The Treachery of Russian Nesting Dolls

CHAPTER 15

Iskra’s mother looked more like someone in need of salvation and less like a colonel in the army. Granted, just because the Salvation Army used a military hierarchy didn’t mean its officers were supposed to look like George Patton or Joan of Arc. Still, I was stunned when Maria Romanova opened the door to greet me at her palatial home by the ubiquitous Amsterdam canal. She welcomed me with a smile but her eyes looked vacant, like the view of a long stretch of desert through a pair of binoculars. Her sweater hung so loosely on her frame I feared she’d misplaced her shoulders. Iskra had been murdered less than two weeks ago, but her mother looked as though she’d been struggling with life for far longer.

I wondered why.

The Romanovs’ home was decorated in an opulent French style. The living room reminded me of the most beautiful salons in New York City hotels where I’d attended more than one corporate presentation through the years. Elegant gilding surrounded pistachio-colored boisere. Antique furnishings enhanced the sensation that one had just entered a wealthy Parisian home. Some people might have scoffed at the extravagance of it all, but there was no doubt that the room had been meticulously appointed with impeccable taste.

It was a room built for splendor and joy but even the paneled walls were crying. The musical selection didn’t help, some sort of Russian opera with constant wailing from a heavyweight soprano bent on global depression. It was the sort of selection my Ukrainian mother would have made. There was something genetic in Eastern European blood that made its people wallow in mourning. Why limit your sadness to that which came naturally when you could make yourself truly miserable and reduce your own life expectancy?

Perhaps that was an unfair assessment and Maria Romanova’s selection of music was a virtue. If mourning was the prerequisite to emotional healing, perhaps the pursuit of maximum distress was a shortcut to a return to normalcy. Whatever the truth, there was no doubt that Iskra’s mother had loved her daughter. The same could be said for her father, George, I thought, remembering his despair at the murder scene. In fact, I wouldn’t have been surprised if the musical selection was a mutual one.

Maria served us tea and croissants. I poured some milk into my tea and added a packet of natural sugar substitute. When I lifted my cup, a plume of steam twisted into the air. As I gazed at my host through the cloud of moisture, she looked like a ghost who’d been summoned at a séance.

“Is George at home?” I said.

I used his first name on purpose to suggest we’d become friends. That wasn’t too much of an exaggeration. In her husband’s mind, the Russian whore from the decrepit States was his mate for life.

Maria ignored my question as though I hadn’t said a word. Instead, she lifted a croissant from the basket with a pair of tongs and dropped it onto her plate. The odd thing was that she dropped it from a foot above its target, and smiled like a child when it landed unscathed.

“George?” Maria said, without looking at me. “He has his morning routine. The gymnasium and then the sauna. Always the sauna. He’s one of those Russians that still thinks dehydrating yourself will make you live longer.”

“If that’s the only way he’s dehydrating himself, then it’s not the worst thing.”

She looked at me as though I’d spoken Japanese. All traces of emotion vanished from her face. It was as though she’d pushed her own personal panic button and her brain had erased her short-term memory. The vacuous look returned to her eyes.

“Who are you again, dear?” she said.

Her question rattled me. I’d just arrived ten minutes ago. She’d been prepared for my arrival and had recognized my name right away.

“I’m Simeon Simeonovich’s friend,” I said.

Nothing.

“I’m Simmy’s friend. I’m the investigator he hired.” I stopped short of saying what I was investigating, for fear she might have forgotten her daughter had been murdered.

A spark ignited in her eyes. “Simmy,” she said. A thin smile crossed her narrow lips. It was such a weak attempt, she had such difficulty sustaining an expression of joy, I wondered when she’d last smiled even before Iskra’s murder. She gazed past me toward a random place in space. “There was a time when he thought I was quite special. To think, I could have been Mrs. Simeon Simeonovich.”

I seized the opportunity for conversation. “Where did the two of you meet?”

“At university. I was getting my master’s degree in physics. Simmy was a doctoral candidate which basically made him an assistant professor. None of the tenured professors wanted to deal with graduate students after class. They delegated it to their favorite doctoral students. We hit it off right away.”

I couldn’t help but think of my deceased husband. He’d delegated all his grunt work to his favorite doctoral students, too. A grungy-looking boy and the stunning female protégé with the auburn hair. My sole encounter with her would persecute me until the day I died.

