The Woman From Prague

by Rob Hart

  Is this the future I’m running toward?

  A life where you do the work and then you die alone?

  And in this moment, I know: that is not the life I want.

  “You okay?” I ask.

  She pulls back. Looks up at me like she thinks I’m a moron.

  “I’m always okay,” she says, smiling like she didn’t just get shot.

  We wait across the street from the train station, under a bus shelter. Three buses pull up and leave while we stand there. The wind is picking up and my ears are cold enough to sting. Neither of us has spoken and Sam doesn’t need to explain what we’re doing.

  Waiting for Chernya Dyra.

  I look over at her every now and again, and sometimes catch a small wince or grimace on her face, but otherwise, the wall is back up. She’s in a coat that looks remarkably similar to mine. The best option we could find inside the mall.

  The emergency surgery makes me think of last year, Bombay sewing my forearm at his kitchen table after some asshole cut it open. He used purple thread because he thought it would be funny. Looking back now it was a stupid thing to do—I didn’t even use something proper to sterilize it, like Sam did. I used vodka. The scar is a little ugly but you don’t even really notice it unless you’re looking close.

  My scars having nothing on her scars.

  When we’re fifteen minutes out from departure, Sam walks away from the bus shelter and I follow, pulling my new baseball cap down over my eyes. We move quickly through the station. There are a lot of people, and every time someone makes even brief eye contact with me, I wonder if they’re a plant, for Roman or Chernya Dyra or Ansar al-Islam.

  Moscow rule. Everyone is potentially under opposition control.

  Or, every person is this place is potentially someone who wants to kill us.

  That’s probably not the truth, but it’s definitely what it feels like.

  We board the train and it’s the same kind of layout—long hallway, wood paneling, cheap dingy curtains. It might even be the same train. The conductor is a hard-faced man, probably my age. He nods curtly to us as we load into our room. Sam disappears to handle the passport situation, and reappears a few moments later.

  “Do you think we’re safe?” I ask.

  “If we’re not dead within an hour of the train pulling out of the station, then probably,” she says. “She’s got to be working alone. She probably has great access to information but there’s no way she’d crack the number of layers between me and how I ordered the tickets.”

  “Good, then,” I tell her. “So what’s the plan?”

  “The plan is I need some rest,” she says, pulling the sweater over her head. “My body needs to heal. I need to sleep. I’m taking a little dose of what I knocked you out with. Not as much. Enough to get me under. You stay up in case someone tries to murder us.”

  “You trust me to do that?”

  “Sure. Why not?”

  “And if the Dyra shows up?”

  “Then we’re dead either way,” she says. “And I’d rather be asleep for that.”

  Sam turns to the mirror and removes the bandage, which is heavy with diffusing shades of brown and red. After a few moments of inspecting it, she takes out a bottle of water and the brown liquid and proceeds to clean it and place a new bandage.

  “You know, the Dyra doesn’t seem so tough,” I tell her. “We got away twice, didn’t we?”

  “Yeah, the odds of that happening even once are pretty remarkable,” she says. “The thing is both of those situations—the bridge and the apartment—were locations she couldn’t control. Don’t be surprised if in the next day or two you’re walking into a room and you have a bad feeling and you don’t even know why you’re there. That’s the moment the lights go out.”

  “Unless you kill her first?”

  She gets the clean bandage in place and pulls a black t-shirt out of her pack. “We’ll see how that goes.”

  The train whines and moves slowly out of the station, picking up speed.

  “You said we should know within the hour?” I ask.

  Sam pops a pill into her mouth and washes it down. “The countdown begins. Night night, sweat pea. Don’t wake me unless it’s an emergency.”

  “Can I have the knife at least?”

  She takes it out of her pocket and hands it to me, then climbs onto the top bunk, pulls the blanket over herself, and turns away from me. The knife is heavy in my hand. I flick it out, look down at the blade. I snap it closed and slip it into the coin pocket of my jeans, but it doesn’t make me feel any better. Locking the door to the compartment doesn’t make me feel much better, either. It feels like a formality.

