“A hundred cases,” he said. “I bought it for three bucks a bottle. I can get ten here-more if we sell it by the shot.”
“I have to think about this.”
That was a good sign. She was ready to agree, but did not want to rush into anything. “I understand, but there’s no time,” he said. “I’m a wanted man with a truckload of illegal whisky and I have to have your decision right away. I’m sorry to hustle you, but you can see I have no choice.”
She nodded thoughtfully, but did not say anything.
Lev went on: “If you turn me down I’ll sell my booze, take a profit, and disappear. You’ll be on your own, then. I’ll wish you luck and say good-bye forever, with no hard feelings. I would understand.”
“And if I say yes?”
“We’ll go to the police right away.”
There was a long silence.
At last she nodded. “All right.”
Lev looked away to hide his face. You did it, he said to himself. You sat with her in the same room as her father’s dead body, and you won her back.
You dog.
“I have to put on a hat,” said Olga. “And you need a clean shirt. We want to make a favorable impression.”
That was good. She was really on his side.
They went back into the house and got ready. While he was waiting for her he called the Buffalo Advertiser and asked for Peter Hoyle, the editor. A secretary asked him his business. “Tell him I’m the man who’s wanted for the murder of Josef Vyalov.”
A moment later a voice barked. “Hoyle here. Who are you?”
“Lev Peshkov, Vyalov’s son-in-law.”
“Where are you?”
Lev ignored the question. “If you can have a reporter on the steps of police headquarters in half an hour, I’ll have a statement for you.”
“We’ll be there.”
“Mr. Hoyle?”
“Yes?”
“Send a photographer too.” Lev hung up.
With Olga beside him in the open front of the van, he drove first to Josef’s waterfront warehouse. Boxes of stolen cigarettes were stacked around the walls. In the office at the back they found Vyalov’s accountant, Norman Niall, plus the usual group of thugs. Norman was crooked but pernickety, Lev knew. He was sitting in Josef ’s chair, behind Josef ’s desk.
They were all astonished to see Lev and Olga.
Lev said: “Olga has inherited the business. I’ll be running things from now on.”
Norman did not get up out of his chair. “We’ll see about that,” he said.
Lev gave him a hard stare and said nothing.
Norman spoke again with less assurance. “The will has to be proved, and so on.”
Lev shook his head. “If we wait for the formalities there will be no business left.” He pointed at one of the goons. “Ilya, go out in the yard, look in the van, come back here, and tell Norm what you see.”
Ilya went out. Lev moved around the desk to stand next to Norman. They waited in silence until Ilya came back.
“A hundred cases of Canadian Club.” He put a bottle on the table. “We can try it, see if it’s the real thing.”
Lev said: “I’m going to run the business with booze imported from Canada. Prohibition is the greatest business opportunity ever. People will pay anything for liquor. We’re going to make a fortune. Get out of that chair, Norm.”
“I don’t think so, kid,” said Norman.
Lev pulled his gun fast and pistol-whipped Norman on both sides of the face. Norman cried out. Lev held the Colt casually pointed in the direction of the thugs.
To her credit, Olga did not scream.
“You asshole,” Lev said to Norman. “I killed Josef Vyalov-do you think I’m scared of a fucking accountant?”
Norman got up and scurried out of the room, holding a hand to his bleeding mouth.
Lev turned to the other men, still holding the pistol pointing in their general direction, and said: “Anyone else who doesn’t want to work for me can leave now, and no hard feelings.”
No one moved.
“Good,” said Lev. “Because I was lying about no hard feelings.” He pointed at Ilya. “You come with me and Mrs. Peshkov. You can drive. The rest of you, unload the van.”
Ilya drove them downtown in the blue Hudson.
Lev felt he might have made a mistake back there. He should not have said I killed Josef Vyalov in front of Olga. She could yet change her mind. If she mentioned it, he decided he would say he didn’t mean it, but just said it to scare Norm. However, Olga did not raise the matter.
Outside police headquarters, two men in overcoats and hats were waiting beside a big camera on a tripod.
Lev and Olga got out of the car.
Lev said to the reporter: “The death of Josef Vyalov is a tragedy for us, his family, and for this city.” The man scribbled shorthand in a notebook. “I have come to give the police my account of what happened. My wife, Olga, the only other person present when he collapsed, is here to testify that I am innocent. The postmortem will show that my father-in-law died of a heart attack. My wife and I plan to continue to expand the great business Josef Vyalov started here in Buffalo. Thank you.”
“Look at the camera, please?” said the photographer.
Lev put his arm around Olga, pulled her close, and looked at the camera.
The reporter said: “How did you get the shiner, Lev?”
“This?” he said, and pointed to his eye. “Oh, hell, that’s another story.” He smiled his most charming grin, and the photographer’s magnesium flare went off with a blinding flash.
CHAPTER FORTY – February to December 1920
The Aldershot Military Detention Barracks was a grim place, Billy thought, but it was better than Siberia. Aldershot was an army town thirty-five miles southwest of London. The prison was a modern building with galleries of cells on three floors around an atrium. It was brightly lit by a glazed roof that gave the place its nickname of “the Glasshouse.” With heat pipes and gas lighting, it was more comfortable than most of the places where Billy had slept during the past four years.
All the same, he was miserable. The war had been over for more than a year, yet he was still in the army. Most of his friends were out, earning good wages and taking girls to the pictures. He still wore the uniform and saluted, he slept in an army bed, and he ate army food. He worked all day at weaving mats, which was the prison industry. Worst of all, he never saw a woman. Somewhere out there, Mildred was waiting for him-probably. Everyone had a tale to tell of a soldier who had come home to find that his wife or girlfriend had gone off with another man.
He had no communication with Mildred or anyone else outside. Prisoners-or “soldiers under sentence” as they were officially called-could normally send and receive letters, but Billy was a special case. Because he had been convicted of betraying army secrets in letters, his mail was confiscated by the authorities. This was part of the army’s revenge. He no longer had any secrets to betray, of course. What was he going to tell his sister? “The boiled potatoes are always undercooked.”
