Requiem For a Glass Heart (18 page)

W
HEN IRINA WOKE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE MORNING, HER LIMBS
were leaden, and the heavy-headed effects of sleep were difficult to shake. Suddenly remembering the Asian woman, she reached across and felt the empty bed. She tried to remember the woman’s face. It wasn’t difficult. Though the episode was almost like a dream, she could remember details of color and touch and fragrance, and most of all the feeling of being comforted, of not being alone.

As she lay in bed, the bedroom door opened, and through blurry eyes she saw a woman in a maid’s uniform enter cautiously, carrying a silver coffee service. She held her breath expectantly as the maid moved out of the shadows into the light nearer the bed.

“Madame?” It was the maid of the morning before.

“Yes,” she said with disappointment, “I’m awake.”

The maid placed the coffee on the small table near the bed and proceeded through the same series of questions as on the previous morning. Did Madame want her to run her bath? No. Did Madame want her to run the shower? No. Did she need any assistance in the bath? No. Did she need … No, thank you, she needed nothing. Very well. Monsieur Wei wished her to join him on the terrace in forty-five minutes. If
Madame required anything, please ring number six on the telephone.

Irina showered again, washing off the oneiric fragrances, all that remained of a nocturnal experience that had been all too rare in her life. She chose a dress that would be comfortable on the flight back to London and went downstairs to the terrace.

Wei, dressed in a summer suit of off-white silk, stood as she came out onto the terrace. He took her hand and held her chair for her to be seated.

“I apologize for not being available when you arrived last night—or rather, this morning,” he said, sitting down and pouring coffee for her from the silver service on the table.

The morning was a precise duplicate of the day before—the rosy late morning sun, the faint sound of Paris muffled by the surrounding woods, and the crows cawing in the tops of the towering chestnuts and pines.

“I wouldn’t have expected you to be awake,” she said, looking at him as he handed her coffee to her.

“Did you get enough sleep?”

“Yes, thank you.” She saw nothing in his face that indicated he knew about her episode with the maid. But then again, perhaps this was not something unique for Wei’s guests. He lived in a manner that might seem exotic to most of them. She decided he knew everything about last night. She also decided she didn’t care.

Wei sat back in his chair with a fresh cup of coffee for himself and smiled at her.

“So how did you find Signor Carlo Bontate?”

“It was an enlightening visit,” she said, buttering a croissant from the tray on the table.

“A long visit.”

Irina assumed the pilot had been debriefed before he was allowed to go to sleep in the small hours of the morning.

“A long visit,” she said.

“Did you like him?”

“I did,” she said. “He is very direct.”

Wei laughed. “Yes, he has that in common with Sergei. They are not all that different in many respects.”

“Really? What else?” Irina thought it was time Wei himself was quizzed a little.

“Ambitious. Direct.” He paused to choose his words
carefully. “Aggressive. Not given to … finesse. Not for very long, anyway.” He looked at her, and his smile faded briefly. “Both men have a utilitarian view of women.”

“You object to that?”

“Perhaps I view it differently.”

“It?”

“The issue.”

Irina nodded and took another bite of the pastry. She was starving. Stress was upsetting her metabolism, and she seemed to be constantly hungry.

“Eleven hours is a long time,” Wei said, finally getting to the point of his conversation.

Irina swallowed the bite of croissant and sipped her coffee. Wei was very curious, but she was under no obligation to tell him anything.

“Yes, it was,” she said, looking at him.

“You were hardly here eleven hours. Much less did we talk that long.”

“And we talked about considerably different things,” she said. “I did not discuss art with Bontate.”

“What did you discuss?”

“He was less comfortable with me than you were. He had to be … reassured.”

“And how did you do that?”

She looked at him a moment before answering. She did not want to appear to be readily submitting to his interrogation.

“I answered his questions,” she said.

“You told him what he wanted to hear.”

“I don’t know how you feel about Carlo Bontate,” she said. “I mean, how you personally feel about him. But I did not find him to be a man who would be satisfied with that kind of response. He did not strike me as someone who would tolerate being patronized.”

“Well, I think you are right on that point, Madame Serova.”

“I did not try to deceive him any more than I tried to deceive you, monsieur. But to be candid, you are suspicious men, and I’m not sure how well I succeeded.”

“Meaning?”

“I doubt that either of you is entirely comfortable with me. You are more polite about it, but you keep your feelings
more in check. But I doubt if you are accepting me without serious concern.”

“You seem to want to defy what is apparent. Have I not told you I trust you?”

“Yes.”

“Then I don’t understand.”

“Of course you do. Sergei trusts me too, but I am not so naive as to believe he is not watching my every move, checking with each of you after my departure to see that I have acquitted myself as I was supposed to.”

