I wagged my finger in warning at Ray and we both laughed, then I turned and left the room. I hurried down the hall and the door to my room opened as I approached. Opari had felt me coming. She stood in the doorway with the dim light angling across her face. She was barefoot and wearing a simple cotton nightgown. I couldn’t see her eyes but I could see her mouth. “Welcome back, my love,” she whispered, then pressed her lips to mine.
That night, after telling Opari everything I had told the others, and falling asleep with her arm across my chest, I had a strange and unsettling dream. I was standing outside an enormous stadium, not a baseball stadium, but something else, something more dangerous. The stadium was circular and built with stone and brick. It was massive. All around the top of the walls, pennants and flags whipped in the wind. A crowd roared inside, rising and falling like waves. From somewhere in the shade by one of the entrances, I heard my name shouted three times in rapid succession, like gunshots. I ran or glided toward the arch of the entrance and walked through, into a glaring light and surrounded by dozens of snarling, growling lions, each one chained to a stake in the ground. I turned in a circle, looking for a way out. “Over here,” someone yelled. “Over here,” said another. Then one of the lions broke loose and began a slow walk my way. The walk became a trot, then a loping, full-out run until he leaped and opened his great jaws and hundreds, thousands of bumblebees came pouring out, buzzing, diving, and spinning around, never touching or stinging, almost taunting me, daring me to move a single muscle. Then I heard a voice, from somewhere I heard a voice that sounded familiar yet was unlike any voice I’d ever heard. High-pitched, strained, awkward, the voice seemed to be saying, “We are waiting for you.”
I awoke from the dream and couldn’t get back to sleep. Moonlight shone through our open window and slanted across the bed and onto Opari’s cheek and neck. For the better part of an hour I watched a tiny place on her throat where I could see her heartbeat rise and fall, over and over again.
Cardinal was attending a medical conference in Rome, and Mowsel reached him by telephone, asking if he could “help us find a friend.” Cardinal replied that he would be glad to help and suggested a meeting on May 1 in Montreux, Switzerland, where he would be staying at the Grand Hotel Suisse-Majestic. After a conference of our own, it was decided that Sailor, Sheela, Opari, and I would make the trip to Montreux. The rest would travel to Paris and wait somewhere for word from us. Mowsel suggested San Sebastian, saying he might like to spend some time in Basque country. “With my eyesight restored,” he said, “there is no place I would rather see than my homeland.”
“I ain’t ever been there, Mowsel,” Ray said. “You mind if Nova and I tag along?”
“Ray, it would be a pleasure. And I should warn you now, you will never taste better food. If it still survives, I know a little inn and restaurant where we shall begin and end our journey.”
We left Istanbul over the span of a single weekend, traveling in twos and threes, so as not to draw attention to ourselves. Old trick, new century. We flew to Paris and Sailor, Sheela, Opari, and I said farewell, promising to rendezvous in San Sebastian in six months, or send word as soon as we had some answers.
Traveling by train, we gradually climbed out of France and into Switzerland, stopping in Lausanne, then continuing on around Lake Geneva until we arrived in the beautiful town on the northeast shore, Montreux. The sun had set an hour earlier, and the lights of the town were shimmering on the water. The scene was idyllic, almost magical. Sailor said, “I first passed through here on the Roman road to Gaul through Besancon. I stayed that night and four more. Even then, and by torchlight, it was equally beautiful.”
Although Cardinal had yet to check in, rooms at the Grand Hotel Suisse-Majestic had been reserved under his name for his “nieces and nephews.” With great respect and efficiency, we were shown to our connecting rooms on the third floor overlooking Lake Geneva. I walked out onto the balcony into the black diamond night and looked up and over the lake, which was dancing with light. If you have to wait for someone, I thought, this is the place to do it.
When Cardinal finally arrived the next day, he apologized and blamed his tardiness on his surprise companion, a sports writer who was in Switzerland to cover the upcoming FIFA World Cup Soccer Championship in a series of articles for the
“How’s your mother?” I asked.
“She says you are already late.”
“Late for what?”
“For not coming to see her.”
“That sounds like Carolina. Well, maybe it won’t be too long.” I paused and glanced at Cardinal. “I have seen Valery.”
Jack and Cardinal exchanged looks of concern.
“Don’t worry, he didn’t see me. But he mentioned someone, someone who might be in Berlin. He called him ‘the Beekeeper.’ I … we … need to find this person. We were wondering if you might have some information on him. He has something, or he will soon, an object, a stone sphere, and I need to examine it.”
Jack had never asked or involved himself in why the Meq did certain things or how we did them. In our long relationship, he had always left that part alone, and this time was no exception. “This is important, right, Z?”
“Yes.”
“Then—”
“Then we will find the Beekeeper,” Cardinal finished.
We only stayed in the big hotel one night. The next day, after checking out and renting a car, Jack drove us to a rambling array of connecting stone structures on the edge of a village called “La Tour-de-Peilz.” Jack said it was a Catholic school named for the Renaissance priest, mathematician, astronomer, and philosopher Pierre Gassendi. It was built up against and along the north face of a sheer cliff. Because of the surrounding wall of rock, it had always been known to locals as
We waited a week. During that time, we celebrated my birthday on the fourth. Sailor insisted on it, reminding me that birthdays for the Meq must be counted and celebrated. “Otherwise,” Sailor said, “our hearts and minds would numb and we would simply be adrift in a meaningless sea of time with no beginning and no end.” Opari actually baked a cake, a chocolate cake, and I blew out eighty-five candles in one breath.
The information Cardinal brought with him wasn’t much. He said he had located a dossier on the Beekeeper that contained exactly one page, single-spaced. We were disappointed, but it was a start. “The Beekeeper,” Cardinal said, “if he still exists, is an assassin for hire who was employed mainly by Stalin in the 1930s to eliminate several of Stalin’s potential enemies living outside of the Soviet Union. However, on one occasion he is supposed to have worked for an American general in the Philippines, although the incident was never verified. According to a Soviet agent who defected, no one ever knew the true identity of the Beekeeper. His transactions were always done near a beehive, and he never removed the hat and net that concealed his face. He is said to have been a short man, and he spoke in English with a Cantonese accent. He is also believed to be a genius at code breaking and reading unreadable ciphers. But as far as we know, he and his services have not been used by anyone since World War II. Also, there seems to have been one other curious aspect to the Beekeeper. The Soviet defector said that often the agent who hired the assassin and conducted the transaction would disappear himself once the contract had been fulfilled.”
“What about Berlin?” I asked. “Did you find any leads in Berlin?”
“Possibly. I am still working on it.”
I glanced at Sailor and turned to Jack. “I need to go to Berlin.”
Jack said, “No problem, Z. You can go with me while I do interviews with the West German soccer players. When do you want to go?”
