Babii had begun using the word after seeing the American Godfather films. Even now, staring at this marvel of nature, he thought how beau-ti-ful it would have been if, back in the old days in the Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic, Boris Gerlak’s body, with its load of bullets, could have evaporated away to nothing before hitting the marshy ground along the road to Odessa. Bullets traced back to the Makarov auto pistol Uncle Iosif failed to melt down because of his dementia. Beautiful.
Although KGB lab evidence had not convinced the drunken Moldavian judge of Babii’s guilt, evidence linking him to sex holiday and drug businesses ruined him during the collapse of the Soviet Union, a time when he could have risen to prosperity in the new Moldova. He had been forced not only into exile but also into finding another business.
It had been called the Moldovenesc Camp when he bought it. Now it was called the Moldovenesc Self-Awareness Sanatorium. Business at the sanatorium was profitable. First came the Turks and their hunger for light-complexioned girls. Next came Arabs, Czechs, and Greeks, taking his girls away via the same Balkan Trail used to smuggle drugs and weapons. Some of the younger ones could be sent back to Ukraine where they originated and be redirected to Russia or Dubai. A few years ago, several U.S. strip clubs made purchases. Then, with prostitution legalized by Germany and Netherlands, the sky was the limit. His original plan had been to turn the sanatorium into a resort for sex holidays, but time and technology had passed him by. Internet filmmakers were lured to his mountain retreat by privacy, the availability of panoramic shots between takes, and, oddly enough, the presence of horseflesh, which apparently enhanced the interest of clients who used their computer monitors and their hands rather than other human beings, or other animals, for sexual satisfaction.
This year business was especially profitable because an American filmmaker named Donner had mysteriously disappeared from his Ukraine mountain retreat. Donner, the fool who’d insisted on calling him “Baby” while he was alive, had opened the underground business to Ivan Babii. This season, in the same way young horses are led up from the foothills in spring, sweet young ones had been brought up to his lodge. Three girls who spoke Ukrainian, plus a boy who spoke Russian and Ukrainian. The boy and one of the girls supposedly from Kiev with their showoff haircuts, body piercings, and clothing. Tough street demons until they arrived here.
All four were over sixteen. No more babies for Babii. Ethical standards had not caused the age limit, nor the fact Donner was American and several American law enforcement officials had visited Ukraine and Romania seeking the source of the videos. The reason Babii had moved away from children was a current trend among sexual addicts—a preference for tough teenagers brought to their knees. Babii, the man from Moldova, had become the connection for delivering tough-looking young ones to Romania and getting them out, selling them across several borders and time zones.
Vakhabov, originally from Uzbekistan, was the Kiev connection. Vakhabov insisted teenagers could be found wandering the streets. But with NGOs like La Strada making trouble and the US appointing itself trafficking sheriff in order to work with the SBU, the simple use of “employment” agencies was no longer enough.
“A promise of Odessa sunshine is replaced by a trip through Moldova,” said Vakhabov. “We simply borrow them, while at the same time using opiates to calm them. They forget everything. Even if they wander off and make their way back to Ukraine … even if they find a shepherd hut with supplies and cross the border into the Nature Park, they will have clear heads, remembering nothing. Perhaps a trip to a Kiev clinic and some concern at first, but in the end they blame themselves. It is like fishing. We may even hook them more than once. Back in Kiev, they may decide to return to families. We bring families together, Ivan. Newly adopted families abroad, or the families they left in Ukraine. Catch and release. Fishermen in the Chernobyl region do it because of radiation. As they say in America, it’s win-win.”
Vakhabov was insane. But if Babii did not supply an outlet for Vakhabov’s girls and boys, someone else would, someone in Moldova or Slovakia or Poland or Russia or Albania or here in Romania, where Babii was only one of many. Vakhabov coined the phrase “Chernobyl Trail,” saying this would confuse anti-trafficking agents because no trafficker in his right mind would venture across the Chernobyl Zone. Traffickers used the trails established decades earlier for smuggling drugs and weapons. With lack of jobs, trafficking of individuals was inevitable. If Vakhabov did not grab lost souls wandering the streets, another trafficker would get them. Perhaps a cult would get them, like the one run by Andropov who insisted he had found God.