“That is only good management.”

“Call it what you will. I am sure that all three of you have talked since I left Marineo last night. I know you have already worked together. You wouldn’t be working together again if you didn’t trust each other at some level. I am only an element, a temporary element, made necessary by the special logistics of your new venture. I am no more than that. I do not want to be any more than that. I have nothing invested in this and want nothing more than to see it done and over.”

Wei had crossed his legs and was regarding her with his favorite wan smile of amusement. He nodded, studying her.

“You are a very direct woman,” he said, pushing his cup away from him and folding his napkin carefully on the edge of the table. “Which is good. I would not have expected any less from Sergei.”

He looked away momentarily toward the light angling across the lawn, a gesture that caused Irina to hear the crows again, their mindless cawing drifting away from them, away toward the Seine. When he turned back to her, there was no smile of amusement on his fine features. She had no doubt that what he was about to say was going to be business at its most intense. At some point, even the polite Asian had to drop all pretense and get to the essence of what he considered important.

“You know, Olya, that men like us have enormous resources for information. You know, I am sure—you have said as much—that you have been the subject of intense investigation by information brokers. This is necessary. I know you have loyalties to Sergei Krupatin, which I accept. All three of us surround ourselves with people we trust, people we believe will be loyal to us under the most extreme circumstances.

“This entire … operation is my idea and has come
about through my careful planning. You are a new element in it and therefore come under considerable scrutiny.” His left hand was lying on the table, resting on the napkin he had just folded. At this point he raised and lowered it from his wrist, a gesture of finality. “I trust you. We will go on with this as planned. But you must know that I will not stop watching you. If I suspect you are deceiving me or in any way working against me, I will have you killed. Without warning.”

They stared at each other.

“I told Sergei this,” he added. “And I told him I was going to tell you. Carlo did not have to be told. He feels the same way I do.”

Irina said nothing. Wei did not ask her to respond.

“I know you understand this,” he said. “Now, having said that, I want to say something else. Your debt to Krupatin is something I cannot evaluate. I only know what you tell me about it. But I would like to make a bid for your fidelity as well.”

He let these last words hang in the air, where they took on a prismatic dimension, a dimension of potential and possibility but also of malevolence, a dimension of finitude as well as infinitude.

Wei’s voice grew soft, and he spoke more slowly. “If at any point in these negotiations you should find yourself in possession of information that would be crucial to me, or if you should discover yourself in a position to be helpful to me, you would find me as generous in that instance as you would find me uncompromising in the other. I am not asking you to betray anyone—you must be clear about that. But if
I
am betrayed-—if something is about to occur that works to my disadvantage and that I do not expect—I would look upon a warning as an act of loyalty worthy of generous reward. I am not seeking an advantage by making you this proposition. Rather, I am wanting to forestall a
disadvantage.”

By making Irina this offer, Wei had immensely complicated an already sophisticated game. She was gathering secrets from each of them; each of them was binding her to the negotiations with something that none of the others knew about. In a very real—and dangerous—sense, she was being woven into the fabric of this triad to a degree that wrapped her in a complex pattern of lies. Truth became a single small
thread smothered and hidden deep within the warp and woof of a dense cloak of deception.

“Why have you said this to me?” she asked, trying to be as clinically frank as Wei. “I am obligated to take this to Krupatin. Surely you know, and understand, that.”

“I know what you’ve told me,” Wei said. “But I have to protect myself. I have to believe that you belong to me in this negotiation as much as you do to Sergei. That has to be the way of it. I would be surprised if Carlo has not done something similar. Don’t you see, there is no such thing as your loyalty to only one of us. That simply is not possible. You have to belong equally to all three of us. Sergei knows this. That is why he sent you around. It may be that each of us will bind you to himself in a different way, to be sure. But I can assure you, once you are bound, the only real way to gain a separation is through surgery … a necessary loss of blood.”

Irina regarded the Asian’s smooth face with as much calm as she could summon. He had to know that she was just as audacious as he was; he had to know that she would not flinch, nor would she be bought into a betrayal.

“Monsieur Wei, I appreciate your position, but you must appreciate mine as well. How can you trust me if you know that Krupatin cannot trust me? You are asking me to arbitrate, to decide on my own when you are being taken at a disadvantage. I am not qualified to do that. I wouldn’t know how.”

“No. I am not asking you to betray Sergei. I am asking you
not to
betray me by your silence if you should become aware of anything kept from me that works to my disadvantage.”

