IGENKO
Levitsky, from the window, watched Igenko approach.
The man was prissy, a bit pudgy. His white suit wore immense, dark crescents under the armpits. He needed a shave. He looked desperately uncomfortable.
Come, little one, Levitsky thought.
The man wandered with not a small amount of trepidation the winding, evil-smelling, narrow streets of the Barrio Chino, which was just beginning to fill with customers as the night began. Even the revolution had not halted the practice of certain ancient professions and in the Barrio Chino, in the warren of overhanging buildings, balconies bright with wash, amid the smell of garbage and piss, amid the little bars where Spanish men stood and ate and talked the nights away, the tarts had come out, mingling with sailors, soldiers, politicians, and revolutionaries; a hundred little nightclubs had half-open doors that promised certain otherwise unavailable delights inside.
As Levtisky watched, prim, chubby Igenko tried to melt into the cosmopolitan crowd, evidently terrified first that he was under observation by the NKVD and second that he might be stopped by an Anarchist patrol. For the Anarchists controlled the Barrio Chino, which is why it was able to flourish, but the Anarchists were not terribly fond of Russians.
But the man was stopped by no one, fortunately, and after a time consulted a watch. He seemed to take a deep breath, as if in search of his courage, and, with a last glance at the world around him, ducked out of sight.
Levitsky waited. He could imagine poor Igenko’s ordeal as he negotiated the protocols of the brothel. In time, Levtisky knew he approached: he could hear the girls cooing.
“Hey, sugar tits, come see me, I’ll make a man out of you.”
“Put your little thing in a woman’s hole, princess.”
“Lick my titties and I’ll show you things you never saw in your life, dolly.”
Poor Igenko, pretending to stoicism. Teenage boys frequently yelled things at him and the whores knew, too. Levitsky wondered ? how did they know? So surely, how did they know? How did
Outside the door, they stopped.
“In here,” Levitsky heard the girl say. “Now give me the money.”
There was a pause, as Igenko dug through his wallet.
“You Russians,” she said. “Through the eyes and the nose, you all look the same. Fat or thin, you all look the same.” She left him.
Igenko opened the door and stepped into the darkness.
“Ivanch? Ivanch, are you there?” he called, using the most intimate abridgment of Levitsky’s middle name.
“Were you seen?”
“Ivanch, thank God you’re all right.”
“Close the door!” Levitsky hissed.
Igenko closed the door. There were another few seconds of silence and then the light came on.
“God, Ivanch. You look dreadful.”
“God had nothing to do with it, I assure you,” said Levitsky. He held himself with grave care, because the pain was still intense. His face was pinched and drawn.
Yet it was Igenko who seemed close to coming apart. He sat on the bed, heaving and breathing wretchedly, struggling for his breath, his pallid skin becoming chalkier. “It’s so terrible. They beat you?”
“Of course they beat me. They’re serious about their work.”
Igenko began to weep. He covered his eyes with his dainty handkerchief and made sniveling sounds.
“Is it really that awful?” said Levitsky.
“You were such a handsome man. To see you like this is almost more than one can take.”
“Don’t concern yourself. It’s nothing I won’t recover from.”
“We heard that you were here. There were rumors. That the NKVD had?”
“What about my escape?”
“Nothing. Nothing at all. That is why I was so stunned when your note reached me.”
Levitsky laughed harshly, through pain.
“Glasanov has gotten himself into a terrible mess. He can’t let anybody know I’m gone or he’s on his way back to Moscow for a bullet in his neck. So he must catch me without officially admitting I’ve flown. Let’s see him bluff his way out of this!” He enjoyed it immensely.
“Ivanch, how did you manage to?”
Levitsky laughed again.
“Don’t concern yourself. One simply does what one must.”
But it had been quite simple. Levitsky laughed at the memory. They are so stupid, these new fellows. Some inheritors! He looked about the cell in his hour of need and noted by the variation of color on the stone that for centuries a crucifix had been hung above the pallet. He reasoned that surely such a device must have been affixed to the stone in some fashion or other. It didn’t take much cunning to find a nail sunk in the crevices of the stone ? an ancient thing, there for centuries. A strong tug and it was his.
He felt his trophy in his pocket now ? a wicked lance of black iron, perhaps four inches long.
He used it to pick the lock. Then, reasoning he had no chance to escape in full daylight, he simply slipped into the cell next door, where his hardest problem was to stifle his laughter during the great Commissar Glasanov’s rage. When he and his Amerikanski finally left, Levitsky went back to his original cell, figuring that it would be the safest place. He waited there until nightfall, then made his way out.
“I suspected that an Anarchist neighborhood would offer the least chance of NKVD observation, and so here I am. Safe, if not quite sound,” he told Igenko.
“You are brilliant, Emmanuel. As usual. You always were.” Igenko’s little eyes shone with respect and admiration.
He reached and touched Levitsky on the knee, with a weak, hopeful smile. “I’ve always been your staunchest supporter. Your greatest admirer. You know that.”
“I need help, Ivan Alexyovich. I need it badly.”
“I understand. You can trust me. I owe you so much. I will do anything for you.”
“Yes.”
“Anything. Use me in any way to advance your plan.”
“All right. All right, Alexyovich.”
Igenko began to weep. He put his head down on the bed and cried. Levitsky stroked the back of his fat neck and crooned to him gently.
“It’s been so long,” Igenko said.
“So many years. Since 1919. Come on, wipe your tears, old Ivan Alexyovich. Stop whimpering.”
“I’ll be all right, now that you’re here.”
“Of course you will.”
“I know I can help. I’m a clerk in the Maritime Commission. I know people in the port. People owe me things. I’ve done favors. I can get you out. I can get you on a ship. To Africa maybe, to America, even.”
“No.”
“Emmanuel, they’ll kill you. Glasanov and his monster Bolodin. They’re feared everywhere in Barcelona. The Comintern people dread them. The radicals and the Anarchists are terrified of them.”
His voice rose in pitch; he was verging on hysteria.
“Listen, Ivan Alexyovich, please. Calm yourself, and listen. I need money. And I need a place to go to earth for a while. It’s only a question of a few days before they begin to run down the brothels, even in the Anarchist neighborhoods.”
“Glasanov controls the SIM, and the SIM is everywhere.”
“I know. That’s why time is so desperate. But mostly I need papers. Above all, I need papers. I need to
“I can give you money. I have twenty pieces of gold. I’ve had them for years. I can sell them. And I can find
