by Alex Archer
Annja accepted her tea from Klykov, selected one of the pies stuffed with fish because she suddenly realized she was hungry and added a couple of pickles.
Nadia Silaevae spoke to Klykov, who immediately translated for Annja. “She would like to see the elephant.”
“Oh, sure.” Annja reached into her backpack beside the sofa and brought out the piece. While at Odessa International Airport, she’d found a curio shop that featured small keepsakes that came in boxes with foam padding. She’d bought the keepsake, which she hadn’t kept, and tucked the elephant safely inside.
She took the piece out and handed it to Nadia Silaevae, who smiled in recognition and talked in an excited voice. She handed the elephant back to Annja and left her seat to walk to a small closet.
“She has never before seen the elephant,” Klykov explained, “but she has seen pictures of it. Her family was very proud of it.”
“What does she know about it?”
Klykov shrugged. “We will see.”
Nadia Silaevae returned to her seat and opened the thick photo album she had brought back with her. Growing more animated, she flipped through the album and stopped a few pages in. She pointed proudly.
Six black-and-white photographs on the page were of a gray-bearded old man who looked wrinkled as a prune. He was grinning widely in most of the pictures, and he was holding the piece in his hand, posing with it on his biceps and holding it again in his cupped hands.
“May I?” Annja pointed at the photo album.
“Da. Puzhalsta.”
Yes and please were two of the words Annja knew in Russian. In fact, she knew yes, no, please, thank you, and where can I find food in most languages. “Spasiba.” Thank you.
“Puzhalsta,” Nadia Silaevae repeated, only this time it meant, “not at all.”
Annja surveyed the photographs, then turned the page and saw still more paragraphs of different family members showing off the elephant. Evidently the piece had become something of a treasured heirloom.
“This is wonderful,” Annja said, listening to Klykov translating beside her. Evidently he had experience in playing the go-between. “What can you tell me about the elephant? Where did it come from?”
Chapter 30
“The elephant was given to Queen Catherine by the Japanese sailors who were rescued from America,” Nadia Silaevae explained, and Klykov translated only a few seconds behind her words. The old woman spoke slowly so that Klykov had no problem keeping up. “It was among the gifts delivered to the queen in return for the safe passage for the men to their homes in Japan.”
Annja interrupted for a moment, apologized and asked about the Japanese sailors.
“They were part of a trading business sent to America.” Nadia Silaevae held up a gnarled finger, then got up and went to the bookshelves. She returned with a geography book that looked ancient. The book was in Russian and contained many maps. When she opened the book, it fell open to a familiar place.
The map was of the western border of the United States. Her finger traced the Aleutian Islands.
“My father was brother to Asaf Chislova,” Nadia Silaevae went on, “great-uncle to Rachel Chislova, with whom you have spoken. My father was younger brother, so their father left the elephant to Asaf. But my father was a sailor in World War II. He was on a ship that patrolled the islands where the Japanese sailors were rescued so many years before. The Russian ships were there to help protect America from the Japanese after the attack on Pearl Harbor. They were quickly recalled though, because the United States and Canada did not trust them so much in those days. My father said it was his wish to visit that island where the Japanese had been, but that was never to happen.”
Annja had her journal out and was taking notes. The battles in the Aleutians were sometimes called the “Forgotten War” because so much focus had been on what later developed into the Battle of Midway. For a time the Japanese had occupied a couple of islands before they were taken back by Allied forces.
“My father was more interested in the elephant than his brother.”
Annja gestured toward the pictures. “Are those pictures of your father?”
“No, those are of my grandfather. My father’s father.” Nadia Silaevae sipped her tea. “My father was forever worrying at the story of the elephant. Always a curious man. He was the one who discovered among my grandfather’s things how the elephant came to be in our family’s hands. You know of Queen Catherine, nyet? Also called Catherine the Great?”
“I do.”
“It is said she took hundreds of lovers while she was in power.” Nadia Silaevae looked somewhat embarrassed by her words, but a hint of merriment danced in her eyes. “I would not speak ill of the dead, but the woman took excesses.”
Annja grinned. “Yes, she did. It is well documented, so you are not speaking ill of her.”
“One of the men in her life was Captain Leon Argunov.” Nadia Silaevae pronounced the name carefully and spelled it, which Klykov had to guess at for the translation. “He was one of the queen’s lovers, but only for a short time. He was supposed to be related to Grigory Grigoryevich Orlov. He was an important man. Do you know this name?”
“Yes.” Annja nodded. “Orlov helped Catherine overthrow her husband, the Grand Duke Peter, and take the throne. She didn’t marry Orlov because he wasn’t a very good strategist, and she needed someone who could help her with political arrangements.”
“A very practical woman,” Nadia Silaevae stated with a small smile. “Very Russian.”
“She knew what she wanted and would settle for nothing less.”
“Da. As I said, Argunov was a lover only for a short time. He made a name for himself during the second war with the Turks.”
Annja jotted that down as well, fixing the time frame in her mind. Time was so important in her line of work, and when an artifact had been around for centuries like the elephant had, figuring out a time line became exceedingly important. The Second Russo-Turkish War had taken place in the late 1780s to the early 1790s.
