Traffyck (26 page)

Eva Polenkaya straightened her hair and sat behind her desk. Her face was red. “I apologize for my outburst. Sometimes I become emotional. I simply wish for someone to find an answer for the parents before the loss of their children, or something else, destroys them.”

Janos stopped for lunch at a new McDonald’s in east Pechersk. While he waited in line to order, he watched the workers, mostly young, but a few babushkas as well, preparing hamburgers and french fries. An assembly line, Eva Polenkaya had said—children taken from the streets of Ukraine cities and run through an assembly line until they have the desired flavor.

While he ate his hamburger and french fries, Janos compared the telephone codes of the numbers he had copied from Aleksandr Shved’s list to the code pages he had torn from a Kiev phone book. One number, from which he received no answer, was in Odessa. He called the number several times while digesting the french fries he had pushed into his mouth one after another. Outside the window, a young man pulled up in an ancient Volkswagen Rabbit with a diesel engine. The man walked around the back of the McDonald’s and returned with two ten-liter cans of grease, which he loaded into the backseat of the Rabbit before driving off, leaving a trail of gray smoke and a chunk of rust that fell off the back door when it was slammed shut. Janos wiped grease from his cell phone with a napkin and tried the Odessa number again. Still no answer and no messaging, nothing but ring tones like the belches coming from his stomach. Janos considered complaining to the management at the new McDonald’s about the insufficient heat of the deep fryer, but knew he had more important things to do than the commonplace tasks of life. One thing he did do was visit the men’s room.

That afternoon, while at Kiev militia headquarters seeking information from Investigator Nikolai Kozlov, Janos called the Odessa number several more times, but there was still no answer, and Kozlov was as informative as a street sweeper, refusing even to trace the number.

At seventeen hundred hours—happy hour—Janos parked his rusty orange Skoda and took the funicular down to the river. He walked some distance from the terminal where boat tours and cruises originated and sat on a lower section of concrete at the river’s edge. In the distance, passengers wearing jackets on an excursion boat looked like multicolored peas in a pod. Back at the terminal, passengers carrying umbrellas walked down the ramp from a shuttle returning from the islands. Although it had rained earlier in the day, it had cleared and the umbrellas were closed, some being carried like sidearms.

On the bottom level of concrete, with his feet dangling above the river, Janos was low enough so the sounds of metro and street traffic were cut off. The concrete on which he sat was brittle and crumbling from years of freezes and thaws. As he sat waiting for Comrade Strudel, he listened to the river lapping against rusted steel piling encasing the concrete and watched the passengers being shuttled out for an evening cruise.

Comrade Strudel approached, a bulky sphere on legs, with a face puffy as if his cheeks and neck were perpetually stuffed with cream. Janos thought he looked nearly seventy but was probably younger. Drinking and overeating had given Comrade Strudel’s face a red shine, and he was missing most of his teeth. Other than his appearance, all Janos knew about Comrade Strudel was that he lived somewhere in south Podil and was one of the best informants in Kiev.

Comrade Strudel was dressed, as usual, in his vagrant look-alike outfit—tattered coat and slacks, scuffed work shoes, out-of-season winter cap with rippled peak. Thin chunks of concrete cracked as he walked nearer.

“I am hungry,” said Comrade Strudel, easing his bulk down beside Janos.

“You are always hungry. But today, in order to eat, you must speak of young people.”

“There are many young people around here. Especially in parks.”

“Did you hear about Aleksandr Vasilievich Shved?”

Comrade Strudel stared out at the boats. “His life on earth ended curiously.”

“He was searching for missing young people and apparently had concluded pornography might be involved. The militia does not know if he was killed in the fire or not. I would like to know whether someone in Kiev or from outside Kiev might have set the fire. The wife of the store owner believes it was murder.”

“Zhulyany Airport is not my usual territory,” said Comrade Strudel.

“But you have friends there.”

Comrade Strudel looked at him, smiling a three-toothed smile. “Yes, living in warehouses. They do not eat as well down there.”

“The pay will be fair.”

“You are always fair in this way.”

“Shall we meet Sunday at the same time?”

“Make it sixteen hundred hours,” said Comrade Strudel, looking side to side. “There will be much activity at the terminal, and blending in will be improved.”

