East of the Sun

by Janet Rogers

  Amelia considered his words in silence, unsure of how to voice her thoughts. ‘But I’m not even Russian,’ was all she could say. She spoke gently, careful not to offend. ‘I have no claim to your goodwill, Nick. There are people here – Russians – who are in far greater need than I am.’

  He held her eyes for a moment. ‘It doesn’t matter in this moment. I mean, it always matters that there are people in need, but right now you’re the one who could do with some help. This place made it possible for your nightmare to happen, made it possible for people, whether they are governments, companies or individuals, to dispose of an innocent person purely because he got in the way.’ Nick sighed. ‘Besides, it’s all I know to do right now, all I feel I can help with.’

  Silence fell between them again. Amelia was touched that he would deem her worthy of his help, but also that he’d shared some of his past with her. The rawness of earlier was gone. When they finished the wine, he started gathering the dishes together.’

  ‘Leave it,’ Amelia said, briefly touching his arm. ‘You’ve done enough.’

  He straightened. ‘I should go.’

  She nodded and followed him into the entrance hall.

  ‘We need to talk,’ he said, ‘strategise. We never spoke about the next steps tonight. Or the contents of that envelope.’ He was visibly switching gears, becoming business-like again. ‘I have some new information. Remember that we wondered if the project’s geologist would be able to confirm or deny the value of the deposit? Well, it looks like I may have tracked him down. Hopefully we’ll be able to find out soon . . .’ He trailed off, exhaustion clear on his face.

  ‘It doesn’t matter right now. Tonight was good. Thank you.’ She saw the surprise on his face, and she felt some surprise of her own for being willing to let the new information wait.

  ‘I’ll be back in the morning,’ he said. Again she nodded, not wanting him to leave her alone, but not voicing the thought. He put on his coat and gloves and she fought the urge to ask him to stay.

  At the door he paused. ‘Don’t open the door or answer the phone.’

  She nodded.

  ‘I’ll be here again at nine.’

  She turned the lock to let him out, suddenly unable to meet his eyes. As she started to open the door, he leaned towards her. The leather of his glove brushed against her temple as he pushed her hair away and placed a kiss on her forehead. His eyes rested on hers for another moment and then he was gone. An unfamiliar emotion took hold of Amelia as he disappeared from sight. She listened until she could no longer hear his footsteps. Carefully she locked the door behind him and reluctantly turned towards the foreign apartment that would now be her fortress.

  19

  The night in the unfamiliar apartment turned out to be exhausting. Spells of deep sleep were intermingled with dreaded periods of wakefulness filled with noises, real or imagined. When Nick arrived at nine, as promised, she could see her own fatigue mirrored in his face. His gentle smile made her struggle to suppress the memory of the cautious intimacy and his brief kiss of the previous night.

  After what happened, it was probably natural for them feel a sense of closeness, but she just couldn’t be distracted by it. She wouldn’t be able to live with herself if she let Robert down again. And so she waited until they each had a cup of coffee in front of them, took the bull by the horns and told him everything.

  In silence he listened as she told him about all three of the notes left at the hotel, the strange meeting with Jennings, Popov’s refusal to see her and his threats when she’d intruded on his lunch. She ended with her visit to the hospital and Sergey Alyoshen’s diminished state.

  It was a relief to talk about the things that had happened. Throughout Nick remained attentive, his face still with concentration.

  ‘You seem to have ruffled quite a few feathers,’ he said when she finished.

  ‘It couldn’t be helped. I was as careful as I could be in the circumstances.’ She took a breath. ‘There’s one more thing.’ She pushed the envelope she’d received the previous day across the table.

  For a long moment Nick hesitated. He gave her a searching look, as if waiting for her to change her mind.

  She nodded. ‘Open it.’

  He took out the single piece of paper. A quick frown was the only visible sign of his bafflement. He said nothing.

  ‘It’s an e-mail from Robert to someone else. At least, that’s what it looks like.’

  Nick nodded. ‘I see. Was this his e-mail address?’

