A Whisper to the Living

back.

“A giant?” the man in blue said.

His look was one of incredulity. He turned toward the people in front of him and said, “Have any of you seen a giant?”

They all shook their heads no except for a woman in the group, who said, “Yes,” so softly that it almost escaped without notice.

“You saw the giant?” Iosef asked the woman.

“Yes. He came out of that building.”

She pointed to the building in which Vera Korstov lived.

“Where did he go?” asked Iosef.

“He got into the car that was waiting for him,” the woman said. “Then the car drove off.”

“What kind of car was it?” asked Iosef.

“Blue,” said the old man.

“Green, definitely green,” said another man. “I saw it clearly. One of those little tiny cars.”

“It was a large dark red car with a significant dent in the left rear fender,” said the old man with calm finality.

“Thank you,” Iosef said with only slightly disguised insincerity. “You have been very helpful.”

As he turned to go back to the apartment building to tell the others that a search was unnecessary, he saw Zelach pause, put his feet together, roll his shoulders forward, and place his open palms against each other pointing skyward. Then Zelach bowed his head slowly. All of the sweat-suited people returned the gesture. It was brief. Zelach and the people exchanged a small smile.

As they walked back toward the apartment building, Iosef said, “What was that?”

“The bow is a sign of respect,” said Zelach. “A sign that you are giving up self-importance.”

Iosef shook his head and grinned.

“Akardy Zelach, you are probably the least self-important human I have ever known.”

“It is good to remind oneself.”

“How do you know this?” Iosef asked as they walked.

“My mother and I used to do tai chi exercises three times a week. We did it since I was eight years old. She is not well enough to do it anymore. She insists that I do it without her, but I do it with an empty heart.”

Now they were standing at the curb, more or less where the car had picked up Ivan Medivkin. There was nothing there to see. Iosef looked back at the Chinese man and the others, who had returned to their graceful slow movements. Iosef could not imagine Zelach doing this, but Zelach was not lying. In fact, Akardy Zelach was the worst liar Iosef had ever known.

“Akardy, you are a fountain of confounding information and new revelations. Now if you could only tell me what color that car was. .”

“It was a large dark red car,” Zelach said as they stepped onto the sidewalk.

“The Chinese man is the only one who got it right?”

“Yes. He is the only one both focused and seeing everything around him.”

Iosef looked back at the Chinese man. His eyes were closed as he moved his arms and hands gently and brought his left leg slowly forward with his foot not touching the ground.

“He is looking at us now?”

“Yes,” said Zelach.

“With his eyes closed?”

“He senses and sees,” said Zelach, looking across the street at the man about whom they were speaking.

“A red car?” said Iosef.

“Yes,” said Zelach.

“With a dent in the left rear fender?”

“A significant dent,” said Zelach.

“Let us find it.”

“Out all night. I thought you were dead.”

So Lydia Tkach, mother of Sasha, widow of Borislav, shouted at her son when he came through the door of his apartment, which she had moved into with him almost a year ago. She stood, a small stick of a woman with arms folded, looking at him with a reprimand Sasha had known since he was a small child.

“I was working,” he said.

“What?”

Oh God, thought Sasha, she is not wearing her hearing aids.

“I was working. Working,” he shouted.

“At what?” she said, matching the volume of his words.

There was no point in trying to pass on to her the complexity of what had happened. And even if he did, he would certainly not mention that he had gone to bed with the Englishwoman. Lydia Tkach was a bigot. She distrusted anyone who was not Russian and every nation that was not Russia.

“Protecting someone. I have just come home to shower and change clothes.”

“You smell of perfume,” she answered as he moved toward the bedroom. “You should shower and change your clothes.”

Lydia followed him, arms still folded, into the bedroom where he took clean clothing from the closet and bureau drawers.

“Who is this woman of perfume?” she demanded.

“I must shower and perhaps shave,” he answered as he began to undress.

“She is a flower and a slave?”

“Yes,” said Sasha. “I took her from the harem of a Turkish pasha.”

“She was in a bare room and you took her Turkish kasha? You are going mad or you are trying to make jokes at the expense of your mother.”

Sasha was now wearing only his underpants. He looked at her as he put his thumbs under the elastic. If nothing else would give him respite from his mother, perhaps the sight of his nakedness would force a retreat. He took off his underpants, looking at her as he did so.

“Did she bite you on the thigh? I see a red welt. Did she bite you?”

“No.”

The truth was that he seemed to remember Iris Templeton indeed biting him.

Sasha moved into the tiny bathroom and reached over to turn on the water as he muttered a prayer that he would not have to shave and shower with cold water. He looked over his shoulder at Lydia, who was in the doorway examining his body in search of other violations of his flesh by this woman.

“Mother, leave me in peace for a few minutes.”

“Leave you a piece of what?”

A peace of mind, he said to himself, thanking whatever gods might exist for the hot water he felt with his hand.

“You look like your father,” Lydia shouted without going into a retreat. “He was too skinny like you. You should be in Kiev on your knees begging Maya to come back to Moscow with my grandchildren.”

I have been there and I have done that to no avail, he said to himself as he washed.

“You should not be a policeman,” Lydia cried.

There were few conversations with his mother during the nine years he had been a policeman that she did not show her disapproval of his profession.

“Policemen got shot,” she shouted. “There are crazy people out there. Remember when someone shot Karpo?”

Seven years ago, he thought. That had happened seven years ago and the wound had long since healed.