Last Snow - Eric van Lustbader [34]
At last, Dyadya Gourdjiev expelled a deep sigh. “The truth. There is a millipede, I’m told, somewhere in Asia, the Mekong region perhaps, that manufactures cyanide. The truth is this act of killing another human implants just such a creature. With each death, the insect releases more of its poison, until the heart of the assassin withers and dies. In just this way, Karl Rochev became a man without conscience, without a moral compass. Without his heart, he lost interest in distinguishing good from evil.”
“So when there was no more need for an underground, when Ukraine freed itself from the Soviets, he became a criminal,” Jack said.
“A politician,” Dyadya Gourdjiev said. “But then, as we all know, the two are indistinguishable.”
EIGHT
“THIS IS why I know Karl is the man you seek.” Dyadya Gourdjiev snared a cookie between two fingers free of the crooks and unnatural bends of arthritis. As he contemplated it, he turned it, revealing first the top, then the bottom. “Politicians,” he said. “Your senator and Karl, two sides of the same coin, pulled inexorably together even from opposite sides of the world.”
The old man gave the cookie to Alli then, taking another, popped it into his mouth whole, crunching on it happily. When he’d swallowed the last crumbs, he continued, “Your senator—what was his name again?”
“Lloyd Berns,” Jack offered.
“Yes, your Senator Berns would have had to meet with Karl if he wanted to get anything accomplished in Ukraine.” He cocked his head. “Have you any idea why the senator was in Kiev?”
“So far as anyone knows, he was here on a Senate fact-finding mission, but his very last appointment was with K. Rochev,” Jack said, “and it wasn’t official, which is what caught my attention.”
The old man eyed him carefully, listening perhaps for a misstep on Jack’s part—if, for instance, Jack had said “what caught our attention,” which would have given him the opening to ask who, precisely, Jack worked for. As a lifetime forger, he was not in the habit of asking such questions outright.
“Then it’s Karl you want to speak with.” He stood and walked across to a hand-rubbed rosewood table with cabriole legs as delicate as a fawn’s. For a moment, he rummaged through some papers until he found a much earmarked address book. He didn’t look like the kind of man to rely on Outlook. He made two quick phone calls, then turned back to his guests.
“As I suspected, you won’t find him at the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, our parliament. Likewise, it would avail you nothing to seek him out at home; you’d find only his wife and his mother, though, in truth, there’s little to distinguish them.” He shook his head. “No, if history is prelude to the present, today being Friday, Karl will be with his current mistress. He will be with her all weekend.”
“Do you know her name or where he might be keeping her?” Jack asked.
“As I said, Karl and I haven’t been in touch for years. It’s a curious thing with longtime compatriots in their old age, they sometimes have a falling out. Ours was quite bitter. He’s dead to me. However, all is not lost, Mr. McClure, if I can find a certain number.” He paged through the book, moistening his forefinger every so often to ease the process. “Ah, here it is. Milla Tamirova.” Reaching for a pencil, he wrote a few lines on a scratch pad, ripped off the top sheet and, turning back, handed it to Jack. “Milla Tamirova was Karl’s mistress at the time he and I parted ways. I very much doubt that she still is, since he changes girls like other people rotate the tires on their cars. But she might know who his current one is.”
“Why would she know that?” Jack asked.
“All of Karl’s mistresses came from one stable.”
“Why bother paying?” Alli asked. “So far as I can see there seem to be a hundred willing girls for every man in Moscow and I imagine the same’s true here.”
The old man smiled as he wagged a finger at her. “A clever one here. Of course, there’s a reason. The stable mistress trains all the girls in different, er, disciplines.”
“Your friend’s into fetishes,” Alli said without