Politika

FORTY-FIVE

There were three men in dark suits, widebrimmed fedoras, and long gray overcoats hanging around outside the bathhouse when the Rover pulled up in front of it.

“Will you take a look at them?” Scull said from the backseat. “It’s like they’re fucking play-acting at being gangsters.”

“They are and they aren’t,” Blackburn said, glancing out the front passenger’s window. “In some ways, I really don’t think these monkeys can distinguish reality from what they’ve seen in old-time American gangster flicks. But you have to remember that every one of them is packing a weapon under his coat.”

“You guys want me to come in with you?”

This from Neil Perry, who was behind the steering wheel.

Blackburn shook his head.

“It’d be better if you wait here, in case we need to take off in a hurry,” he said, and halfway unzipped his leather jacket. Scull could see the butt of his Smith & Wesson nine in a shoulder holster underneath it. “I don’t think they’ll give us much trouble, though.”

Perry gave him a small nod.

Blackburn looked over the seat rest at Scull.

“Okay,” he said. “You ready?”

“Been ready for days,” Scull said.

The two men exited the car and strode across the sidewalk. It was a sunny day and a few degrees above freezing, warm for Moscow in winter, but despite the relatively moderate weather the street was nearly empty, and business was slow in the trendy shops along Ulitsa Petrovka. It was the uncertainty about worsened food shortages, and the withdrawal of NATO assistance, and a potential economic embargo, Scull thought. People were holding onto their money in anticipation of the worst.

The hoods closed ranks as Blackburn and Scull approached the bathhouse entrance, blocking their path to it. One of them, a tall man with dark hair and a large shovel chin, said something to Blackburn in Russian.

“Ya nye gavaryu pa russkiy,” Blackburn replied.

Shovel Chin repeated what he’d said, motioning the two Americans off. Out the corner of his eye, Blackburn noticed another of the men edging forward, opening the middle button of his coat. He was shorter than the first one and had a mustache that looked as if it had been traced over his upper lip with an eye pencil.

“I just told you I don’t speak Russian,” Blackburn said, and started forward.

Shovel Chin bumped him back with his shoulder.

“I tell you again in fucking Engleeski, then,” he said, shoving out his chest. “You get the fuck out of this place right now, you motherfucking American asshole.”

Blackburn looked at him a moment and then punched him hard in the sternum, pivoting toward him as he connected, putting his full weight into the blow. Shovel Chin sagged to his knees, grimacing. He heaved twice and then threw up all over his coat.

Still watching him peripherally, Blackburn saw the thug with the mustache stick a hand into his coat. He whirled and drew his Glock, shoving its barrel into the thug’s throat, cocking its trigger. Mustache’s hand froze under his lapel.

“Get your hand out where I can see it,” Blackburn said. “You understand?”

The guy nodded, a fearful, bolting look in his eyes. His hand appeared from inside his coat. Scull hurried over and patted him down, reached under his lapel, extracted a Glock pistol, and shoved it into the right hip pocket of his jacket.

Blackburn glanced at the third man. The guy hadn’t budged from where he’d been standing when they got out of the car. He shook his head quickly back and forth as Blackburn’s gaze fell on him, then put his hands up in the air.

“No trouble,” he said. “No trouble.”

Scull frisked him, found his gun, and pocketed it, shoving it somewhere inside his jacket.

Blackburn screwed the bore of his gun deeper into Pencil Mustache’s throat.

“Help your komerade to his feet.”

The gangster did as Blackburn asked. The three of them stood there, trembling.

Blackburn gestured again with the gun. “All three of you, I want you to walk slowly and quietly into that bathhouse. If you make a sound that I don’t like, you won’t live long enough to regret it. We’ll be right behind you. Now move!”

A moment later, all of them were headed down the sidewalk. Shovel Chin was still unsteady, and had vomit dripping from his chin.

They pushed through the door of the bathhouse and a kind of stewy, humid warmth spilled over them. An attendant peeked his head out of a doorway. A moment later he pulled his head back and quietly closed the door.

Scull looked around and started opening likely-looking doors. Halfway down the corridor he found what he was searching for. A closet, stacked high with towels and cleaning supplies. He pushed the gangsters inside, whispering a chilling promise of what he’d do to them if he should hear a sound from this closet in the next hour or so. Then he closed the door, shutting them in, and propped a chair against the knob. They’d be able to break out eventually, of course, but not without making lots of noise — and they’d be too scared to do that for a while.

“Come on,” Blackburn said to Scull.

The sauna was on their left toward the back. They could hear groans coming from inside it. A man, at least two women. Blackburn nodded to Scull and reached for the door handle, pulling open the door to release some of the steam. The Smith & Wesson was in his free hand.

Yuri Vostov was naked. So was the woman on his lap, her back against his rolling middle, his hands on her belly. And so was the second woman with her head between both their thighs. The three of them looked up from the bench in shock and bewilderment, jumping apart as they saw the armed man in the doorway.

Scull pulled a couple of towels off hooks on the wall, tossed them to the women.

“Good-bye,” he said, cocking his thumb over his shoulder at the steamroom door. “Da svidaniya!”

They got out in a hurry, the towels draped haphazardly around their bodies.

Vostov started pushing up from the bench.

“Hold it.” Blackburn raised his palm, training his gun on Vostov. “You sit right where you are.”

Vostov’s small, flat eyes skipped between Blackburn and Scull like stones off the surface of a pond.

“Who are you?” he said in English. “What is it you want from me?”

Blackburn moved closer to him, his gun still aimed steadily in his direction.

“You’re going to tell us who ordered the bombing in New York,” he said. “Right now.”

“Are you mad? How would I have any idea—”

Blackburn shoved the gun between Vostov’s legs.

Hard.

Vostov flinched in pain. His back seemed to slide up the tile wall behind him.

“Tell us,” Blackburn said, and cocked the hammer of his nine.

Click.

Vostov looked down at himself, wattles forming under his meaty chin, and drew a ragged breath. His eyes bulged.

“Are you CIA?” he said. “My God, this is criminal!”

Blackburn rammed in the gun. Vostov mewled and cringed, tiny rosettes of color forming on his cheeks.

“CIA won’t blow your balls off,” Blackburn said. “I’m about to. Unless you talk.”

“Please…”

“You’ve got three seconds,” Blackburn said. “One. Two…”

“Pedachenko,” Vostov said, and swallowed. “It was Arkady Pedachenko. And others from outside this country.” He swallowed. “Look, take the gun away from there, I’ve told you what you want to know.”

Blackburn shook his head, his mouth a tight seam.

“No, no you haven’t,” he said. “In fact, you’ve only gotten started.”