“Follow me please.”
A huge jet roared overhead as they made their way across the parking lot to a big blue sedan; American, of course. Nicholas held open the right rear door, but Andreas hesitated.
“I would prefer to ride in front.”
The Russian scowled. The request clearly offended his sense of professionalism, but he closed the rear door firmly and opened the passenger side. Andreas removed his gray fedora and slid carefully into the deep, comfortable leather seat. Queens always depressed him. The thick tangle of highways, warehouses, and tenements; cars rotting into the broken pavement. Only the season improved the ride, with the dirty slush or poisonous smog of previous visits replaced by clean air and banks of yellow forsythia, pressing through chain-link fences up and down the blocks of brick row houses.
“You live around here?” Andreas asked.
“Further out. Little Odessa, they call it.”
“You like this country?”
Nicholas shrugged. “Better than where I come from.”
“How long have you been here?”
“Two years.”
“You learned English before you came?”
“A little. Mostly here.”
“You speak Greek?”
“Not so good.” He swung onto Astoria Boulevard. “Not really. No.”
“Mr. Dragoumis likes it better if you don’t speak Greek, yes?”
Nicholas conceded a brief smile.
They turned onto Twenty-first Street, then a quick left and the car pulled up before a white clapboard house. The place was unremarkable, but for the profusion of rosebushes in the narrow strip of soil in front. The house appeared small, though in fact it ran quite deeply back from the street. A warehouse bracketed the building on one side, a semi-famous restaurant on the other. Fotis owned both. Andreas had been here before. He examined the roses, not even in bud yet, then followed Nicholas up the concrete steps into the house. A barrel-chested man came out of the parlor and met them in the narrow hall, crowding Andreas against the wall. The younger men exchanged a few words in their native tongue, then the new man led Andreas down the dim corridor. Black beard, black eyes, full of suppressed violence. There would be no pleasant conversation with this one. A soft knock at the door, a word, and they were in the study, Fotis’ inner sanctum. The man himself, gray as a ghost and sporting a huge white mustache, stood to greet them, covering the plush oriental carpet in great strides. The effort cost him, Andreas could see at once.
“My friend,” Fotis said with real warmth, “my old, dear friend.” They squeezed hands, rights over lefts, shaking their intertwined fists like happy children, like palsied old men. Andreas was always surprised by the affection he received from his old boss, ally, adversary. There was dampness in the corner of Fotis’ eyes, and he grinned a huge smile of expensive false teeth, looking his comrade up and down. Then his face turned stern, and he swiveled a fierce gaze on the young Russian. “You donkey, you couldn’t take his coat?”
Blackbeard murmured an apology and helped Andreas out of the heavy gray fabric. Fotis appraised the black suit and white shirt buttoned to the collar, and laughed, a short, barking exhalation.
“You look like a priest.”
“Your man seemed to think I was one.”
“Well, no wonder, dressed like that. Sit, sit. Coffee? Cognac?”
“Just water.”
Without instruction, Blackbeard slipped out the rear door of the study. Fotis clasped his hands before him and leaned back in the creaking chair, a satisfied look on his face. Andreas took him in properly now. An elaborate maroon smoking jacket, stitched with abstract designs, hiding his too-lean frame. Slippers on his long feet, a box of Turkish cigarettes on the table by his elbow. Behind him, a stack of large, framed canvases leaned face-away against the wall. In fact, there appeared to be more paintings hanging about the room than Andreas had remembered previously, and despite the poor light and his imperfect knowledge of art, he guessed that some were quite valuable. A winter landscape. A small, very old-looking religious work, the Annunciation or some such. Gold leaf from what could only be an Orthodox icon threw reflected light from a dark corner. His old friend had many identities, many roles he liked to play. Fotis the spy, Fotis the exiled politician, Fotis the respectable businessman. Now it appeared to be Fotis the collector.
“How was your flight?” Dragoumis asked, switching from English to their native tongue.
Andreas shrugged. “I’m here.”
“It’s hard on old men, and you are younger than me. Even once a year I find too much now. I may not see Greece this spring.”
“Oh, I think you will go.”
Blackbeard returned with a glass of tepid water, which was how Andreas preferred it.
“That is all, Anton,” said Fotis, and the young Russian left the room again.
“How is the restaurant?” Andreas asked.
“The restaurant,” the other groaned. “Quite successful. We have our loyal customers, you know, from the neighborhood, and now we are getting young people from Manhattan. Apparently, we have been written up somewhere as the best Greek food in Astoria.”
“Congratulations.”
Fotis waved a hand. “What the hell do those people know about food? Anyway, I am not involved much with the restaurant these days.”
“No?”
“I have an excellent manager, who doesn’t even steal. And I have other concerns.”
It was an invitation, but Andreas was not interested. He knew about his friend’s various activities, and if there were some new ones, it was no matter. Ambition did not impress him, nor even audacity in the pursuit of it. There was a sort of sad desperation in Fotis’ extralegal dealings-the desperation of a dying man trying to stave off fate with accomplishment.
“My son is ill,” Andreas said.
Fotis looked at him hard, sympathy vying with annoyance at the change in subject.
“I know.”
Of course he knew. Matthew, Andreas’ grandson, was also Fotis’ godson. Irini, Matthew’s mother, was Fotis’ niece. The two old men were hopelessly entangled. There was no chance of escaping each other.
“Matthew tells me that it’s bad,” Andreas went on, needing to speak. “Alekos is not responding to the treatment.”
“Maybe he needs better doctors.”
“They are supposed to be the best at that place. Mount Sinai.”
“There are better ones in Boston. But then, science can only do so much.”
“We do not have such illnesses in my family.”
“You must have faith.”
Was it a taunt? Spoken with such gentleness, it was more likely an old man’s forgetfulness.
“I do not think I am likely to acquire it so late in life.”
Fotis stared at him, unreadable, the ever-present jade worry beads clacking in his hand.
“My poor Andreou.”
They sat in silence for a minute or two, comfortable with it. Andreas sipped his water and finally decided to indulge the other man.
“Some of these paintings are new.”
Fotis’ eyes lit up. “I have become more involved in collecting the last few years,” he said eagerly. “I think it is my true calling.”
“Ah.”
“Never mind that, I know what you’re thinking. Only a fool would collect art for money. Too unstable. I enjoy it. I enjoy pursuing my own peculiar tastes, and I enjoy being surrounded by beautiful things.”
“This landscape?”
Fotis shifted to look. “Dutch. A student of Bruegel, I’m told. Beautiful, yes?”
“Very beautiful. And I see you have an icon.”
“A few of them. Not very old, or valuable. They have been greatly overproduced in recent centuries. This one is Russian.”
“You would like to collect some authentic Byzantine examples, no doubt.”