The Fifth Man (14 page)

“What about the two wounds?” Chris Massi asked. “Uncle Frank said there were two wounds. Did you have to shoot him twice.”

“Yes, I did,” Matt replied without hesitation, thinking,
I should have known he’d speak to Frank.
And then a worse thought
: he knows I’m lying.
“I was nervous. I missed low with the first shot.”

“How did it feel?” Chris asked.

“I don’t know. Inevitable.”

26.

Prague, September 1, 2012, 2:00 p.m.

Of the women whose pictures he had fallen in love with, Tess Massi was the first Max French had spent any time with. Or even met for that matter. He had never been formally introduced to the beautiful redhead, Megan Nolan, nor could you call the five minutes he was in her presence before she was killed in an abandoned hunting lodge as having spent time with her. The same went for Jeanne-Claude Robiana, the woman who had slowly killed her husband with rat poison in Paris. A reporter then, he had covered her arrest and attended every minute of her trial, but there was all that distance between them. Now he found himself walking over the Charles Bridge on a beautiful late summer day with Tess Massi, feeling guilty about the photograph of her he kept in his jacket pocket, and shy to the point of
psychosomatic-muteness
, a term used by psychiatrists to describe the shell he went into after watching his stepfather kill his mother when he was thirteen.

“Max,” Tess said.

“Sorry, yes?”

“Are you with me?”

“Yes, of course.”

“You were drifting.”

“No, I was assessing our situation.”

“What situation?”

“The pedestrians around us, the vendors, the guy on stilts with the striped pants and wig, the boat that just passed under the bridge.”

This was not a lie. Situational awareness was for Max a near automatic, near constant function of his brain and his senses. At the same time as he was remembering the term psychosomatic muteness, he was seeing and hearing the man on the sightseeing boat, in a blue vest and bowtie, microphone in hand, describing the sights of Prague to his passengers.
The Charles Bridge with its historic Gothic Towers was built in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Construction began in 1347 under the auspices of King Charles IV…
he remembered hearing.

Tess, absorbing this, remained silent, which was fine with Max, but alas, not only was Tess beautiful, she was also normal in all respects, including her eagerness to talk to the man who would be watching over her until she left Prague.
The mysterious Max French
, she had said when they were introduced,
at last
. This did not bode well, and now here he was.

“Is that something I’ll learn how to do in Arizona?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“My father said you teach there.”

“Sometimes.”

“I’m sorry I forced you to do this.”

“You mean take a walk?”

“Yes.”

“You have to get out.”

“You could have sent one of the other guys.”

“No, I couldn’t.” If you get hurt or taken, I’m a dead man, so no, it has to be me who takes the two walks a day with you.

“Let’s start now,” Tess said.

“Start what?”

“My training.”

“Tess…can I call you Tess?”

A second of silence. Two seconds. The man on the stilts was a woman. She had breasts. He had given her a wide berth and seen their profile under her bright red shirt. She was behind them now, handing a balloon to a small child.

“Of course,” Tess said.

Silence. The bridge was fine.

“Max.”

“Yes?”

“Can we start now? I mean it.”

“The person on the stilts,” Max said. “Was it a man or a woman?”

“I don’t know. A man I assume.”

“Did you notice the wig?”

“How could I miss it?”

“What color?”

“Purple.”

“It was a woman. What would you do if she approached us?” Tess turned to look back at the stilt person, now some twenty yards away.

“I don’t know?”

“Move to the side. And if she reached into her pants pocket?”

Silence.

“Go low. Knock her off her stilts. Pull your weapon. Point it at her head from behind.”

“Max, are you serious?”

“Yes and no.”

“You sound like my father.”

I’m forty-five
, Max thought,
old enough to be your father. And of course your father…well, I work for him.
As he thought this, Max could not stop himself from thinking about the sound of his name coming from Tess’s lips, of how her voice made such a stupid name sound…sound what?
Normal, a nice name for a man to have.
Fuck
. Stop it, Max.

“That’s a compliment,” Max said.

“What, that you sound like my father?”

“Yes.”

“Tell me about Arizona. I’m nervous about what to expect. Very nervous.”

“Everyone there will be nervous. Even your instructors.”

“Why?”

“I’ll tell you one overall concept. So that you won’t be killed, err on the side of killing.”

Silence.

“Do you know how to use a knife?”

“No, of course not.”

“Tomorrow, instead of taking a walk I’ll teach you the fundamentals.”
The proximity will kill me, but I’ll do it.

“Good, thank you.”

“No problem.”

“Max?”

“Yes?”

“What happened? Why are you so shy?’

Max’s throat suddenly became very dry. He stopped walking. With some effort, he worked up some saliva and swallowed. He opened his mouth to talk, but nothing came out.

“Don’t answer,” Tess said, taking his arm and getting them walking again. “What kind of knife will we start with?”

27.

Prague, September 1, 2012, 6:00 p.m.

“Is this it?” Matt asked.

Anna did not answer. She had her hair pulled back in a ponytail and was wearing no makeup but, standing there in the late-day sunlight, staring at the tiny house and barren front yard, the site of the event that changed her life in ways he could only imagine, she looked more starkly beautiful than ever. Matt had linked pain and wisdom before in his mind, but never pain and beauty. Until today.

