The Woman Who Knew Too Much

by Tom Savage

  Nora nodded and plugged in another question based on Galina’s reply. “Ah, yes, your hometown. What are your earliest memories of performing as a child?”

  Galina launched into a story about her first time onstage at the age of seven, and Nora smiled and nodded as she spoke. But Nora was actually scanning the restaurant and the piazza outside. The room was crowded, and the well-dressed natives and tourists occasionally glanced over at their corner with indulgent smiles, but for the most part they ignored the filming. The square beyond the windows was busy with locals and guided tour groups and lots of cellphone photography. But where the hell was Jeff?

  Even as she was thinking this, she spotted him, and she very nearly laughed. He was out in the center of the piazza in the weak winter sunlight, wearing a down-filled electric blue parka over jeans and sneakers. He wasn’t in makeup today, but he wore huge, mirrored sunglasses that effectively concealed his face under his New York Mets baseball cap. He had an open Fodor’s guidebook in one hand, and with the other he brandished his cellphone, clicking away at everything in sight. He might as well have been wearing a sandwich sign: TYPICAL AMERICAN TOURIST.

  Now that she knew he was nearby, Nora relaxed a bit and returned her full attention to her subject.

  “Tell me about your training for the Moscow State Theater. That must have been quite an experience for a sixteen-year-old girl, away from home in a new city.”

  “Oh, it was terrifying! At first, anyway. But I soon learned to love it because…”

  This went on through Galina’s schooling, her debut in Three Sisters, and her early parts on the professional stage. Mario stopped them when lunch arrived. Galina turned to talk to the general and her assistant while they dined, overseen by the standing watchdogs, Rudi and Sergei. Nora picked at her salad and white wine, thinking furiously.

  Item: Galina was planning to defect, leaving her parents, friends, acting career, and General Malinkov behind. Now, the general had arrived in Venice on what appeared to be a spur-of-the-moment romantic visit. Conclusion: The general was in love with Galina, but Galina was not in love with the general.

  Item: Last night after the play, Galina had already seemed nervous—nervous enough to pass a note canceling the plan. This afternoon she was definitely distracted. Nora’s acting training told her that everything the woman was doing today was false, an elaborate performance, presumably for the benefit of the general and her retinue. Conclusion: Perhaps Galina did love the general, and she was leaving her great love behind in Russia for a greater cause.

  Item: The general was accompanying them to the island of Murano to see the glassmaking. This—or in the boat to or from Murano—was where Nora had planned to take Galina aside and find out what was wrong. The Venice Arts Council gala tonight at the Danieli would be slammed with people, including the mayor, all of them worshipping the visiting artists from Russia, so no chance of a private meeting there. And tomorrow afternoon was when the extraction was to occur. Conclusion: This afternoon was Nora’s only opportunity.

  At the moment, there was something even more urgent that she had to do. Her cellphone was in her purse, but she didn’t dare use it here. Jeff was outside, and he probably intended to follow them to Murano. Now that General Malinkov had joined the excursion, this was no longer feasible. The general might recognize the American agent, even in his tourist garb, and the two young Russian guards were too eagle-eyed for Nora’s liking. Jeff would have to stay away from her this afternoon.

  “Excuse me a moment, please,” Nora said to the others at her table. She rose and went over to the next table, grateful that the Russians had barely noticed her departure. The Sound Byte group looked up at her expectantly. She stood behind Frances’s chair, her back to the general and the two Russian security men, and leaned down to speak to her friends.

  “Hi, folks,” she said in her best stage whisper. “I don’t have much time, so listen up. Pretend we’re talking about the filming. My husband is in the piazza outside, disguised as a tourist. Frances and Patch, you both know what he looks like, so one of you has to casually wander out there and tell him to go back to his place and wait there till he hears from me. I’ll explain later. Now, everyone laugh as if I just said something hilarious.”

  Everyone complied, and Mario the director spoke up.

  “Yes, it’s going very well, Joan,” he fairly shouted. “We have some great shots, and I loved that story about her childhood acting days. We must use that in the final cut!”

