Wolves Eat Dogs

'Who did they call?'

'Who called who?'

'At the samogon party, you did a hilarious impersonation of the control-room technicians, how they blew up the reactor and had to report to Moscow. Who in Moscow did they call?'

'You're serious? What does it matter?'

'Who?'

'It was a chain. The minister of energy, the director of power-plant construction, the minister of health, Gorbachev, the Politburo.'

'And who did they call? Someone respected, with firsthand experience in nuclear disasters. I think they called Felix Gerasimov. They called your father.'

'That's a guess.'

'It can be checked.'

Alex seemed to consider a wide range of responses. With self-control, he picked up Arkady's motorcycle and dusted off the saddle. 'A good trip home, Renko. Be careful.'

A thought struck Arkady. 'You said you had an understanding with me. Do you have an understanding with Eva?'

Alex smiled, caught out. 'I said I wouldn't hurt you.'

16

Bela tucked Bobby and Yakov into jump seats behind a washed and brushed Kamaz V8 in a wooden cradle and security straps.

'Not hidden but not seen,' Bela said. 'It's going to go down like cream. I've done this a hundred times. As soon as we get going, I'll turn on the air conditioner. I guarantee a good time.'

Yakov kept one hand on the gun inside his jacket and smiled like a grandpa. Bobby held onto his laptop.

Arkady glanced at Bela's CDs. 'Your Tom Jones collection?'

'It's a long drive.'

Bobby rallied enough to say, 'Renko, you remind me of a dog I once had. With one eye, three legs, no tail. Answered to the name Lucky. That's you. You never know when to stop.'

'Probably not.' Arkady wasn't sure it was a compliment.

'Ozhogin is really coming?'

'I think so.'

Yakov nodded. Wonderful, Arkady thought, the paranoids agree.

Bobby said, 'One thing, Renko. Tell me you're staying because you know who killed Pasha. Tell me you're close.'

Arkady let his fingers lie: he held his thumb and forefinger a centimeter apart and slid the van door shut.

'Where are you?' Zurin demanded. 'I expected you here in this office an hour ago.'

'I'm sorry. That flight was overbooked,' Arkady said.

'To Moscow?'

'Yes.'

'Where are you right now? I hear shouts.'

'On the plane.' Arkady was in Campbell 's dormitory room. The professor himself was curled up in the bottom of the shower stall, and a tape of a soccer game between Liverpool and Arsenal was on the television.

'What flight number?' the prosecutor asked. 'When are you landing in Moscow?'

'Can Colonel Ozhogin meet me?'

'No.'

'How do you know? You haven't asked him.'

'I'm sure he's busy. When are you landing?'

'They're telling us to turn off our mobile phones.'

'How could you-'

Arkady ended the call. That was the problem with long leashes, he thought. You couldn't tell whether the dog was at the other end or not.

He hoped he had done one thing right and gotten Bobby and Yakov safely out of Chernobyl. It wasn't like rescuing babes from a fire, but Arkady was willing to celebrate small accomplishments. Yakov's expression at the end might have been the ghost of a smile.

He cleared Campbell's desk enough to write a list of what he knew about Timofeyev: the pivotal relationship with Pasha lvanov, their paired careers, their similar poor health and poisoning, the letter that Timofeyev had mentioned at Pasha's charity party, the discovery of Timofeyev's body in the Zone by what Militia Officer Karel Katamay had reported as a local squatter. Everything parallel to Ivanov except his death; that was different. The only person as ill as they were, in the same extraordinary fashion, was Karel Katamay. Katamay was the key, and he was a wraith in the woods. Or hidden in Pripyat near the theater, at least during the day, while the Woropay brothers were on duty.

Arkady's task was to avoid Ozhogin. The colonel would consider him the most likely lead to Bobby, and Arkady suspected that he enjoyed gathering information. Arkady had taken the precaution of hiding his motorbike in back of a woodpile behind the dormitory. Of course, Ozhogin's arrival might be a figment of Arkady's imagination, and the urgency in Zurin's commands merely revealed excitement at having Arkady near.

In the meantime, Arkady hydrated the wilted Campbell with a glass of water and a lukewarm shower; any decent guest would have.

Victor called. 'You were right about the travel office. Anton and Galina picked up tickets for Morocco.'

'For when?' Arkady felt apologetic: he had completely forgotten about Anton. He paced, negotiating empty bottles on the floor. On the television Liverpool still played Arsenal.

'Two days. I caught the travel agent on the way down and bought her a coffee.'

'You chatted up the agent?' The newly attired Victor must be much less frightening than the old one, Arkady thought.

'I chatted up an agent. Did you know that it's often cheaper for two people to travel than one?'

'You're getting very sophisticated.'

'But there's more to it than that. We were having our coffees, the travel agent and I, when Anton and Galina came out of the building. See, after the agent. So, they must have gone into the dentist's office. That just struck me as odd. Where was the dentist?'

'Dr. Levinson?' No inspiration in Liverpool. Arkady switched to England versus Holland. From the 1990s. A classic.

'That's right. There was a phone number on her office sign. I called it and a voice said she was going on a month's vacation starting tomorrow. It was a sweet voice, but not a well-educated voice, and my bet is it was our lovely Galina. I worry about the dentist.'

'Why?'

'You know where Anton went from there? A bank. I ask you, since when does Anton Obodovsky use a legitimate bank? He launders money or he buys diamonds. He does not stand in line like a normal person at an ordinary bank. Something is going on.'

'What?'

'I don't know. Whatever it is, I have a feeling that when he and Galina take off to Morocco they're not going to leave any loose ends behind. If so, I am very disappointed in Galina.'

'Where is Anton now?' It was the end of the soccer match. Arkady could tell because the British fans were ripping out grandstand railings and hurling them at police.

'The last I saw, he and Galina were tearing along the river in a new Porsche convertible. Real lovebirds.'

Klaxon wailing, a bus pulled onto the field and disgorged Dutch police with helmets and shields.

Victor said, 'By the way, you may be right about Alex Gerasimov. He either fell or jumped off a four-story