“These people whacked Goncharov at a top secret safe house. Before we go walking into a police station or FBI office, we had better figure out how they did it. We make one mistake, we’re dead.”
She tossed off the last of the whiskey, then snagged a piece of ice and sucked noisily on it. She looked at Dorsey, then met my eyes. “I want to see the bastards dead.”
“That’s the spirit.” I stood and took the empty glass. “Get a good night’s sleep. We’ll talk in the morning. I warn you. Don’t make any telephone calls. The killers know we got away. They’re going to be moving heaven and earth to find us. Let’s not make it easy for them.”
“I’ve got a boyfriend,” she objected. “And parents and a couple of girlfriends who really care about me. They are going to be worried sick.”
“We’ll worry about that when and if your name gets in the press.”
“You don’t think that—?”
“Bet the press never hears a whisper. Now get some sleep. We’ll talk in the morning.”
“Okay.”
I shooed Dorsey out of the room and turned off the light, then pulled the door shut.
“Who’s the guy?” I asked Dorsey, referring to the pork chop by the fireplace.
“Just a friend.”
“Sorry about dropping in on you like this. If you’ll give him a raincheck, I’ll tell you how we spent our day.”
To her credit, Dorsey didn’t hesitate. She led the way down the stairs. I went to the kitchen while she said good-bye to her guest. I knew where the liquor and ice were, so I made myself a drink while she attended to that. When she came into the kitchen I was sitting in the breakfast nook working on bourbon and a chunk of cheese from the fridge.
She poured herself some wine, then sat down across from me.
“How you been?” I asked conversationally.
She brushed that aside. “You used the word ‘killers’ to that woman upstairs. This had better be good.”
“Your cook and maid? They here tonight?”
“No.”
I shrugged. We needed her cooperation, so I told her about the bodies in the rain, the assassins, and the fire.
The archivist awoke when the woodstove began cooling. It took several seconds for him to remember where he was, why he was there. The stove still had glowing coals in it, so he added more wood. He left the iron door to the stove open and, when the wood burst into flames, used the dim light to explore his surroundings.
The cabin had no electricity. He found a candle and lit it. With that in hand, he examined the contents of the cupboard. A box of crackers caught his eye. He stripped off his damp clothes, arranged them on a chair to dry, then wrapped himself in the blanket and attacked the crackers.
Bunks lined the wall opposite the door. Fishing rods stood in one corner. An old coat hung from a peg near the door. The little cabin was snug and warm, much like the vacation dacha he used to visit in Russia. With Bronislava.
All that was past, finished. She was dead, murdered.
The killers would probably find him soon. If they thought him dead in the rubble of the CIA outpost, he would have a little time before they came. But they would come. Of that Mikhail Goncharov was certain. He knew the Russian secret police — for more than twenty years he had spent his working life reading their case files. They never gave up. They would hunt an enemy of the state to the ends of the earth no matter what the cost, no matter how long it took. They would get him. One day, as inevitably as the turning of the earth, they would find and kill him.
He had traded his life and her life for…
For what?
He fed more wood into the stove and sat staring at the flames.
He had spent his life surrounded by evil. In the end it had consumed all that he loved. Consumed everything and left him with nothing.
CHAPTER EIGHT
When I finished my summarization of the day’s events, Dorsey O’Shea asked, “Who are you, Tommy? Really?” She was sitting across from me in her breakfast nook in her silk hostess dress that looked as if she had nothing on underneath, her chin on one hand, staring at me with narrowed eyes.
“Just a guy in over his head.”
“You don’t expect me to believe all that hooey, do you?” She got up from her chair. “Killers, car wrecks, Russian spies … sounds like something from a movie. Things like that don’t happen in real life. Give me a break!”
The irony of the moment was not lost on me. Why do women refuse to believe me when I tell the truth, yet buy every word when I lie to them? I finished my drink and stood. “Help me un-load the car.”
She didn’t want to — that was plain. While she was trying to figure out a way to toss me out of the house on my keester, she reluctantly trailed along behind me. The first thing I pulled from the trunk of the car was the MP-5. I handed it to her. “Carry this. And be careful — it’s loaded.”
I got my soft bag, closed the trunk, then led the way back into the house. She followed along carrying the gun in both hands.
I sat down on one of the sofas near the fireplace, took the gun from her, and laid it on the floor.
“That’s a submachine gun?”
“Yep.”
“Never saw one before.”
“Help me with this suitcase.” It was sitting by the end of the couch. I pulled it around and opened it, then brought out several handfuls of paper, which at this stage of the game were smashed in there like so much trash. I passed her a couple handfuls.
Goncharov had tiny, cramped handwriting, nearly illegible. The fact that he used the Cyrillic alphabet and wrote in Russian didn’t help. It could have been Sanskrit for all I knew. I pondered that verity for a moment — the bodies I had seen that morning had been real enough, and the man I killed hadn’t faked it, yet I had no verification for Kelly’s statement that these notes were purloined copies of KGB files. Were they? Really?
After a minute or two Dorsey put the pages I had given her back in the suitcase. She placed two more slabs of wood on the fire, poked it up some, then sat down beside me on the sofa and stared moodily at the flames.
The silence grew and grew. “Was the guy the fiance?” I asked finally.
“Oh, no. We broke up months ago.” She shrugged dismissively. “Geoff is an outside artist. I am thinking about sponsoring him.”
“Outside? He does statues in the park?”
“No, silly. He’s outside the establishment. He has no formal artistic training.”
“Oh.” The fire popped a few times, then settled down. “Guess I’m an outside artist, too.”
She gave me a withering look.
“How come you never suggested sponsoring me?”
“For Christ’s sake, Tommy! You killed several men today, and now you’re sitting here in front of my fire trying to be funny.”
“I’m just happy to be alive.”
“I never met anyone so callous.”
I made a rude noise. Then I kicked off my shoes, stretched, wiggled my toes, and indulged in a huge yawn. Frankly, I felt pretty good … tired and mellow. You gotta admit, being alive has its attractions.
“I want a drink,” she said, and stood. “Do you?”
“Sure. Whiskey, please.”