  “Absolutely!” Nora/Joan said, turning around to face her own table. Galina and Malinkov were deep in conversation, and Vera was discreetly concentrating on her pasta. The two sentries stood behind them, scanning the tables and the square outside for enemy agents, but one of them—Sergei, the one from the theater—kept glancing over at Nora as she moved between the tables. With a sunny smile, Nora went back to her lunch.

  Galina immediately turned her attention to Nora. “I’m so glad your producers could arrange for us to go to the Museo del Vetro on Murano today. I’ve always loved anything made of glass, and I hoped to see the museum during my stay in Venice. And to be interviewed for American television! This is fun, isn’t it?”

  “Yes,” Nora said. “I’m having a wonderful time.” She nearly winced at the artificiality in her voice, but she continued to smile at the actress and the man beside her, who seemed to be making a study of Nora’s face with his laser-beam gaze. Behind the couple, Sergei and Rudi scowled.

  As Nora chatted with Galina and the general, she saw Patch whisper to Mario, who produced a pack of cigarettes and handed him one. Patch rose and wandered out into the square. After an elaborate search of his pockets, he asked the passing tourist in the New York Mets cap for a light. The tourist shook his head and pointed to a nearby VIETATO FUMARE! sign. Patch shrugged and pocketed the cigarette, and the two men spoke briefly before Patch moved on, idly circling the piazza before ambling back inside and resuming his seat. He caught Nora’s gaze and nodded: Message delivered.

  Nora smiled some more, but she wasn’t feeling happy. Jeff was gone; she and her crew were on their own here with a nervous actress and a three-man Russian army. It was going to be a long afternoon.

  Chapter 11

  The boat ride north from the main island to Murano was too noisy for filming a conversation, but Patch got footage of the two women admiring the scenery. Nora smiled around at the landmasses that made up the city, and Galina seemed to be delighted by the view. The big water taxi—the same one that had brought them from the airport yesterday, with the same friendly pilot, Aldo—soon deposited them at the Museo landing in Murano, where a plump, grinning, bespectacled young Italian man awaited them, courtesy of Ham Green.

  “Buongiorno,” he said. “I am Benni. I will be your guide today. It is an honor to meet a member of the illustrious theater company visiting our city, and the American newspeople. If you will please follow me…”

  He took off toward Palazzo Giustinian, the beautiful former residence of the Torcello clergy that now housed the Museo del Vetro, talking and pointing as he went. Nora and the others hurried to keep up with him, which wasn’t easy for Patch, who insisted on filming everything. Galina was holding hands with the general, who paid little attention to anything but the actress. Paolo and Mario remained alert, watching the group closely, mainly the two bodyguards. Nora noticed that Frances seemed to be bonding with Galina’s assistant, Vera. The two women chatted a lot, and Nora wondered if Frances was learning anything interesting about the Russian actress and her friend the general.

  “Murano is Europe’s oldest and most famous glassmaking community,” Benni announced as they entered the museum. He explained that the glass industry had been banished from Venice to this northern location in the thirteenth century, a result of the fear that fires from the glass foundries might engulf the mostly wooden structures on the main island. Since 1291, the artisans in this cluster of attached islets had produced much of the world’s finest glass, and they fiercel
y guarded the secrets of its manufacture. “Now,” Benni concluded as he led them to the display rooms, “come and see our glorious heritage.”

  And glorious it was. Nora had been here before, but she still marveled at the austere white rooms of colorful wares, from goblets and pitchers and figurines to the tiniest, most delicate jewelry ornaments. The history of glass was laid out in chronological order, beginning with the crude but functional glass implements of the ancient Egyptians, then on through Greece, Rome, and the later empires, the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, right up to the present. Glass mirrors adorned the walls and chandeliers glistened from the ceilings in all shapes and sizes. There were bottles, bowls, baubles, bangles, and beads in every shade of the spectrum, but the dominant color was red. Nora knew why, but she listened as the tireless Benni explained that the secret ingredient in red Venetian glass was pure gold.

