it at Rostnikov, whose hand came up quickly to catch it. He placed it on the table before him.
“Natalya,” Elena said gently. “Tell the chief inspector. This is a new Russia. You can get lawyers, people to help you, courts that will listen.”
“Betrayer,” said the old woman, looking at Elena. “I promised you cooperation and you have brought me to this.”
“I believed you were innocent,” Elena said.
“I am guilty only of moving my own possessions from one place to another safer place,” the old woman said. “I did not feel my house was safe with all these people in uniforms yelling, threatening, watching. Not much of a crime.”
“The address of the garage,” said Rostnikov.
“Then I betray those who helped me,” said the old woman.
“You simply hired them to bring trucks to your back door and haul away a large load of items,” said Hamilton. “I doubt if they had any idea of what was taking place.”
“That’s right,” said Natalya.
Orlov let out a deep sigh, and something that might have been a sob escaped from Terhekin. Natalya looked at Rostnikov, who was straightening the petals of the flower and ignoring the eyes of the old woman.
“All right,” she said. “I’ll tell you, but there are two conditions.”
“Which are?” asked Elena.
“First, I talk to a lawyer, the best lawyer in all of Moscow,” the old woman said.
“Second?” asked Elena.
The old woman stood and held out her hand toward
Rostnikov. He returned the flower. She did not know the address of the garage, but she did know the name. She gave it to the three investigators sitting across from her.
“Pulcharia called me a name,” screamed Sasha’s mother the moment he entered his apartment. “But I have forgiven her.”
Maya, dark, pretty, and showing no sign of having had two babies, brushed down her hair, moved to her husband, and kissed him softly. Maya and Sasha exchanged a brief look of mutual suffering.
“Would you like to know what she called me?” asked the wisp of a woman who was Sasha’s mother, pulling herself away from the evening news on the television. She was sitting a few feet from the set so that there could be a compromise level of volume, but the television was still loud.
“I can think of nothing that would give me more satisfaction,” said Sasha seriously, taking off his jacket and hanging it on a hook near the door.
“The sarcasm comes from his father’s side,” Lydia screamed.
The children in the other room had learned to live with their grandmother’s shouting and snoring. They shared the bedroom with her.
Lydia’s strident voice was a result of a deafness she refused to acknowledge. Each year it grew worse.
The table was set for Sasha-a cold plate of something that looked like sausage, a large piece of bread, and some slices of raw cucumber and onions.
“We have soup,” Maya said, moving to the stove in the corner and turning it on. “We ate late.”
“Is it warm?” Sasha threw his head back to clear the hair from in front of his eyes as he sat down at the table.
“Yes,” said Maya.
“No need to heat it,” he responded, tearing off a piece of bread. “I have to get a few hours’ sleep. I’m replacing Zelach on a watch at midnight.”
Maya sighed with deep resignation-her usual response to such announcements. She touched his hand.
“What am I? A block of wood? A stuffed chicken?” Lydia asked, moving to the table to sit in front of her son.
Maya walked immediately to turn off the television.
“I’d say a stuffed chicken,” said Sasha. “If those are my only choices.”
“You are not funny,” shouted Lydia. “Not funny. Like your dead father. He thought he was funny too. I watch the children all day till Maya gets home from work. I expect respect.”
Holding a forkful of sausage, Sasha looked seriously at his mother and said, “What did Pulcharia call you?”
Sasha examined the bowl of dark, thin soup his wife had just placed beside his plate.
“Why?” asked Sasha.
“I told her she had to go to the toilet,” said Lydia. “When she woke up from her nap while the baby and I were watching that show with the clown. I told her, ‘Use the toilet.’ She called me ‘diarrhea.’”
“Maybe she was just telling you that she had … Can this conversation wait till I finish eating?”
“I know the difference between a child telling me she has a problem with her bowels and a child calling me a name,” said Lydia, ignoring her son’s request.
“She is three years old,” said Sasha.
“No excuse. I never let you make excuses,” said Lydia, looking at Maya. “I never let him make excuses. Just the truth. Am I right?”
Though Lydia was not within a kilometer of being correct, Sasha said, “My mother is right.”
“And Maya refused to discipline her,” Lydia went on, feeling a wave of triumph.
“I didn’t think she had done anything that deserved discipline,” said Maya, taking a seat at the small table.
“It is nice to be home,” Sasha said, reaching out to touch his wife’s hand. Maya’s hands were soft. Maybe if he yawned a few times and reminded his mother that he had to get back to work in a few hours, his mother would retire to the bedroom with the children and read a book. Maybe he and Maya could pull out the sofa bed, turn out the lights, make love, and still have time for enough sleep.
“So, what are you going to do?” Lydia insisted.
“I’ll beat her with a belt when I return in the morning,” he said. “Or maybe I should get it over with and pull her out of bed now for the beating. She’ll never forget it.”
He tried the soup. Beans. Still warm. The soup was good. He dipped his bread in it.
“You will not strike that precious child,” Lydia said indignantly. “I never laid a hand on you when you were a child. Neither did your father.”
Sasha contemplated the selectivity of his mother’s memory.
“I’ll starve her for a week,” said Sasha. “Maya, no food for Pulcharia for a week. Make a note.”
“Stop,” Lydia insisted. “You don’t intend to do any of those things.”
“Then, Mother, what shall I do? Maya, what is in this sausage?”
“I’m not sure,” said Maya. “It’s not bad, though.”
Sasha agreed. He simply didn’t like eating the unknown.
“Deprive her of … of television,” Lydia said. “For two days.”
Since Pulcharia seldom looked at television, Sasha agreed.
“I would, however, like to ask her why she called you a name,” he said.
“I will ask her about this gross violation the moment I next see her,” said Sasha. “Immediately after dinner I would like to get some sleep.”
“You can sleep in the bedroom,” Lydia said. “Maya can clean up, talk a little, watch the television. We’ll wake you.”
“I’m sure you will,” said Sasha. “But I want to shave, get out of my clothes, shower, and go to sleep in here, with my wife, who will, as usual, have to get up early for work.”
“You want to make love,” Lydia said indignantly.
“That is a possibility,” Sasha agreed, smiling at his wife.
“You take away my last crumb of dignity and you smile,” said Lydia with an enormous sigh.
“You have my full and deep respect,” said Sasha.