They were playing word games now. The syntax had to be massaged to the point where each of them could live with an acceptable ambiguity. That was the apparent game. The darker game, the game of the subtext, was one that made Irina’s face and chest burn as though she had a fever. She was the point at which all of the vested interests came together, and all of them wanted her
to
insure that those interests were secure. How in God’s name did Sergei Krupatin think she would be able to accomplish what he wanted? The road from here to there was choked with snares. Whatever Krupatin’s plans, she thought he had made a mistake in making her a
pawn in their negotiations. At first she had thought that he intended this arrangement to give her access to her targets. Now she was not so sure. Now she wondered if Krupatin did not have more targets in mind than just the Sicilian and the Asian.

“I can only tell you this,” she said finally. “I will not be a part of any betrayal, yours or his. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life afraid of what is waiting for me around the corner. I want to be able to sleep.”

Wei studied her in silence, nothing showing in his face except concern.

“I believe you,” he said.

W
EI EXCUSED HIMSELF ONLY MOMENTS AFTER THIS EXCHANGE
and left Irina sitting alone at the table on the shady terrace, her heart still pounding from his statement that she had been the subject of an intense investigation. Surely Wei and Bontate had access to the same information brokers as Sergei. These sellers of intelligence were more mercenary than arms dealers and would sell to the highest bidder, good or bad or indifferent. They made no judgments. They gathered information; they sold it. If it resulted in thousands of deaths or one, or none, that was nothing to them.

It always had worked to Krupatin’s advantage that he came from a closed society. In the world of international crime, the Russians had benefited greatly from the fact that they had no past. In the former Soviet Union, secrecy was a way of life, and the information brokers were confronted with perpetual darkness when they sought to buy information within that great gulag archipelago. But with the disintegration of the Soviet empire, with the collapse of the economy—even if it was a false economy—came a new rapacity for survival. Now the files of the secret police, the files from the prison camps and transit centers and espionage organizations, the files of the KGB and State Security, were as valuable
in the world marketplace as the FSU’s nuclear weapons components, which caused so much concern.

What had Wei really learned about her? How good were his sources in Russia?

Suspecting she was being watched, she poured another cup of coffee and sat back to “enjoy” it. It was important that she appear, if not calm, at least not unnerved. Taking another bite of her croissant, she gazed across the lawn toward the splinters of sunlight slicing through the trees. The pastry almost stuck in her throat, as her mouth was too dry to help her swallow. She forced herself to think logically over the sound of her heart pounding in her ears. If she could believe Wei’s threat—and she didn’t doubt it for an instant—she must still have the advantage, since she was still alive. It was small comfort, since the margin of advantage, whether it was one or one hundred, was an unknown factor.

“Madame.”

Irina flinched. She turned and managed an unperturbed expression. “Yes?”

“Monsieur Wei informs you that he had to leave and would you please forgive him.”

Irina nodded.

“Monsieur informs you that a car will be waiting for you in half an hour in the portico.”

Irina looked at her watch. “Thank you.”

She supposed there also would be an airline ticket in the car and directions as to what to do next. This triumvirate of Satans worked very quickly and enigmatically. As best as she could tell, she had passed muster and would be seeing a good deal of Wei and Bontate. Krupatin would be most pleased.

She quietly finished her coffee and croissant, her mind flying in a dozen different directions at once. She hadn’t felt so unsure of herself since the first one. And yet she had passed through a world of hells since then, and she was no longer the same woman. Even her doubts now had more assurance in them than her former confidence had contained. The deep well of her doubts had been filled with the stones of experience and a fatalistic belief that isolation was her only safe refuge.

Suddenly she remembered the time and checked her watch. It was time to go. Putting down her napkin, she got up from the table and left the terrace to go upstairs to pack her
small bag. Inside the house she walked alone through the marble hallways and up the marble staircase to more marble halls. She glanced around to see if she might glimpse the maid of the night before, but the woman was nowhere in sight.

When she got to her room, she found her bag already packed and sitting in the middle of the floor. She went into the bathroom to see if they had missed anything, but they hadn’t. The suite of rooms was as immaculate as if she had never occupied it. There was just her overnight bag sitting in the center, a symbol of her expulsion from this Asian Eden in the heart of Paris.

No one came to carry her bag, which was unnecessary anyway, and she saw no one in the hallways as she descended to the main entrance hall and headed for the portico. She saw no one as she followed the white light of day that glowed from the entrance. Just as she got to the door a car pulled up in front of the steps, so she never even broke her stride as a doorman appeared and opened the outside door for her. A man got out of the front passenger seat of the car—it was not the Bentley this time but a glistening black Mercedes—took her bag, and opened the back door for her. As she stepped into the back seat, she was startled to find someone already there.

“Well done, Irina,” Krupatin said.

She sat down beside him. The car smelled faintly of leather and the French lime cologne he favored.

“What are you doing here?” She tried to act unconcerned, as though his unexpected appearance did not shake her. The Mercedes pulled out of the drive at Rue Férou and glided down the narrow lane toward Rue de Vaugirard.

