Zrada

by Lance Charnes

  That may be a growl on his end of the line. Or maybe it’s a diesel engine.

  Slam it home. “We can finish this in ten minutes. Then you’ll have your million euros and I can leave this fucking place forever. I promise you I’m on the level—no tricks, no ambush, no risk to you. You’ll walk away safe. It doesn’t get any better than this. Say ‘yes’.”

  Mashkov breathes in loudly enough to drown out the noise. “I don’t have the painting here.”

  “Get it.”

  “I can have someone bring it. It’ll take at least two hours to get here. Where are you?”

  “Dokuchajevsk. Same as you.”

  “Very good. The city administrative building is on Independence Street. There’s a football pitch behind it. I suggest we use it. I can contact you when the painting is here.” Carson likes hearing the urgency in his voice. He’s bought in…maybe. “I’m entering into this in good faith. But I must warn you, Miss Tarasenko—if you try to trick me, I’ll shoot you where you stand.”

  “Same here. You try anything, I’ll kill you. Send a photo of the picture when you have it.” She cuts the call before things can get more complicated.

  A bouncy pop tune Carson remembers from Thursday morning fills the inside of the car when she slides into her seat. She glances at Rogozhkin.

  “Eurovision.” He rolls his eyes, then rocks his head back toward Galina.

  Carson’s stiff from inactivity, achy from her injuries, and mentally drained. This supposed one-day-plus-travel, quick in-and-out project has turned into a slog. She’s sick of this place—the bad roads, polluted water, poverty, lines, fighting, death—and wants to go home. She rarely wants to go home. Living in hotels suits her; they’re usually clean and comfortable, and the staff is nice to her. There’s no past in a hotel. “Home” is a crappy bachelor apartment in Rexdale with white noise provided by the airport. There’s lots of past there.

  This road may lead her home. The contact line is walking distance from here. She could get there in less than thirty minutes without trying hard. She’s sure Galina and Rogozhkin are already thinking about what they’ll do on the other side. But if she crosses now, she goes back home a failure.

  She has to tell them they have to stay longer. How do I do this?

  “Wait a minute!” Galina’s head surges between the two front seats. “She won? Jamala won?” She whoops and thrusts her fists as high as she can without punching the headliner.

  Galina’s celebration kicks Carson out of her own head. Now that she’s listening again, she recognizes the song on the radio and flashes back to that bar in Komsomolske: the pretty brunette in the blue gown on TV, the dramatic words that Carson couldn’t figure out, Galina grinning and clapping, the Russian-speaking drunks grousing and throwing insults. Jamala was Ukraine’s Eurovision entry.

  Galina, now laughing, wraps her arms around Carson’s neck from behind. Carson hopes it’s a hug and not attempted murder. “She won!” Galina crows. “Ukraine won!” She plants a big, sloppy kiss on the top of Carson’s head. Then she pokes Rogozhkin’s shoulder with a finger. “Your guy lost.”

  He shakes his head sadly. “Politics.”

  Carson closes her eyes. Galina’s in a good mood. That just makes this harder. To make the swap work, she’s got to get the money Galina took from the farm at Byryuky. She can’t see a way to do that except by lying to Galina or stealing from her. Carson doesn’t want to do that.

  It’s not her money.

  Not the point. If anyone deserves to get the cash, it’s her.

  Point is, you got a job to do. Do it half-assed, you don’t get paid. Make it work.

  Just as Galina settles down, Rogozhkin sticks his head outside his window. A bright blue Opel Astra hatchback approaches slowly in the opposite direction. Someone holds an oversized sheet of paper out of the sunroof with “Checkpoint closed” scrawled on it in Russian.

  Rogozhkin mutters, “Damn.”

  A minute later, a slate-gray VW station wagon passes. A young woman in the back seat yells out her open window, “It’s closed! The checkpoint’s closed!”

  Carson stifles a whew reaction. Now she doesn’t have to pull them out of line.

  Rogozhkin cranks the wheel and roars into a gap in the oncoming traffic. The distance they’d covered in almost an hour going west passes in less than ten minutes heading east.