A dark blue van with heavily tinted windows followed Janos away from his parking space. The van had been waiting several spaces back. He drove a zigzag route around central Kiev for almost an hour. The evening rush of buses and pedestrians kept traffic slow, and the van stayed with him, never more than an intersection back. On Khreshchatik Boulevard, near Dynamo Stadium, three militiamen stood at the corner, and the van was two cars behind. Pedestrians crossed, but traffic did not budge. Janos got out of his Skoda and walked back to the van, making sure the three uniformed militiamen were watching. The driver’s window on the van came down, and two men in gray suits stared out at him with grim looks.

“Good evening, comrades,” said Janos. “This will get us nowhere. Obviously, you are not members of the Mafia. Perhaps we should get out and walk.”

“Where should we go?” asked the driver.

“See those militiamen. We should go have a word with them.”

The driver looked to his partner, shrugged, then looked back to Janos. When he dug into his pocket, Janos stepped back, reached beneath his jacket, and touched the butt of his pistol.

“Identification,” said the driver.

They were SBU. Janos looked at both their identification cards.

“Agent Yuri Smirnov said to bring you to SBU headquarters for a chat. Would you consider driving there yourself? We will follow you if this crowd ever clears the intersection.”

Horns sounded, and one of the militiamen shouted at Janos to get into his car. He got in and moved slowly with the traffic. Kiev’s SBU headquarters was on Khreshchatik a few blocks ahead. He had been there several times throughout his years in the militia.

Although he was not an old man, Agent Yuri Smirnov was a fixture in the SBU Kiev office. When Janos sat down in front of Smirnov’s desk, he placed his hands on the desk, palms up, wrists together, as if he were handcuffed.

“Your agents could not find the key. I told them I would keep my hands like this.”

“You are very funny,” said Smirnov. “Have we met?”

“Yes, when I was still in the militia,” said Janos. “You were visiting Chief Investigator Boris Chudin at the time.”

“I remember. And now you are Janos Nagy, private investigator. I will not keep you long, because I know you have much investigating to accomplish.”

“What will I be questioned about?” asked Janos. “Espionage? Foreign intelligence?”

“Please do not make it difficult,” said Smirnov, resting his head on his hand. “I simply wish to ask a few questions.”

“I apologize. I’ve had a busy day. I’m tired but ready to cooperate.”

Smirnov gave him a weak smile. “Good. Perhaps I will still be able to raise a glass with my associates.” Smirnov opened his desk drawer and pulled out a sheet of paper and read from it a moment, making Janos expect an intricate question. Instead, Smirnov looked up and said, “What the fuck is going on?”

“Going on where?”

“Here,” said Smirnov pointing to the paper but not looking at it. “I can understand your interest in the pornographic video store burning down. But why have you chosen to make yourself a nuisance at the office of Father Vladimir Ivanovich Rogoza?”

“Rogoza requires nuisance.”

“Why?”

“Because he is a fool.”

Smirnov shook his head. “That cannot be the only reason.”

“Rogoza’s foolishness has lead to action. There was a sign on my office from his hooligans, a broken window, and a car tried to run me over.”

“Did you get the plate number?” asked Smirnov.

“There was none. It was a black Zil, exactly the kind Rogoza rides in.”

“So you became angry.” Smirnov sighed as if he understood. “Very well, so much for fools in Zils. Now, please tell me about the video store fire. What have you learned?”

Janos told Smirnov about the investigation. Of course, he did not reveal everything, simply what the militia knew.

“Tell me about child pornography and missing children,” said Smirnov.

“I know the militia found pornography at Shved’s office.”

“Yes,” said Smirnov. “I was told about it.”

When Smirnov was silent for a moment, Janos began forming his own questions. He took out his notebook and opened it to the page with the drawing he had shown Mariya, the circle with an
X
inside. Janos studied Smirnov’s face while he slid the notebook across the desk.

Smirnov stared at the drawing a moment, turned it around, and slid it back across the desk. “Very clever, Janos.” Smirnov glanced beneath his desk. “Are you testing for my reaction to your drawing? Perhaps you have some kind of covert polygraph invention you slipped on my penis while I wasn’t looking.”

“No,” said Janos. “The covert equipment shop didn’t have your size in stock.”

Smirnov gave a weak smile. “Where did you get the drawing?”

“I have connections. What do Ivan Babii and an American named Donner have to do with all this?”

Janos caught it: a slight reaction, a blink, and no quick comeback or smile.

Janos continued. “I lean toward leveling with an investigative associate as long as he levels with me. I know of Ivan Babii’s murder, but I know nothing of Donner. I question what organization uses this symbol. I have asked my contact, but I will not have an answer for a while. Perhaps if we shared information—”

Smirnov raised his hand. “Very well. You have me in your snare.”