  ‘No. At least not that I was aware of. Look at the recipient.’

  ‘Who is it?’

  ‘No idea, but look at the e-mail address – chross@eme.com.’

  ‘EME. The company that bought Prism’s stake?’

  ‘Exactly.’

  Nick read the message out. ‘I’m ready to help you out at the agreed terms. Contact me when convenient.’ He shook his head. ‘Strange.’ He stopped and stared at her. ‘What do you make of it?’

  ‘I really don’t know. Obviously someone wanted me to see it.’

  Nick nodded. ‘But who? And how would they have gained access to something like this? And what does it mean?’

  ‘I don’t know, but when I went to see Popov, he dropped a heavy hint that I didn’t know Robert quite as well as I thought I did.’

  Nick frowned. ‘Does this really sound like something Robert would write?’

  ‘Not the message, but it doesn’t sound unlike his writing style.’

  ‘It’s two sentences. Anyone could have written this.’

  ‘Look at the date.’

  Nick glanced down again. ‘It was sent last year in September.’

  ‘Right in the middle of the Prism-Sibraz negotiations.’

  Nick was silent. He gave her a searching look.

  Amelia took a deep breath. ‘I know, I know. I can’t believe that Robert would have been driven by financial gain or agree to manipulate negotiations, but that’s what the e-mail implies, doesn’t it?’

  ‘You don’t know that. That’s a big conclusion from so little.’

  ‘Maybe, but it’s still difficult to ignore.’

  ‘Amelia, I’m going to remind you of what I said a few minutes ago. You’ve ruffled feathers. Powerful feathers, I might add. Quite a few people seem to be worried by your presence here.’

  ‘That’s the problem. It “seems” and “feels” like a lot, but when you dissect the facts, there’s very little of substance, except for this e-mail.’

  ‘Perhaps, but having very little evidence, which may even be fabricated or manipulated, doesn’t have to be a permanent state of affairs.’

  ‘Let’s hope it won’t be.’ She stared at the sheet of paper in his hand. ‘But what do I do about it?’

  ‘I’d say ignore it for the moment, purely on the basis that it’s out of character for Robert.’

  Amelia hesitated, then relented. It probably wouldn’t serve her well to jump to conclusions based on something so flimsy.

  Forcing herself to focus, she changed the subject. ‘I still think the diamond deposit and its true value lies at the heart of the matter.’

  ‘I happen to agree with you. I’m not sure how it all fits together, but I have a feeling you’re right.’

  ‘And I think Bruce Jennings is involved,’ she said, pleased and relieved that he shared her suspicions.

  ‘Or at the least he knows something.’

  Amelia nodded. ‘And much as I would’ve liked to pay Popov another visit, I think that’s a dead end. He, like Jennings, must know something about how the whole Prism-Sibraz thing played into Robert’s disappearance, otherwise he wouldn’t have been so aggressive. Unfortunately I don’t think he’ll tolerate my presence again.’

  ‘While we’re on the subject, Amelia, I don’t want to sound overbearing, but I’d like you to promise me that you won’t try and do anything like that on your own again. Please.’ Nick’s gaze was solemn and the moment she’d hoped wouldn’t arrive, was the
re for her to handle.

  She needed to tell him of the afternoon’s planned meeting with Mikhail at the grave of Stalin’s Soviet Foreign Minister, Vyacheslav Molotov, the sixty thousand roubles hidden at the bottom of her suitcase and the stern warning to go alone.

  Nick’s face froze when she told him. He got up, walked the single step to the kitchen window and looked out for a long time before he turned back to her.

  ‘It’s too dangerous. You can’t go.’

  ‘How can I not go?’ Amelia countered.

  ‘It’s most likely a trap.’

  ‘That may be so, but—’

  ‘Amelia,’ Nick said, leaning his hands on the table, a flash of impatience in his eyes, ‘have you forgotten the notes? Someone knows you’re here, they don’t like it and you’ve been warned off. What do you think their next step will be?’

  Amelia fell silent, knowing that, no matter what he said, and no matter how convincing his arguments were, she would go to the meeting. Whether he was in agreement or not.

