Voroshilovgrad (9 page)

Olga's office was right around the corner, on a quiet, shady side street. There was a beat-up scooter parked next to the sprawling mulberry that grew by the doors. When I was a kid, there used to be a bookstore here. Its heavy iron doors were still there, still painted orange. I opened them and walked in.

Olga was sitting by the window on a stack of papers, smoking. She was roughly my brother's age, although she still looked quite good. She had curly red hair and chalky skin that seemed as though it was illuminated from the inside by fluorescent light; she hardly wore any makeup, which may have made her look younger. She was wearing a long dress and white designer sneakers.

“Hi.”

“Good afternoon,” she said, waving the clouds of smoke away and sizing me up. “Are you Herman?”

“Have we met before?”

“Injured told me you'd be stopping by. Take a seat,” she said, pointing at a chair and getting to her feet. As she did, the papers she'd been perching on spilled all over the floor. I was about to lean over to help pick them up, but Olga stopped me, saying, “Forget it. Leave them there. I've been meaning to throw them out anyway.”

She took a seat in her chair and swung her feet up onto the table like cops do in American movies, her sneakers resting heavily on some reports and log books. Her dress slid up for a second. She had some nice legs on her—long, lean calves and high hips.

“What are you looking at?” she asked.

“At the log books,” I answered and sat down across from her. “Olga, I'd like to have a talk with you. Do you have a few minutes
to spare?”

“I've got an hour. You want to talk about your brother?”

“That's right.”

“Okay then, you know what?” she said, drawing her legs back abruptly, so her calves flashed before my eyes again. “Let's go to the park. It's too stuffy in here. Did you drive here?”

“I got a ride.”

“No big deal. I've got a scooter.”

We went outside. There was a padlock hanging from the front doors; she closed it and hopped on the scooter, which only started on the third try. She nodded to me, and I got on, gingerly holding onto her shoulders.

“Herman,” she said, twisting to face me and yelling over the roar of the motor. “Have you ever ridden a scooter before?”

“Sure,” I yelled back.

“Don't you know where to put your hands?”

Flustered, I took my hands off her shoulders and put them on her waist, feeling the outline of her panties through her dress.

“Don't get too carried away,” she said, and we set off.

The park was just across the street. Nevertheless, Olga tore down the road, drove onto the sidewalk, and darted between the thick bushes. There was a paved path ahead; Olga adeptly squeezed in between the trees and popped us right out onto the asphalt. The rows of trees were sunny and empty, and behind them were amusement park rides and swings, giving way in turn to other, younger trees, a playground whose sandboxes were being slowly taken over by grass, and old ticket booths now inhabited by drowsy, cooing pigeons and skulking stray dogs. Olga rounded
a fountain, turned onto a side path, zoomed by two girls walking a dachshund, and stopped by an old bar overlooking the river. The bar had been around for ages; I remembered how back in the late '80s we used to make bootleg tapes in one of the back rooms. In my Communist Youth League days, I'd even recorded some heavy metal here. Oddly enough, the bar was still open. We went into a rather spacious room suffused with the smell of nicotine. The walls were paneled in hardwood and the windows were draped with heavy curtains dotted with numerous burn holes and lipstick marks. A sixty-year-old guy who looked like a Gypsy, meaning he was wearing a white dress shirt and had gold teeth, was manning the bar. Olga greeted him, and he nodded in reply.

“I had no clue this place was still open.”

“I haven't been here in ages myself,” Olga said. “I just didn't want to talk in the office. It's more relaxing here.”

The Gypsy came over.

“Do you have any gin and tonic?” Olga asked.

“No,” he said firmly.

“Well, what
do
you have?” she asked, a bit flustered. “Herman, what are you going to have?” she asked me. “They don't have any gin and tonic.”

“Do you have any port?” I asked the Gypsy.

“Yeah, white port.”

“Oh, I'll have that,” I said. “What about you, Olga?”

“Well, fine,” she agreed, “we'll have port. So, have you seen your brother lately?”

“The last time was about six months ago. Do you know where he is?”

“No, I don't. Do you?”

“Nope. What are you to him, anyway?”

“I'm his accountant,” Olga said, taking out a cigarette and lighting it. “Isn't that why you wanted to talk to me?”

“I didn't mean to imply anything.”

“Who said you did? Don't worry about it.”

The Gypsy came back over, carrying our port in the squat glasses they use to serve tea on trains, though their new role had allowed them to shed the metal holders meant to keep passengers from burning their fingers.

“Well, what's your next move?” Olga asked, taking a cautious sip.

“I don't know,” I answered. “I'm only in town for a few days.”

“I see. What do you do for a living?”

“Nothing really. Here, take a look,” I said, pulling my business card out of my pocket and handing it to her.

“So you're an expert?”

“Yep, sure am,” I said and downed my port. “Olga, you know the whole business is in my name, right?”

“I know.”

“What should I do?”

“I don't know.”

“Well, I can't just leave everything as is, can I?”

“Maybe you can, maybe you can't.”

“Would that be a problem?”

“Maybe.”

“So . . . what should I do?”

“Haven't you tried getting in touch with your brother?” Olga asked after a short pause.

“I've tried. But he hasn't been picking up his phone. I have no idea where he is. Kocha says he's in Amsterdam.”

“That Kocha . . .” Olga said and motioned for the Gypsy to bring her another.

Visibly irritated, the Gypsy hauled himself up, placed the unfinished bottle of port on our table, and went outside—clearly, he didn't want to be bothered anymore.

