“Good,” said Sasha, closing the door and turning to the others.
“Lokanski prepared a new supply.”
“We are in a hurry,” Boris said impatiently.
“I take care of my dogs,” Sasha said indignantly.
“Get a cage,” said Illya. “Let’s go.”
Sasha moved to the next padlocked storage room and once again took out the keys he had been given. Elena controlled her near panic. If a transport cage were not inside, Sasha would be very hard pressed to come up with an explanation for why he did not know where things were in his own kennel. Relying on his drunken for-getfulness would not work with these men. Elena tried to think of what she could do, but she was still certain that her intervention would not be appreciated by the two men. They had pointedly ignored her all evening, and she had accepted their rudeness with gratitude. She did not have to speak any more than the two young mannequins who were waiting in the car parked on the Arbat.
Sasha opened the door of the second storage room, stepped in, and reached up for the string that turned on the light. Stacked on the far wall were six metal-mesh cages with handles on top. Hanging almost carelessly on the wall on hooks were a wide variety of ropes, muzzles, things she could not identify and was certain Sasha could not either. One other item hung on the wall, one Elena and Sasha both recognized, an electric prod.
Sasha, with some difficulty which required him to ask Boris and Illya to help, got down a top cage and said, “Gentlemen, we are late.”
Sasha, she could see, had glanced at the wall of dog-control items, possibly considering if he should take one, for he had no idea of how to get the pit bull into the cage. He rejected the idea and, carrying the cage awkwardly, had moved past a curious rottweiler, a pair of large mongrels, a German shepherd, and a sleeping St. Bernard, toward the pit bull. Elena was relieved that there was only one pit bull in the garage.
Moving to the front of the cage of the pit bull, who stood looking into the face of the man, Sasha lifted the door which covered the entire front of the transport cage. He pushed the open cage in front of Tchaikovsky’s cage, which he opened, lifting the sliding door slowly.
Now, the difficult part: getting the pit bull to go into the transport cage. The dog did not move. Sasha was supposed to be the expert. He had to get the animal in the transport cage and do it quickly without destroying his cover as Dmitri Kolk.
“You need help, Dmitri?”
Elena could tell from the look on his face that for a moment he did not remember that he was Dmitri. Then he recovered and said,
“No, I have my own methods for doing things. If I need anything, it is another small drink.”
Sasha’s improvised method was to squat behind the transport cage and talk to the dog the way Elena had seen him talk to his baby son. Elena thought quickly about finding a weapon if they were unmasked. She decided that the best, though riskiest, thing to do would be to kick the transport cage out of the way and let Tchaikovsky free to attack, hoping he would go for Illya and Boris.
But miraculously the pit bull quick-stepped into the smaller cage and Sasha dropped the door, trying not to show his relief.
Illya had to help carry the animal to the car. There were metal grips on each of the top corners of the cage, which made the task easier. Tchaikovsky stood all the way to the car, maintaining his balance and dignity.
The limousine was large, but with six people and a dog there was not a great deal of room. They placed the cage next to the driver, who looked straight ahead and made no comment or response. The two beautiful young women ignored the animal and Elena, and talked softly to each other as they rode. Boris and Illya pressed Sasha for information about his operation. Since he had no information and was obviously thinking about the coming battle, Sasha did not want to make up any more tales.
The rest of the night had been a nightmare to Elena.
The small arena in a converted warehouse in Pushkino north of the Outer Ring Circle was ringed by wooden benches. The first row had blue-cushioned seats with armrests, certainly the place where the big bettors sat. All the seats were set up high so the spectators could look down at the dirt-covered ring.
When Sasha, Elena, and the others arrived, a badly mauled and dying black-and-white mongrel was being carried off by two men.
The dog was on a canvas litter, his mouth muzzled to keep him from one last angry attack at the men who carried him out.
Sasha nodded and with Illya’s help moved the cage to the side of the fighting ring next to a blue stick standing over the back of the circle.
“You start here, at the blue side,” said Boris.
The crowd was loud, angry, crying out, “Let’s go. We haven’t got all night.”
In fact, Elena thought, they probably did have all night and more.
The air was thick with smoke. Elena tried not to cough. There had been cushioned seats reserved for the six arrivals. The seats were comfortable. The smoke was unbearable.
“What if one of the dogs jumps over the wall and gets into the crowd?” Elena asked the young woman at her side. “The wall is low.”
“Shooter,” the young woman said, pointing at a man who stood in the entranceway, arms folded. He wore jeans, a white T-shirt, and a denim jacket that did nothing to hide the gun he wore under it.
Tchaikovsky’s opponent was huge, a mastiff with a long, ugly white scar along its right side. The mastiff seethed with anticipation but was held back by his trainer. Tchaikovsky, on the other hand, simply stood inside his cage, looking at his opponent.
“Bets down, side bets require ten percent for the house. We don’t care if you give odds. With rare exceptions, house bets are even money. We are here to watch an ancient and honorable sport,” said the sweating announcer who wore an incongruous green tuxedo and used a handheld microphone. “Blue is Tchaikovsky, the pit bull whose record, if any, cannot be verified. Red is English, who many of you have seen here before. Eight victories, all kills.”
It took five minutes of loud wrangling, taking bets, and having a quintet of well-built men going up and down the aisles taking the house percentage and making eye contact with the three shills in the audience whose job was to spot bettors who tried to bypass the house.
“Now,” said the announcer, backing up to the entrance near the shooter to be out of the way of animals and out of the sightline of the nearly rabid audience. “Release our gladiators.”
The crowd went silent. The mastiff charged and for a moment it looked as if the pit bull would not even make it out of the cage.
The crowd laughed at the impassive dog still standing in the cage.
The laughter stopped when Tchaikovsky suddenly dashed through the cage door and leapt at the mastiff, which raced toward him. The mastiff snapped his jaws and missed the smaller animal.
Tchaikovsky did not miss. He dug his teeth into English’s neck just below the ear.
The big dog tried to shake the pit bull off but couldn’t. English twirled in pain. The pit bull bit even deeper. The mastiff tried rolling on the ground. Tchaikovsky held fast. Blood was coming now, spurts of blood all over the ring and the face of the smaller dog.
The crowd went wild. The mastiff made sounds of pain which drove the crowd to even further madness. The big dog, with the pit bull appended, sank down on his belly. Tchaikovsky ripped the flesh in his mouth and stood back to look at his dying opponent.
The pit bull dropped the piece of flesh and fur on the dirt floor and trotted back to his cage, ignoring the shouts and applause of the crowd.
By that time, Elena was ill, ill from the smoke, ill from repul-sion, and most of all, ill from the blood-and-battle-hungry crowd.