James stared at Maraklov. “Then … who are you?”
“I am you, Kenneth. I am Kenneth James. I’ve come to help you.
Through his rapidly dulling senses James clutched tighter to Maraklov to keep from falling. Maraklov held him steady.
“Give him here, tovarisch,” one of the strong-arms muttered. “We-don’t have all night—”
“Shut up,” Maraklov said. “And no Russian. These hotel walls are paper thin.”
“Sorry,” the other said. He had wheeled a large white canvas laundry cart into the room. “Drop him in here and—”
“I said be quiet. I’ll turn him over when I’m ready.”
James had been taking in the exchange among the three Russians. When Maraklov turned back toward him he asked what was going on, what were they going to do with him …
Maraklov opened his mouth to invent an easy lie for the half-dead alter ego standing before him but could not. This American, whom he had only known for a few minutes, was also someone it seemed he had known all his life … and the closest any human being had been to him since he left his home for the Connecticut Academy eight years earlier. He forced his voice to sound firm, reassuring. “Don’t worry; everything’s going to be okay. You don’t have to worry about dad, or mom, or Matthew, or about Cathy or about school … I’m going to take care of everything, Ken. Everything will be fine. I’m strong and smart, I’ll take care of our problems. Don’t worry. You just go with these guys and forget about everything.”
James seemed to nod, even smile a bit. Andrei eased him over and handed him to the first man.
“Hey … hey … Who are you?”
Andrei smiled benevolently, brotherly. “I am you, Ken. I told you that. I’m you and I can take care of everything. You just go on now …”
James was slipping away fast but still had residual instinct to resist. He turned to Maraklov. “Ken …”
Maraklov was nearly mesmerized by the sound of that name, hearing for the first time an American — the American — call him by the name the KGB had assigned him three years ago.
“Yes … what?”
“You love father, don’t you?”
The two enforcers were puzzled by this exchange, but Maraklov ignored them. They no longer existed. It was just the two … brothers. They wouldn’t understand.
What could he say to ease things for this man …? Kenneth James, Sr., was, he had learned, a stressed-out war veteran who had taken out his frustrations and failures in civilian life on his family. He had killed Matthew, the younger son, on one of his drunken sprees. How could a son forgive the man? But apparently Ken James, Jr., could. Or wanted to.
“Sure, Ken,” Maraklov said quietly. “Sure I do. He was our father, a war hero, he wasn’t … responsible.”
But Maraklov’s words seemed to make things worse. Something in James’ face, misery and terror in his eyes … “He wasn’t responsible—” Maraklov repeated, and James’ body actually began to tremble and he shook his head. “No … I did it … I—”
Maraklov stared at James, finally understanding what the American was saying.
“I didn’t mean to do it.” James was crying now. Maraklov motioned to one of the men with him to lay the boy down on the bed. “I didn’t hate him, I didn’t really hate him. But damn it, Matthew was making father spend all his time with him. Not like it used to be when we were together so much. I felt all alone and it was Matthew’s fault …”
Left alone … Maraklov knew something about that. “You shot Matthew …?”
“An accident, I was just going to scare him. I got father’s gun and went and told Matthew to stop it and … the gun went off …”
“Go on, Ken.”
“Father saw me and he saw Matthew, and he told me not to worry, just like you now” … his eyelids were beginning to close … “he called the police and an ambulance and they took him away. I saw him just once when he got out of the hospital. He made me promise never to tell, it would be our secret … I hated mother for marrying Frank, I hate her, and Frank, hate myself too. But don’t hate father. You understand …?”
Maraklov tried to put it together, to readjust. Ken had killed his brother. To protect his son, his father had taken the blame for the shooting. There was no drunken rampage like Ken’s mother had said. His father had endured years in a mental institution to save his son. No wonder he went crazy.
And now another thought forced itself on him. He bent down to James. “Kenneth?”
The American opened his eyes.
“Cathy. Cathy Sawyer. Where is she?”
“Gone.”
Footsteps could be heard outside the hotel door. One of the KGB agents grabbed Maraklov’s shoulder. “Stop this, let’s get out of here.”
Maraklov shrugged off the hand and bent closer to James. “Answer me. Where? Where is she?”
“She never loved me, said she never wanted to see me again. Even laughed at me when I said I loved her …” He stopped, reached up as though to touch Maraklov’s face, the face so like his own, just a fraction of an inch from the freshly healed plastic-surgery scars. “Thank you …” The hand dropped, the haunted eyes closed for the last time.
“Took longer than it should have,” mumbled one of the agents, then nudged Maraklov out of the way and began to strip off James’ jewelry and clothes.
“He killed his brother … and his girlfriend,” Maraklov said half-aloud, trying to absorb it, and understood the personal impact of it. He rubbed his eyes, his temples.
“Get undressed, Maraklov …”
“James,” Maraklov said as if by rote. “The name is Ken James.”
“Whatever your damned name is, sir, get undressed and put these clothes on.” In less than a minute they had tossed James’ clothes to him and were busy putting his clothes on the corpse.
Maraklov looked at James’ clothes, shook his head. “I can’t wear these—” Maraklov gasped.
“We don’t have time for—”
“I said, I can’t.” Not yet, anyway. Not until he had exorcised, or taken as his own the images that assaulted him … Matthew, from the only photograph acquired by the KGB weeks before his death — happy and laughing … Kenneth hefting the big Colt .45 caliber pistol — he could almost feel the weight of it, with a grip almost too big for his fingers to wrap around, a hammer almost but not quite too tight to cock, could feel the recoil, feel the weapon hot and alive, hear the blast drowning out his younger brother Matthew’s cry of pain … then his father’s face, the sorrow, the compassion in it — and he could see himself begging for forgiveness, for understanding. And his father had given it all to him. He had sacrificed his life for him.
Maraklov struggled for control. Only a few weeks ago it had been, he thought, a game he played with Janet Larson, something that always seemed to excite her. Make up stories about Kenneth James. The juicier, the better. She wanted to know if James had a lot of women, if he masturbated, if he liked older women. Maraklov always had a new story for her. Including the one about his target Ken James killing his girlfriend Cathy Sawyer. He thought he had just made it up, embroidered what the KGB reports told him. But now … he had thought he had an overwhelming reason to kill Janet Larson, and he had been right. Only it was not just the logical one — to do away with a threat to his mission in America. Somehow he had been duplicating what Ken James had done to Cathy Sawyer. Andrei Maraklov had become more complete with his target than he could have imagined. Cathy Sawyer had died twice — once in America, and once at the Academy in the Soviet Union …