“I came to get you,” he said, adjusting the white cuff of his shirt at the sleeve of his dark suit. He was neat, precise, not a single gray hair out of place. His mustache was perfectly trimmed, his face as smooth as a polished stone.

“I see that. I could have flown to London without your help.”

“I’m sure. But we are not going to London.” She looked at him.

“We are on our way to the airport, Charles de Gaulle.”

“We?”

He nodded affably.

“I hope you know what you are doing,” she said. Her
heart was pounding again. They had never once traveled together since she had started working for him. When she was on an assignment, she always traveled alone. He was very deliberately thousands of miles away from what she did.

“I know what I’m doing,” he said.

“I suppose it doesn’t matter that I have no clothes.” It was a stupid thing to say, but it was all she could think of. She did not like what was happening. This departure from the usual had a terrible air of finality about it.

“No,” Krupatin said. “Listen, I’ve talked to both that fat Sicilian and the Chinese. They love you. Wei wants to have sex with you.”

Krupatin laughed and shook his head and laughed some more. Irina turned away and stared out the window. Paris. It would be a good place to die. If there was nothing after that, then at least your last thoughts would be thoughts amid the sounds and sights and smells of a beautiful city. In the end, what more could you want than beauty? It was free. Anybody could appreciate it—the wealthy, the poor, the healthy, the dying. Paris would be a good place to die.

“What in the hell did you tell them, anyway?” Krupatin asked with a lewd smile. “What kind of promises did you make? Huh? Irina?” he said, nudging her as she continued to stare out the window. They had turned onto Boulevard St.-Michel and were approaching the Seine. “Hey, tell me, huh?” He was grinning, in a good mood.

“Did Wei tell you he would kill me if he suspected me of deceiving him?” she asked, still looking out the window.

“What? Oh, of course. He says things like that.”

“He told me he did a background check on me.”

“So?”

“What could he find out?”

“Not very damn much, huh? You would already be dead, wouldn’t you? No, Wei is satisfied. Believe me. I swear to God, he was absolutely charmed. That business about the painting—pigments. I knew that would work. Good God. You would have thought he had met a queen.”

“You might have told me some of that,” she said. “If you are going to create background for me, you’d better let me in on it.”

“I didn’t have to. That
is
your background.”

She turned on him angrily. “What’s the matter with you,
Sergei? This is no game, damn you. If you want me to do this, then let me do it. You’re going to get us both killed if you insist on
dabbling in
this. I can’t even believe this is happening. What do you expect me to do?” She glared at him. “How in God’s name do you think we can do this?”

Krupatin let this frantic burst hang in the air between them a moment. They looked at each other.

“This one has to be different,” he said calmly. “Dramatically different. Just the opposite of the others, in fact. Irina,” he said with sarcastic composure, “you are not on your own this time. I am going to be directing you, and you have to do as I say. I know these two men. I know how they think, what they want, and what they will do to get it. I have studied these men, and I know what they are thinking right now. I know what they will be thinking in two days. I know how they are going to react when you meet them again in Houston.”

“When will they both be in Houston?”

“Two days.”

Her eyes held his unblinkingly. “What happens if you make a mistake?”

He stared at her. “You would be surprised how little thought I give to that possibility.”

“Then you are a fool, Sergei.”

Silence.

“Five years ago you may have been able to say that with some authority,” he said, “but not anymore. I know you too, Irina, just like I know them. I know that inside that beautiful body you carry around on your skeleton is an emotional disaster. I can see it in your eyes. I even felt it in your sex.” He shook his head, an expression of bored pity on his face. “You don’t have long to go, I can tell you that. So do you think it makes sense that you should be giving me advice? Every time I see you I have to put you back together, and every time it gets harder and harder to do. So I’m relieving you of all the responsibility of planning this time. All you have to do is follow instructions—go here, go there, say this, say that, do this, do that. I have it planned down to every … last … breath.” He smiled at his double entendre. “Listen, you do one thing exceedingly well. Do it two more times, and then you can go to hell.”

She turned away and looked out the window of the car
again. The beautiful city was passing by outside her window—the Boulevard de Sébastopol.

“Of course, you always have a choice,” he said. “In that respect, this time is no different from the others.”

It was like reminding a leper of her disease or a saint of her salvation; the choice was never out of her mind for a moment. She could neither ignore it nor forget it. It was both her bondage and her deliverance; it drove her toward madness and rescued her sanity; it was, in fact, the one thing that defined her.

The beautiful city was passing by outside her window.

She had no idea how much time streamed away, how many people saw her face in the window of the car, how much architecture she saw without comprehending it. The car moved on, and she moved with it, she and smirking Satan, riding to hell together in his black Mercedes.