  Tonight I learned something about myself. I really like Agatha Christie. Murder on the Orient Express is a great book.

  Though it’s bumming me out a little because this train is far less luxurious than the Orient Express. And I’m not being called on to consult on a murder investigation where everyone sits around and the biggest threat is whether the tea is too hot. That’d be a nice change.

  I don’t have a phone and there’s no clock in here but I’m sure it’s been a few hours since we left, which is encouraging, because we are not dead. Still, I’m afraid to step into the hallway to pee. I’ll have to risk it soon. At this point I feel okay about the Dyra and less okay about the conductor. I’ve got my New York driver’s license but no passport, and no Sam to run interference if something happens.

  I’m thirsty though. I get up and take a sip from the bottle of water sitting on the counter. Look up at Sam, who’s still facing away from me. Wonder if at this point I can risk sleeping a little bit, but don’t really want to.

  If I can’t sleep, I can at least be comfortable. It’s boiling in here, and even with the window cracked it’s not helping much. I take off my socks and pull off my shirt, get ready to climb in the bunk and get under the thin blanket and find out who among the aristocrats on the Orient Express murdered Samuel Ratchett.

  I’m in a nice groove when the train slows and stops.

  After a few moments, there’s a commotion outside the door.

  I get off the bunk and look at Sam, who hasn’t moved. I slide open the door a little and hear a man talking hurriedly in Czech or Polish at the other end of the hall. I can’t make out what it is. But the person repeats himself it in English.

  “Border control. Passport please.”

  Of course.

  I move over to Sam and nudge her shoulder. She doesn’t move. I nudge her a little harder. Nothing. I put my fingers to her neck to make sure she still has a pulse, and she does, which is great, but doesn’t exactly help me. I tap her cheek lightly, leaning back as I do, expecting her hand to shoot out and hit me in the throat, but it doesn’t. She’s dead to the world.

  The inspector is starting on the other end of the car and working his way down. I don’t know how many doors are between us. I have a few minutes at best.

  If they find me without a passport, I could be detained. Stuck in a cell or a holding room somewhere. Roman is waiting for me. What if I don’t show up? Will he assume I skipped town? Decide to move against my mom in retaliation?

  Only a few minutes to solve this.

  Think.

  We can’t hide. The conductor knows there’s someone in this room. Can’t get us out of the train because the window is too small and where the hell would we even go? I could find Sam’s ID but that doesn’t really help.

  I move to the crack in the door and peek out. They’re glancing at papers. Not examining them too closely.

  Look back at Sam, and she’s prone in the bunk.

  It’s a random security check. I need them to look in and not want to come in here. To not think about checking us too closely. I need to distract them with something.

  How do I do that?

  Think think think.

  Oh shit.

  I’ve got an idea.

  It’s not a nice idea, but it’s an idea.

  Quick a
s I can, I strip down to my boxers, tossing my jeans into the corner, making sure to leave the door closed but unlatched. I put the ladder against the bunk, climb up until I’m next to Sam, turning her so she’s lying on her back. I drop her arm off to the side so she’s more visible from the doorway, climb on top of her, and pull the sheet over us.

  She makes a little face but doesn’t wake up. I hold myself mostly in a push-up position, my back pressed up against the ceiling. It hurts like hell to hold in the narrow space. I look down at Sam and really hope she doesn’t wake up at this moment. I’m thankful the knife is down in my jeans.

  The door slides open and I thrust forward like we’re having sex. In the doorway is a short, stocky man in a uniform and a funny hat. I put on my best attempt at a Czech accent, and yell, “Jdi do prdele, kokot!”

  Which roughly translates to: “Fuck off, dickhead!”

  There are only six words you need to learn to cut it in another country.

  But curse words help, too.

  The man in the uniform pauses. His mouth drops open.

