It’s what they are, these men. Look at Stalin. Never safe. Sooner or later, everybody goes. So the trick is to go later.”
“If you’re lucky,” Leon said, imagining the field littered with bodies. “You were hit twice?”
“This?” Alexei said, pointing to the smaller scar. “No, this was a woman. In Bucharest. You don’t expect it from a woman.”
“She shot you?”
Alexei shrugged. “She was a little bit-” He touched his temple. “Again, lucky. Not a good shot.”
“And the others?” Leon said, pointing, curious now.
“Shrapnel. Also Stalingrad.” He ran his hand down his side. “Like a war map, no? Except for Ilena. A crazy temper. But a good fuck. Like that one back there,” he said, jerking his head toward Marina’s flat. “Well, you know. She said you’re a regular. A good fuck.” Something between them, easy, locker-room friends.
Leon said nothing.
“But these days,” Alexei said. “You never know if it’s your last. So they’re all good. The Russian desk? How’s that?”
Leon stood up and went over to the basin, sluicing himself. Why couldn’t everything wash off like sweat? Selling Jews for Antonescu. Sending them back. Straulesti. Fucking Marina. They’re all good now. He rubbed a soapy mitt over his chest, scouring it, as if he were wiping away Alexei’s hands, touching him. The same woman. More water.
When he turned back, the whole room seemed to be behind gauze, not quite clear. Bodies shiny with fat, hairy, leaning over with their heads down or sitting back, faces raised to the star-shaped pinpricks of light coming through the dome, the fleshy democracy of the baths, everyone just a body. Who were they all? Shopkeepers and rug salesmen, maybe a policeman off duty, a dockworker, not real in the steam, bodies to hide behind. He looked at Alexei, smaller somehow in his towel, paler, the war map of scars just little bruises from this distance, skin beginning to sag, the inevitable gravity. Before Leon had seen a fighter in military trim, but now the body was older, as slack as all the others, the same tired face Leon had seen when they walked out of Laleli. You never know if it’s your last. Not a monster, a man in a towel. Both.
“You weren’t in the war?” Alexei said when Leon came back, his voice drowsy.
“No. My eyes.”
“In Romania they take you even if you’re blind.”
“I tried. I was too old for the draft but I went anyway and I couldn’t get past the eye test. All they’d have let me do was hold down a desk somewhere. I was already doing that here.” Explaining himself, some point of honor.
“And that’s why you started doing this work?”
“I guess. It came up, that’s all.”
“No eye tests for this. And now it’s over, the war? You want to fight the next one?” He snorted. “A soldier. You think you know what it’s like. What you have to do.” He went quiet for a minute, private. “The first time, it’s difficult. But then it’s easier.”
“What? To kill somebody?”
“No, betray them. You think you can’t do it. It closes up.” He put his hand to his throat, a choking gesture. “That’s how it was for me anyway. I couldn’t breathe. But you have to do it, so you do. And after that it’s easier. You’ll see,” he said, facing Leon.
Alexei turned back, closing his eyes again, drifting with the steam.
“Do you know what I remember about the war? The cold. No mountains there, just wind. I thought I would never be warm again. And now look. Sweating. Maybe they’ll send me somewhere where it’s warm, when they’re finished with me. We never discussed that. What should I ask for? Where is it warm in America?”
“I don’t know. Florida.”
“Florida,” Alexei said, pronouncing it in syllables.
“Just go wherever they can hide you.”
“You think it’s like Trotsky? I’m so valuable the Russians send out assassins?” He shook his head. “Once I say what I have to say, they don’t care.” He paused. “Neither will you.” He stretched a little, enjoying the heat. “They have nice women in Florida?”
“Jews.”
Alexei opened his eyes, looking over at him. “Always that with you.” He leaned back again. “Ilena was a Jew.”
Leon was quiet, trying to imagine what the story had been, what she’d known. Or maybe it had been before Straulesti, a lovers’ quarrel. Angry enough to shoot. And then miss. His sixth life, or seventh.
“You’ve paid for a massage?” Alexei said, looking toward the masseur. “It’s okay?”
Leon nodded.
“What’s the word?”
“
Leon watched Alexei flop on the warm marble, the
But what if Frank had called the hotel? You don’t expect it from a woman. Standing behind him at his desk, an easy shot. Facing down Gulun. He was with me. Each other’s alibi. But Leon hadn’t been, not all the time. Not while he’d been in Tommy’s office, the unreliable Saydam gone somewhere else. Somebody in Ankara. It was Frank who thought there was a plant in the consulate. Who had killed Tommy. Except he hadn’t. Leon had.
His mind, idling in what-ifs, began racing now. Everything she had ever said to him. Hating secrets, his. Tell me. Or maybe something simpler, like Ilena picking up a gun in a Bucharest hotel, doing it for love, not missing this time. Coming up to him at Lily’s. Do something for me. What did he know about her really? Everything. His mind stopped, so still now that he felt the trickle of sweat on his chest and then he felt it on hers, brushing it with the back of his hand. How do you know? Because you do, the rest all steam and circles, fever dreams. Not like Alexei, suspecting everybody, the only life he knew. How long did it take for that to happen? You think you know what it’s like. In bed now, his skin still slick, but not with Kay, Marina, Alexei on her other side, leaning over, winking at him, sharing.
He opened his eyes, panting, not sure where he was. Smoke. No, steam, hot in his throat as he gulped it down. The bath, awake again, but the room still insubstantial, wispy. How long had he been out? Crazy dreams, with Alexei in them now, in his head. But not here. He looked again at the marble slab, empty, a Turk being pummeled near the edge. He stood up. Don’t panic. He wouldn’t have been taken without a fight, some noisy struggle. Unless he had walked out by himself, waiting for his babysitter to nod off, a plan of his own.
Leon went over to the basin and poured water over his head, as if he still hadn’t completely awakened. Don’t draw attention. He looked around the room. The same interchangeable bodies, no Alexei. Not on the benches, in the alcoves. Gone. Check the cubicles. See if his clothes are still here.
He hurried through the temperate room, back to the big rotunda, and stopped short. Alexei was drinking tea by the fountain, a new towel wrapped around his waist. Leon breathed out, a relief that was almost a physical shudder.
“What’s wrong?” Alexei said.
“I didn’t know where you were,” Leon said, hearing himself, a parent who’d lost a child in a store.
“You should drink some tea. Replace the sweat.” Unconcerned, only Leon rattled, aware suddenly that Alexei had become his lifeline, that without him everything would go wrong.
He picked up a towel and started to dry himself, catching a flicker of movement over Alexei’s shoulder, a newspaper page being turned.
