“And?” Simmy said.
“A short old man with a cane. Didn’t say much. He paid the bill.”
“If he paid the bill, you must have his signature somewhere,” Nadia said.
“I have better than that,” the cemetery man said. “I have his name right here as the contact for the burial.”
He showed Nadia the ledger. The contact’s name was Dr. Arkady Shatan. Nadia tilted the ledger so that Simmy could see it. He read the ledger but showed no emotion.
“No priest?” Nadia said.
“No. There was no religious ceremony.”
That didn’t necessarily mean anything, Nadia thought, but it was unusual. Most Ukrainians were Orthodox Christians, and there was a strong contingency of Catholics in Western Ukraine.
“The doctor said a few words,” the cemetery man said. “A few raindrops fell — I remember because no one was shedding any tears so the heavens opened up to show some sympathy for the recently departed — and that was that. They left.”
“Any visitors since then?” Simmy said.
“None. Not a single person.”
“How can you be so sure?” Nadia said.
The cemetery man glared at her as though he were offended. “Because she would have told me.”
“Excuse me?” Simmy said.
“The spirit of the departed. Eva Vovk. She would have told me. The dead, you see, they speak to me.”
“They speak to you,” Simmy said.
“Who else do they have to talk to?”
“I see your point,” Simmy said. He pretended to scratch his forehead, shielded his face, and rolled his eyes at Nadia.
The cemetery man replaced his ledger on the shelf.
Nadia and Simmy went outside.
“I find it hard to trust a man who believes he speaks with the dead,” Simmy said.
“As opposed to the corporate men you deal with every day?” Nadia said. “In Russia, England, and America? The ones who run our corporations, with such sterling ethics?”
“I trust them even less.”
“He was lucid, he remembered details about the burial, and he didn’t hesitate when he answered questions. He sounded reliable to me, up until the bit about talking with the dead. Eva died of an infection. Why no funeral home? Why no visitation hours? She had to know other people. Teachers, people who took care of her growing up. People who would have wanted to pay their final respects.”
“Don’t be so sure. She was a child of Chornobyl. You yourself said they were social outcasts. And maybe the uncle couldn’t afford the funeral home.”
“You may be right about that. Still, no priest strikes me as suspicious, too.”
“Not me. She was an orphan. She was buried by two scientists and a former hockey player and coach. If the latter three weren’t religious, why would they want a priest? Why would they pay for a priest?”
“Always the financial angle,” Nadia said.
“Financial challenges are the reality here. That makes it one of the most important angles. My men arranged for him to raise the casket as soon as he arrived this morning. A quick ride and all will be illuminated.”
They drove deeper into the cemetery. Mounds of dirt surrounded a plot. A closed casket rested beside it. The cemetery man arrived in a dilapidated truck with cracked sea-foam paint and blotches of rust. A young protégé with an obvious affinity for beer climbed out of the truck with him. They worked the latches on the casket.
Simmy took an audible breath beside Nadia. “No offense intended, Nadia. I understand your sense of urgency and the danger of Bobby’s current situation. But I must be honest.”
Nadia raised her eyebrows, unsure of what he intended to say.
“This is more exciting than buying low and selling high.”
Nadia breathed a sigh of relief. She feared he was going to confess the entire business was a giant nuisance. “I suspect that depends on just how low you bought and high you’re selling.”
Simmy cocked his head to the side and nodded. “Yes. I guess you’re right.”
The cemetery man and his protégé opened the casket. Nadia took a breath and stepped forward.
A human skeleton rested inside.
“Broad pelvis, narrow collarbone, small frontal and temporal bones,” Simmy said. “Looks like a woman to me. And there’s evidence of a break in the left fibula.”
Nadia saw the broken bone below the knee. It brought back memories. She’d stabilized a broken tibia for a distressed hiker on the Appalachian Trail during a three-day Ukrainian Girl Scout survival test. Both bones belonged to strangers she’d never met. The difference was this one would never heal.
She appraised Simmy with a fresh perspective. “Did you work in a morgue?”
“No. My platoon stumbled on a mass grave in Siberia when I was in the Army. I watched and listened when the forensic technicians came. So much for your theory. There lies a woman. There lies Eva Vovk.”
Nadia stared at the skeleton. How could she be sure it belonged to Eva? Nadia wished she had more time to investigate further.
A voice startled her from behind.
“You’re right on the first count,” the cemetery man said, “but wrong on the second.”
Simmy regarded him with curiosity. “How so?”
“A girl definitely lies there, but she is not Eva Vovk.”
“Why do you say that?” Nadia said.
“Because this girl speaks to me. I told you. When I tend to her lot.”
Simmy gave Nadia another skeptical glance.
Nadia said, “And what does she say?”
“That she has finally found peace now that she is alone.”
Nadia waited for him to follow up, but he didn’t add anything. “And?” she said.
The cemetery man shrugged. “And nothing. That’s all the proof you need the girl is not Eva Vovk.”
Simmy looked amused and confused. “How is that?”
“Eva Vovk. Her last name means wolf. Wolves travel in packs. No wolf would ever say she was at peace now that she was alone. A wolf would only find peace with others like her. I’m not educated like you two and I may just move dirt for a living, but this I guarantee you. That is not the body of Eva Vovk.”
CHAPTER 35
Nadia and Simmy completed their business at the cemetery in twenty minutes. They were back on the road to Kyiv by 1:55 p.m. That left them two hours until Nadia’ self-imposed deadline for her plane to depart for Vladivostok.
“Not only will my driver make up time on the ground,” Simmy said, “my pilot will make up time in the air.”
He excused himself while he called his assistant to get briefed on what had transpired since he’d last talked to her half an hour ago. Such was the life of an oligarch. He ran a multi-billion-dollar empire. He demanded performance and held his employees accountable. He didn’t micromanage them but he stayed informed so that he understood the business. Charities, pension funds, other businesses depended on him. Nadia had worked for such men in New York City. They were consumed with their work. In Nadia’s experience, such men had to maintain an exhilarating pace for fear of coming to rest and realizing the magnitude of their unhappiness in their lives.
Simmy finished his call and hung up.
“I’m not convinced it’s Eva’s body in the casket,” Nadia said.
Simmy appeared distracted. “Pardon? Oh. Yes. I see. Would you like to spend the night so you can talk to the recently departed and ask her yourself?”
“Very funny. Dr. Arkady and Eva’s uncle were relevant in the Soviet era. A scientist and a hockey star. If they weren’t powerful, they were at least well-connected. Maybe they maintained their connections. Maybe one of them knew someone that could have provided him with a similar-looking corpse. Or sold him one. Maybe they were able to stage a burial with an actual body, someone who died of an accident or natural causes, perhaps another orphan or a homeless girl. It wouldn’t be too hard to break a fibula, either, to make the illusion even more convincing.”