"I know. I'm sorry about that."
"Acch," he said, as though disgusted by my apology. "But I thought that you would call today."
That surprised me. "Why?"
"Because, my young nephew, we need to talk."
"About what?"
"About why I never talk about anything over the phone."
Sosh's business was, if not illegal, on the shadier side of the street.
"I'm at my place in the city." Sosh had an expansive penthouse on 36th Street in Manhattan. "When can you be here?"
"Half an hour if there's no traffic," I said.
"Splendid. I will see you then."
"Uncle Sosh?"
He waited. I looked at the photograph of my father on the passenger seat.
"Can you give me an idea what it's about?"
"It's about your past, Pavel," he said through that thick accent, using my Russian name. "It's about what should stay in your past."
"What the hell does that mean?"
"We'll talk," he said again. And then he hung up.
There was no traffic, so the ride to Uncle Sosh's was closer to twenty-five minutes. The doorman wore one of those ridiculous uniforms with rope tassels. The look, interestingly enough with Sosh living here, re minded me of something Brezhnev would have worn for the May Day parade. The doorman knew my face and had been told that I was arriving. If the doorman isn't told in advance, he doesn't ring up. You just don't get in.
Sosh's old friend Alexei stood at the elevator door. Alexei Kokorov had worked security for Sosh, had for as long as I could remember. He was probably in his late sixties, a few years younger than Sosh, and as ugly a man as you'd ever see. His nose was bulbous and red, his face filled with spider veins from, I assumed, too much drink. His jacket and pants didn't fit right, but his build was not the kind made for haute couture.
Alexei didn't seem happy to see me, but he didn't look like lots of laughs in general. He held the elevator door open for me. I stepped in without saying a word. He gave me a curt nod and let the door close. I was alone.
The elevator opened into the penthouse.
Uncle Sosh stood a few feet from the door. The room was huge. The furniture was cubist. The picture window showed off an incredible view, but the walls had this thick wallpaper, tapestry-like, in a color that probably had some fancy name like "Merlot" but looked to me like blood.
Sosh's face lit up when he saw me. He spread his hands wide. One of my most vivid childhood memories was the size of those hands. They were still huge. He had grayed over the years, but even now, when I calculated that he was probably in his early seventies, you still felt the size and power and something approaching awe.
I stopped outside the elevator.
"What," he said to me, "you too old for a hug now?"
We both stepped toward each other. The embrace was, per his Russian background, a true bear hug. Strength emanated from him. His forearms were still thick coils. He pulled me close, and I felt as though he could simply tighten his grip and snap my spine.
After a few seconds, Sosh grabbed my arms near the biceps and held me at arm's length so he could take a good look. "Your father," he said, his voice thick with more than accent this time. "You look just like your father."
Sosh had arrived from the Soviet Union not long after we did. He worked for In Tourist, the Soviet tour company, in their Manhattan office. His job was to help facilitate American tourists who wished to visit Moscow and what was then called Leningrad.
That was a long time ago. Since the fall of the Soviet government, he dabbled in that murky enterprise people labeled "import-export." I never knew what that meant exactly, but it had paid for this penthouse.
Sosh looked at me another moment or two. He wore a white shirt buttoned low enough to see the V-neck undershirt. A huge tuft of gray chest hair jutted out. I waited. This would not take long. Uncle Sosh was not one for casual talk.
As if reading my mind, Sosh looked me hard in the eye and said, "I have been getting calls." "From?" "Old friends." I waited. "From the old country," he said. "I'm not sure I follow." "People have been asking questions." "Sosh? "Yes?"
"On the phone you were worried about being overheard. Are you worried about that here?" "No. Here it is completely safe. I have the room swept weekly." "Great, then how about stopping with the cryptic and telling me what you're talking about?" He smiled. He liked that. "There are people. Americans. They are in Moscow and throwing money around and asking questions." I nodded to myself. "Questions about what?" "About your father." "What kind of questions?" "You remember the old rumors?"
"You're kidding me." But he wasn’t. And in a weird way, it made sense. The First Skeleton. I should have guessed. I remembered the rumors, of course. They had nearly destroyed my family.
My sister and I were born in what was then called the Soviet Union during what was then called the Cold War. My father had been a medical doctor but lost his license on charges of incompetence trumped up because he was Jewish. That was how it was in those days.
At the same time, a reform synagogue here in the United States- Skokie, Illinois, to be more specific, was working hard on behalf of Soviet Jewry. During the midseventies, Soviet Jewry was something of a cause celebre in American temples getting Jews out of the Soviet Union.
We got lucky. They got us out.
For a long time we were heralded in our new land as heroes. My father spoke passionately at Friday night services about the plight of the Soviet Jew. Kids wore buttons in support. Money was donated. But about a year into our stay, my father and the head rabbi had a falling out, and suddenly there were whispers that my father had gotten out of the Soviet Union because he was actually KGB, that he wasn't even Jewish, that it was all a ruse. The charges were pathetic and contradictory and false and now, well, more than twenty-five years old.
I shook my head. "So they're trying to prove that my father was KGB?"
"Yes."
Frigid' Jenrette. I got it, I guessed. I was something of a public figure now. The charges, even if ultimately proven false, would be damaging. I should know. Twenty-five years ago, my family had lost pretty much everything due to those accusations. We left Skokie, moved east to Newark. Our family was never the same.
I looked up. "On the phone you said you'd thought I'd call."
"If you hadn't, I would have called you today." lo warn me?
"Yes."
"So," I said, "they must have something."
The big man did not reply. I watched his face. And it was as if my entire world, everything I grew up believing, slowly shifted.
"Was he KGB, Sosh?" I asked.
"It was a long time ago," Sosh said.
"Does that mean yes?"
Sosh smiled slowly. "You don't understand how it was."
"And again I say: Does that mean yes? "No, Pavel. But your father… maybe he was supposed to be."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Do you know how I came to this country?"
"You worked for a travel company."
"It was the Soviet Union, Pavel. There were no companies. In Tourist was run by the government. Everything was run by the government. Do you understand?" 1 guess.
"So when the Soviet government had a chance to send someone to live in New York City, do you think they sent the man who was most competent in booking vacations? Or do you think they sent someone who might help them in other ways?"
I thought about the size of his hands. I thought about his strength. "So you were KGB?"
"I was a colonel in the military. We didn't call it KGB. But yes, I guess you would call me"-he made quote marks with his fingers-" a spy' I would meet with American officials. I would try to bribe them. People always think we learn important things-things that can change the balance of power. That's such nonsense. We learned nothing relevant. Not ever. And the American spies? They never learned anything about us either. We passed nonsense from side to side. It was a silly game."
"And my father?"
"The Soviet government let him out. Your Jewish friends think that they applied enough pressure. But please. Did a bunch of Jews in a synagogue really think they could pressure a government that answered to no one? Its almost funny when you think about it." you’re saying…?