Bobby looked up, his eyes hot and wet. 'Pasha asked me.'
'To visit the tomb?' Arkady said.
'No. All he wanted was that I prayed, that I said the Kaddish. I told him I didn't do that stuff. Pasha said, 'Go, you'll do it.' He insisted so much I couldn't say no. But I got here and it didn't matter. I couldn't.'
'Why not?'
'I didn't pray for my father. He died in prison, but he wanted a Kaddish, from me especially, only I was already on the run over some stock swap. Unimportant. The thing is, I blew it. And what the hell kind of deal did God give my father, anyway? Half his life in jail, a disease that took half his body, my mother for a wife and me for a son. So I signed off on all this stuff. I just don't do it.'
'What did you tell Pasha when you got back to Moscow?'
'I lied. The only favor he ever asked of me, and I let him down. And he knew it.'
'Why did he choose you?'
'Who else would he? I was his guy. Besides, I told him once I was a yeshiva kid. Me, Bobby Hoffman. Can you believe it?'
Before Bobby went completely down the emotional drain, Arkady wanted to get the facts straight. 'The men facing the river were saying Kaddish for Jews killed in the pogrom eighty years ago?' A listless nod. 'And that's what Pasha Ivanov sent you from Moscow to join?'
'It had to be Chernobyl.'
'To say a prayer for victims of the pogrom here.' That, at least, seemed understood.
Bobby had to laugh. 'You don't get it. Pasha wanted a Kaddish for Chernobyl, for victims of the accident.'
'Why?'
'He wouldn't say. I asked. And after I went back to Moscow, he never mentioned it again. Months went by, and apparently no harm done, and then Pasha dives out a window and Timofeyev comes here to get his throat cut.'
Well, there had been a few signs of trouble brewing, Arkady thought. Isolation, paranoia, nosebleeds.
Bobby said, 'Somehow I can't help but believe that if I had only prayed when Pasha asked, he and Timofeyev would be alive today.'
'Was someone watching you?' Arkady asked.
'Who would watch?'
'The camera watched.'
'Do you think it would have made any difference?' Bobby asked.
'I don't know.'
Out of mercy, Arkady switched tapes and stepped into the hall with Yakov.
'Clever,' Yakov said. The eye under the crushed brow shone in the light of the moon.
'Not really. I think Bobby has been trying to tell us this since he arrived. That's probably why he came.'
'Now that he has, do you have a way to take us out?'
'I have an individual in mind.'
'Trustworthy?'
Arkady weighed Bela's character. 'Reliable but greedy. How much money do you have?'
'Whatever he wants, if we get to Kiev. On us now, maybe two hundred fifty dollars.'
'Not much.'
'It's what we have left.'
Not enough, Arkady thought. 'That will have to do, then. Keep Bobby as quiet as possible and take off his shoes. And keep the television on; as long as the housekeeper thinks the Englishman's here, she won't go in.'
'You know Ozhogin?'
'A little. He'll watch your car and the house first. Then he'll strike into the field. He's more a spy than military; he likes to operate alone. He might bring two or three men. All he'll want from Marchenko is to keep the checkpoints closed. When you leave, I'll follow you out.'
'No, I operate alone, too.'
'You don't know Colonel Ozhogin.'
'I've known a hundred Ozhogins.' Yakov took a deep breath. Outside, the taller trees were starting to separate from the night. The first birdsong rang out. 'Such a day. Rabbi Nahum said no man was beyond redemption. He said redemption was established before the creation of the world itself, that's how important redemption is. No one can take it away.'
Arkady went into his own room and packed, if for no other reason than to give the impression that he was leaving and following orders. His life-case notes and clothing-fit into a small suitcase and duffel bag with room to spare. There were flights all day to Moscow. He had options. He could change from camos, bungee-cord the suitcase and bag to the rear fender of the motorcycle and look like any other office worker making an early commute to the city. If he raced, he might still catch a plane and get to the prosecutor's office by noon. Where would Zurin assign him next? Was there a position for a senior investigator out on the permafrost? The people of the Arctic Circle were said to be full of life. He was ready for a laugh.
He noticed, at the top of his file, the employment application for NoviRus. He was surprised to find he still had it. He scanned the opportunities. Banking? Brokerage? Security or combat skills? It did nothing for his confidence to realize he had not one marketable talent. Certainly not communication skills. He wished he could start the night over again, beginning with Zurin's call, and clarify to Eva what he was doing. Not going, only helping a criminal flee the Zone. Was that better?
Bela was already up, having a daybreak coffee in front of CNN, when Arkady arrived.
'I always like to hear the weather in Thailand. I picture listening to the soft rain as Thai girls walk up and down my back, kneading it with their little toes.'
'Not Russian girls in boots?'
'A different picture altogether. Not necessarily a bad one. I judge no one. In fact, I always liked those Soviet statues of women with powerful biceps and tiny tits.'
'You've been here too long, Bela.'
'I take time off. I see the doctor. I walk around the whole yard every day. That's a 10K walk.'
'Let's walk,' Arkady said.
The scale of the yard was best appreciated on foot. As it broke the horizon the sun turned shadowy canyons into the neat ranks of a necropolis. The endless rows of poisoned vehicles evoked the hundreds of thousands of soldiers who had dug, bulldozed and loaded radioactive debris. The trucks were here. Where were the men? Arkady wondered. No one had kept track.
'Two passengers,' Arkady said. 'You take them out like your usual customers.'
'But they're not regular customers. Things out of the ordinary make me nervous.'
'Selling radioactive auto parts is ordinary?'
'Get out while you're ahead.'
'I could. I should be reaping the benefits of my labor, not living in a graveyard. The situation with Captain Marchenko has become intolerable, the bastard's always trying to get me dismissed.'
'Does he ever stop your van?'
'He wouldn't dare. I have more friends upstairs than he docs, because I'm generous and spread the money around. When you think about it, I have a good thing going here. I'm the only one in the Zone with a good thing going. I'm sitting pretty.'
'You're sitting in the middle of a radioactive dump.'
Bela shrugged. 'Why should I jeopardize that for two men I don't know?'
'For five hundred dollars that you don't have to spread around.'
'Five hundred? If you called a taxi from Kiev, he'd charge you for both ways, two people, luggage. A hundred dollars, easy. And then he couldn't get past the checkpoint.'
'What are you moving today?'
