The Black Russian

by Lenny Bartulin

  They walked over to a scratched service door: there was a picture of a staircase on it.

  ‘After you, Mr Susko,’ said Viktor Kablunak.

  ‘What are we actually going to do up there?’

  The Russian levelled his cold eyes at Jack. ‘We are going to stop all of this nonsense, Mr Susko.’

  ‘Oh, good.’

  ‘And then you will be in my debt.’

  ‘What about my book?’

  ‘From Russia with Love? I accept it as a small token of your gratitude.’

  Pascal gave Jack a push. ‘In.’

  Jack went through the door and started up the stairs. Pascal and the Russian followed. They climbed to the top, went through another door and entered a hallway. Jack remembered that the room he had been tied up in — the one with the safe in it — was on the left. The gallery was on the right. He went right, walked about ten metres, and then paused before the door that led into the smaller gallery room. He could hear voices. He strained his ears and listened for a moment. Larissa was talking: he could not understand exactly what she was saying, but she did not sound too distressed. Jack turned to Kablunak and Pascal, shrugged his shoulders and gave them a questioning look. Pascal put a finger to his lips, then pointed at the door with his gun. Silently mouthed: You go. Then he pointed to the other door in the hallway, the one that Jack remembered led to the kitchen. Pascal motioned with his head, indicating that he and Kablunak would go in there. Jack now gave them a perplexed look and held his hands up, to show that he was at a loss as to what they were on about, but Pascal and Viktor had already ducked away through the kitchen door and half closed it silently behind them.

  He stared after them, now alone in the dark, empty corridor. That was their plan? They were going to hide in the kitchen? Jesus.

  Behind him, the gallery door opened. Jack stood in a beam of light. It threw a very long shadow of him down the hallway: elongated legs slightly apart, ten-foot-long orangutan arms and hands by his sides, everything stretched up to a ridiculously compacted head and shoulders and torso. He stood there, staring at the image, like a black cut-out on the floor.

  ‘The fuck are you doing, Susko?’

  Jack waited for Pascal to step back out into the hallway again with the .38 and start waving it around a little. After a couple of seconds, it was clear that this was not going to happen. He waited a few moments more, just in case. Nothing.

  ‘Susko,’ said Lewis behind him. ‘I thought I asked you to call. You shouldn’t sneak around like that, you know?’ He stepped forward out of the doorway and stuck a gun into Jack’s kidneys. ‘It’s a good way to get dead.’

  Jack held his breath and put his hands up. He had no idea what Plan A was, so how the hell was he supposed to put Plan B into motion?

  ~

  29 ~

  OUTSIDE, THUNDER CRACKED AND THE RAIN BEGAN to pour in a roaring rush.

  ‘In here,’ said Lewis. Then, with a smirk in his voice: ‘And you can put your fucking hands down.’

  Jack turned, dropping his arms. He was surprised to see Lewis in a black suit. Tight around his shoulders and chest, as though maybe it was a size too small: or maybe Lewis was just always a size too big, no matter what he wore. He looked a little hot: beads of sweat had gathered at his temples. Underneath the jacket, a white shirt and a thin black tie that seemed to be struggling to find a neck somewhere below his blonde, concrete-block head. Jack looked down at Lewis’ shoes and noticed how small his feet were. He thought about mentioning the old correlation between shoe size and manhood, but decided it was probably better to wait until Lewis was no longer pointing a gun at him.

  The big man stepped aside and Jack walked through the door. In the gallery, things did not look as Jack had expected them to. He paused, hitched his bag over his shoulder.

  ‘Bit early for booze, isn’t it?’

  Larissa Tate was sitting on the edge of Rhonda de Groot’s desk. She was wearing a charcoal-grey pinstriped suit with a pencil skirt, tight around her smooth thighs and ending just where her exquisitely chiselled knees began. Under the jacket, a pale-pink blouse with a ruffle front, and a thin, silver chain around her neck. Her high heels were sideways on the floor below her feet, as though kicked off after a hard day at the office. She was sipping from a champagne flute: no doubt a very fine, biscuity French number. Two orange-labelled bottles were on the desk beside her and neither was wearing their cork.

