Part 23 (2/2)

'I have no idea what you think you're talking about.'

She smirked as she chewed. I wondered what to do. How could she know? 'Drop the ham acting, Latunsky. Everyone knows about the little game you're running here.'

Behind her, out of sight of the gloom of the lodge, Rudi had picked up a monkey wrench and was walking up very slowly behind her, his forefinger over his lips. My mind raced ahead, saw the steel flas.h.i.+ng down onto her skull I felt I don't know what I felt keep her talking, keep her talking, I felt afraid, a part of me even wanting to warn her, but another part of me felt warm and hungry. Don't move a muscle, b.i.t.c.h. Bunnykins is coming.

'And what little game would that be?' We would dump her body in the marshes out towards Finland...

'Stop playing games! You're lousy at it! I'm talking about your little scheme to pull yourself up into the high life, of course!' That look in Rudi's eyes, bad cocaine. Gutbucket thinks she has me on the run. Ravens would come and peck out those beady eyes of hers. Wild dogs would fight over her belly, a.r.s.e and thighs, the stronger getting the juicier cuts. Her life is in my hands, and she doesn't even know it... I no longer want her to run away, and I have to stop myself laughing. She's still chewing, her fat face, badly in need of an expensive beautician. 'You're after Head Curator's job, aren't you? Sleeping your way into his office chair! You're just a shameless wh.o.r.e, Latunsky. That's what you've always been and that's all you ever will be.'

Rudi lowered the monkey wrench, and I laughed, and spat at her. That got rid of her.

I finished my cigarette. Even the bats had gone. What was wrong now?

Nothing, that was what. I checked my watch: 2.24 a.m. The picture would be safely stowed at Jerome's, Suhbataar would be handing over the cash from the buyers, and I could start packing for Switzerland. After all these years I was finally getting out! In the iron curtain years Switzerland was as near in dreams and far in fact as the Emerald City. I attacked the rest of the stairs. It was natural I should be jittery. I'd just stolen a painting worth half a million dollars.

I knocked Rudi's code on my front door, just to please him. But there was no reply. Well. I hadn't expected one. He'd be home soon.

In my hallway I clicked the light-switch, but the bulb had broken. I clicked a switch further down the hallway, but the second light also wasn't working. Odd. The electricity must be down. But I didn't really need electricity tonight, anyway. The White Nights were here, and the sky over towards Europe was lit by perpetual dusk and the milky way. I walked into my living room, saw my coffee table with its legs in the air and my nerves snapped like a string of cat-gut.

My room had been wrecked.

The shelves yanked off the walls, the TV smashed, the vases flung to the ground. The drawers ripped out, the contents hurled across the room. The pictures methodically pulled apart and tossed aside, one by one. My clothes foraged through and ripped to ribbons. Shards of gla.s.s littered the carpet like dinosaur teeth.

Who would want to do this to me?

All this destruction, all this silence.

Oh G.o.d, not Rudi. Was he safe? Had he been taken?

A corner of shadow was twitching under the wreck of the dining table. I felt my throat constricting and refusing to swallow. My eyes strained to read the swarmy dark. The corner of shadow was a pool of blood, blackened by the twilight I recognised the tiniest of whimpers-

Oh my G.o.d oh my G.o.d Nemya, not dear little Nemya. I crouched and peered under the table. There was a mesh of torn roots where one of her hind legs should have been. I think she was too close to death to be in pain. Her eyes looked back at me, calm as a Buddha on a hill somewhere, outstaring the sun. She died, leaving me falling alone, unable to see the bottom.

An awful form was floating down the Neva from the marshes. Lazily, on its back, until it reached Alexandra Nevskogo Bridge. It would crawl up a support, and haul its stumps and teeth through the streets, looking for me.

What do I do? What do you always do? 'Ask your desire!' orders the serpent.

I went into the bedroom, and telephoned Rudi's mobile phone number, the one for emergencies. The static hiss sounded like the cras.h.i.+ng of waves, or the noise of many coins falling? Thank G.o.d, the call connected. I blurted out, 'Rudi, they've turned the flat over-'

A woman's voice was talking back. A cold, metallic one. Smug as Gutbucket's.

'The number you have dialled has been disconnected.'

'Christ above! Reconnect it, you frigging wh.o.r.e!'

'The number you have dialled has been disconnected.'

'The number you have dialled has been disconnected.'

What?

I put down the receiver. What next? Desires. I wanted Switzerland, and Rudi, and our children. So I needed the Delacroix painting. That simple. Rudi will be proud of me. 'Babe,' he'll say, 'I knew I could rely on you.'

I telephoned Jerome.

'h.e.l.lo, my dear. A shplendid evening'sh work.' His voice was woozy with alcohol.

'Jerome, have you seen Rudi?'

'Of coursh, he left here only twenty minutes ago after dropping off the latest addition to our family. My word, she is is a beauty, isn't she? Hey, did I ever tell you about Delacroix's fling with the nephew of-' a beauty, isn't she? Hey, did I ever tell you about Delacroix's fling with the nephew of-'

'Has Suhbataar come yet?'

'No. The Great Khan telephoned to say he would be arriving shortly did you know that in the thirteenth century, the Mongolians used to seal their captives in airtight containers and conduct feasting atop the box, listening to the sounds of suffocation-'

'Jerome, shut up. I'm coming over now. We have to move out.'

'But my dear, that's scheduled for tomorrow. And after everything I've done I think I deserve not to be told to shut up like I was a-'

'Tomorrow has to happen now! My place has been done over. I can't get hold of Rudi. My-' my cat has been killed, and I felt it move nearer down the river, 'something's going wrong. It's all going wrong. I'm coming over for the painting now. Pack it.'

I hung up. What did I want?

I reached through the rip in the underside of the bedframe thank you, Jesus! I untaped the loaded revolver. Guns are heavier than they look, and colder. I put it in my handbag and left. I came back for my pa.s.sport, and left again.

It's true, it's harder to get a taxi when you need one, and if you're desperate, forget it. I walked. I shoved whatever it was that I mustn't think about back upstream, but it kept floating down. I focused on the little things around me. I remember the cobbles on Gorokhovaya Street. I remember the smoothness of the girl's skin, as she kissed her boy on the steps of the bronze horseman. I remember the heads of the flowers in cellophane around St Isaac's Cathedral. I remember the tail-lights of the planes as they took off from Pulkovo airport, bound for Hong Kong or London or New York or Zurich. I remember the mauve silk of a laughing woman. I remember the maroon of a leather flying jacket. I remember the crunched-up form of a homeless person, sleeping in a coffin of cardboard. Little things. It's all made of little things that you don't ordinarily notice. My jaw muscles were killing me.

Jerome's door was bolted from the inside. I banged it so loud that I set off a dog in another part of the building.

Jerome flung it open, pulled me in, and hissed. 'Shut up!' He locked the door and ran back over to where he was packing the picture with sheets of cardboard and brown tape and string. A suitcase was already packed, lying open on the sofa. Socks, underpants, vests, cheap vodka, a Wedgwood teapot. There was an empty bottle of gin on its side in his jukebox drinks cabinet.

I stood perfectly still. What should I do? What did I want? 'I'm taking the picture.'

Jerome barked a laugh. He didn't even bother to look up. 'Are you indeed?'

'Yes. I'm taking the picture. You see, it's Rudi's and my future.'

I don't even think Jerome heard me. He was crouching over the package with his back to me. 'Make yourself useful, my dear, and put your thumb on this bit of string while I tighten it up.'

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