winter. A rutted road rose up a hill toward the hotel, a concrete building with a few ugly frills. Behind the hotel, a dozen cottages sat among leafless trees. Beside the cottage farthest from the hotel, Yusuf cut the engine and they sat in the dark. The rain had stopped, but the air was cold and damp. They waited in silence, listening to the cars on the coast road, and to their breathing.
They passed an hour that way. The car grew cold, but Yusuf didn’t seem to mind. He closed his eyes and dozed lightly. Grigory tried to do the same, but he couldn’t. Each time he closed his eyes, he saw everything that had happened since Friday, the convoy arriving, the masterful way he’d played Major Akilev, the way Boris had checked the trunk. It was as if he’d been born two days ago, and everything before that hardly existed.
“Tajid,” he said. “When Boris checked the car, were you nervous? Was your heart pounding?”
“I suppose.”
“That’s all you can say? You suppose. These bombs in our trunk, our lives facing us, and what did you think? Wasn’t your heart pounding?”
“You know what,” Yusuf said abruptly. “I never knew before. But two days with you have shown me. There’re only two kinds of people in the world.”
Grigory waited for Yusuf to explain, but he said nothing. “Shall I guess? The fat and the thin?” Silence. “Men and women?” Silence. “The strong and the weak?” Silence. “The tall and the short.” Silence. “Come, Yusuf, give us your wisdom.”
“Those who can keep their thoughts to themselves,” Yusuf said. “And those who can’t. Sometimes I could cut your throat for a few minutes of peace.”
“Only sometimes?”
Grigory never got to hear Yusuf’s reply, because at that moment a car scraped up the hotel driveway. It was the same Toyota that had stopped beside them at the petrol station the day before. The Toyota parked next to them and a man stepped out, an Arab by the look of him, darker than Yusuf. He wore a cap and a heavy jacket. The man was in charge, Grigory saw immediately. Yusuf treated him with a deference he wouldn’t have given Grigory even if Grigory had put a gun to his head.
Yusuf and the man walked behind the Nissan, and Yusuf flipped up the trunk lid. A minute or so later, the trunk lid was lowered. The man sat in back beside Tajid and pulled off his cap, revealing a nearly bald head — unusual for an Arab. He was in his thirties, medium height, with a neatly trimmed goatee, wide dark eyes, a handsome round face. He looked gentle, though Grigory was certain he wasn’t.
They drove down the hill, leaving the Toyota behind. At the coast road, Yusuf swung left, to the southeast. “I won’t ask you how you did it, but it’s a great accomplishment,” the bald man said.
“At last,” Grigory said. “Someone understands.”
THEY MADE GOOD TIME for a while, but then the road became a true coastal serpentine, rising and falling along the swooping contours of the hills. Yusuf drove slowly, and after two hours they’d traveled barely seventy kilometers — forty miles. But neither Yusuf nor the man in the back showed any impatience. Grigory figured they must have driven the route before and knew how long it would take.
Russians called this strip of the coast their Riviera, and during the summer, this road was jammed with vacationers. Now the houses and hotels scattered through the hills were mostly dark, closed for the winter.
Just past midnight, Yusuf swung off the road, to the right, down a narrow track that hugged a steep cliff down to the sea. When they reached the base of the cliff, they were in a campsite beside a narrow, heavily forested cove. The main road stretched high above them on a concrete bridge supported by a dozen pillars. With trees all around them and thick gray clouds blocking the moon, they were invisible from the road.
“I hope you’ve arranged a boat,” Grigory said. “Otherwise it’s a long way to swim.”
No one bothered to answer.
“Hard to believe the Olympics will be in Sochi in 2014, isn’t it? Though I don’t suppose any of us will be there.” Silence. Grigory sighed. “All right, then. Tell me this, Yusuf, since you’re such a philosopher, dividing the world into categories. What’s the harm in a bit of chatter?”
“Nothing.”
“At least he speaks! Go on, then.”
“As long as you’ve got something to say. Which you don’t.”
“And who made you emperor?”
“My knife.”
“Yes, because you have a weapon, you can do as you please, insult me or anyone you like. Some world this is.”
“Shh,” the bald man in the back said. “Listen.”
In the silence, Grigory heard the distant rumble of a boat engine.
The man in the back swung open his door and the others followed. Yusuf popped the trunk and they pulled up the toolboxes and their bags. By the time they were done, the boat had arrived, a black motorboat with an open deck. Grigory couldn’t imagine it would get them across the Black Sea. Nonetheless they transferred everything to the boat, and then Yusuf and the bald man hugged briefly and whispered in Arabic.
The motorboat’s captain clapped his hands together, obviously anxious to be gone. Yusuf and Grigory and Tajid stepped into the boat.
THEY LOST SIGHT of the coast within an hour, and Grigory began to get nervous. But the captain steered confidently, occasionally checking the GPS tacked to the dash of the boat.
The fishing trawler was running without lights and Grigory didn’t see it until they were almost on top of it. They drew up alongside and someone inside threw down a rope. The motorboat’s captain tied the two boats together. The men in the trawler hauled up the toolboxes in a reinforced net and then sent down a rope ladder. Grigory wasn’t sure he would make it up, but somehow he did, the ladder creaking under his bulk. Tajid and Yusuf followed. The motorboat turned back toward the coast and the trawler rumbled into the sea.
THE SUN ROSE and set again and all the while they headed west. Grigory passed the time by amusing himself with his magnetized chessboard, even playing a couple of games with the ship’s captain. At midday the seas picked up, and by nightfall the waves batted the boat like a cat playing with a mouse. About then, Tajid threw up.
But Grigory, to his surprise, felt fine. Another unexpected talent. First he’d stolen the bombs. Now this. A new day for Grigory. He closed his eyes and imagined his future. He’d take the money they gave him, go on a diet, and—
He startled as someone tapped his shoulder. Yusuf. He was smiling, a thin smile that pulled at the corners of his mouth and frightened Grigory.
“Let’s play chess,” Yusuf said.
So Grigory set up the board and they played, twice. Yusuf played well, but Grigory beat him both times. Yusuf’s smile never faded.
“Let’s go,” Yusuf said when they were done, nodding at the door that led to the storage room behind the main cabin.
“What?”
“It’s time, Grigory.”
Grigory didn’t have to ask what he meant. “Please, Yusuf,” he whispered. His bowels came loose and he thought for a moment he would soil himself.
“Don’t beg,” Yusuf said. “I’m giving you the chance to do this properly, with dignity.”
“But you promised, and I’ve done everything you asked.”
“You knew how this would end, Grigory. It’s the same for all of us.”
Yes, of course, all of us, but why now for me?
“I should have turned you in.” So many chances, so many wrong choices.