“Why do you think you hit it off?” I said, my curiosity getting the better of me. Maria frowned, and I immediately hit an apologetic note. “If you don’t mind my asking. He’s so mysterious, you know?”

“Really?” Maria looked me over the way a woman did when she imagined her former lover with another now. “How interesting, because I didn’t think he was much of a mystery when I knew him. He was ambitious and he was capable of being ruthless, but he was a little boy at heart.”

“How so?”

“His mother died when he was young. He was the kind of man who needed a strong woman in his life. The kind of man who was always looking for the approval of a strong woman. Has he changed much, or is he still the way I describe?”

“I’m not sure I’m qualified to answer that.”

“But you would like to become qualified, wouldn’t you, Nadia?”

I felt myself blushing and came within a split second of blurting out that what I really wanted to do was solve her daughter’s murder.

“I understand you work with the Salvation Army?” I said.

“Since back in Russia. We were the primary care system for the homeless and the people infected with HIV. They’re treated like a leper class in Russia.”

“Do you miss it?”

“Working with the homeless and the HIV-infected?”

“No. Russia.”

Maria considered the question for a moment, looking every bit lucid and present. “Do I miss the Russian people? Absolutely. They are no different than the Dutch or the Americans, or anyone else. People are people. They want love, security and freedom. Their government lies to them—Putler took control of all three federal televisions stations less than a year after he took power—so they don’t understand the world they live in. The Chekhists—the men and women who believe a secret police force should have unlimited powers—they control the entire country. And the people yield to them, out of loyalty and fear. It’s a vicious cycle and they cannot break it, but the average Russian person is passionate, loyal and good.”

“I believe that,” I said, sincerely. “Speaking of Russian people… what can you tell me about Nashi?”

“Thugs,” Maria said, with extreme prejudice.

“Why do you say that? I thought they were like a youth group with patriotic overtones.”

“Who told you this nonsense? Is that what American believe?”

“Americans have never heard of Nashi. George told me Iskra had been a member. He made it sound like a normal extracurricular school activity.”

“Sure, if you consider hooliganism a normal extracurricular school activity.”

“Really?”

“Don’t listen to anything my husband tells you. He’s a Chekhist, too. How do you think we ended up with a home like this? He thinks Putler walks on water. He’s such a fool. And the funniest thing of all is that he’s not even a full-blooded Russian.”

“You’re kidding me.”

Maria laughed. “He’s a mutt. Part Russian, Moldovan, Belarusian, and Ukrainian. There’s even a touch of Azeri in his past, but don’t tell him that.”

I couldn’t help but smile before getting back on track. “But hooliganism? That doesn’t sound like Iskra, based on what I’ve been able to learn about her.”

“It wasn’t. Nashi was created by the Kremlin to be the opposite of a freedom fighting organization with grass roots. Any politician dares to question the party line, Nashi follows him. Harasses him. Makes him look like a villain in public, on the internet. And if any community or university dares to organize a rally for democracy or any other worthy cause the State doesn’t like…”

I raised my eyebrows.

“Nashi has an elite street fighting unit.”

“Sanctioned by the Kremlin?” I said.

“They smash heads, especially talking heads.” Maria frowned at me. “As though there’s something going on in Russia that isn’t sanctioned by the Kremlin?”

I shrugged.

“No, Nashi was not good for my daughter. She did not fit in with them. She was an artistic girl. She wanted to be free to express herself, and all that experience did was alienate her from her father, from me, and from Russia.”

“I assume it was her father who made her join in the first place?”

“Of course. Like I said, he’s a fool. He never understood our daughter. He only understood what kind of daughter he wanted to have, what kind of girl he thought she should be.”

“And who was that?”

“The Chekhist’s dream girl. An Olympic hero with uncommon beauty who marries a younger version of himself.”

The notion of Iskra marrying created an opening for me. “Did Iskra have many boyfriends?”

“Too many, don’t you think?”

“I wouldn’t know.”

“Of course you know. You’ve been working on this case long enough, and you’re obviously an intelligent woman. George said you’re smart. He said you were smart and that I would like you.”

I wanted to make fun of her husband’s compliment by reminding Maria she’d called him a fool twice, but I didn’t dare.

“I’m trying to understand if there were any special men in her life that I don’t know about,” I said.