“When did the Japanese deliver the elephant to Queen Catherine?” she asked.
Nadia Silaevae shook her head and looked troubled. “Sometime after the war, but I cannot say when for certain.”
Annja made a note to check on the Japanese story. That seemed too big to not have been mentioned somewhere. “That’s fine. You said Argunov took the elephant?”
“Yes. Usually Queen Catherine gave a—” Nadia Silaevae hesitated, obviously searching for the correct word even in her native language.
Annja grinned. She’d already known of the queen’s habit of giving her lovers something, which included positions of power and palaces, depending on how much they could do for Catherine once she’d dismissed them from her bed. Almost always she had put them in places that had benefited her, either by shoring up her rule or getting them out of her way.
“In Captain Argunov’s case, no such arrangement was made,” Nadia Silaevae continued. “Or, if an arrangement was made, he considered that arrangement too small. So he took the elephant before he left Queen Catherine’s palace.”
“Why did he choose the elephant?”
The old woman shrugged, and her answer made Klykov laugh before he was able to translate. “Who knows what goes through a man’s mind? Over fifty years I was married to my husband, and still I never knew exactly what he was thinking.”
Annja grinned again.
“I have been told he took the elephant because he believed it would lead him to great wealth.”
“What wealth?”
Nadia Silaevae frowned. “These are old stories, handed down and handed down yet again, over and over. Who is to say what was then and what is now? I cannot.”
“Was Captain Argunov part of your family?”
“No.”
�
��Then how did the elephant end up with your family?”
“Captain Argunov remained with the Russian army after his separation from Catherine. The person I have been talking to regarding this matter—I will give you her name and an introduction when we are finished here—believes that Captain Argunov hoped to discover the secret of the elephant. Instead he ended up dying during the march into India when Emperor Paul decided to join forces with Napoleon against the British.”
“How did Argunov die exactly?”
“Captain Argunov perished from sickness. One of those things men get when they are out chasing wars. I do not know the precise cause. While he was there in India, and he knew he was going to die, he gave the elephant to my ancestor, who was also a soldier and carried the elephant home with him when the Russian army turned back from India. It had been with our family ever since, here in this country, till Asaf Chislova brought it to the United States.” Nadia Silaevae smiled and looked at the elephant there on the coffee table between them. “And now you have it.”
“Once I am finished with it, I’ll return the elephant to your family,” Annja promised.
“No, no. My family has carried the elephant long enough, and it was never ours to begin with. It would be better if you discovered who it truly belongs to and gave it back to those people.”
“If I can. If not, I’m sure there is a museum that would love to have this piece if I can successfully document its history.”
“As you wish. You know more about such things than I do.”
Annja looked down at her notes. “You said there was someone else who might be able to give me more information about the elephant?”
“Yes. Her name is Sophie Ezria. She is descendant of Argunov. She is also ballerina here in Moscow. We met through my husband, who had always been in love with the story of the elephant. He and Sophie Ezria searched some of the same histories and discovered each other. Their interests made them friends, and I became friends, too. She is lovely girl. But, even though they worked together, they could not find answers to mystery of elephant. My husband always wished he could solve the puzzle.” Nadia Silaevae smiled sadly. “Is always way of Russian men, you know, to fall in love with things they can never possess.”
Klykov leaned toward the woman, spoke softly and patted her on the shoulder. Nadia Silaevae smiled at the old gangster, and for a moment Annja got a glimpse of what the woman must have been like as a young woman.
“My husband always wished my father had gotten the elephant from his father instead of my uncle receiving it. Asaf Chislova never cared so much to have the elephant, only that he possessed it and my father did not. There was jealousy between them. Brothers, you know. Either they get along or they fight. Sometimes both. My husband, like my father, treasured old things. They were forever taking me to markets to look at old junk.”
Annja felt a kinship because of that. She always trolled the markets and bazaars wherever she was because artifacts still turned up in curio shops. So much history had been lost, and still continued to be lost.
“My father and husband only bought a few things while my father still yet lived,” Nadia Silaevae continued. “Most of our finances were used to raise our children. Things were very hard then, but we made do, as people always must.” She shifted forward and touched the elephant gently. “I am so glad you came my way, Annja Creed, and I am so glad I finally got to see the elephant that has been so much a part of my family.”
* * *
IT WAS ALMOST dark by the time Annja and Klykov left Nadia Silaevae’s home. The old woman had insisted on feeding them supper, and she had offered them the use of her home to stay in. Klykov had politely turned her down and thanked her again for her time.
Vladi still waited for them in the sedan out front, and Annja realized guiltily she had forgotten about the man in the excitement of getting the story. As they approached the car, Vladi got out and opened the rear door so Annja and Klykov could get inside. It was already running, and the interior was warm, taking away the bite of the cool night breeze.
“Did you get something to eat, Vladi?” Klykov asked as the big man slid behind the wheel.
“Da. I hire boys to bring me dinner from restaurant.” Vladi put the car in gear. “Where you want to go?”