  Galina asks, “Where are we going?”

  Rogozhkin doesn’t answer until he’s turned left on the highway that had brought them to this point. “North. The crossing at Olenivka may still be open.”

  Carson checks her GPS. Olenivka is an exurb of Donetsk about seven klicks north of here. It’s split by the H20 motorway, the local version of a freeway. The road they’re on now hits the H20 a few hundred meters west of the contact line. “If this checkpoint’s closed, why would Olenivka be open?”

  “You’re in the Donbass.” Rogozhkin flashes her a quick smile. “Don’t expect logic.”

  This is how Carson can buy time. “Is there a hotel here?”

  “Yes, in Dokuchajevsk center. Why?”

  “We should go there and check in before they run out of rooms.”

  Galina leans forward between the front seats. “But what if we can get out through Olenivka? I can drop you where you want and—”

  “What if we spend another hour in line and the checkpoint’s already closed?” That comes out harsher than Carson intended. She turns her voice down a couple notches. “I’m not sleeping in the car or some abandoned house. Not again. I need a shower and a real bed. We all do. Okay?”

  Rogozhkin says, “She has a point.” Another sudden U-turn takes the Octavia south.

  Galina sighs and flops back into her seat. “At least it’s a nice hotel. It’s more than I like to spend, but since you will pay…”

  Carson feels a second or two of relief, followed by another lurch of guilt. She still has to get the money away from Galina. No matter how it goes, Galina’s going to be pissed and resentful. This tentative friendship—or whatever it is—that they’ve built will go straight down the toilet. Carson knows all too well what that feels like…and it’s already making her sick.

  Chapter 47

  The Hotel Mriya fills the southern edge of a plaza centered on a statue of Lenin on a black-marble pedestal. The hotel itself looks like it should be a university or government building—two stories tall with a grand central portico fronted by six tall columns and a broad staircase. A pack of cars is already parked on either side of the entry.

  Carson and Galina end up in a room on the second floor overlooking the back courtyard and staff parking. There’s a small sitting room with a desk, a mirror, and a couple wood-frame chairs. The separate bedroom has two low, single beds and—thank God!—a real washroom.

  Galina turns on the sink’s tap. Clearish water comes out. “There’s water!” She says it like a kid says “There’s a pony!” on Christmas morning.

  Carson’s already stripping. Dropping the body armor feels like losing a hundred pounds. “I need a real shower. Don’t get in my way.” By the time she drags off her underwear—the same ones she’s been wearing since Wednesday—Galina’s done peeing loudly and rattles open the washroom door.

  She gasps. “The kolorady did that to you?”

  It’s the first time Carson’s seen her own body in a day and a half. There’s more black-and-purple than unblemished skin. Some bruises are nearly as dark as her body armor. The cuts and scrapes are now rust-colored accents to the green edges on her contusions, forming a weird camouflage all over her. “Yeah.” She sweeps the thin white towel off the foot of her bed. “If you got something stronger than paracetamol in your first-aid kit, I’ll pay you extra.”

  Carson’s stretched out naked on her bed, drifting on whatever was in the big, white lozenges Galina gave her when she stepped out of the shower. It’s wonderful to not have all that stuff on her, chafing her sores, irritating her bruises. Being ri
d of the body armor feels like a day at a spa.

  Galina had gone all maternal on her, rubbing some kind of salve into her scrapes and cuts, even washing her tee, underwear, and socks (in real soap and water!) and hanging them in the shower. They drip noisily.

  Another stomach-growl erupts as a masculine knock rattles the front door. Galina—freshly showered and changed, her hair still damp—sets down the book she’s been reading at the sitting room’s desk and crosses left out of Carson’s sight. The door creaks open. “What do you want?” Galina hisses.

  “I was wondering if you ladies would like to—” It’s Rogozhkin.

  “Keep your voice down. She’s resting.”

  “Sorry.” His volume decreases by about half. “Would you ladies like to join me for a walk in the park? It’s becoming a nice evening, and we all need to work out the kinks from driving on these roads.”

  “You mean the ones you people destroy with your tanks?”