“She had many clients but no real lovers. Do you understand that?”

I lowered my head. “I’m so sorry…” I considered the question I was about to ask and made sure I needed to ask it. “What about women?”

Maria’s face went blank. I feared she’d fallen into her personal abyss but then she frowned. “Excuse me?”

“If there were no special men in her life, is it possible there was a special woman in her life?”

Her lips quivered for a few seconds, and then tightened. “Are you suggesting my daughter—my Iskra—was a lesbyanka?”

I shook my head. “Not at all. Please don’t be offended. I’m just being a professional, asking every possible question to consider every possible angle. You’re a professional. Surely you understand.”

She sipped her tea and collected herself. “Yes, you’re quite right. Good for you. Not ruling out the ridiculous shows how diligent you are. George was right. You are very smart. Iskra a lesbyanka.” She followed up with some laughter but it sounded forced, the creation of a mother who was in denial.

“How long did you know Iskra was moonlighting in De Wallen?” I said.

Maria didn’t acknowledge me. Instead, she kept staring into space as though she’d withdrawn from our conversation again.

“George told me he only learned of what she was doing a couple of weeks before her death,” I said.

“A few weeks ago, yes,” she said, like a robot.

“I’m sorry to ask but this may be important. Did you confront Iskra about her night job? Did you try to talk her out of it?”

“You know, this tea needs a bit of sweetening.”

“The reason I ask is if you had a mother-daughter conversation recently, you might have spoken about her life in general. She might have told you what was on her mind. She might have told you she was scared of someone. No, not scared, terrified. Did Iskra tell you that she was terrified of someone during her last few weeks? Or ever, for that matter?”

I was so focused on presenting my question in the most respectful way possible that I didn’t see what was happening right before my eyes. Maria Romanova was spooning raspberry jam into her tea. She dragged her teaspoon around in circles, licked it, and batted her eyes twice in satisfaction. Then she sipped her tea.

“Ah,” she said, “that’s much better.” Her eyes settled on me and she frowned. “Oh, hello. Remind me, dear. Who are you again?”

I didn’t know what to say. I smiled, waited three beats, and introduced myself all over again. When I finished, she didn’t respond with any sort of recognition.

“What was it you wanted to talk about this morning?” she said.

“Fear,” I said. When finesse fails, reach for the velvet hammer. “We were talking about Iskra and the person she was mortally afraid of. You were about to tell me that person’s name.”

Maria Romanova almost smiled. “Iskra,” she said, as slowly as one could utter two syllables. Then she came alive like an old engine that had finally turned over a sufficient number of times. “Fear, you say? My Iskra had no fear. None whatsoever. That was her gift. That was her tragedy. You understand, yes? Come. Let me show you some pictures.”

I wasn’t sure if she was entirely present again or not. Nevertheless, I followed her to a table by the window that contained a collection of framed photographs. The frames matched the pistachio color of the walls. Maria showed me a series of pictures of Iskra in chronological order. She supplemented each viewing with a commentary about her daughter at the given age.

I listened closely enough to comprehend the gist of Maria’s remarks but tried hard to focus primarily on the images. The circumstances at the time a picture is snapped often dictate a subject’s emotions. A joyous occasion might stimulate a smile from the most somber of people, while a comedic moment could jolt a manic depressant into smiling for a brief moment. Some people were born posers and didn’t need any help. They could primp and preen their way to hide their true state of mind regardless of the adversity they might be suffering. And others still were the exact opposite—they remained transparent and uninterested in masking their inner selves.

Iskra Romanova was clearly one of the latter and her proud mother was clearly delusional. As she framed each photo with a memory of the specific time and place, Maria seemed to be describing the sweet-looking girl that could be seen in pictures until she turned twelve. From that point on her daughter looked increasingly sullen as the years passed. I paid special attention to her eyes. Anger, resentment and ultimately, disinterest defined their expression, until I saw the most recent picture.

In that photo, Iskra stood posing with her parents and Sasha in front of the famous I Amsterdam sign near a museum. They were all smiling, even Iskra. In fact, she appeared downright joyous. I wondered if her blissful state was a function of the romantic delusion that gripped her before her death.

“Who took this photo?” I said, lifting it up for closer examination.