“The gas station, is it even profitable?” I asked.

“How should I put it?” Olga replied after I had poured another round and she had downed her glass. “Your brother made enough money to keep the place afloat. But he never made enough to open another station.”

“Uh-huh. My brother didn't want to sell it?”

“Nope.”

“Did anyone make him an offer?”

“Yeah,” Olga said.

“Who?”

“Well, we've got some local hoods.”

“So I noticed. Whose hoods are they?”

“Marlen Pastushok. He's a corn guy.”

“I might know who you're talking about.”

“He's also a member of the Parliament, from the Communist Party.”

“He's a Communist?”

“Yep, he's got a chain of gas stations in the Donbass, and now he's buying up everything over here too. I don't know where he lives. He offered Yura fifty thousand, if I remember correctly.”

“Fifty thousand? For what?”

“For the property,” Olga said.

“Why didn't Yura take it?”

“Would you have taken it?”

Finally, I just said, “Well, I don't know.”

“I do. You would have.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because you're a wimp, Herman. And stop staring at my tits.”

I had indeed been inspecting the front of her dress for some time—it was rather low-cut, and Olga wasn't wearing a bra. Some wrinkles were developing under her eyes, but the effect was pretty cute. I still probably wouldn't peg her as forty.

“Olga, this just isn't my thing, you know what I mean?” I said, trying to be diplomatic. “I've always stayed out of his business.”

“Now it's
your
business.”

“Olga, would you sell it, if it was your gas station?”

“Sell it to Pastushok?” Olga asked. “I'd burn it to the ground before I did that, and I'd throw all that scrap metal on the pyre as well.”

“But why? What's the problem?”

“Herman,” she said, finishing another drink, “there are two kinds of people that I really hate. First and foremost, I can't stand wimps.”

“And the second kind?”

“The second kind are railroad workers, but that's strictly personal. Well, you do what you want. At the end of the day, it's your call.”

“It seems like I don't have a choice, do I?”

“It seems like you just don't know whether or not you do.”

I didn't have anything to say to that, so I poured the rest of the
wine. We clinked glasses, without saying a word.

“You know,” Olga said after the silence had dragged on long enough, “there's a disco around the corner.”

“I know. That's where I had sex the first time.”

“Oh yeah?” she said, for want of anything else to say.

“By the way, I also had sex in this very bar one time. On New Year's Eve.”

“Maybe it was a mistake to bring you here,” Olga said, after thinking a little.

“Nah, everything's fine. I like this park a lot. We would always come here after soccer games. We'd climb over the stadium fence and head over here . . . to celebrate.”

“I can only imagine.”

“Olga,” I said, “if I wound up staying, would you work for me like you did for Yura? How much was my brother paying you?”

“In any case, you'd have to pay me more.” She took out her phone. “Oh,” she said, “it's twelve already. I gotta go.”

She paid for the port. She ignored all of my attempts at picking up the tab and said she made a good living so there was no need for my poor show of generosity. We went outside. I didn't really know what to do next, though I did know that I had no real desire to ask her any more questions. Her phone rang as we stood there.

“Yeah,” Olga answered. “Uh, yeah.” Her voice immediately took on a distant, professional tone. “Yes, he's here with me. Should I give him the phone? You want to talk to him? All right, if that's how you want it. By the fountain.”

“Well,” she said to me, muffling the phone with her hand, “now you'll have a chance to talk to them in person.”

“With who?”

“The corn guys.”

“How'd they find me?”

“Herman, there aren't that many people in this town, so it's pretty easy to find someone when you want to, you know? They want you to wait by the fountain. I'm off. Enjoy!”

She hopped on her scooter, which emitted a thick cloud of smoke, then disappeared into the depths of the municipal park.

“But how will I recognize them?” was the thought that popped into my head as I waited on the brick ledge of the dried-up fountain—there was more grass growing on the bottom. It seemed to be sprouting just about everywhere in this city. In fact, there wasn't anybody else in the park besides me, the two high school girls walking the dachshund, and the Gypsy. Nobody, that is, till the black Jeep from yesterday came barreling around the corner, scattering the pigeons and honking to high heaven. “I'll know them when I see them, all right” I thought.

The Jeep did a victory lap around the fountain and stopped across from me. The back doors opened and a petite bald guy wearing a light-colored polo shirt and white pants leaned out of the car at me. He hadn't been at the gas station yesterday. He smiled, exposing his fine collection of metal. He wasn't, however getting out of the car.

“Herman Korolyov?” he inquired.

“Good afternoon!” I said, holding my ground as well.

“Have you been waiting long?” The bald guy was sprawled out on the leather seat in a way that was clearly intended to suggest an easygoing disposition.

“Not very long!”

“My apologies,” he said. By now the dude must have been pretty uncomfortable in that position, but he refused to sit up. Who would budge first had become a pissing contest now. “We had a hell of a time getting here.”

“No worries,” I answered, making a great show of how relaxed I was.

“I was trying to figure out if you were the one I was looking for?” the bald guy said, breaking into laughter. His body began to jerk, and suddenly he was sliding down the slippery leather seat and onto the ground.

I darted toward him, but he clambered back to his seat quite adroitly, assuming a more comfortable position and extending his hand resolutely. All I could do was jump into the Jeep next to him and shake his hand.

“Nikolay Nikolaich,” he introduced himself, producing a business card from somewhere underneath the seat, “but you can just call me Nikolaich.”