  ‘How can I not go?’ she said gently. What other argument could she offer? ‘I promised myself that I would pursue every possible lead.’

  ‘With the emphasis on “possible”, meaning every lead that holds a measure of promise.’

  ‘I think this does.’

  Nick didn’t reply. There was no time for a long impasse.

  Amelia came up with a compromise. ‘Fine then, you come too. You can arrive well ahead of me and wait near Molotov’s grave. If it is a trap, you’ll be there to help. But you cannot let anyone see you.’

  He shot her a look, but didn’t argue further. Time was limited and they made brief plans. When he got up to leave an hour later, she felt a stab of fear, both for him and herself. He must have seen it, because he simply said ‘See you,’ as if nothing big lay ahead before he disappeared down the stairs.

  ‘See you,’ she echoed. She certainly hoped she would.

  Novodevichy Convent and Cemetery lay to the southwest of the Moscow city centre. It had been one of the places Amelia and Robert had explored together when they’d first arrived. Not only was it an obvious place of worship, but also a site of particular beauty. Less popular than the churches in the Kremlin, and therefore less overrun by tourists, it had always managed to retain its calming, peaceful quality. Here visitors actually obeyed the unspoken request for silence, mainly because the spirituality of the complex of cathedrals and chapels compelled them to do so.

  As Amelia arrived at the convent, her thoughts returned to the message delivered by Yuri, the kind old Canadian embassy security guard. She could only imagine how petrified he must have been to be visited by a stranger in the middle of the night. He would have realised immediately that there would be no choice but to act as the stranger’s messenger. She only hoped the old man’s senses hadn’t deserted him and that he’d relayed the message correctly.

  She was far too early for the meeting with the so-called Mikhail, so instead of heading to the cemetery immediately, she entered the walled-in convent through the tall Transfiguration Gate-Church.

  In this weather, there were even fewer visitors than on a normal day. Since the snow had started the previous night, it had only let up for brief periods. Now a wet greyness hung over the cluster of white buildings lining the western perimeter wall. Amelia bought a ticket from the attendant in the steamed-up kiosk and headed to Smolensk Cathedral in the centre of the convent complex. Its relative simplicity compared with many other Russian churches had always appealed to her. It was the oldest building on the convent’s grounds and had been Amelia’s favourite from the first time she’d seen it. Until now.

  Today the onion domes, high walls and striking sixteenth century frescoes did nothing to calm her nerves. All she could think about was the impending meeting, the possible danger, but above all, the answers she might find.

  Now, several hours after her conversation with Nick, she was glad about the compromise. It was good to know that Nick would be out there somewhere, even if he would be hidden from view. She glanced at her watch. She still had half an hour to kill before she had to leave to meet Mikhail. She touched the wad of cash through the leather of her handbag, making sure for the hundredth time that it was still there.

  Most average Russians would still consider sixty thousand roubles a large sum of money, but it was far from the excesses the Russian crime world sometimes dealt in. Depending on the exchange rate of the day, it was somewhere around two thousand dollars. Money she would happily part with if she could gain useful information in doing so.

  Like Nick, she’d been unsure of how to view the demand for money and the relatively modest amount that was stipulated. Did it mean this was just an amateur who had somehow learnt of her situation and wanted to extort money? Or was there a bigger force at work, trying to confuse her by hiding behind this demand for money? Or could the message really be from someone who’d been involved in Robert’s disappearance, perhaps a member of the Russian Mafia, who now wanted to sell his two cents’ worth of information?

  Apart from the attendant seated on a chair inside the doorway and a huddle of old ladies silently lighting candles and whispering their urgent prayers, Amelia was the only other person in the cathedral. Once more she did a slow 360-view of the frescoes, her hand resting on a massive column to her left. It was truly beautiful and beyond impressive.

  ‘Why are you early?’ a voice spoke suddenly at her shoulder.