Maria peered over my shoulder. “A stranger. We went to the Rijksmuseum to see an exhibition of Rembrandt’s Claudius Civilis. I forced my family to pose for a picture so I could remember the moment. You know what they say. If you keep staring at a photograph, eventually you’ll see things you never saw before. I don’t remember ever seeing Iskra as happy as she was then.”

“And when was this taken?”

“I don’t remember exactly. Two or three weeks ago? It’s the most recent picture I have of my Iskra.”

Maria’s estimate suggested the picture had been taken shortly before Iskra’s murder, at the precise time when she’d fallen in love with Sarah Dumont.

“Who’s the boy?” I said, pretending I didn’t know, to see where the question led.

Maria glanced at me sharply. “You know who he is.”

My face started to burn. All of a sudden Maria sounded more than lucid—she seemed downright perceptive.

“I do?” I said, denying her assertion because I didn’t know what else to do.

“Yes, you do,” she said, narrowing her eyes as though studying me for the first time. “George told me he showed you his picture and that you asked about him…”

“Oh my God…” I said, with an expression of shock.

“And that he arranged for you to meet with—”

“Sasha,” I said, beaming at her.

She pursed her lips as though I was a poor actress. I, of course, refused to yield. I was certain I was a damned good one, especially when dressed in a lime green bikini in red-light districts that featured poor lighting.

“I didn’t recognize him without his red Rasta hat and dreadlocks,” I said.

Maria frowned. “His what?”

I nodded at the picture where Sasha wore his hair at shoulder length in its naturally greasy state for all to see.

“When I met him, Sasha was not… Sasha,” I said. “In fact, he didn’t look anything like this.”

“Eh?”

Maria hadn’t seen her surrogate son in quite some time, or she’d have understood what I was talking about. Neither had George, I inferred. Sasha’s Rasta get-up was so eccentric that it would have stimulated instant gossip between husband and wife regardless of what else was going on in their lives. I was as certain of this as they both were that their surrogate son was innocent in any wrongdoing in their daughter’s murder.

“George used that same phrase when he first told me Sasha’s name. ‘Sasha is… Sasha,”’ I said. “It’s like a family mantra where he’s concerned. What exactly do you mean by that?”

Maria shrugged. “He’s a dreamer. Always was, always will be. Some boys want to be men but they never learn how. And that is why we say Sasha… is Sasha.”

“Why do you say he’s a dreamer?”

“Just that. He’s always hatching one scheme or another to try to make his fortune, as opposed to going to school, getting a job, and working for a living. Now it’s these silly t-shirts that look like something a six year-old could design. Before that it was his reggae band, and before that it was the acting.”

“Acting?”

“We paid for three years of lessons. He actually had talent. He got three roles in local plays, but he wanted to star in movies and when it didn’t happen right away he quit. No patience. No vision. He even had an agent but he lost his temper with him and burned that bridge, too.”

I was surprised to hear that Sasha had a temper. This revelation forced me to consider the possibility that Sasha had been acting when we’d met, that he wasn’t as sweet and honest as he’d appeared to be.

I studied every square inch of the picture again, as though I were looking at it for the first time. Iskra looked so different, so damn happy. That made this the most important picture of all, I thought, and made me wonder if there was anything else noteworthy about it. I studied her parents, Sasha, the people on the foreground and background, and even the signs around the museum, but found nothing out of the ordinary. My refusal to give up surprised me. I wasn’t sure if my instincts were telling me that I was missing a clue that was staring me in the face or I was becoming desperate and searching for something that wasn’t there.

“You said you think Iskra was afraid of something,” Maria said.

“Not something. Someone.”

“Does she looked frightened in this picture?” Maria said.

I glanced at Iskra yet again. There was no doubt about it. I wasn’t misinterpreting. She looked uncharacteristically radiant and stress-free.

“I’d say she looks anything but frightened,” I said.

“That’s my girl,” Maria said, smiling wistfully at the photo.

“But you must admit that she looks troubled in these other pictures.” I pointed to the series of photos that captured the time period from earliest childhood to the final shot of her. “Is it possible that someone did something to allay her fears right before she was killed?”

A flicker of consternation crossed Maria’s face, as though she knew that Iskra had been terrified of someone. But it vanished just as quickly, no doubt an unbearable reminder of her daughter’s true disenchantment.