Babii thought briefly of his mother. When he was a boy she lit enough votive candles at her Orthodox bedroom shrine to heat the house. His mother complained about evils in the world, yet ignored—until the night on her deathbed—the business his father and Uncle Iosif had gotten into after the fall of the Soviet Union.
“They sell drugs, Ivan. I’ve known for years and prayed nightly to the Virgin’s icon. Do not follow them, Ivan. Go to school and stay away. Promise you’ll stay away from it.”
But, of course, he did not stay away from it. At school there was money to be had, and his connections were ready-made. Ivan Babii, the Kiev University connection.
When Babii heard a muffled scream in another part of the lodge, he put a finger to one ear as if to itch himself, but actually to make the sound of today’s business disappear. Outside, the snow-bearing cloud passed and the sun, heading toward the western horizon, shone down through virgin pines. There could not be screams here. It was much too peaceful. He had been assured the new arrivals were sufficiently sedated. He stopped itching his ear and listened carefully. Now he heard only a gentle feminine whimper, much more peaceful, as it should be at the Moldovenesc Self-Awareness Sanatorium, where inquiries on the listed phone line resulted in a message saying the sanatorium was booked in advance and to call the Bucharest number, which was changed regularly and led nowhere.
For the occasional mountain traveler who wandered into the sanatorium, Babii patterned his operation after one he’d visited in Sevastopol years earlier. There, a wide-eyed, bald woman had intoned in a mix of Russian and Ukrainian, “Business exploded after the Chernobyl explosion. When the Union fell, we became part of the new age.” So he was. Isn’t this what new agers and liberals claimed? Nothing is really good or evil? Everything simply is?
The whimpering finally stopped, which meant Belak and his Slovak crew were between takes. Filming would soon be finished, and all four young ones would be given back to Vakhabov. By tomorrow night they would be fed and gone, and Babii could relax instead of pacing his office like a child with his hand stuck in ajar of sweets. A fifty-year-old who feels older than his age because of this idiotic guilt! Perhaps it was time to get out, to run away from this business.
As he stood at his window at the end of the crisp, spring afternoon, the last thing Babii expected to see was a group of young priests emerging from the woods beyond the stables. Not bearded Orthodox priests wearing cassocks. These priests were clean-shaven and wore black tops and Roman collars. They ran quickly in and out of the slanting shade cast by virgin pines, leaping over tree trunks like thin mountain wolves.
Babii blinked his eyes. One moment the young priests were imagined and would soon be erased like evaporating snow-flakes; the next moment they were real and he recognized the familiar shapes of the AK-47 rifles they carried. As he dove to the floor, the window imploded and glass cascaded down on him. Before he could crawl to the filing cabinet where he kept his own AK-47, a voice yelled, “Stop!”
Babii turned to look over his shoulder. The priest stood outside the broken window aiming at him and smiling as if he would soon give his blessing. The priest had blond hair and fair skin and was muscular. A handsome young man, a strong and merciful man. Then the priest aimed the AK-47 low and shot Babii through the backs of his knees.
The pain made Babii think of his mother and his childhood and going to confession at St.
Mikola church. He thought of his confirmation—Uncle Iosif’s hand on the shoulder of the boy who would someday have to kill him—and his marriage to Elena and his loneliness when she left him after he fled Moldova. Finally, he thought of his unhappiness here and his plan to escape the barbarity.
Through the pain, Babii heard shots and screams; not teenagers screaming, but grown men. He tried to crawl to the door, but the pain was too great. On the verge of passing out, he realized the shooting had stopped. Beyond the pain, he fantasized this had been a mistake. He stared down at the fresh office carpet, put in only a few weeks earlier. When he tried to breathe through his nose instead of his mouth, he could smell the carpet.
Suddenly, he was turned brutally onto his back, his legs feeling like stakes driven into his torso. His face was to one side, and he was aware of the feel of the carpet on his cheek. He saw hiking boots, black slacks, black shirt, and Roman collar as the priest stepped to his side. He wanted to sink into the fibers of the carpet and reemerge, new and fresh, a young man who could defend himself. Or a young man confessing his sins and promising to live a holy life.
