Bad Luck in Berlin: An Exclusive Short Story

CHAPTER 7

The man spoke while looking ahead at the wall behind the bar which was lined with bottles of spirits and liqueurs standing on shelves that almost reached the ceiling. It took Victor a second to realise he was the recipient of the question.

‘Up and down,’ Victor answered.

‘Mostly up,’ came the reply as the man turned to face him. ‘From what I saw of you on the blackjack table.’

Victor did his best not to show his surprise. He hadn’t seen the man on the casino floor. It could be a bluff, hoping to draw a reaction.

Victor shrugged. ‘My luck seems to be holding.’

Now the man was close Victor saw the flecks of white in the neat brown hair above the ears. His skin was almost colourless over the gaunt face, with fine lines across the forehead and around the eyes. His eyebrows were thin and jet black. He’d shaved today but the dark stubble had resurfaced so that his cheeks, upper lip and chin were as grey as graphite. His eyes were small and the irises pale green.

The man nodded slowly and considered Victor’s response for a long moment. Then asked, ‘So you are someone who believes in luck?’

‘Of course,’ Victor lied.

The man with green eyes nodded again, as if Victor had confirmed something of greater significance, and said, ‘I find it a difficult concept to accept. How can anything in this existence be the result of pure random chance? You roll a die and it comes up a one. You roll again and it is a six. You can’t control which number is rolled so you call it luck. Yet if you roll that die six thousand times you will roll one thousand sixes and one thousand ones and a thousand of every other number. More or less. It is probability. It is causality. It is the only outcome. So it cannot be luck, can it?’

Victor revised his deduction on the man’s accent. He spoke German as would someone would who had Russian as a first language, but Victor didn’t believe the man was from the federation itself. The accent was from one of the states east of the Black Sea. Most likely Georgia, Chechnya, or perhaps from one of the many — stans in that region.

‘Maybe not,’ Victor said in answer to the man’s question, ‘but on a six-sided die the six is on the opposite side to the one. And that side has the least number of dots carved out. So it is fractionally heavier than any other side and gravity will ensure it comes to rest on the table surface more than any other. Therefore it will roll marginally more sixes than other numbers.’

The man nodded. ‘Then we are in agreement that it has nothing to do with luck.’

Anika returned with his Coke. He didn’t thank her. He left no tip. He paid with his right hand, took the change with his right hand, and picked up the drink with his right hand.

‘This has been both interesting and enlightening,’ the man with green eyes said before he returned to the corner.

The conversation could have been nothing more than small talk, but it could also have been a ruse to test out his suspicions on Victor. In the same way Victor had noted the man as someone who didn’t belong, he could have been similarly noted. Although he hadn’t been sitting in a corner to attract that first level of scrutiny.

Victor opened up the encrypted internet feature on his phone to log on to the secure email account he used to deal with his CIA employer. Two separate parties potentially interested in Deák or Farkas warranted the risk of communicating with someone he didn’t trust. And Victor hadn’t completely dismissed the possibility that the man with green eyes was there for him. How his employer responded could prove crucial.

He composed a message:

Victor tapped send.

When Deák returned from the restrooms he was only halfway through redoing his belt, but finally managed to get the buckle centred by the time he reached his drink. He whispered something to the blonde, who giggled as though she’d regressed a decade in age. He ordered another Scotch for himself and a glass of rosé for her.

Victor wasn’t sure how long he would have to wait to receive a response from his employer. It was still before six p.m. in Virginia, so there was a good chance he would get one before Deák left. There was a distinct possibility any reply would tell him nothing based on what little information he’d been able to give, but it might tell him everything. He would have liked to have sent a photo along with the description, but even though the camera on the phone wouldn’t flash or otherwise give away that Victor was taking a picture, the man in the corner would notice a phone being angled towards him.

With his new Scotch in hand Deák led the blonde to a booth out of Victor’s field of view. Normally, he would have waited a moment and made a subtle adjustment to his seating position so as to keep Deák in his peripheral vision, but the man in the corner would surely notice. Whatever the reason for the man’s presence, Victor didn’t want to reveal his own if there was still a chance the man hadn’t yet worked it out.

The squat Turk with the flat nose ran a palm over his curly hair and changed positions, taking a seat at a small table in the centre of the room so he could keep Deák in view. Deák was too far away to create any meaningful reflection on the bottles behind the bar, but the Turk was close enough. Victor didn’t need to watch Deák when the Turk’s reaction would tell him everything he needed to know.

It had been forty minutes since Victor had sent the message to his employer when the phone in his pocket vibrated to inform him he’d received a reply. The Turk was still at his stool, which meant Deák was still in the booth with the blonde.

The email read:

Victor put the phone away without responding. Our objective. It was interesting phraseology. Victor had no objective beyond staying alive and seeing out his commitment to the CIA. But to do that meant following orders.

The information on Basayev told him nothing that confirmed the identity of the man with green eyes. The email suggested Victor was right to have his suspicions, but he preferred to deal with facts over speculation. Fortunately there was a way to help him decide, one way or the other.

In the corner the man with green eyes sipped his Coke. The glass had about a quarter of liquid left. Victor gestured to Anika.

‘Another iced water?’ she asked.

‘Think I’ll go for an orange juice this time, thanks.’

She gave him a look. ‘Moving onto the heavy stuff?’

‘I’m letting my hair down.’

She returned a minute later with a highball glass filled with fresh orange juice.

‘Don’t go too wild,’ she said and took his money to the register.

Victor sipped his drink and waited.