“Yeah, well.” Foster turned away, embarrassed. “Hell of a thing, to live with that. I’m sorry. Here we go.” The hotel doorman came to meet them. Foster put his hand on Nick’s shoulder, a coach’s gesture. “Do us a favor, okay? Keep your nose clean. We don’t want to run interference with the police. The Czechs don’t like it. They have to watch themselves too, since the Russians came in. You don’t want to start anything.”
Nick took in the friendly hand, the open face, an American kind of menace. What had he said on the bridge?
“No. I just want to get out of here.”
“You and me both. I used to be in Paris. Now that’s a place. Here you have to watch your back all the time.”
Nick nodded. “I’ll remember.”
He got out and saw the Skoda two car lengths behind. In the hotel lobby he could feel the change immediately. The desk clerk’s eyes followed him across the room, a disturbance, someone the police had asked about. When Molly opened the door and hugged him-the same smell, the same smooth skin-he felt they were onstage, with one part of him out front, watching. It was easy to do, being someone else. His father’s son.
She sat on a chair a few feet away, curled into herself, while he told her about the morning at Holeckova, the body on the grass, feeding her only what he wanted her to hear, watching, measuring the distress in her face. They ate in the hotel dining room, old starched napkins and pork with sludgy gravy, sleepwalking through the meal. She took his distance for grief, picking at her food, waiting for him to speak. Then they sat drinking wine, almost alone in the faded room.
“You haven’t told me about the train.”
“Yes, I did.”
“I mean why. I don’t understand.”
“Something happened yesterday.”
“Yesterday? What?”
“I don’t know. He was all right at noon. Then at the concert, all of a sudden he has to leave. Something happened.” But how many possibilities were there? The gallery. The walk to the Loreto. The bridge. He looked at her.
“Did Anna know?” she said. “About the train?”
“I’m not sure. I don’t think so.”
“Is it possible that-” She stopped.
“What?”
“Please don’t be angry. That he did kill himself?”
“No.” She waited for more. “Why would he have gone to all the bother about the train? The whole plan, making me get tickets. Would he have done that to me?”
She shook her head.
“He was murdered.”
She flinched. “But why?”
“Because someone didn’t want him to leave. There can’t be any other reason.” He looked straight at her. “So who else knew he was planning to go?”
She didn’t meet his eyes but looked down at her glass, somewhere else. Then she folded her arms across her chest, shivering, as if there were a draft in the stuffy room.
“What?” he said.
“I’m sorry. It’s the wine.”
“It’s not the wine.” Tell me.
“No, it’s everything. It’s my fault, isn’t it? Starting this. We never should have come.”
Not what he’d expected. “Stop.”
“You blame me.”
“I don’t blame you.” But why did you lie?
“It never would have happened.”
“Stop it, Molly. Somebody killed him, not you. This isn’t helping anything.” He put his napkin on the table. “Come on, we’re both tired. Let’s go up.” Play everything through.
“Sorry,” she said, stung by his tone. “This is just making it worse, isn’t it?”
And upstairs it was no better. They got into bed, an acting kiss, then turned away from each other, lying on their sides. He looked at the light on the ceiling, thinking of the other night, the tram bells outside, drowning in her. Now he was alert but absolutely still, as if he were afraid moving would wake her, even though he knew the reason he could not sleep was that she was awake too.
They took a taxi to the funeral address, a street out past the station, near the outskirts of town. The room, a kind of chapel with pews, was plain and functional, stripped down to a lectern, a Czech flag, one vase of flowers, and the wooden coffin on a platform in front. An undertaker in a black suit hovered near the door, an anxious maitre d‘ waiting for the room to fill, but after a few early arrivals no one came, and finally he had to start.
Anna sat in front, with Anna Masaryk behind her, like two squat matrioshka dolls. Zimmerman, in a suit, sat near the back, his curious eyes darting frankly around the room. There were four people Nick did not know, scattered off to the side, and Frantisek, sober now, who went to the lectern to speak. No one else. Where were the others? Would there have been more people in Moscow, old friends? Or was this the extent of his father’s life, a pared-down circle and a son?
He and Molly sat across from Anna, and he kept his eyes fixed on the closed coffin. The eulogy was in Czech, so he had no idea what was being said. Probably the usual empty phrases, as comfortless as medals. In Moscow they would have mentioned the Order of Lenin, but not here. No socialist heroes, not since the invasion. His father had, somehow, become nobody at all.
The loneliness of the room was oppressive, and Nick shifted in his seat, causing a creak. Were they watching him? He had seen it in their faces, that he had a new role to play now, the cause of his father’s despair, the unbearable reminder of everything he’d lost. His fault. And for a moment he gave in to it, became what they wanted. What if none of it was true, the whole story a pretense his father could no longer keep up? No Silver. No plan. Just a story whose plot had run out. Easier for everybody. What had he actually seen in the flat but the disorder of a final night? Then Molly squirmed beside him and he was alert again. He turned. People were nodding at the speech, their heads down. Only Zimmerman was looking at him, his eyes bright, interested. Who knew it hadn’t been suicide, only that people wanted it to be.
The Czech went on, Frantisek dropping to a guttural rumble, then chopping the air with his hand, making some point. Anna was crying quietly. A hurried funeral, her decision. Did she think it was Nick’s fault too? Or had she discovered that his father was going to leave, even helped him? Out of the way, visiting relatives. But she must have been with him that afternoon, when something had happened. Nick looked at the wooden box, his mind freed by the droning language to sift through the last few days. Everything that had happened. Except for Molly, sitting next to him, pale, who couldn’t be explained.
The words ended abruptly, and Frantisek sat down next to Anna and patted her hand. No one moved. Nick waited for music, some formal signal, but there was just the quiet. The undertaker and a helper came forward, said something in Czech, and pushed a button. Behind the platform, doors opened in the wall, and Nick saw that the coffin was on a kind of ramp, maneuvered now by the two men so that it began sliding toward what must be the crematorium, shuddering a little until the angle took it and it fell away, like a ship being launched into the water. Then the doors closed and his father was gone.
The room emptied quickly, a few polite condolences to Anna, then a shuffling toward the door. No one talked to Nick.
“I’m sorry, Anna,” he said when the others had gone.
“Thank you for coming,” she said formally. Then, softly, “He would have wanted that.”
He felt his insides lurch. “I wish I had known him better.”
“I think you knew him better than anyone,” she said sadly. “You knew what he was like before.”
“I’m sorry,” he said again, at a loss. “Can we take you home?”
“No, no. I have to stay here. For the arrangements. Goodbye,” she said to Molly, holding out her hand. “He liked you.”
“Oh,” Molly said, struck. She reached over and embraced Anna, surprising her. “Is there anything-”
