"Did they?"

"Ustinova was in Facebook. She had a million 'friends' but Oksana Petrovna was not one of them. These women lived in Moscow but in two different worlds."

"Did they club?"

"Yes. A pretty girl can always get in a club. Models like Ustinova are regulars at the Nijinsky and at a dozen other clubs. Now, if Petrovna had been a Nijinsky dancer like Vera, there might be a tidy little connection, only she wasn't. So that's that."

"Did she try?"

"What do you mean?"

"Did Petrovna audition to be a dancer at the Club Nijinsky?"

"Where are you going with this?"

"Someone said yes or no. There's always a gatekeeper."

"That's it?" Victor took on the gravity of a physician delivering a grim prognosis. "You're fucked."

"Maybe you'd like to elaborate on that."

"You can't go on pretending that you're an investigator."

"I've been doing it for years."

"Did they leave your gun?"

"Yes."

"You're being set up."

"Possibly."

"You are so fucked. You have no authority and no protection, just enemies. What are you looking for? Blood on the sidewalk and a round of applause?"

Arkady didn't know, although he thought a little clarity might do. "The door is open," Arkady heard, and ventured in.

Wrapped in a silk robe, Madame Isa Spiridona, choreographer of the Club Nijinsky, reclined on a chaise longue with one arm free to reach her opium and brandy. Her apartment overlooked the Moscow River but it could have overlooked the Seine, with excellent copies of French antiques in tulipwood veneer and velvet-covered chairs. A dash of silk flowers. Inscribed photos of Colette, Coco and Marlene on a table. Photos of a young Spiridona dancing with Rudy and Baryshnikov on a grand piano. Photos covering the walls as if she were a person with no faith in her memory.

"Please forgive me if I don't rise. They say that dancers live a short time en pointe and a long time in pain. It was a brutal system, but it worked, didn't it? We had beauty and dancers. I suppose that's why you're here. To ask about Vera?"

"Yes."

"More questions about the Club Nijinsky."

"One more." He sat because one question always led to another. Stand and you're halfway out the door. "Who runs the auditions for the Nijinsky dancers?"

"I do. I am the choreographer."

"And there are many talented dancers who would like to be Nijinsky dancers?"

"Yes."

"And want nothing more than to audition for you?"

"Yes."

"Then why settle for a not very good dancer like Vera?"

"She had other qualities."

"Such as?"

"She was a charming individual. It came through in her dancing. It's something you can't teach."

"Do you mind if I turn up the lights?" He was at the switch before she could object, then returned and placed a snapshot before Spiridona.

"Do you remember Inna Ustinova? She was a yoga instructor. She wanted to be a Nijinsky dancer."

"Of course I remember her. She was too old. She would hang around the club, looking for a shoulder to cry on."

"Did she find any?"

"No. People here are professionals. I told her to go back to her yoga mats. I felt terrible when she was killed. Found by a dog. How horrible, how awful that must have been."

Arkady wasn't listening. What he had not noticed when the lights were low was a framed, dramatically dark poster of a young dancer with golden hair, the same boy that Arkady had seen drained of blood on a table in the morgue. On a salver was a stack of programs for different ballets.

She followed his eye. "My son, Roman."

"He dances too?"

"He did until he injured himself. Last week Roman called to say that he and his friend Sergei were going on a trip. Yesterday, Sergei called to say that Roman had gone on alone."

This was more than Arkady had bargained for. He had not come as a messenger to tell this woman that her son was dead. Dead and burned under another name, yet.

"Where to?"

"I don't know. I try not to get in Roman's way. He suffers from depression but the doctors say I should let him hit bottom. What does that mean, 'hit bottom'?"

Roman Spiridon had certainly done that. Hit bottom and continued to the center of the earth. Not even as himself, but under another man's name.

Arkady remembered Madame Borodina's voice, as dry as kindling.

"Burn him."

Although the church condemned cremation, the state provided the option. Rolled him into a furnace with flames hot enough to melt gold, pulverized his ashes and bones and delivered them in a screw-top canister to the hands of Borodina. Where to then? There was a choice of parks-Siloviki, Gorky or Ismailova-where ashes could be dumped. Or lobbed into a trash bin or poured like flour into the river.

"Sergei who?"

"Borodin."

"Sergei Borodin called instead of your son? To reassure you, but not tell you where they were going?"

"Sergei said he had to come back to pick up his book."

"What book would that be?"

"There on the desk. I'm waiting for him to pick it up."

On a Louis XIV desk was a well-worn paperback entitled The Diary of Vaslav Nijinsky, which sounded pretty innocent to Arkady. He flipped through the pages to see whether anything fell out.

"Do you mind if I borrow this?"

"Sergei is coming for it."

"Then he can come to me."

She didn't have the willpower to refuse him. Her attention gravitated to the opium layout, a lacquered tray inlaid with silver dragons and mother-of-pearl. A resinous "pill" nested in the bowl of a slender ivory pipe.

"Sometimes God's gifts were given to the wrong person."

"If Borodin is such a great dancer, why is he swinging on a wire at the Club Nijinsky instead of dancing with the Bolshoi?"

Spiridona asked, "How do I put this? Dancing is an intimate affair. The women don't like the way Sergei handled them."

"Too soft? Too hard?"

"Like chickens in a butcher shop."

23

Maya imagined herself on a golden escalator that reached up to the clouds. Her baby was just a few steps ahead. For some reason Maya could not close the distance or see what awaited them but she was sure it would be better than what they left behind.

"How old are you, my dear? In Pakistan, you would already be married and have a baby on your hip. Your breasts are full. That is exciting to a man, but leave the nursing and mess to someone else. No, let me undress you. It is my pleasure. I will fold everything neatly. My God, you are more beautiful every moment. Our mutual friend Yegor was not overstating the case. Do you like this place? It's an office of another friend, very important man. Pakistani, but the sofa is very comfortable, don't you think? Nice paintings if you could see them. Everything totally modern. Champagne on ice. Minibar. Would you like a drink? Up to you. Since it's Sunday we have all night and the entire building. The shaved head is curiously erotic, as if you had revealed everything to me. As you can see, I cannot hide the fact that I am not in the best of shape. When I came here as a student thirty years ago, I was thin as a reed. This is what Russian cooking does. My wife, bless her, is a wretched cook. I call her my wife although we're not really married. I don't know what Russians have against spices. Also I don't exercise nearly enough. A man my size should exercise. It's incumbent on him or he'll go to fat as I have. But I have to spend all day and night in the kiosk or my workers will rob me blind. Look at this. I haven't been this hard in ten years. Do you mind being kissed? I'll turn the lights down and you can pretend that you are having sex with the handsomest man in the world. If you touch me I'll explode. Really, really. Oh no, oh no, oh no. See? That comes from being deprived. But I've more to spare. I will run to the men's room and be immediately back. Give me one minute. It will be even better. Less urgent."