“A hotel. Somewhere nice.”
“Sure.” Vladi nodded and pulled onto the street.
Annja’s phone rang. She didn’t recognize the number but saw that it was from Moscow. “Hello.”
“Annja Creed?”
“Yes.”
“I am Sophie Argunov. We have a friend in common, yes? Nadia Silaevae?” The young woman spoke good English with only a hint of an accent.
“We’re just leaving her house now.”
“I know. She just told me you would like to talk to me. Would you have time to meet this evening?”
“Definitely, but I don’t want to inconvenience you.”
Sophie laughed pleasantly. “I am dancer in Russia. My life off the dance floor is an inconvenience to my trainer. I am just now out of dance school, out of practice for so long, so I can meet if you wish. I must admit I am very curious. Nadia Silaevae told me this is all very exciting and that you have the elephant.”
Exciting? Annja and Klykov hadn’t even mentioned the murders and the close calls they’d had while searching for the story behind the elephant. “I’d love to meet with you if you have time this evening.”
“Good! I was hoping this would be no imposition to you. We are preparing for big competition and time is very scarce. Since you are in Moscow, is all convenience, yes?”
“Yes. Maybe we could meet somewhere for drinks?”
“Good. Where do you stay?”
Annja asked Vladi where they were heading and relayed the answer on to Sophie.
“Fabulous. Is not far. I can meet you there in an hour?”
“An hour?” Annja looked at Klykov, who nodded. “An hour will be fine.”
“Also, I took liberty of contacting my boyfriend, Peter Kargaltsev, and asking him to join us. He is a historian and, as a favor to me and Nadia Silaevae, was working on deciphering the origins of the elephant Captain Leon Argunov stole from Queen Catherine. I thought perhaps you and he could speak. Did Nadia Silaevae tell you about the night the elephant was nearly taken from the Winter Palace by Japanese thieves only a few weeks after its arrival there?”
“No.”
“Well, I believe you will find this a most enjoyable story. Peter found out about the attempted robbery when he was doing research on the elephant.”
“I’m looking forward to it.” Annja said goodbye and pocketed her phone.
“What is on your mind?” Klykov asked.
“According to Nadia Silaevae, the Japanese gave the elephant to Catherine the Great, but Sophie says her boyfriend discovered that Japanese thieves tried to steal it back a short time afterward.”
“That’s interesting. Perhaps this will help explain this young man’s interest in the elephant. Nguyen Rao, nyet?”
“Yes, but he’s not Japanese. He’s Cambodian. And if the elephant is Cambodian, how did the Japanese get their hands on it?”
Chapter 31
“The thieves who broke into the Winter Palace were not Japanese.” Peter Kargaltsev sat across the table from Annja in the lounge around the corner from the main desk at the hotel Vladi had delivered them to. Peter was tall and blond and blue-eyed, a charmer who was very confident of his language and his subject matter. He kept himself in shape and looked nice in his dark blue suit. “Sophie got that part wrong.” He flashed a grin at the beautiful, elfin woman seated next to him. “Sometimes when I talk, she does not listen as closely as she thinks she is.”
Dark haired and dark-eyed, her skin the color of milk, Sophie Argunov swatted playfully at her significant other. “He never sh
uts up, this one. Always with dates and wars and things. Some days I can think of nothing else from listening to it all. I do not know how he remembers so much. Thankfully he is beautiful man, so when I am not listening, I can still look at him.”
Smiling, obviously in love with the young woman, Peter shrugged. “Perhaps I do talk about my job too much.”
“Tonight we are here to talk about your job, so talk and I will listen,” Sophie said. She wore a little black dress and the two of them together made Annja feel underdressed in her khaki pants and pullover. Klykov didn’t help because he had evidently packed a nice suit in his bags, and the hotel was more upscale than Annja had expected.
Peter spread his hands and looked at Annja. “Where would you like me to begin?”
“How did you get involved looking for the elephant?” Annja asked.
“Sophie mentioned the elephant to me and showed me pictures of it, copies she had gotten from Nadia Silaevae. I met Nadia and her husband a few times. He was a wonderful old man, and Nadia’s charms you have seen for yourself.”
“Boris Silaevae and I met on a genealogy site,” Sophie said. “He had contacted my mother a few years ago and started talking. Then, because I was interested in elephant, I talked. I got to know Nadia Silaevae, as well.” She glanced at Peter. “I met this one at university two years ago and wanted to get to know him better. Since I knew he liked historical things, I decided to find something mysterious in my past to catch his interest.”
“Nyet!” Peter laughed, picked up her hand and kissed it tenderly. “This one had my heart from the moment I laid eyes on her. The mystery of the elephant was only a gift. A bonus, I believe you Americans would call it.”
“We would.” Annja smiled.
“Finding information about the elephant and Captain Argunov was not easy. And I was sidetracked often by her.” Peter grinned at Sophie. “But, thankfully, her dancing is demanding and I have time to deal with trifles such as work and elephants and historical mysteries.” He reached into a briefcase at his side and pulled out a sheaf of papers. “I took the liberty of printing these off.”
