slight angle to catch maximum light from the bedside lamp. She looked at it long, perhaps a full minute.
“What do you see?”
Both mother and son knew they were endowed with certain connections to thoughts and events that others did not have. These visions, feelings, were not controlled by intent. They just came. Akardy Zelach knew his mother was not reading the leaves but looking to them to give her a flash of insight. She and her son had no great intellect, but they did have the insight.
Akardy’s mother felt the shudder of connection and put down the cup.
“What did you see?” he asked.
“Nothing,” she said. “Sometimes there is nothing. Another poem please.”
He obliged and she lay back with closed eyes, listening and wondering about the shadowy specter she had just seen. The vision was too dark to really see, but the dread, the certainty of death that clung to her son now, was evident not in images but in a certainty that pervaded without giving its name.
In the vision, the creature of dark dreams had been looking at her.
“You are still happy with the wedding plans?”
The studio apartment of Iosef Rostnikov was almost dark. The lights were out, but moonlight and street lamps managed to penetrate the drawn shade and thin drapes over the lone window. This was the way Iosef liked it when he slept, just a little light. He retained a dread of total darkness when he slept from an incident during his days in the army. The barracks held memories of a sleepwalker, Private Julian Gorodov, who appeared at Iosef’s bedside babbling. Then there were thieves: Private Ivan Borflovitz had reached gently under Iosef’s pillow looking for his wallet. Iosef had grabbed Borflovitz’s wrist and twisted until the arm of the transgressor strained with a pain that would endure for weeks. Sergeant Naretsev was not so gentle, and Iosef, a light sleeper, awakened to grab him by the neck and whisper a death threat.
“Yes,” said Elena, who lay at his side.
Both Elena and Iosef, on their backs atop the blankets, were looking up at the shadows on the ceiling. Elena wore one of Iosef’s gold T-shirts with the words “Lightning in the Woods” in crimson on the front. Lightning in the Woods was one of the plays Iosef had written, produced, directed, and acted in during the years after his military service.
Iosef, shirtless, wore a pair of gray sweatpants that he had cut off at the knees.
“We are too old for the nonsense,” she added.
“I know,” he said.
“Two days of eating and drinking and warding off drunken people I don’t know.”
“I agree. So do my mother and father.”
“And then,” Elena went on, “the ridiculous ritual of my being kidnapped and you having to get past guards to rescue me and find a way out of this apartment. Why can we not just go to our appointment at the marriage office, sign our papers, and have a small party at your parents’ apartment?”
“I agree with you completely,” he said. “That is what will happen. It will be as you wish. My mother and father and the guests know that.”
“The point of the wedding is to make us happy, not to make us miserable. And the cost of food and drink. .”
“Do you hear me doing anything but agree with you?” he asked, reaching over to touch her shoulder and move his hand down to her smooth stomach.
“No,” she said, moving his hand and turning away.
“I propose we make love one more time and then get up to greet the sun. I will make breakfast.”
“I accept that proposal,” she said, turning back to face him as she considered whether it was the right time to tell him.
Iris Templeton entered the darkened tobacco shop not far from the Kremlin. Daniel Volkovich had opened the door with one of several jangling keys taken from his pocket. He had held it open so she could enter in front of him and have to touch him as she moved.
“You are not afraid,” he said as he closed and locked the door.
“Should I be?” Iris asked, turning to him.