whom Tkach recognized, Dolnetzin, the man in charge of the computer-theft squad.
"You do not look good, Arkady," Tkach said.
"Keep my mother away. Lie to her," Zelach said. "I think my eye hurts the most."
Dolnetzin looked down at Zelach, sighed very deeply, and whispered orders to the man and the woman with him as they went back out through the door.
Sasha was not sure if Zelach had heard his confession or had absorbed it if he had. It had been stupid and self-serving to confess. Zelach was in no condition to ease Sasha's guilt. There would be time later.
"Tkach," said Dolnetzin, a tall young man with a mustache that helped only a little in making him look older. He was no more than a year older than Sasha, but two grades higher and in charge. "What happened?"
"Later," said Tkach, holding Zelach's hand and not looking at Dolnetzin as the ambulance driver and an assistant hurried in with a stretcher.
For now Tkach would not be getting a shower. He would wear the clothing that smelled of Tamara, perhaps for hours, and, he decided, as he stood up, that was as it should be and what he deserved, for he knew that while he had slept in her bed, two men had turned Zelach into the pained creature before him.
The ambulance driver and his assistant opened the stretcher and tried to place Zelach on it carefully, slowly, but even the tiniest movement caused a groan of agony.
Sasha stood and turned to face Dolnetzin, who waited, hands folded in front of him. Dolnetzin wore a British tweed jacket over a white shirt and a plaid sweater.
"I'm going to the hospital with Zelach," Sasha announced.
"What happened?" Dolnetzin asked again, much more firmly than before.
"I failed him," said Sasha, looking anxiously toward the door and seeing the handle of Zelach's gun barely poking out from beneath a reproduction of a seascape that had apparently fallen to the floor in the struggle.
"I will need more than that, Tkach," Dolnetzin said.
"There is no more," said Sasha, moving to the seascape, picking up the weapon, and putting it into his pocket. "Now I must go."
He hurried through the door and ran after the stretcher.
Dolnetzin had twice seen others lose control when they had felt responsible for the death of a fellow officer. There was a madness in their eyes that could either be fought or allowed to run its course. Dolnetzin decided to let it run its course, which was why at such an early age he was a full inspector in charge of a division, with the promise of a very bright future.
Yakov Krivonos was gone. He had been replaced by Yakov Shechedrin. Yakov looked in the mirror at the young man before him. It was the kind of young man he hated. Short hair combed back, perfectly shaved, wearing a suit with a tie.
"Wear these," Jerold said, handing him a pair of glasses with heavy dark rims.
"No," said Yakov.
"Wear them," Jerold said again. "Believe me."
Yakov put on the glasses and looked at himself again in the mirror. No doubt. If he had encountered a person like this yesterday, he would have wanted to hurt him, may even have followed him, beaten him, and taken his money and the watch he was wearing, kicked him two or three times in the face.
"I don't like it," Yakov said.
"One day," said Jerold. "Then you'll be on a plane for Paris. Money and Paris.
And then Las Vegas."
"I don't like it," Yakov repeated, looking at himself in the mirror, scowling at himself. He was sure Carla would laugh at him when she saw what he looked like. She would laugh at him in spite of what he would do. She would laugh at him, and he would throw her through the window again. And then he remembered. How could he forget that? Carla was dead.
She wasn't going to laugh at him.
Jerold looked over Yakov's shoulder and smiled. "You look fine. No one will notice you. Let's go over it again." ' 'I know it," said Yakov, turning from the mirror.' 'I don't have to go over it."
"We go over it one time more, maybe two," said Jerold gently, reasonably, "and then I give you two capsules. No, I'll give you four."
Yakov make it clear that he was annoyed with a surly response of "All right."
And with that Jerold lifted a briefcase onto the table, opened it, and revealed a compact piece of finely polished, smooth maple wood, with a pistol grip on one end, and tubes of metal and a telescopic sight painted black, each piece firmly and neatly held in place by at least two black straps.
Yakov stood in front of the open briefcase and looked at Jerold, who pulled out a stopwatch.
"Twenty seconds last time," said Jerold. "Let's get it down to eighteen. Fifteen gets you two extra capsules. Now."
Yakov moved quickly. His fingers were too short for playing the guitar, which was what he planned to do-learn to play the guitar and start a rock band in Las Vegas. But Yakov did not have the discipline to play a musical instrument.
Jerold helped him, coached him, told him he was talented, assured him that he would make it, that the idea of a Soviet rock band in Las Vegas would create a sensation. He told Yakov of American girls, and Yakov listened and took the capsules.
"I have an important question," Yakov said in English, his fingers moving to the sections of the Walther WA 2000 in the briefcase. "I have been thinking much about it."
"Yes."
"Does Madonna have real yellow hair?"
"It is real," said Jerold quite seriously.
"You have seen?"
"Yes."
"There," said Yakov, holding the assembled weapon in his hand, the same weapon with which he had shot through the door at Emil Karpo.
"Eighteen seconds," Jerold said, putting the watch down and smiling.
Yakov nodded his head knowingly. He knew he was getting better.
In fact, he was not. Jerold had lied. It had taken Yakov twenty-two seconds. He had lied because he wanted an excuse for giving Yakov the extra capsules, wanted the excuse for bringing Yakov Krivonos closer to death, as close as he could possibly bring him after Yakov completed the task that had been set for him with the weapon he now lovingly cradled in his arms like a favored stuffed animal.
Not long after Sasha Tkach opened the door to the apartment in Engels Four, two women in Yalta, sitting on a park bench, began laughing.
The women had started early in the morning with a cup of tea just inside the lobby of the Lermontov Hotel. Had either Sarah Rostnikov or Andy McQuinton had a better grasp or any real grasp of each other's language, they might have abandoned the outing. When they had left the hotel, the sky had been gray and getting darker. A wind threatened, and the temperature had dropped to fifty degrees Fahrenheit, but they were formidably dressed and suitably determined.
They had smiled at each other in the lobby and exchanged shrugs, indicating the awkwardness of the situation into which they had been cast the night before. In spite of that awkwardness, it was clear that they wanted to share each other's company. It was also clear that Sarah would take the lead. She knew a little English compared to Andy's complete lack of Russian.
Besides, it was her country.
What surprised Sarah was that she was the more physically able of the two.
Sarah, who was only weeks beyond major surgery, was by far the more vigorous, and in spite of Andy's willingness to go into town on the bus, it was clear that she was not well.
What they lacked in health, they made up in determination. The bus dropped them at the end of Roosevelt Avenue in Yalta's Old City. The grayness of the early morning gave way to sun and the cold dawn and turned into cool morning. They turned left out of Roosevelt onto Lenin Street, Yalta's main street, which runs along the sea. When they crossed the bridge over the Vodopadnaya River, Andy was slowing noticeably.
When they reached Gagarin Park, just a bit beyond, Andy was breathing heavily.