  Galina gasped and widened her eyes at this news, studying the array of deep red objects more closely. Nikolai Malinkov—“Niki”—barely glanced at them. For a man who professed to have joined the party to see the glass, he was showing little interest in it. Nora made a note of this. She suspected he was here to keep an eye on Galina, but why? She would have to find out.

  She was noticing everything today. As an actor, Nora had always been observant of her fellow human beings, but her recent experiences in her husband’s profession had heightened her awareness of everything around her. When Benni began to herd the group back toward the main entrance, Nora glanced down a hallway and saw two doors with familiar signs on them, and she made a plan.

  “Before we move on,” she said to the guide, “could we, umm…?” She nodded toward the hallway, and Benni smiled and complied. Nora signaled to Frances, who was immediately at her side.

  “Can you keep Vera busy,” she whispered, “while Galina and I go to the ladies’ room?”

  Frances nodded. “Sure thing.”

  Nora turned to Galina. “Shall we?”

  “Ah, yes,” Galina said, and Nora led her away down the hall.

  The restroom was fairly small, and two other women were in there as well, so Nora and Galina stood together at the farthest sink from the door, keeping their voices low.

  “We don’t have much time,” Nora said, “so let’s get down to it. What’s going on?”

  Galina sighed and leaned back against the wall beside the sink. “Oh dear, I don’t know how to say this. Niki’s visit was a complete surprise—I only learned he was here minutes before the performance last night. I barely got through the play, I was so nervous! He says he just wanted to see me, and to get away from Moscow for a couple of days, but I’m wondering why he suddenly decided to join me, at the very time when—”

  Nora interrupted her. “Do you think he knows about the plan?”

  “I don’t see how he could. But he’s a general; he has so many friends and informers. I can’t be sure. I think—I think he might have come here for a different reason.” Galina bit her lip and looked away across the room, apparently reluctant to continue.

  “There isn’t time, Galina,” Nora said, trying to keep the impatience from her voice. “We’re going to see some glassmaking nearby, and then it’s back to Venice, and the party tonight. Please tell me.”

  Galina sighed and looked at her again. “Niki thinks that I am having—relations—with one of the other actors, Ivan Kirin. He is the man who plays the poet, Treplev.”

  “Yes,” Nora said, remembering the handsome hunk from the theater hallway last night. “We met, sort of. I hate to be indelicate, but are you having relations with him?”

  Galina stared, all wounded innocence. “Of course not! I love Nikolai, I really do. Besides, Ivan is not interested in me; he is in love with Natalia, my understudy. They are going to be married soon. We were in classes and plays together and we are friends, good friends, but we are not lovers. You understand?”

  Nora nodded, thinking of her casual friendships with her own theater colleagues. “I understand. What are the general’s plans, do you know?”

  “He is here today, that is all. He will be at the gala tonight, but he must go back to Moscow tomorrow.”

  “What time will he leave?”

  “Very early, I think. He talked to someone on the telephone about meeting at Marco Polo Airport at eight-thirty. Then he will fly to Moscow.”

  Nora calculated. “Okay. The plan is scheduled for four o’clock tomorrow afternoon. We can get you out of Italy, to America, and we can protect you there. I hate to put you on the spot, but the clock is ticking; you must decide now. I have people waiting to hear from me. Do you still want to go through with it?”

  Galina closed her eyes, and tears crept down from her dark lashes onto her cheeks. The two other women left, and through the briefly opened door Nora caught a glimpse of Frances in the hallway outside, having another gossipy conversation with Galina’s assistant. Frances didn’t even know about the plan, not really, but she sensed that Nora could use some help. She was right in that assumption—Nora needed all the help she could get. Nora turned back to the actress.

  Finally, Galina opened her eyes and said, “Yes. I love Niki, I love my parents, I love Russia. I do not want to go, but I must. I cannot explain it to you—Mrs. Anderson said you were not to be told that information. But yes, yes, yes. I must go to America now.”

  The relief that flooded through Nora was so great that she grasped the edges of the sink for support. She thought of Ham Green and her team, but mostly she thought of her husband. Jeff believed she could make a success of this mission, and now she had the defector back. She couldn’t wait to tell him. But first she had to get through this.