  Larissa smiled brightly, her face welcoming and warm. ‘Jack! You’re already here.’ She slid off the desk and tugged at her skirt as she looked up at him. ‘That’s great.’ Under the perfect, straight fringe, her big browns were like a couple of chocolate-coated almonds. She turned and grabbed one of the bottles on the desk and topped up her glass. ‘Would you like a drink?’ she asked, as though Jack had arrived for a gallery opening. ‘Come on, have one. Join us.’

  He took it all in. Larissa and Lewis. Dressed like a couple of account executives. He noticed two small leather suitcases upright and side-by-side in the corner beside the desk. A matching pair: His and Hers. Oh yeah. Jack took it all in.

  ‘Off somewhere?’ he said.

  Larissa glanced at him sideways. ‘Business trip, Jack. To do some business.’

  ‘Someplace nice?’

  ‘Yes. Someplace nice.’

  ‘Hotel or do you know people?’

  ‘Hotel. And I know people.’

  ‘Good stolen art and money-laundering service?’

  She grinned. ‘The best.’

  ‘Then you’re all set.’

  ‘So have a drink and wish me well.’

  Jack noticed the me. He turned to Lewis, watched him a moment, but Mr Muscles did not notice anything.

  ‘Jack?’ said Larissa. ‘You want some champagne or what?’

  ‘Got anything stronger?’

  ‘Champagne only, lover boy. Relax. You don’t have to be such a man all the time.’ She glanced at Lewis. ‘It can get really boring.’

  Jack stared at Larissa Tate. Questions tumbled into his brain and tried to settle into the slots, like a hundred roulette balls bouncing around on the same wheel. ‘Champagne will have to do then,’ he said.

  ‘Coming right up.’

  Okay. So it was Larissa and Lewis. Rhonda, Jack, Shane and Carl, all scratched. Kablunak was in the kitchen. Richard de Groot was dead. Somebody had killed him. Who? They had sped away in the Maserati. Maybe. Most likely. But not necessarily. But … Shit. Jack looked at Lewis, holding a gun. Too obvious? Jack had no idea. Somebody had pulled the trigger — and that was the somebody he wanted to watch out for.

  He remembered a line from the 1963 bestseller Tuesday and There’s No Tomorrow by Francis O’Connor: ‘Count the bullets before you move, and make sure you count ’em all the way to six. And if you can’t count, brother … you’d better wait for Christmas.’

  Lewis went over to a plush, red two-seater sofa pushed up against the wall opposite Jack. He sat down, heavily, leaned back and rested one squat tree-trunk leg on top of the other. He held the gun in his hand loose, only casually aimed at Jack. With his other hand, he grabbed some nuts out of a cut-glass bowl resting on the arm of the sofa and shoved them into his mouth.

  Jack said: ‘So where’s Rhonda?’

  Lewis laughed. Peanut shrapnel flew out of his mouth. ‘Never heard of her.’

  ‘Is that what you’re going to tell the cops?’ Jack was making it up as he went along.

  ‘Fuck off,’ scoffed Lewis, screwing up his face. ‘What cops?’

  ‘The ones I’ve called.’

  ‘You haven’t called any fucking cops.’

  ‘Yeah? What if I said they were out in the kitchen right now?’

  Lewis shook his head, leaned it back against the sofa and then draped an arm over his eyes. ‘Don’t make me get up, Susko. You’ve got nothing. Zilch.’

  Larissa walked over and handed Jack a glass of champagne. She stood with her back to Lewis. ‘Pay no attention to him,’ she said. ‘He’s dru
nk.’

  ‘I’m not fucking drunk!’

  Larissa stared intently at Jack and frowned a little. Then she smiled and brought her glass up to her lips. ‘You could still change your mind,’ she said, softly, so that Lewis could not hear.

  ‘You’re crazy.’

  ‘What are you whispering?’ growled Lewis.

  Larissa smiled again and then gave Jack a quick, disappointed, oh-well-bad-luck kind of look. She winked at him and tapped his glass with her own. Jack stared at her and swallowed some champagne. Then he swallowed some more and finished it off. He could smell her perfume, a sophisticated, vaguely floral scent that added a good whiff of boardroom sex to her strictly business look.

  He pointed at Mr Muscles on the sofa and handed his glass back to Larissa. ‘Are you going to tell me about it?’

  ‘What’s to tell?’ Larissa moved away, sipped more of her champagne as she walked. She turned around and sat back against the edge of the desk. ‘Jack plus the mail plus the Sergius equals flight to Spain and fortune. And here you are.’

  ‘You use a calculator for all that or did you do it in your head?’