  And then he smiles and nods, his face a swirl of embarrassment and approval. He says something and I don’t know what it means but he winks at me and throws a thumbs-up before he slides the door closed.

  The latch clicks and I exhale.

  Then I look down and Sam is staring up at me, her face twisted in fury.

  She brings her fist into the side of my head, making contact with my ear. The blow rattles through my skull and I tumble off the bed, hitting the far wall before landing hard on the floor, my arms up, trying to protect my head.

  Sam jumps off the bunk, blocking the door. Her eyes are heavy with sleep and rage. She searches her pants for her knife and remembers that I have it. I make it as far as my knees when she grabs me by the throat and slams me into the wall. Immediately my oxygen supply is cut off.

  “As soon as this train is moving I am going to start carving you up and dropping parts out the window until we get to Prague and there’s nothing left,” she says. “I bet you know which part I’m going to start with.”

  I try to speak but can’t so I shake my head and wave my hands, try to get her attention.

  “What?” she asks. “You got something to say before I get started?”

  I nod against the force of her hand. She drops me and I fall to the floor, take greedy breaths of oxygen.

  “There was… a passport check,” I tell her. “I thought if it looked like… we were having sex… they would be embarrassed and move to the… next cabin.”

  She doesn’t move, doesn’t acknowledge what I’ve said, just watches as I climb to my knees again. My jeans are behind me. I reach back, feeling around for the knife. It’s not close enough. I would have to turn all the way around.

  “I swear,” I tell her. “It was the best idea I could come up with. And it worked. They moved on. I’m sorry. But I tried to wake you up. You were out.”

  She takes a deep breath in and out. I wonder if she’s going to start choking me again. She looks very angry.

  After a few beats she says, “That was actually kind of clever.”

  “Kind of clever? I’d say it was very clever.”

  “Yeah, it worked because you rubbed your gross body all over mine,” she says.

  “And what would you have done?”

  “Handled it better than that.”

  “Oh, why the fuck didn’t I think of that?”

  “Will you get dressed? It’s weird talking to you like this when you’re on your knees and half naked. This feels like the start of a weird fetish video.”

  I get up and put my jeans back on. Sam reaches around me to take the bottle of water off the counter. She takes a deep drink and climbs onto the bunk.

  “We must have passed back into the Czech Republic,” she says. “Only a few hours now. I’m going to try to sleep a little more. You good?”

  “Now that you’re not going to kill me, yes, I’m good. I’m almost done with my book. I’m about to find out who killed Mr. Ratchett.”

  “It was everyone,” Sam says. “All the people who hated him teamed up and took turns stabbing him so the crime couldn’t be blamed on any one person. They all get away with it in the end because Mr. Ratchett is an asshole.”

  “C’mon,” I tell her. “Did you have to spoil it for me?”

  “The book was published eighty years ago,” she says. “It’s not a spoiler anymore.”

  “Jerk.”

  “Shut up.”

  I go back to reading anyway. Not like I’ve got anything else to do. After a few moments, I notice that my heart is still racing so I close the book and put it in a mesh basket next to me and stare at the top of the bunk for a little while.

  Sam pushes me to wake me up.

  “We’re almost there,” she says.

  I climb out of the bunk and get myself put together. By the time I’ve got my boots on the train is slowing to a stop. We move quickly off the train and make our way through the station.

  “So what’s the plan?” I ask.

  “Let’s go back to Kaz’s,” she says, checking a phone. A new phone, apparently, since she smashed the other one. “Shower, clean up. I’ll make contact with Jeremiah and find out where the password is stashed. We have to get that first. Then we go see Roman. Once we have your passport back, we get you out of the country quick as we can. It’s a short train ride to Budapest. You can get a flight home from there.”

  “And the Dyra?”

  “We’ll see. With any luck she’ll just be after me at this point.”

  “Yeah, about that. Why not kill her when you had the chance?”

