“It’s going to be all right,” he said.
“No,” she said. “It can never be all right.”
He released her gently and stood. She was leaning forward now, still wiping her eyes periodically with the back of her hand. She looked frail, almost childlike in her vulnerability, a world away from the cynical sophisticate of his first acquaintance.
“What will you do with me?”
“I spoke to someone who knows you well,” he said quietly. “And she said that, of all the Russian girls here, your circumstances were the most impaired.”
“Mrs. Orlov, from the Majestic.”
“What did she mean?”
Natasha lowered her eyes. “I don’t know.”
“If you don’t help me, I cannot help you.”
She looked up, the hurt deep. “No one can help me, Richard.”
“You’re wrong.”
“No I’m not.”
“In what way are your circumstances impaired?”
She shook her head. “Do what you want with me, but please don’t ask me any more questions about it.”
Field felt his mouth tightening. “How did you become one of Lu’s girls?”
“I cannot talk about him.” There was another long silence as Natasha wrestled with herself. “Lena . . .” She stopped.
“Go on.”
“I . . . There was someone new. You asked if there was someone else, and it was true, there was. He . . . Lena did not talk about it, about him.”
“For how long before her death?”
“About two months. She seemed happier, as if something good had finally happened to her.”
“Lu asked her to see someone else?”
Natasha nodded.
“Do you have any idea who it might have been? Did she give you any clues? His nationality, for example, or the type of work he did? Or why Lu would be wishing her to do this?”
Natasha shook her head.
“Does he often ask his women to see other men?”
“He has many women, and many uses for them.”
Field wanted to know, more than he had ever wanted to know anything in his life, whether Natasha had slept with Lu, whether she was forced to lie down and degrade herself beneath that sallow, scarred face, and before he could stop it, he was assaulted by an image of the two of them together, naked, Lu’s portly manicured fingers on her dark smooth skin.
He stood up, stepped over to the door, and looked out of the grille before coming back and resuming his seat. She was sitting demurely, her arms wrapped around her legs, looking at him.
“Natalya Simonov, Lena Orlov, Irina Ignatiev—stabbed so many times, crying out in pain, screaming in agony and terror, but nobody heard them.” He looked at her. “And even now, nobody can hear them.”
She lowered her head again, staring at the bed.
“All Lu’s girls. Who is next, I wonder?”
She did not answer.
“Perhaps it’s you?” he said at length.
She went on staring down.
“Do you have any cigarettes?” he asked.
Natasha straightened, fumbled in her raincoat pocket, and then threw the box toward him.
“Do you want one?”
She shook her head.
Field lit one and inhaled heavily, enjoying the smoke and the way it brought momentary relief from the smell. He looked at Natasha and then stood once more. “I want to get you out of here.”
Caprisi was at the door, his face against the grille. Field wondered how long he had been watching. “Macleod wants a word, polar bear.”
Field stepped out of the cell and wiped the sweat from his forehead. Caprisi pulled him away from the door so that they could not be heard. “Macleod has heard she is in, and he wants her.”
“What do you mean, wants her?” Field’s heart was thumping again.
“He wants her to go down, as a warning to Lu. She’ll get fifteen years and there will be fuck-all Lu can do