  ‘Very funny, Jack.’

  ‘So how come you’re here so early, all dressed up and raring to go?’

  She smiled and turned to face him. ‘There’s been other business to attend to, Jack.’ Larissa pointed to a laptop on the desk. ‘While we sleep, the rest of the world does business.’

  ‘Getting the buyer ready, huh?’

  ‘Good boy. Full marks. There’s an art thief in you somewhere, eh?’ She sighed. ‘See how good we could be together?’

  ‘You still haven’t got the Sergius.’

  ‘But you’re here, Susko,’ said Lewis from the couch, slurring his South African accent a little. ‘So we do.’

  ‘The mailman doesn’t deliver this early.’

  ‘Oh come on, Jack. So then why are you here?’ Larissa shook her head. ‘You’ve had it the whole time, haven’t you? Tricky boy. Probably under your bed the other night.’ She gave him a sultry look.

  Jack stopped. It was a good moment for Kablunak and Pascal to come bursting through the door. They did not. He stared at Larissa. He checked out Lewis again on the sofa. The two of them actually thought he had the Bible there with him. What the hell was he going to do now?

  ‘Poor Jack,’ said Larissa. ‘You had your chance, love. I even threw myself at you. And I was good. How much bait does a healthy man need?’

  ‘Fuck all, baby!’ Lewis lifted his head, threw more nuts into his mouth and chewed them, grinning like an idiot. Jack noticed that the gun was now aimed at a painting on the wall down by his right. Might be another perfect moment for Kablunak and Pascal to come bursting into the room. He hoped for a second or two longer, but nothing happened. Maybe they were making a toasted sandwich.

  Larissa said: ‘It was nice, Jackie-o. You were lovely. But of course, that was also when I knew. You’re not game enough, Jack, not really. You’re a lot of talk and pose, and it’s all very nice and fun and looks good, but you’d never take it over the line.’

  ‘What, like kill somebody?’ Jack watched for her reaction.

  She ignored the comment, as though she had not heard it. ‘You flirt on the edges, but you’re too cautious. Women need commitment, a man who’ll go the full distance. I should have known with you after the first time, but I must have believed there was a chance. Or maybe I was just hoping.’

  ‘Commitment?’ Jack frowned. ‘Have I slipped into a parallel universe or something?’

  ‘You’ve got a spark, baby, but …’ Larissa looked meaningfully at him and shook her pretty head. She held the look for a moment and Jack could feel her driving it home. ‘I did, honey,’ she said, with a little swoon in her voice for added effect. ‘For a moment I hoped. But then I knew. You’re just another scaredy cat. Jack who plays pretend, but never the real thing.’ She drank some of her champagne.

  Jack felt his body fill with tiredness. Outside, the rain was getting louder: the streets splashed and the streetlights blurred, and the drains and gutters flooded. The parched city drank its fill.

  Larissa grinned. ‘Have I hurt your feelings, Mr Susko?’

  ‘I’m devastated,’ he said, face grim but not because of what she had said. He nodded at Lewis. ‘He knows you’re going to do him over, doesn’t he?’

  ‘You don’t get it, do you, Jack?’

  ‘You think he does?’

  Lewis did not like being talked about as though he was not there. ‘Enough of that shit,’ he said, a dose of menace in his tone. He tried to sit up, but it was all just too much effort. He fell back into the sofa and stretched his legs and flicked the gun at Jack a couple of times, casually. ‘The Sergius, Susko. Now.’

  Larissa smiled at Jack as though he was a cheeky five-year-old. ‘Come on now. You win some, you lose some,’ she said and held out her hand. She pointed at his bag, slung behind his hip. ‘You lose some.’

  ‘That the hand you used to shoot Richard de Groot?’

  That one got her. ‘What?’

  ‘Or did you just pack the cash into a bag while Lewis let him have it?’

  The South African looked up. ‘The fuck you talking about?’

  Jack watched their faces: the surprise seemed genuine enough. But he was not putting any money down yet. ‘I saw him about an hour ago,’ he said. ‘Two plugs in the back. Head down in the floor safe. Safe empty.’

  ‘Fuck!’ Lewis had managed to get off the sofa this time.

  ‘That the gun, Lewis?’ asked Jack.

  The big man ignored him, looked at Larissa. ‘She shot him. Just like she said she would.’

  ‘Who?’ But Jack knew as soon as he asked. Rhonda.

