Pacheco said, “She plays the harp and she strips. This is a talented young lady.”

“If not the Virgin, who?” Arkady asked. “Anyone in mind?”

“People see what they want to see,” Wiley said. The smaller dancer peeked at Wiley from between her legs. She had short dark hair and a beauty mark. Her name was Julia; she was twenty-three, spiritually advanced, looking for a man with his feet on the ground. Arkady knew because he had seen her photograph and description in the Cupid album of marriageable women.

“Renko can’t do anything,” Urman reassured Pacheco. “He’s hiding from the prosecutor here and disowned by the prosecutor in Moscow. Besides, he’s a dead man.”

“You mean, he will soon be a dead man?”

“No, I mean he’s dead now. He got shot in the head. If that’s not dead, what is?”

“I’ve noticed that Isakov never actually says Stalin’s name,” Arkady said.

“Why should he?” Wiley said. “Right now all anyone knows about Nikolai Isakov is that he’s a good-looking war hero. Everything stays vague and generally patriotic. Once he actually uses Stalin’s name, Stalin is an issue, which has some negatives. Our job is to connect Isakov and Stalin without saying so out loud.”

“How do you do that?”

“Visuals.”

“At the new dig? As I understand it, a mass grave of Russian soldiers has been discovered. That’s a strong visual, isn’t it? Any chance that a patriot named Isakov will be there, shovel in hand, when the television cameras arrive?”

Pacheco said, “The son of a bitch doesn’t sound that dead to me.”

Aretha Franklin sang, “R-E-S-…”

Tanya slid off the runway, ignored her ringside regulars and climbed onto Arkady’s lap, where she breathed heavily and stamped him with sweat and powder. She kissed him as if they were lovers reunited and when he tried to ease her off she clung to his neck.

“Where is this hole I hear about? Is it the size of a bottle cap?”

She pressed herself against his face while she felt his scalp. All that remained of his operation were drain scars, but she found them. If Arkady had humiliated her, she would humiliate him. On stage Julia spun at half speed.

Pacheco reached across the table and gathered Tanya’s golden hair in his hand. “Darling, if money is your object, you are humping the wrong man. My friend here is as poor as a church mouse, whereas I am slipping a hundred-dollar bill in your G-string. Am I getting your attention?”

“I told you this was a bad idea,” Wiley said.

Tanya held on.

Pacheco said, “I like you and I am a great admirer of the harp, but you have to let go of my friend’s head.”

Tanya turned enough to say, “Make it two hundred.”

“Damn, this is a fine woman. Two hundred it is.”

Pacheco gave Tanya a chivalrous boost back onto the runway. Patrons applauded her return.

“Would you like some sushi?” Urman said.

“No.” Wiley threw money on the table. “Let’s go, let’s go, let’s go.”

Outside, the Americans piled into a black Pathfinder and waited while Urman followed Arkady to the other end of the parking lot. Arkady had come in the Zhiguli because he had intended to be seen.

Pacheco hit the horn.

“I would love to kill that cowboy,” Urman said. “Threatening to drag Tanya by the hair? What kind of behavior is that? I appreciate the fact that you restrained yourself.”

“No problem.”

“Look, do us all a favor. Leave Tver. Go away and we can forget our paths ever crossed. Or did she call already?”

“Who?”

“Eva. She was going to tell you she was coming back.”

“But she isn’t, really?”

“No, I’m afraid not.”

“But she is going to call?”

“You think I’m just trying to fuck up your mind?” Urman had a soft laugh. “Frankly, I wish you would take her with you. I’m sick of the radioactive bitch.”

Arkady was taking a long route to the apartment, looking for any car following him, when he saw Isakov on Sovietskaya Street. It was two a.m., the hour between sweet dreams and black despair, a time to pace the floor, not the sidewalk. Arkady went around the block, turned off his headlamps and coasted to the corner.

A light snow melted on the ground. Isakov could have continued down Sovietskaya and taken shelter in the portico of the Drama Theater, instead he walked back and forth along a wrought iron fence. He wore a poncho with the hood back and by the dampness of his hair he had been outside for some time. Arkady thought Isakov might be waiting for someone, but he showed no signs of looking up and down the street.

The buildings behind the fence were obscured by trees, but they seemed to be typical pre-revolutionary mansion turned municipal office. Walls maybe yellow, white trim. The gate had a guard post, but the night guard had been replaced by closed circuit surveillance cameras. Nothing special, except that it was the same gate that Sofia Andreyeva had spit at.

The cell phone rang. Arkady snatched it up. Across the street, in his own world, Isakov didn’t appear to hear.

On the phone Eva said, “I want to see you.”

He had imagined there would be conversation, explanation, expressions of regret.

Instead, when she came through the door of the apartment, he removed her jacket and pressed her against the wall and found the hook of her skirt, a voluminous Gypsy affair, while she unbuckled his belt. In a moment he was in her, past the cool skin to the heat within. Eva’s eyes were huge, as if she were in a car that was rolling over and over in slow motion.

“Take off your blouse.”

Just the way she lifted the blouse over her head was graceful, Arkady thought. Her Chernobyl scars melted and every line of her was perfect. He pulled her to the floor. She managed to pull out the lamp plug and in the dark she hung onto the cord as if it were a lifeline. The back of her head hit the floor with every thrust, and when his anger was spent she kept him inside until he was hard again, so that the second time he could be gentle.

22

Arkady said, “I think Napoleon slept here. This bed is about his size.”

“It’s perfect,” said Eva. “I slept like a cat.”

He was always struck by her smoothness. In comparison, he was wood, bark and all.

“How is your head?” she asked.

“Improved.”

“But you haven’t seen Stalin?”

“No.”

“Or his ghost?”

“No.”

“You don’t believe in ghosts.”

“Not flying through the air, but waiting.”

“Waiting for what?” Eva asked.

“I don’t know. Maybe political consultants.” He reached to the floor and refilled two glasses of the professor’s Bordeaux. “Today is the last day of the campaign. Is Isakov confident?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact, but I don’t want to talk about him. This is good wine.”

“French. Everything here is French. In fact, even our situation is extraordinarily French. Until someone dies, then it’s Russian. Pushkin had over a hundred lovers and then died in a duel defending his wife’s honor. She was a flirt. Is that irony or justice?”

Eva said, “We had a seminar on Pushkin at the hospital.”

“Poetry in the workplace. Excellent.”

“They said that the bullet that killed him penetrated Pushkin’s right pelvic bone and traversed his abdomen.”

“I think he would have preferred one through the heart.” He set down his glass and pulled her close to draw in the scent of her neck. “Have you ever noticed that when one lover leaves the bed, the other rolls into that space?”

“Is that true?”

“Absolutely true.” Something struck him. “Are you aware that Isakov gets up in the middle of the night to pace up and down Sovietskaya Street?”

Eva took a moment to adjust to the change in subject. Her voice flattened a little. “I didn’t know he did. Marat mentioned once when we were driving on Sovietskaya that Nikolai’s father used to work there.”