When he looked up to the priest’s face, the young man who had shot him through the backs of his knees smiled down at him. Babii tried to return his own smile to the peculiar smile on the priest’s face. He tried to cry out for help but lacked the strength. He tried to say the prayer of contrition he’d known from boyhood. Finally able to mumble, he pleaded as best he could in Romanian and Ukrainian and Russian and even English. But it was no use. The Avtomat Kalashnickova - 47, named for its 1947 inventor, Mikhail Kalashnikov, was raised toward Ivan Babii’s head.
The priest aimed the gun between Babii’s eyes and fired.
Beautiful. Just off the mountain road beyond a small sign announcing “Moldovenesc Self-Awareness Sanatorium—Private,” a green Mercedes van and a tan Zhiguli station wagon were backed into the unpaved entry road side by side. Stands of beech and pine shadowed the entrance. If someone had driven past minutes earlier, they might have heard shots. But no one had driven past.
For several seconds, footsteps erupted behind the vehicles, the van rocking slightly on its suspension as passengers boarded from behind. Two armed young men in black with Roman collars ran to the van’s driver and passenger side doors, got in, and sped off to the north.
The muscular young man who shot Babii, and an even younger man in his teens who wore a black sweatshirt over his Roman collar and bib, remained. They put their AK-47s into the station wagon and stood to the side of the car. The boy in the sweatshirt was thin with dark, stringy hair. The blond, muscular man, perhaps in his late twenties, stared back toward the lodge building with wide, unblinking blue eyes. They spoke to one another in Ukrainian.
“It will burn quickly,” said the boy. “Everything is dry.”
“Vasily has decided not to burn it,” said the young man. “Our cans of gasoline have become too expensive.”
The boy look puzzled. “But Vasily is already gone and Pyotr said—”
“I am joking,” said the young man. “Pyotr said Vasily is in charge. Fire attracts attention, flames spread in the underbrush, and innocent people living in the area could be hurt.”
Something seemed to click in the boy’s countenance. He looked down, walked slowly to the front passenger side of the station wagon, and got in.
Behind the station wagon, the senior among these young men dressed as non-Orthodox priests stooped down, took a twig from the ground, and traced a circle in the dry soil on the entry road. Inside the circle, he traced a cross. Then he stood, pushed the twig into his pocket, used his foot to wipe out the crude image he had traced in the soil, and went to the station wagon. After the station wagon drove off, all was silent and still as the sunset turned treetops purplish orange and night came on.
Several nights later in another wooded compound many kilometers from the mountains, three men sat in the shadows on the front porch of a cabin. The men sat around a small table, speaking Russian and Ukrainian alternately. The only light came through a curtain from inside the cabin, from the brilliant stars above, and from the glow of the cigarette one of the men was smoking.
It was a clear, cool, windless spring night. One of the non-smokers had silver hair, which glowed in the window light. Although seated, the silver-haired man was obviously much taller than the other two. The other nonsmoker was heavyset, bearded, and fidgety in his seat. The tall silver-haired man had just asked the other two if they thought the meeting had been successful.
“It depends how you measure success,” said the man with the glowing cigarette. “We agreed all four should stay. End of business.”
“Their stay will be profitable,” said the tall silver-haired man. “They have arrived at an emotional moment in their lives.”
“I suppose, Pyotr Alexeyevich, living here you are familiar with emotional problems,” said the cigarette smoker. “In any case, what you do with your Natashas and Nikolais is your business. My concern is security and corruption in Kiev. With this in mind, tonight’s visit will be my final trip here.”
“Certainly,” said the tall silver-haired man. “I do not expect a man in your position to take unnecessary risk. We’ll still be able to accommodate your special needs.”
The cigarette smoker coughed uncomfortably, then said, “We’re getting off track. How do you justify the presence of four young people to the others now that your storm troopers have dragged them here?”
“Perhaps you would have shipped them to Turkey,” said the bearded heavyset man.
