“Then, perhaps we should go inside,” Yagamata said. “There is something I would like you to see.”
“Yeah, what?”
“A little display I have put together from my personal collection. I call it the Treasure of the Czars exhibit. Furniture, artifacts, icons. It really is suitable for a museum. It’s in my gallery, and so is Comrade Kharchenko.”
“Let’s go have a look,” I suggested, “before he steals it all.”
T he floors were white marble, the columns green malachite, the cornices leafed in gold. Real gold. The ceilings were high, the lighting subdued. The gallery was quiet, almost churchlike. The only worshiper was a thick- necked man with a bandaged face.
Kharchenko stood next to a jade pedestal on which stood a gold vessel filled with what looked like white marbles. Yagamata raised his hand as if to signal Kharchenko not to be alarmed. Yagamata bolted the door behind him, and we crossed the room together. Enameled saddles shared space on polished wooden frames with silver bridle chains. Antique weaponry-rifles with ornate fretwork of silver beasts-was attached to the walls, along with intricate Russian needlework. Golden chalices laced with rubies and emeralds shared space with decorative military breastplates. A mannequin of a nobleman was dressed in eighteenth-century finery, its vestment encrusted with precious gems. Closer to the jade pedestal, I could see the gold vessel contained pearls-hundreds, the same size and lustre.
As we approached, Kharchenko pointed to a nearby painting of what looked like a holy man, head bowed in prayer. In excellent English, he said, The Measure Icon. Ivan the Terrible honored the birth of his son by commissioning a painting of the boy’s patron saint. Twenty-seven years later, Ivan murdered his son in a fit of rage.” Kharchenko watched us for a reaction, his dark eyes alert above the white bandages.
“Your history is like that,” Foley said. “Works of great beauty, acts of great horror.”
“Is it so much different from yours? We had our Gulag, you your lynchings.”
Yagamata cleared his throat. “Politics is so boring compared with business, and in any event, your histories are about to merge. With the free market, soon you will not be able to tell the difference between the streets of Boston and St. Petersburg.”
For some reason, I thought about the Hermitage going condo.
Yagamata was fondling a gem-studded egg that he had picked up from a marble-topped table. The egg was covered with a map of Russia engraved on silver. Two gargoyle creatures with shields and swords stood at the base of the egg, protecting Mother Russia, I supposed. Yagamata lifted off the top of the egg and withdrew what looked like a gold chain. “My favorite piece,” he said, unfolding a miniature train of solid gold, “the Trans-Siberian Railway Egg. I sometimes carry the train with me, just to draw it out of my pocket and enjoy the sheer pleasure of it. Have you ever seen such workmanship, such love of detail combined with whimsy?”
“Whimsy,” Foley said, barely suppressing a sneer. “It’s just a thing, Matsuo. It’s just an object to be bought and sold like everything else.”
Yagamata folded the train back into the egg. “No, Mr. Foley, it is not. Some ‘things’ are too valuable to simply be bought and sold. Some are more valuable than life.”
“Enough talk,” Foley said, his eyes seeming to narrow behind his glasses. He turned toward the Russian, who hadn’t moved. “Your face looks like shit, Kharchenko. Tell me, did a woman really do that to you, tough guy?”
“You cannot provoke me,” the Russian said. “I have my instructions, and I will carry them out.”
“There’s been a change in plans. I’m taking charge in the field. You’re to turn the shipment over to me.”
Kharchenko’s smile revealed a missing front tooth. He pointed a finger at Foley and said, “I don’t take my orders from you.”
Foley’s hand shot out with frightening speed. He grabbed the jabbing finger and pushed it backward. Hard. The crack echoed off the marble floors. Kharchenko let out a high-pitched wail, and Foley twisted the finger, left then right. Crack, crack. Three clean breaks, one at each knuckle. Kharchenko was on his knees, tears filling his eyes.
Foley never let go of the finger, but used it to yank the Russian’s right arm behind his back. His movements were so smooth, so quick, I never saw the clear plastic handcuffs come from his pocket. In a moment, Kharchenko’s hands were bound behind him. The Russian rocked back and forth, still on his knees. He gave the impression of being in painful prayer.
Foley’s eyes darted around the room. On an ornate desk was a gold wicker basket filled with lilies of the valley. Foley motioned for me to get it.
“Now? You want flowers now?” I asked.
Yagamata sensed something I didn’t. “You wouldn’t,” he pleaded with Foley, a tinge of fear in his voice. “Please. I abhor violence and detest the destruction of beautiful things. That is Faberge’s first flower study, a gift to Empress Alexandra-”
“Lassiter! Give me the goddamn basket. That’s a direct order.”
“Hey, I never joined up.”
“Goddammit! You’re an American, and I’m calling on you by the power vested in me by the President.”
I didn’t know what he was talking about, but it sounded impressive. I walked over to the desk and picked up the basket. These lilies didn’t need water, and the only scent was of unlimited money combined with incomparable artistry. I am, in the main, untutored in the world of art and artifacts. I do not go gaga over a fine jade doodad; I do not wax ecstatic over a Ming dynasty vase; but even my rough-hewn self could appreciate this. I had never seen such beauty in a man-made object.
The moss was spun gold. The delicate looping stems were solid gold rods, the flowers were pearls encircled with diamonds. Who was it who said that diamonds are a pearl’s best friends? I gently touched the green leaves.
“Nephrite,” Yagamata said.
“I’ve never seen anything like it.”
Yagamata laughed. “There is nothing like it, anywhere in the world.”
“Gimme!” Foley barked.
I walked toward him, and Foley tore the basket from my hand. He leaned over Kharchenko, who was silent now. “Where is the shipment?”
Kharchenko muttered something in Russian. Foley grabbed him by the collar of his brown suit coat and yanked backward. He roughly pulled one of the flower stems out of the golden moss. “Let’s see how much you love art, Kharchenko.”
There were perhaps ten pearls on the stem, tiny ones at the tip, growing larger toward the base, where each one was tipped by six rose-cut diamonds. Foley put a hand to Kharchenko’s bandaged face, then pressed hard at the jaw muscles, forcing the Russian’s mouth open. Then he jammed the stem in and let go of his jaw. “Eat! Savor every morsel.”
Kharchenko let the pearl-laden stem sit in his mouth but did not move. Yagamata looked away. He seemed to be memorizing every detail of a colorful tapestry. Foley crouched down, grabbed another of the Russian’s fingers, and bent it back again until it cracked. Pain shot across Kharchenko’s face, and he involuntarily crunched down. I heard the stem break between his teeth. “Be a good boy and chew every bite. You don’t want your tummy to hurt.”
Slowly, Kharchenko worked his jaws. Tiny cuts appeared at the corners of his mouth. Foley leaned over him. “Swallow! Swallow, you greedy Russian pig, or I’ll break every bone in your fucking body, one at a time.” He picked up another golden stem and rammed it in. “Eat, you big cow! Eat your country’s precious art.”
Blood flowed in rivulets down Kharchenko’s chin, staining the gauze bandages, as he chomped down again and again. A tooth broke with a sickening crack.
“Now,” Foley asked, squatting close to the Russian, “where is the shipment?”
Kharchenko spit a bloody fragment of gold into Foley’s face.
With an angry hiss, Foley straightened, paced around the room, and stopped in front of the vessel filled with pearls. “Lassiter, a Western visitor attended one of the czar’s parties in the Hermitage where the guests ate their weight in caviar. Do you know how he described the Russian nobility?”
I shook my head.
“He said they were ‘dripping pearls and vermin.’ Hey, Kharchenko, we’ll provide the pearls. You probably have your own vermin.”