  “All right,” she said to Galina. “I’ll tell my people the plan is on. You know what to do tomorrow, and Natalia Fedorovna must be ready, too. A lot of other people are working on this, so I must be able to depend on you.”

  “Yes,” Galina said, wiping away her tears. “You can depend on me. I will be ready.”

  “Excellent. Now, let Vera fix your makeup for you. We want to film you at a glass foundry and on the wharf before we return to Venice. And we don’t want the general to see that you’ve been crying.” Dear God, Nora thought, that’s the last thing we want.

  “Yes, yes,” Galina murmured.

  Nora opened the door and called to Galina’s assistant. Vera arrived in the room with her purse open, reaching for cosmetics. Galina turned from the mirror to look back at Nora, who stood in the doorway.

  “Thank you,” Galina said to her. “Thank you.”

  Nora knew practically no Russian, but she remembered the correct response to this in Galina’s language. She used it now.

  “Požalujsta,” she said, and she smiled.

  Chapter 12

  “Thank you for a marvelous afternoon, Joan,” Galina said, embracing Nora and once more submitting her to the ritual double air kiss. “Thank you, everyone! We’ll see you tonight.”

  Aldo the boatman handed the Russian actress and her assistant onto the wharf in front of Hotel Danieli. The general and the two Russian Federation agents followed them, and the little group went off to the hotel. Nora sank back down onto the padded bench in the water taxi, her body slumping in relief.

  “Well, that’s done,” she said to no one in particular.

  Her own group of four laughed at that, and Patch said, “What now?”

  “I could use a drink,” Paolo said with a sigh. “Or three.”

  His father-in-law nodded in agreement. “I’ll buy the first round. That was a stressful experience. Even in my acting days, pretending never seemed like such hard work.”

  “That’s because acting is different,” Nora said. “It’s easy to pretend on a stage or in front of a camera. This was real.” She looked around at them all. “Thank you so much for everything you’re doing, and for being so quick to pick up your cues. You two”—she indicated Patch and Frances—“were especially impressive. I suppose you’ve gathered by now that this is more than just a ph
ony interview for secret information, and it’s time you knew the rest.” She turned to Aldo. “San Marco Vallaresso, please, and take your time about it. We have a lot to discuss, and this moving boat is the perfect place for it.”

  The big, burly, ever-smiling boatman nodded and steered the water taxi away from the hotel landing, heading straight out into the wide Bacino di San Marco. Nora understood what he was doing. Their landing was not far west of the Danieli, so he was taking the scenic route, the one he might offer legitimate tourists.

  Nora talked and the others listened. By the time Aldo had guided the powerboat to the landing thirty minutes later, everyone was up to speed. The two Italians had already known what she’d just told them, but Frances Camillo and Patch Sullivan were wide-eyed with excitement, which Nora interpreted as a good thing. No Nervous Nellies aboard this ship, she decided. They both assured her that they were ready to do whatever she needed, and she thanked them.

  She’d called Jeff from the ladies’ room in Murano as soon as Galina had agreed to continue. He’d told her he’d relay the information to the appropriate people, and she told him she was coming to the convent.

  “It’s four-thirty,” Nora said to the others as they disembarked. “I’ll be back by seven, and we’ll meet in the lobby at seven-thirty. Then back here, and Aldo can take us to the Danieli.”

  “You’re not coming with us now?” Mario asked. He looked from Nora to Paolo and back, and nearly stepped down into the boat again. “If you’re going somewhere else, one of us should be with you. Mr. Green said you were never to be—”

  “It’s all right,” Nora assured him. “I’m going directly to my husband, and he’ll bring me back to the pensione. See you soon.” She resumed her seat and spoke to Aldo at the wheel. “Do you know the convent Santa Maria Magdalena?”

  He smiled. “Si, signorina. It is at the north side, not far from the Fondamente Nove landing.” He pointed west. “We go that way along Canal Grande to Rio dei Santi Apostoli to Rio dei Gesuiti, and we will be there very soon, si?”