“Submitting to the demand of the market,” added the tall silver-haired man. “We once sent older girls to Turkey because they know how to control them, and boys we sent to—”
“Do not assume what I would do!” shouted the smoker. “You do not see what happens to the girls when they are gone! I accuse you both … No! We are all three guilty! We ship our blonds via the Balkan Trail to Bedouins so they can smuggle them through the desert in order that Israelis have their vengeance for the Holocaust!” The smoker coughed up phlegm and spit off to the side. “Israelis want our girls so their young men will not rape their own girls!” He coughed up more phlegm and spit, then spoke more quietly, but still in anger. “Pyotr Alexeyevich, my concern is your lack of discipline and how this complicates matters!”
The tall silver-haired man spoke in a steady but firm voice. “If you have been offended, I apologize. The past is the past. I agree we share the guilt. We’ve made our decision, and since I am responsible for discipline here, I will deal with it appropriately.”
“How?” asked the bearded heavyset man.
“I will assign a mentor to each. If necessary, we use light doses of medication.”
The cigarette smoker was still angry. “And I suppose when the hair in their armpits grows long enough, they’ll become good little soldiers like the rest, with you, Pyotr, as their messiah! You once said, ‘Like Mr. Bill Gates, we develop one copy and sell it again and again.’ You treat teenagers like computer software!”
The man named Pyotr ran a hand through his silver hair. “At least I admit past mistakes. At least here the ones who have not gone down the Balkan Trail escape abuse in back rooms by politicians and religious leaders who are chauffeured about Kiev in Zils and Bentleys!”
There was an uncomfortable silence. Out in the woods surrounding the compound, insects and small reptiles sang what sounded like a dirge in a minor key. Eventually the smoker smashed his cigarette butt in an ashtray. “We consider ourselves an indestructible troika. Out here in the dark so we can’t look one another in the eye.”
“Has anyone found them yet?” asked the bearded heavyset man.
“Who?” asked the cigarette smoker, still smashing the butt.
“The filmmakers in the Romanian mountains.”
“No. But it can’t be long before the stench reaches the road. What is next on your agenda, Pyotr? Weren’t the clinics enough? Would it not be best to confine your actions to—”
“No!” shouted the silver-haired man.
The bearded heavyset man sighed, “Turmoil demands a cooling off period, Pyotr. Even though I am Orthodox, dressing boys as Catholic priests was unwise.”
“Did you both come here to confront me?” asked the silver-haired man.
The cigarette smoker lit another, took a deep drag, said, “My men on the left bank are nervous about the comings and goings and theatrics of your people. You’ve had most of the ammunition moved onto the peninsula, and my men wonder who has the key to the armory.”
“Only myself, Vasily, and Ivan have keys,” said the silver-haired man. “I would be more concerned about your lungs than life here on the peninsula. I saw you sneaking a smoke on Kiev television while reporters chased you out one of the lesser-known entrances of the House of Government. Hasn’t anyone told you killing yourself with cigarettes is old school?”
The cigarette smoker inhaled, blew a thick stream of smoke toward the silver-haired man, and then said in a low voice, “The idiot filmmaker rotting in the mountains was named Ivan. I never trust a man named Ivan. As for my smoking, perhaps like our Chernobyl expatriates, I am in search of a convenient way to expire.”
There was a long, tense silence. Finally, the bearded heavyset man struggled to his feet. “We took care of business. The teenagers stay. Although my church has worked on the project for millennia, our newly enlightened Pyotr must be given his opportunity to cleanse his corner of Ukraine of its evils. We will see how far he gets.”
The silver-haired man named Pyotr also stood, towering above the other two, anger obvious in his stance. “It’s definitely time to leave, gentlemen. The van is waiting on the left bank to take you back to Kiev.”
In the shadows, the three men shook hands reluctantly. Then, invisible to one another but obvious to an observer in the woods seeing the men backlit on the porch, the cigarette smoker and the bearded heavyset man wiped their hands on their trousers, as if the tall silver-haired man called Pyotr had power over them and they were trying to wipe it away.
Traffyck: The Thrilling Sequel to Chernobyl Murders Page 2