  Larissa stared into space. She had lost a little colour in her face.

  ‘We’ve got to get out of here,’ said Lewis. He had sobered up in record time. ‘Right now.’

  ‘Not without the Sergius.’

  Lewis swung around and pointed the gun at Jack. ‘Okay. Give. Now.’

  ‘I told you. I haven’t got it.’

  ‘What?’ Larissa almost growled. Jack was glad she was not holding the gun. ‘Where the fuck is it?’

  ‘Post office,’ he said, feeling his legs go a little cold. ‘Waiting to be picked up.’ He swallowed and held the strap of his bag. ‘I’ve got the slip but you’re going to have to wait for nine o’clock.’

  ‘The post office!’ Lewis was shaking his head. ‘Babe, we’ve got to go right now. There’s no time for the post office.’

  ‘We’re going to go get it,’ said Larissa.

  ‘Fuck the Sergius!’ Lewis pointed his gun at the suitcases in the corner. ‘There’s two hundred grand in there!’

  Jack looked at the suitcases. So they had stolen the money. And then Rhonda had come around for the killing deed.

  Larissa blinked, came back from wherever she had gone. ‘What are we going to do with two hundred thousand dollars, you moron? That’s nowhere near enough! I’m not planning on getting a fucking job!’

  ‘Yeah, well it’s enough for me.’ Lewis swung the gun around at Jack again. ‘Pick up the bags, Susko. We’re going down to the car.’

  ‘Don’t be an idiot.’ Larissa moved over to stand in the way.

  ‘Hey! We did the safe and now he’s dead! How long do you think it’s going to take the cops to be onto us? We’ve got to go, now.’

  ‘We took the money so that we could move the Bible,’ said Larissa, rigid and pissed off and just holding it all in. ‘Without the Bible, the money is nothing. Does that fucking compute?’

  ‘I’m out of here.’

  ‘You stupid fuck.’

  Lewis stopped. Stared at Larissa. Wiggled a few fingers on the hand holding the gun.

  ‘You wouldn’t dare,’ she said.

  ‘Want to find out?’

  Jack was wondering if he should call out for Kablunak.

  ‘Which post office?’ snapped Larissa, swinging around to Jack again, not co
ncerned with the gun.

  ‘City. Corner of York and Market.’

  ‘Morning peak hour into the city!’ cried Lewis. ‘Come on, it’s fucking pointless.’

  ‘Shut up.’

  The gallery door swung open behind Jack. He turned, relieved, expecting to see Pascal and Viktor Kablunak.

  He expected wrong.

  ~

  30 ~

  MAX THE GALLERY ASSISTANT WAS THERE — with a gun. It looked a little too big for him, but he held it with a certain professional nonchalance and style: both hands around the stock, stretched out in front of him about shoulder high, sweeping the barrel swiftly across the room, and then pausing and holding it steady on Lewis. Max was wearing a Hawaiian shirt, just like the first time Jack had seen him, only this one was blue with lots of Hula girls all over it. His bare legs looked like the meat had been boiled off them. In his whiny little voice, he said: ‘Nobody fucking move.’

  He might not have looked it but Max sounded pretty serious.

  Rhonda de Groot walked in behind him. ‘Well, well, well,’ she said. ‘Everybody in, nice and early.’ She was smiling, but not like she was happy.

  Lewis still had the gun in his hand, but had not adapted quickly to the new situation.

  ‘Drop it, big boy,’ said Max.

  ‘What?’ Lewis gave a confused look, like he had just seen a magic trick and was trying to work it out. Then he bent his knees a little and dropped the gun to the ground. As reality hit home further, his drink-warmed complexion rapidly paled.

  Rhonda de Groot stood as though she was staring down at everybody from a pulpit. Her womanly curves stretched defiantly against the tight fabric of her maroon designer tracksuit. A white Nike headband matched her white Nike sneakers. She looked fit, fifty and fucked off. ‘Where is the Sergius? And where is my husband’s money?’

  Jack saw Larissa glance at her handbag on the desk. Lewis crossed his arms. Lifted his chin at Rhonda de Groot. ‘You shot him.’

  ‘Technically, no.’ Rhonda patted Max’s shoulder, smiling. ‘My little dynamo was there to take care of all that.’

  ‘You killed your husband for Christ’s sake!’ Lewis was having trouble coming to terms with the news.