  She whirled around. He was leaning against the column and was slightly turned away, as if he was a casual visitor viewing the frescoes on the wall behind her. She hadn’t heard or seen him come in. His face was half-hidden, courtesy of a thick scarf and a hat pulled low over his eyes.

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘You are early. Why?’ he asked again, more impatiently. He spoke English, although his accent was heavy.

  ‘Did you bring the money?’ he asked when she didn’t answer, still keeping his face away from her and the light.

  She ignored his question. ‘Who are you?’

  ‘Mikhail,’ he replied with heavy sarcasm, implying that surely she had to know it was just a name plucked out of the air.

  Amelia cursed her own nervousness. She was supposed to be demanding facts and cooperation, but instead she was making one nervous blunder after another. She took a breath, mentally calming herself down, and tried again.

  ‘Who sent you?’

  ‘No one,’ he replied very quickly. He glanced at her for a brief second and all she could make out were dark eyes and thick eyebrows, perhaps a slight central-Asian element to the shape of his eyes.

  ‘Follow me in five minutes. Come to the cemetery.’ He turned away and disappeared behind the column as noiselessly as he had appeared. Amelia stood frozen to the spot. This was it. It was actually happening.

  Nervously she glanced at her watch, noting the time. The old women had finally lit all the candles they’d wanted to and were on their way out too. Soon she was alone. She counted the slow seconds and when it was time, raised her eyes to the icons lining the wall, hoping their presence would have a positive influence on the meeting to come.

  She retraced her steps, exiting again through the Transfiguration Gate-Church, turned right and took another right onto Luzhnetsky Street. It wasn’t far, but the time it took to walk the 400 metres or so to the cemetery’s entrance, felt like an eternity.

  What an eerie place, she thought and shivered in her coat. She knew from the cemetery’s map she’d found in an old guidebook in Nick’s friend’s apartment that she had to walk straight down the central path for a while, then take a sharp right to get to the graves next to the boundary wall. This was where Molotov’s grave was located, where she would have her meeting with the stranger.

  As she walked through the gates, a hand gripped her elbow tightly, painfully.

  ‘Come,’ the voice she recognised as Mikhail’s commanded. ‘Come, faster!’ he snarled again. She had no choice but to follow him. His steely
grip was impossible to shake off. He marched her down the central path and soon yanked her roughly to the left and into a row of old graves. With sudden, horrible dread Amelia realised that Nick would be waiting at the opposite end of the vast cemetery. He would never see or hear her from his hiding place. How stupid they had been!

  In her panic, she kept stumbling, but Mikhail showed no mercy and simply pulled harder on her arm. She struggled to move her feet quickly enough over the uneven, snowy surface.

  ‘Please, slow down,’ she gasped, her throat burning.

  Just as suddenly as he had gripped her elbow, he pulled her to the right, behind a tall headstone, and released her arm. Amelia glanced around frantically. They were hidden from view by the enormous headstone. In different circumstances she might have been able to laugh at the overly dramatic angular stone pointing to heaven and the incongruous angels perched on its corners, but right now all she could focus on was her cold fear at Mikhail’s apparent rage.

  ‘Give it to me!’ he demanded and made a movement for the bag that was still, miraculously, despite the feverish run over the bumpy terrain, slung over her shoulder.

  Amelia stepped back, fear churning in her chest. She wasn’t about to surrender it without a fight.

  ‘No, stop!’ she shouted at him, holding a hand out in front of her. The gesture was absurd, but to her surprise he stopped his approach. ‘I need information before you can have the money. That’s the deal. What do you know?’

  Mikhail sneered at her false bravado. She knew she had very little bargaining power. He could so easily hurt her and simply snatch her bag, and yet she couldn’t stop herself from pushing just a little more.

  ‘I have only half of it here,’ she said, scarcely believing what she heard herself say. ‘I’ll tell you where the rest is if you tell me what you know and if you answer my questions.’

  His scarf had loosened and she could now see that there was indeed a faint but unmistakeable trace of central-Asian ancestors in his features. He was clearly angry about her claim that half the money was elsewhere, but she decided to take another gamble anyway.