“Yes,” she said, finally. “This is it.”

Matt knew enough to say nothing.
Silence is never inaccurate
was another one of his father’s admonitions.
Nor embarrassing or stupid,
he thought.

“What are you thinking?” Anna asked.

“Only of you.”

“Why are we here, Teo?”

“In Prague, you mean?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t know. I’m not sure.”

“I do. It is fate that brought me here. I fled Prague as soon as I legally could. I wanted nothing to do with the Czechs, the people who allowed themselves to be enslaved, who allowed my father to be tortured and killed because he was fighting for their freedom. And now I am back. How strange.”

“It can’t be circumvented, or thwarted,” Matt said, “no matter how you try.”

“My fate.”

“Yours, mine, everyone’s, yes.”

“What is it? My fate.”

Matt shrugged. “My father speaks of inevitability all the time, Anna. He had me memorize
Antigone
when I was fifteen. ‘It will reveal itself,’ he used to say. Be ready.’”

“Your father wants my help.”

“Yes.”

“Perhaps your father can help
me
.”

“How?”

“I would like to find Mr. Blond Man.”

“Anna…”

“I thought I saw him today, getting into a limousine near our hotel.”

Silence.

“I’m not crazy. He’s here, Matt. I can feel it.”

“What would you do if you found him?”

“I would kill him of course, with your help.”

“Anna…”

“Many former
Kumunists
have blended back in, have gotten away with their murders and their tortures. They are alive and happy. My father is dead.”

“When did you get this idea?”

“On the plane.”

“Anna…”

“We have already killed one person who deserved to die, you and I,” Anna said. “And who deserves more to die than Mr. Blond Man? It is what your grandfather did, is it not? Joseph Massi, Sr?”

“How do you know about him?”

“It doesn’t matter, Teo. What matters is that his blood is in your veins, and my father’s blood is in mine.”

28.

Prague, September 1, 2012, 7:05 p.m.

Mr. Massi,

I will be in the lobby this evening at 7:00 p.m., sitting near the fountain. I will be wearing a yellow flowered print dress. I have the other half of an icon that you will recognize.

Valentina Petrov

This note was in an inside pocket of Chris Massi’s linen sport jacket as he sat across from Valentina Petrov in a plush chair in the sunken living room of his penthouse suite at Prague’s Europa Hotel. The wall nearest to them was floor-to-ceiling glass, the view twenty stories below to Wenceslas Square and the Charles Bridge in the distance postcard perfect. As the sun set, lights were twinkling on in a city that in Chris’s view matched Paris in its beauty and overmatched it, by far, in its heart.

“You are a cautious man,” Ms. Petrov said.

“I try to be,” Chris replied, acknowledging that the woman sitting across from him was referring to the fact that he had not met her in the lobby, but had sent two of the hotel’s security men to escort her to his apartment.

“What if I had refused?” she asked.

“They were told not to take no for an answer.”

“Someone may have noticed.”

“I own this hotel,” Chris replied. “People here see what I want them to see, no more.”

This statement produced a slight upward tilt of Valentina Petrov’s chin, a movement that enhanced the Russian woman’s great, dark beauty, softly modeled at that moment by the flickering light from a group of candles on the glass coffee table between them. Next to them were the two pieces of Don Marchenko’s stone goddess, and next to them two fluted glasses and a bottle of Cristal Champagne on ice in a silver bucket.

“Shall we drink?” Chris said, lifting the champagne and filling the glasses. “I appreciate your help in this matter.” He lifted his glass and watched as Ms. Petrov placed a napkin on the stem of hers and lifted it. “Thank you,” he said.

“You are welcome.”

They drank.

“Don Marchenko is lucky to have such a beautiful employee,” said Chris, setting his glass down.

“I am not an employee,” Valentina Petrov replied. ”But I admit, he has been good to my family and I am happy to carry a message for him from time to time if he asks.”

“He is a great man,” Chris said. “What has he done for you and your family?”

“He and my grandfather were boyhood friends in Odessa. When my grandfather died young, Don Marchenko helped support the family. He sent my father to America to college and medical school.”

“As I say, a great man.”

“You remind me of him,” Miss Petrov said. “Very much.”

“Thank you. That is a great compliment.”

“Do you want to hear his message?”

“Not yet,” Chris answered. “Do you know your Russian history?”

“Russian history?”

“Yes, this champagne, for example, was first produced by Louis Roderer for Czar Nicholas. Later, Alexander II insisted it come in clear bottles with flat bottoms.”

“Why?”

“He was afraid someone would smuggle a bomb in it.”

“Better to be a poor nobody,” Valentina said, “than a czar worried about assassination all the time.”

“Not in 19th century Russia.”

“He
was
assassinated though, was he not?” Valentina asked.

“Yes,” Chris replied. “In 1881, despite all his precautions. Do you know why?”

“No, I’m afraid not. The czars are still not much in favor in Mother Russia.”

“Your present prime minister is pretty much a czar, is he not?”