“George said you’d be persistent, that you would ask difficult questions, and that I should be happy about it. He said you’re our best chance of finding Iskra’s killer. He said the Dutch police—they don’t give a damn about a dead Russian girl. But I’ve just about had it with your rudeness. You tell me she was scared, I tell you she wasn’t. But you just won’t listen to me—”

“I’m so sorry,” I said. “I don’t mean to appear disrespectful. I’m just trying to reconcile what you’re telling me with what other people told me.”

“What other people?”

“And those people—at least one of them—saw her on a regular basis. One of them worked with her and insisted that she was terrified of someone—”

“Who said that? That disgusting brute? The one that was supposed to guard her and used her body instead? What does he call himself, the Greek?”

“The Turk?”

“Yes, that’s the one. He gives all Greeks and Turks a bad name.”

“How do you know him?” I said. “Have you met him? Personally?”

“Of course I know him. I knew all the people in my daughter’s life.”

“When and where did you meet him?”

Maria Romanova frowned as though she had no idea, or more likely, was falling into one of her trances and losing the gist of our conversation. I quickly spoke up to keep her on point, desperate for her to stay in the moment until she helped me flesh out this unexpected revelation.

“The Greek,” I said, “as you called him…

She continued staring into space. I cursed under my breath and tried to will her to focus on me.

“Did you meet him in De Wallen?” I said.

I emphasized the last two words thinking the name of the red-light district where her deceased daughter had been employed might resemble the sound of fingernails scraping a blackboard to her mother’s ears.

But it had no such effect. Instead, my reference to Iskra’s choice of vocations served only to immerse Maria into a deeper fog.

“Or did you run into him at Iskra’s apartment, when he was walking her home one evening?” I said.

Maria’s eyes regained perspective and focused in on me. “How did you know that?”

“What happened?”

“Nothing happened. We’re not savages. Iskra introduced him as her bodyguard at work and the man was actually polite. He waited for George to offer his hand and then shook it—he even called me Mrs. Romanov.”

“He was polite? Then I don’t understand—”

“He wasn’t so polite when George paid him a visit the next day,” Maria said.

I took a half step back. “George met with the Turk?”

Maria nodded.

“Alone?” I said.

She nodded again.

That was interesting, I thought, because Maria’s expression suggested she was recalling a bad memory.

“Where? In De Wallen?” I said.

“I think so.”

“How did George find him?”

“I don’t know. You’d have to ask George that. All I know is that George found out he was taking advantage of Iskra—using her for his own pleasure—and put an end to that. The thought of that disgusting man with our daughter…”

The Turk had been honest about receiving payment-in-kind instead of money from Iskra in exchange for acting as her occasional bodyguard. I suspected Maria knew this and had altered her interpretation of history to suit her needs and create a hero—the carefree and joyful daughter of her imagination—and a villain—the thug who’d used her body for pleasure.

“If we were still in Russia, I don’t know what George would have done to that man.”

The irony was that if the Romanovs hadn’t left Russia, I thought, their daughter would still be alive. In Iskra’s case, the great personal freedom and liberal social norms Amsterdam bestowed on its citizens had facilitated a lifestyle that had helped shorten her life.

“What did George do with him?” I said.

“Eh?”

“Obviously he was angry. And we’re in the Netherlands, not Russia. So what did George do with the Turk?”

Maria Romanova shrugged. “He did the only thing he could do.”

“Which was?”

“He paid him.”

“To do what?”

“In cash,” Maria said.

“He paid him in cash to do what?”

“Stay away from her.”

I shook my head. “I’m so sorry he did that.”

Maria looked surprised. “Why are you sorry?”

“Because as hard as it is to believe, the Turk really takes his job seriously. And he took his job protecting Iskra seriously.”

Moisture appeared in the corner of Maria’s eyes. It was the first time I’d seen the formation of tears since I’d arrived. Then the vacuous look returned to her face. After a moment of silence, she smiled demurely and asked me to remind her of my name.

I told her who I was, thanked her for her hospitality, and left.

When I’d first arrived I’d noted her palpable melancholy and her undernourished state, and thought that she looked as though she’d been unhappy for a long time. My visit hadn’t shed any light on the source of her sadness, beyond her daughter’s murder, but I had a strong gut feel based on my personal experiences with him and my own deceased husband.

When a married woman is suffering from depression, the husband is always a man of interest.