Red Square - Martin Cruz Smith [128]
“Seriously.”
“Seriously, I will wear different clothes every day and walk into your life until you say, ‘This is just what Arkady Renko should look like; this is the proper suit.’ ”
“You wouldn’t let go?”
“Not now.”
Arkady Described how the breath of a reindeer herd crystallized and fell like snow. He talked about salmon runs on Sakhalin, the white-headed eagles of the Aleutians and waterspouts that danced around the Bering Sea. He’d never thought before of what a catalog of experiences his exile had brought to him, how unique and beautiful they were, what clear evidence that on no day could a man be sure he should not open his eyes.
They had a lunch of microwaved pizza. Delicious.
He told her how the first wind of the day approaching through the taiga made the million trees shiver like black birds taking flight. He talked about oil field fires that burned year-round, beacons that could be seen from the moon. He described walking from trawler to trawler across the Arctic ice. Sounds and sights not afforded most investigators.
They had red wine.
He talked about workers on the “slime line,” the dark hold where fish were gutted in a factory ship, and how each individual was a separate mind with a fantasy unconfined by gunwales or decks—a defender of the Party who had taken to the sea in search of romance, a botanist who dreamed of Siberian orchids, each person a lamp on a separate world.
After finishing the wine, they had brandy.
He described the Moscow he had found on his return. Center stage, a dramatic battlefield of warlords and entrepreneurs; behind it, as still as a painted backdrop, eight million people standing in line. Yet there were moments, the occasional dawn when the sun was low enough to find a golden river and blue domes, and the entire city seemed redeemable.
The Warmth of patrons and the steam of the machines had produced a film of condensation on the window that diffused the light and color of the street. Something caught Irina’s eye and she wiped the glass. Max was outside. How long had he been looking in?
He entered and said, “You two seem to be getting on like a pair of conspirators.”
“Join us,” Arkady offered.
“Where have you been?” Max asked Irina. His manner was alarmed, relieved, alarmed, in three rapid steps. “You haven’t been at the station all day. People were worried about you; we were out searching for you. You and I were supposed to go to Berlin.”
“Talking to Arkady,” Irina said.
Max asked, “Are you finished?”
“No.” Irina took one of Arkady’s cigarettes and lit it. She made it a drawn-out gesture of unconcern. “Max, if you’re in a hurry, go to Berlin. I know you have business there.”
“We both have business there.”
“My business can wait,” Irina said.
Max was absolutely still for a moment, reevaluating Irina and Arkady together, then dropped his brusque manner as easily as his hat, which he shook free of rain. Arkady remembered Stas’s description of him as liquid, the master of a changing situation.
Max smiled, pulled up a third chair, settled and gave Arkady a nod of acknowledgment. “Renko, I’m amazed you’re still here.”
Irina said, “Arkady has been telling me what he was doing the last few years. It’s different from what I’d heard.”
Max said, “He was probably modest. People claim he was the darling of the Party. A well-earned status, I’m sure. Who knows what to believe?”
“I know,” Irina said. She blew smoke Max’s way.
He brushed it aside, considered his hand as if he had caught a cobweb and raised his eyes to Arkady. “So how is your investigation going?”
“Not well.”
“No arrests imminent?”
“Far from it.”
“And you must be running out of time.”
“I was thinking of abandoning the entire case.”
“And?”
“Staying.”
“Really?” Irina said.
“You’re joking,” Max said. “You came all the way to Munich to give up? Where’s your patriotic duty, your sense of pride?”
“I have very little country left and I certainly have no pride.”
“Arkady doesn’t have to be the last man in Russia,” Irina said.
“You know, some people