They were the only game in town for breakfast, having dominated the market for as long as any of the locals could remember. Every now and then a Canadian family would stop in, and a misty-eyed mother or father would reminisce about their summer vacations as children, and how they never missed a Saturday breakfast at Benny’s, no matter how long they had to wait. It made her wonder if the food up in Canada was bad.
Defying gravity and several equally important laws of physics maneuvering through the crowded diner, she arrived at a cramped table of slightly unpleasant-smelling men. Russians, by the sound of them, probably up from New York City on a fishing trip. She’d heard about large pockets of Russian immigrants living in a place called Brighton Beach, near Brooklyn. A lot of New Yorkers vacationed in the area during the summer, but they typically arrived in July or August. Families from New York or Massachusetts owned a good number of the cottages ringing the lake. Judging by the look of this group, they must be up early to take advantage of cheaper rental prices. They were pleasant enough, but certainly not part of the well-heeled New York crowd.
She had to admit, they were by far her most entertaining group this season. The spokesman for the group, a stocky, muscular gentleman with a long scar running down the right side of his jaw, asked if they served alcohol. She checked her watch and laughed. 6:52 in the morning. She wished they served booze, but Benny was too cheap to seek a liquor license. Acquiring a limited license might have made sense given the number of requests for mimosas during the summer. The New York crowd seemed to be enamored with the idea of champagne and orange juice for breakfast, even during the middle of the week. Another opportunity lost. She’d quit making suggestions long ago.
Upon her arrival, one of the men furtively concealed something under the table. She gave him a slightly disapproving look, followed by a wink. He grinned and brought the flask back to his orange juice, dumping a good portion of the contents into the half-full glass. She had seen the rest of them violate Vermont’s liquor laws in a similar manner over the past thirty minutes, but said nothing. Who was she to spoil their vacation?
She offloaded their meals in less than five seconds, announcing that she’d be back with the rest of the order in a minute. The men thanked her in choppy English, nodding happily. As she turned from the table, she caught one of them swigging directly from his flask.
“Discretion, boys,” she said over her shoulder, headed back to the kitchen.
Looking back at the table while loading up the rest of their plates, she could see the guy with the scar explaining what she had said to a gathering of approving faces. She couldn’t imagine how difficult it would be to arrive in a strange country and try to make a new life. With that thought, she delivered the rest of their food and made sure their coffees were full until they left. She hoped they enjoyed their stay in Vermont. They really looked like a group that could use a vacation.
Chapter 38
Feliks Yeshevskey’s car cleared the row of gray apartment buildings towering over Nikolajeva Street, revealing the near impossibility of the task at hand. His mood instantly changed from morose to furiously enraged, led by a string of obscenities that would have offended the Federation Navy’s crustiest chief ship petty officers. Desnyans’kyi Park was packed with families enjoying the unseasonably warm Saturday afternoon. Finding their man in this vast sea of trees and picnickers was going to take the rest of the afternoon.
He briefly considered abandoning the search and waiting back at the man’s apartment building, but the neighbor directly across the hallway told them that Boris Ilkin liked to take his family out to dinner on Saturdays. They would typically return before sunset, when the common areas between buildings of their apartment block filled with drunks looking for trouble. Feliks dismissed the plan. He didn’t have the patience to wait another five hours. It had already taken them most of the day to track down the names and addresses of service tellers that had worked shifts at Kiev Central Station on Tuesday, when Richard Farrington landed and presumably acquired transportation to Russia.
They were dealing with too many presumptions and assumptions in this case. Farrington had entered the Ukraine posing as an Australian, proceeding to vanish into thin air. No record of him beyond customs could be found, leading Feliks to assume that he had shifted identities. Ardankin was convinced that he would try to enter Russia, which made his job slightly less complicated. Transportation to Russia was plentiful on any given day, but the options were finite.
The easiest and most expedient way to enter Russia was by train, but he could also have chosen from several regular bus routes. Worse yet, he could have rented a car from any of the hundreds of rental agency locations around Kiev. They hadn’t begun to explore options beyond rail travel yet. He had limited resources and had been specifically warned not to involve Ukrainian authorities. With a handful of agents, they would concentrate on one mode of transportation at a time. His agents were spread throughout the city tracking down the few remaining ticket agents on the list.
He signaled for the driver to pull over into a residential parking space across the street. Turning in his seat, he addressed the timid-looking woman in the back seat.
“We’re going to walk through the park looking for your neighbor. I better not find him before you do. Understood?”
She nodded. “Yes.”
“This is a matter of state security. When you see him, I need you to be discreet. You’ll stand back at a distance, and once we have him in custody, you are free to go. You wait for me to signal that it’s all right for you to leave. If you leave earlier, I’ll assume you are involved. Are we clear?”
“Yes.”
“Very good. Let’s go for a walk in the park,” he said, stepping out of the vehicle.
Forty minutes into their search, Feliks had lost any remaining vestige of patience for the woman, who pinched her face together and squinted looking for their target like she needed glasses to see more than five feet in front of her. This had become intolerable, made worse by the citizens of Kiev, lounging around on scattered blankets, not making the slightest effort to get out of their way. He was about to kick a bottle of vodka out of a rather insolent-looking man’s mouth, hoping to remove most of his teeth with the gesture, when the woman grabbed his shirtsleeve.
“I see him. We almost walked past. He’s directly to our right, maybe thirty meters. Dark red blanket with white tassel ends. He’s kicking a soccer ball with his son,” she whispered.
“White collared shirt. Untucked. Brown pants?”
“Yes. That’s him. Can I go now?” she pleaded.
“Not until we verify,” Feliks said.
“Why would I lie to you? You know where I live,” she said.
“That’s right. I know exactly where you live. You wait, or we’ll pay you a visit. Maybe smash your husband’s skull with that bottle he lives in,” Feliks said.
“Promise?”
For the first time today, Feliks allowed his face to change expression, displaying the faintest hint of a smile. He would have preferred to bring her husband, but judging by his belligerent demeanor at the door and the bottle in his hand, the man would have been more trouble than help. Besides, he was probably seeing double at this point, judging from the bright red glow plastered on his face. He had little doubt that Elena would take a beating when she returned. The kids too, probably. He’d like to escort her back and threaten the husband with a life sentence in a wheelchair, but he didn’t have the time. She would have to fend for herself. He just hoped that this unusual disruption of their weekend routine didn’t lead to something outside of the normal abuse that she and her children surely suffered on a daily basis.