  Oh, hell. So much for resting. Carson gathers stray bits of her voice. “Galina, play nice.”

  Rogozhkin calls out, “Miss Tarasenko?” The door squeaks, then rattles.

  “No!” Galina snaps. “You stay outside! She’s not decent.”

  Not decent? Carson last heard someone use that phrase in a CBC costume drama. She’d like to just keep drifting, but her gut’s past eating would be nice and approaching must have food. Sitting up is harder than it should be; a good excuse for some exercise. “Rogozhkin? Give me ten minutes and I’ll come with you. Galina, you want to come?”

  “I would rather eat nails.”

  As Rogozhkin leads Tarasenko across the square to one of Miskyi Park’s entrances, he notices she’s moving stiffly, with a rather unbecoming half-frown on her face. “Do you feel any better?”

  “No.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that.”

  “Me, too.” She squares her shoulders. “Galina gave me something to sand off the sharp corners. That helps.”

  Late-afternoon gold washes the dramatic clouds overhead. They enter a paved walk under a canopy of tall, leafy green trees. Apparently, not everything is ruined in this part of the country. “Galina’s been taking good care of you, then?”

  “For the past couple of hours. She swings between hating me and wanting to mother me. I get it, but it keeps things interesting.”

  “I see.” The damage to her face is painful to look at. She’s rolled up the sleeves of her tatty plaid work shirt, exposing forearms that are just as abused. He knows about pain, and hers must be significant. Yet she’s not complaining. “No body armor this evening?”

  She shoots a stern eyebrow his way. “Can’t. Galina washed my tee shirt. I got nothing to wear under the vest.”

  “No extra clothes?”

  “The plan was, I’d be here for a few hours. Why would I pack more clothes?”

  Rogozhkin chuckles. “I’ve known one or two women who’d carry several pairs of shoes to go to the market.” He waves to the north. “It’s too bad it’s so late. The Old Market is a few blocks that way. You could get what you need there, but I’m sure the shops are closed by now.”

  “Oh, well. What’s with the limp?”

  He glances at her to check whether she’s making fun of him. There’s no smirk or sneer; it’s just a question. “Kosovo. A land mine.”

  “Kosovo? How long have you been doing this?”

  He weighs his answer. He doesn’t want to hide his age, but he doesn’t want to emphasize it. “When I was drafted, it was still the Soviet Army. My first foreign deployment was to Afghanistan.”

  Tarasenko nods thoughtfully. Then she peers at him for a few steps. “You said you’re from Siberia. Are you Yakut?”

  “Close. My mother was Khakas. Southwestern Siberia.”

  “Knowing how most Russians feel about non-Europeans, I’m surprised you got so far.”

  She knows about that? “When you win enough medals, kill enough enemies, and keep enough secrets, you’re hard to ignore.”

  They emerge from the trees on the edge of a football pitch behind a school. Several young women sit threading strips of green and brown cloth into a net spread across the patchy grass. Tarasenko stands next to him, not too close but not too far, with her arms folded tightly. “What are they doing out there?”

  “Making a camouflage net. It’s one of the touching things about this war—all the home-made effort on both sides. Hand-knit socks and mittens, home-cooked food, crowdsourced field gear. It reminds me of stories I’ve read about the Great Patriotic War.” He watches the young women—schoolgirls, now that he’s had time to look—expertly weave the colors together to make something that looks natural. “The question here is, which side will get it when it’s done?”

  “From what you told Galina, it should go to the local militia or something.”

  Once again, he needs to consider his answer. “That’s what I told her. It’s entertaining to wind her up—she reacts so predictably.”

  “You lied.”

  “I shaded the truth. There’s some support for the DNR here; it’s not hard to find the graffiti. But most of the people are loyal to Kyiv. I’m sure Kyiv’s army gets almost real-time reporting on the location of every DNR asset in this city. If they ever seriously try to take it back, the locals will make sure there’s no safe place for the DNR men or for us. And then Donetsk will be surrounded on three sides.”

  Tarasenko’s eyes search his face. “Bet you weren’t supposed to tell me that.”

