stuff in Moscow. Apartment buildings. Subway stations. What the fuck are they in Moscow for? And here, now they’re here, in Brooklyn, and how come they make their women wear those bags over their heads?”
I ignored him. He was baiting me and I had no intention of fueling his rage. He could get over it or he could fuck off for all I cared.
“How well did you know the dead girl?” I said.
“I knew Masha a little. She was great dancer. Always twelve guys hanging around for her.”
“Fine. I’m not going to ask how come you didn’t tell me you knew her in the first place or what shit you know about Dacha, the club, just find out who they were, the twelve guys, also the girls she knew. Get me some hard information.”
“Not twelve exactly.”
“I get it. I get it’s not exactly twelve, but however many.” I was impatient. “What else?”
“Once we eat on the boardwalk on Saturday night, a group, seven, eight friends, we just sit out and watch the ocean and talk. Masha was there.”
“Write it down. Send me an e-mail.”
“Artie?”
“Yes?”
“You ever wonder about the m on Masha, the one somebody made with a knife?”
“The lab’s been looking at it all along.”
“You wonder what it stands for? You think it stands for Masha?”
“Yeah, maybe.”
“What about Mohammed, what about this guy Moe?”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” I said, but he’d planted the seed of doubt into my head where it could take root.
Bobo’s car was at the curb. He unlocked the door.
“I’m on it,” he said, his voice turning chilly. “You don’t have to bust my balls.”
“Very nice car,” I said. “You got it where?”
“My parents.”
“Your parents are doing so well?”
“Fuck you.”
“Give it a break, Bobo. Relax.”
“No, I don’t want to fucking give it a break. My pop opened another dry-cleaning place. Why? You think because my parents are living in Brighton Beach, they’re crooked? Because I’m living at home I’m in on some game, too? I stay there to help out with my mom who has arthritis bad, right? The car was a present, right? It was my birthday present.”
“Forget it.”
“No. Let’s discuss. I take a lot of shit from you, okay, so I learn this way. But some stuff it’s not okay. Not okay that you think I take money in some way unclean, you know? Not all Russians are corrupted bastards,” he said in English and then switched to Russian, his voice very cold and very low. “You think that all of us are just creeps, I know that, Artemy, I know how you think, you always show it to me, one way or the other. You’ve turned into an American, so for you Russians are gangsters or religious nuts, you’ve forgotten your country, and I don’t care about that, but get off my fucking back. I’m not your kid.”
“Calm down,” I said.
“Sure.”
“One more thing, Bobo.”
“Yeah?”
“You slept with her? You slept with Masha? You had something going on?”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Standing near my car, I opened the package I had taken from the house in Brighton Beach and found a videotape, and a few sheets of paper. I scanned them, and then yelled for Bobo Leven who was climbing into his car. He shut the door and jogged over to me. I held out a piece of paper. He took it, read it, grunted.
“Jesus, Art.”
“Yeah.” I felt sick.
“Masha Panchuk waited tables for your pal, Anatoly Sverdloff,” he said.
“Give me a cigarette.”
Bobo handed me the pack along with his lighter.
“Fuck it, Artie, didn’t Sverdloff mention this?” said Bobo. “He didn’t tell you one of his girls was missing?”
“Why would he? Maybe he didn’t know. Maybe she was a temp.”
“Don’t be so defensive, but you have to figure by now someone maybe called him about it, Sverdloff, I mean. Right? Or you want to do that?”
“He’s on his way to London. He didn’t have anything to do with Masha Panchuk’s murder.”
“You want to hang onto that raft, like they say, Artemy?”
“Fine. I’ll call him,” I said.
“You trust him, right?”
I lit the cigarette and handed him back his smokes and the lighter.
I worked my phone, I made some calls, nothing. I turned to Bobo.
“Find Dravic, if you can,” I said. “He was supposed to meet me at the house the club uses as an office, he wasn’t there, I just tried him on the phone, there’s no answer. I called the club, nothing. Now I’m thinking he was scared, but of what? Scared because he promised to give me some stuff on Masha Panchuk? Did someone overhear us talking at the club?”
“Sure,” said Bobo. “I will work everything,” he said formally, his English sounding as if he had learned it in school, his Russian accent more pronounced now. “I will be taking everything into consideration, of course, Artemy.”
I knew that Bobo Leven would get into everything, he was tenacious, relentless, one of those cops, even at his age, who never let go. At two in the morning, he’d still be at his desk doing the paperwork. Before the other guys got into his station house, he’d be combing his computer, and then when they arrived, he’d bug them for scraps of information. The phone would be permanently attached to his ear, he would be calling, asking, bribing if he had to. I had known a few cops like Bobo. It wasn’t just that he wanted to make a name for himself, it was who he was, what he lived for. Everything would come under scrutiny, he would talk to everybody, Albanians, Jamaicans, Mexies, Serbs, Russians, and he would go through every detective report on crazy people, on thugs who sliced people up, on the kinds of knives they used, and if they also used guns, and he would read medical reports, and reports on duct tape, fibers and feathers, anything he could get his hands on.
Every single homicide pattern that was anything like the case would be worked by Bobo; so would cold cases he kept in a bottom drawer.
Moving around, he would get to Starrett City, Brighton Beach, looking at how people had been mugged, sliced, killed. He wanted this case, and he would go without sleep, night after night, until fatigue made him crazy.
“I’m going back to the city,” I said, but Bobo didn’t answer; he was already on the phone, already tracking Tito Dravic.
In my car, I studied the picture of Masha I had with me, I stared at it hard as if it would give up some secret, and without warning a faint finger of panic crawled up my neck. The thing I hadn’t seen, the thing I didn’t want to see.
But I had to look. And I looked, and the face stared back at me.
If some creep had snatched Masha Panchuk, and Masha had worked at Tolya’s bar, was it Masha the creep really wanted? Was it a mistake? Were they looking for someone else? Somebody connected to me? Somebody who scared Tito Dravic bad?
Masha Panchuk, in the picture I held, was tall with short platinum hair. It had been taken the month before.