  “I could barely see. Plus she had a gun. Smart move was to get out. Moscow rule. Pick the time and place for action.”

  “Okay. And once I’m gone, you’ll handle the release of the information about the bank?”

  She hesitates. So briefly I wonder if it’s even a hesitation. Maybe it’s my mind playing tricks. But the way she says “yes” gives me a moment of pause. I file that one away, to the “that’s interesting but maybe nothing” file in my head.

  “So what exactly is the plan with Roman?” I ask. “Are you going to kill him? Do I have to do it?”

  “Well…” Sam starts as we exit the train station into the bracing winter air, and standing there in the bright morning sun is Roman, flanked by Pug and Vilém.

  “Huh,” I say. “Speak of the devil, and he appears.”

  Roman is smiling that Day-Glo smile of his that I hate so much.

  “You know nothing about anything,” Sam whispers to me.

  “My little golem,” Roman says. “I thought you could do with a welcome party. Better this than have to worry about coordinating things later.” He turns to Sam. “And this must be your little friend.”

  “Roman, Sam,” I tell them. “Sam, Roman. Something tells me you two are going to get along great.”

  There are two rows of seats in the white SUV. The windows are tinted so there’s be no way to see what’s happening if you’re looking in from the outside. Not comforting. Roman makes us sit in the middle, and then climbs into the row behind us. Pug and Vilém are up front. Pug is driving.

  No one is talking, which makes for a pretty somber mood.

  The buildings yawn and spread out. The architecture becomes blander. Communist-style. Big, blocky concrete. The crowds thin until there’s only the occasional person, walking a dog or riding a bike or carrying groceries. The silence is awkward and I hate awkward silence.

  “So I guess the only person I don’t know here is the driver,” I say. “What’s your name?”

  “Don’t talk,” says Roman.

  “C’mon. I already know Vilém’s name.”

  “Vilém…” Roman says, his voice heavy with reproach.

  Vilém turns. “I did not see the harm.”

  “František,” says the driver in a heavy Czech accent.

  “I’m going to call you Fran,” I tell him.

  �
�Most people do,” he says.

  “You know my pain,” I tell him.

  He doesn’t get the joke. No one does. Tough crowd.

  “Now we’re all friends,” I say. “Doesn’t that feel so much better?”

  “Be quiet,” Roman says.

  “Fine.”

  I look over at Sam. She’s staring forward. I want to catch her eye, try to get some kind of reassurance that she has a plan. But she doesn’t budge.

  Roman’s hand appears from the back, holding a bundle of black cloth.

  “Please put these on,” he says.

  Sam takes the bundle and splits it into two hoods. She hands one to me. I pull it over my head and I’m left with a tiny bit of light trickling between the strands of the fabric, and the musty smell of someone else’s breath.

  “I hope you clean these things between uses,” I say.

  “I am very close to shooting you,” Roman says.

  “I doubt that. I mean, then you’d have to clean up the car. This is a pretty nice car. Granted, you’ll get your stooges to do it for you. You don’t seem like the type who enjoys getting blood on his hands. But still...”

  He smacks me on the head with the flat of his hand. My head snaps forward. It’s more of a warning, but still, I really need to stop getting hit in the head.

  “I said be quiet,” he says.

  The last few times I was forced into a car and taken somewhere against my will, it was in a trunk. This is a nice change of pace. After a little while, though, I have to wonder if we’re even still in Prague. The city is made up of districts, and I’ve only ever been in the first and second. That’s the city center, and where most of the Crash Hop apartments are. I don’t know how long it would take to drive out of the city.

  I’m about to ask another question—something, anything—when the car stops and the engine turns off. Roman says, “You can take the hoods off now.”

  We’re in front of a long row of warehouse type buildings, or an office park. I can’t really tell. Everything is gray and utilitarian, with harsh corners and no real sense of style. Fran and Vilém open the doors for us. We get out and follow the two of them inside, Roman behind us.