Vladimir and two of his boys were bent over the now open case, rummaging through the contents, apparently deciding which tool should lead off.
Oh, Christ. Oh, no. The bastards had bought out the entire torture store. Three or four razor-sharp saws of various sizes and types, wicked things, so sharp and shiny. A small blowtorch. An iron, just like the one Vladimir used to scorch the hammer and sickle on Konevitch. A slew of gleaming surgical instruments employable for everything from eyeball gouging to nut-crunching. Golitsin could put a name and use to every instrument: a vivid picture of their exact use.
How many nights had he spent watching with sick fascination as the boys in the basement at Dzerzhinsky Square found all sorts of inspired uses for these things? Every instrument in that case, he knew them all like a mechanic knows his shop tools.
He squeezed his eyes shut and bit his lip, but it just slipped out. A moan of fear just clawed its way up his throat, into his mouth, and it popped right through his lips.
Five sets of eyes instantly snapped in his direction.
Vladimir smiled. "Ah, Sergei, you're back." With a befuddled expression, he asked, sounding mildly frustrated, "Listen, I can't seem to make up my mind. How would you like us to start?"
"You keep those damned things away from me."
"Well, you see, we're a little past that point. Come on, Sergei, I'm trying to be generous here." He laughed and the others joined him. "So, what will it be?"
"I swear I don't have any more of the money."
"None?"
"It's gone."
"All of it? Two hundred and fifty million?" Vladimir asked, dripping skepticism.
"Yes, it's spent, every penny. I swear it." Golitsin wasn't about to hand over his fortune to Nicky, no matter what. They could cut and slice and dice him however they wanted-not a red cent.
Vladimir bent over, studied the contents inside the case for a moment, then made up his mind and picked up a saw. "Well, that's too bad," he muttered, shaking his head.
"Please, you have to believe me. I was stupid and greedy. I wasted it all on idiotic things. It's all gone."
Vladimir was now ten feet away. With a finger, he was testing the sharpness of the blade as he moved closer. Two of the boys were now hovering directly behind Golitsin. They pinned his arms and squeezed his neck. He squealed but their grips only tightened.
"Where to start, where to start, that's the big issue now," Vladimir said. The piercing, hard, dark eyes began searching Golitsin's body. "Why not toes?" he asked very reasonably. "Start at the bottom, start with the little things, and slowly work our way up."
He bent down and pulled off Golitsin's shoes, then yanked off his socks. The plump white toes were wiggling, trying to curl under his feet. Vladimir carefully selected the big toe on the right foot. Using two strong fingers, he clamped the toe, poised the saw, then looked up. "I should warn you that I get a little carried away. Once I take one, I generally get all ten. You can answer everything, and I just can't stop," he warned, looking slightly remorseful. "It's, oh, I don't know, something wrong inside my head."
"Okay, okay, I have the money. Don't… oh, please, don't touch that toe."
Vladimir gave the toe a little pinch. Golitsin nearly bucked out of the chair. "Switzerland. A Swiss bank," he muttered in a fast rush.
"You wouldn't be lying, would you? I hate liars."
"No, no, I swear. Switzerland."
"What bank?"
A momentary hesitation and Vladimir suddenly had the saw pressed firmly on the flesh, right at the base of the big toe. "Lucerne National. All of it. Every penny."
"How much?"
"Two hundred."
The saw bit ever so lightly into his flesh.
"All right, all right… 220."
"You blew thirty million already?" Vladimir looked like he was ready to just whack the toe off. Nothing to do with disbelief, just anger.
"I'm… I'm sorry."
"I'm sure you are, Sergei. Now the hard questions."
Golitsin couldn't take his eyes off the saw.
"Are you ready, or should I just cut now?"
"No, please no. Ask anything."
"The account and security code numbers. Concentrate. What are they?"
"I… I don't have them in my head. My office. We have to go to my office."
Whack, whack, whack.
"Oh, God, all right." And like that, a fast rush of numbers spilled out of his lips.
As he spoke, another man, this one hiding in a back room, punched the numbers into a laptop computer, and they shot like lightning bolts through the Internet, straight to a large mainframe in Zurich. It took two minutes before the money-225 million and change, it turned out-was shunted into a new account, in a different Swiss bank, coincidentally only two blocks down from Lucerne National.
The man with the computer stuck his large ponytailed head out of the doorway. He gave Vladimir a thumbs-up.
"What will you do with me?" Golitsin asked.
"Why would I do anything with you?"
"You mean you're not going to kill me?"
"You know what? My instructions aren't real clear on that point." Vladimir stroked his chin and played at indecision for a moment. "You're broke now. A fat has-been loser with nothing to fall back on but a tiny pension and the tragic memory that once you were rich. Should I worry about you?"
"No, absolutely not. Definitely, no. You're right, you've ruined my life. I'm nothing, a sorry loser. I don't even know who you are," he lied.
"Well, I'm not so sure." The man dug a hand deep into his coat pocket. He appeared to be fishing around for something. Perhaps a gun or a knife. "Maybe, just to be on the safe side, maybe I should-"
"No, please," Golitsin pleaded, and words kept spilling out his lips. "I'll leave Russia. I promise, I'll be on the next train. I'll disappear and you'll never hear from me again. Please let me live."
The man stared at him with an impenetrable expression for a moment, then finally he shrugged his thick shoulders. "I guess it saves the trouble of what to do with your big, fat corpse."
Golitsin nearly groaned with relief. "Yes, exactly. I don't want to be a burden to you."
"Around nine in the morning the workers in the factory across the street come to work. Scream loud and hard, Sergei. Who knows, maybe they'll come and save you."
The tools were packed back inside the case, and within five minutes Vladimir and his boys had turned off the lights and scattered into the night.
After half an hour, Golitsin tried his hardest to close his eyes and float away into sleep. He so badly wanted to sleep. The fear and terror left him drained and exhausted, but he couldn't shut his eyes. The anger and resentment kept bubbling up. By 9:30 the next morning, he would make Nicky pay dearly for every humiliating moment, and for every dollar the bastard stole. He wasn't sure just how yet. It would be slow and horrible, though. And very, very painful; he promised himself this.
He leaned back on the chair and dreamed of Nicky's death. The rumor started early that evening. Moscow's underworld loved rumors almost as much as gossip, the juicier the better, and this one took off like a rabbit with its ass on fire. By midnight it was bouncing through brothels, thug hangouts, drug dens, was being murmured by pickpockets on the street, and becoming a consuming point of interest in the bars frequented by the city's syndicate chiefs, who at that hour were just starting their day.