  “Perhaps.” Her examination makes him a bit uneasy. He turns away and crosses onto another tree-shaded walkway. The sprinkling of people sharing the area is thin and mostly distant. Tarasenko catches up and walks beside him, matching his stride.

  “You seem to be an intelligent woman. I’m sure you know or suspected this already. Lying to you only diminishes me. I don’t want to do that.” He meets her sandy-brown eyes. “I also want you to know that I’m not a zealot like Galina. I came here with a job to do. I did it, now I’m done.”

  Why is he justifying himself to this woman? Because he finds her attractive? He’s been attracted to other women over the years, but never felt a need to explain himself the way he does now. Perhaps because he’s facing the end of his career without a plan for what comes next? Because he’s never until now met a woman who isn’t afraid of him?

  “I get it,” she finally says. “Can we go by the football stadium?”

  “Of course.” He wants to ask why, but won’t. He can tell it’s not idle curiosity. “Did you call Mashkov?”

  Long pause. “Yes.”

  “And?”

  Tarasenko’s face reflects the wrestling match inside her. “He’ll swap the Cranach for cash.”

  Just as he’d expected. It’s the only possible reason that she’d want the man’s phone number. “You mean the cash Stepaniak had.”

  “Yes.”

  “So you do know where it is.”

  “Yes.”

  “Galina has it?”

  She gives him a sharp look. “Why do you say that?”

  “It’s the only thing that makes sense. Mashkov doesn’t have it, I don’t have it, and I assume you don’t. If you can get to it, that leaves her.” He leads her to an open gate. “This is the stadium. Not exactly Luzhniki, but…”

  Tarasenko surveys the grounds—a regulation football pitch, seating lining the long sides, a fieldhouse on the west, floodlight standards at either end. “What’s ‘DFDK’?”

  “On the seats? It’s for the dolomite mine. They sponsored it.”

  “Are these gates always open?”

  “I don’t know. Are they a problem if they’re not?” The concrete walls on either side are only two meters high. “Is this where you’ll meet Mashkov?”

  She doesn’t answer as she drifts toward the footpath again. That may be her answer.

  “Be careful. Have you ever heard of Stearne’s Law?”

  “No. Who’
s Stearne?”

  “A crazy American Ranger I met on an exchange tour. He said that paranoia isn’t mental illness—it’s the result of acute situational awareness.”

  Carson nods, pursing her lips. Her eyes are aimed someplace far away.

  The gap in the conversation becomes uncomfortable. He nods toward her folded arms. “Are you cold?”

  “No.”

  “Where’s your home?”

  “Canada.”

  “Ah. You’re one of those Ukrainians.” That explains a lot.

  “Yeah.”

  “Your Russian is very good. Very current.”

  “I get to use it a lot.”

  “Working for this company you mentioned?”

  “That and other reasons.”

  She’s making him do all the hard work. Is this a test? “Do you have a man in Canada? Children?”

  Tarasenko arches an eyebrow. “You have anybody?”

  Is she asking because she cares, or to put off answering me? “I’m afraid I’ve never had the time, opportunity, and interest all at the same time to get a wife. A lot of men in my position can say that. I’m sure you’ve met a few.”

  “Yeah. The job’s always more interesting than taking out the garbage.” Another sharp look. “It’s hard to find a woman who’ll put up with being tied to a man she never sees.” She lets a few steps go by. “Who isn’t rich.”

  At least she’s not afraid to have an opinion. “Quite so. Now I’ll have the opposite problem—finding a woman who won’t mind her man being home all the time.”

  “Get a hobby.”

  Rogozhkin chuckles. “I’ll have time for that. There’s a line from a poem I’ve always liked: ‘Let there be spaces in your togetherness.’”

  “‘Fill each other’s cup but drink not from one cup.’” She gets a faraway look in her eyes. “‘Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same loaf. Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each one of you be alone, even as the strings of a lute are alone, though they quiver with the same music.’” Tarasenko pulls her focus from the other side of the world. “Kahlil Gibran. I like that one, too. I know two poems by heart. That’s one of them.”