‘Silence,’ said Kamo. He ground his teeth and put his arm across his chest. His heart had not yet recovered. ‘If you know of the mechanism that reveals the money,’ he whispered, ‘activate it. Now.’
The bronze clock chimed midnight. Saskia knew that it was running fast, and so did two of the guests. They removed their pocket watches and murmured at their dials. Saskia took this as a sign that her band was affecting the time-keeping mechanism inside the clock. She did not understand why the watches of the guests had remained unaffected, but suspected it had something to do with the difference in mass. She considered Kamo. He was tense. Any touch might release his anger. Then he would be impossible to predict.
She decided to tell Kamo that the money was in the base of the model. But as she moved to speak, Pasha interrupted her.
‘“For all ages,”’ he sang, ‘“with his heroic deeds / Stalin has glorified our own people …”’
Pasha was swaying. His eyes were closed and his recital was mechanical, as though the words had been learned by rote by a non-native speaker. His tenor was, however, true.
‘“Over the world waves the Leninist flag / It summons to the path of battle and valour.”’
Saskia saw, at the edge of her vision, a figure enter the room from the direction of the main staircase. The guests put away their pocket watches and listened. Kamo was enthralled, too. The word “Stalin” had not unsettled him to any extent that Saskia could detect. She doubted he had heard it before. His gun arm relaxed and the grimace of pain softened.
‘“Sunny expanses are open to us / The flames of victory light our country.”’
With the slow, inexorable movement of a figurine turning atop a music box, Saskia turned towards the man who had entered the room. It was the photographer. How like a funeral director he looked; all but the black veil on his top hat. He wore a morning suit and simple, black mask. His collar was winged. Only his shoes were flawed: they were dusty. As she watched his soft steps, the hairs on her arms rose. She took a long breath. There was a stiffness in his walk, and his left arm was motionless.
‘“For our happiness lives Comrade Stalin / Our wise leader and dear teacher.”’
The photographer, who had saved Kamo’s life with a flash of magnesium, but had allowed the situation to play out, approached Pasha and looked into his mouth, close enough to kiss.
‘What a wonderful lyric,’ he said. The Russian was fluent but curiously emphasised. It marked him as a native of Georgia, that land of poets and wine. ‘Sing on.’
Saskia said, ‘No.’
Pasha stopped. He remained entranced. His eyes were closed and his body swayed. The photographer turned from Pasha to Saskia. She swallowed. It was pointless denying her fear; the feeling seemed to begin at the soles of her feet and climb to her crown. That was the effect of his look.
The photographer walked to her. Behind him, the remaining guests chuckled at this unusual musical interlude and drifted from the room in the direction of the main staircase, not to miss the unparalleled fireworks display in the square.
Soso, the Georgian bandit who had not until this moment used the name Stalin, reprised a line from the song in his own, exceptional tenor. ‘“Stalin has glorified our own people.” A good name indeed.’ His gaze moved between Kamo and Saskia. He bowed, then gripped Saskia by the scruff of her neck and kissed her three times. He repeated the same gesture with Kamo but added a small touch of their foreheads, during which both closed their eyes. Kamo seemed to shrink in Soso’s presence.
‘I always preferred The Staggerer,’ said Saskia.
Soso grinned. He seldom laughed, as she recalled, and preferred to hear jokes when they came from his own mouth. Once, Soso had been addressing a secret meeting at the Avlabar People’s Theatre when Saskia, who was on lookout, ran inside with the news that the theatre had been surrounded by police. It had been too late to escape, so Soso ordered the Bolsheviks to burn their papers. When the police entered the building, Soso announced to the inspector that they were rehearsing a play and would be delighted if the policeman could help them out with the role of a swine. Delight abounded among the conspirators. The embarrassed inspector said that he knew what kind of actors they were—but was forced to let them go. Soso had made pig noises as he left. That was the night Soso married Kato. That was two years ago.
‘Lynx, mythic beast who sees through falsehood to the truth beyond,’ said Soso. He grinned again. ‘A long time since our last meeting.’
In a business-like tone, she said, ‘Look what happened in the meantime. You shaved your moustache.’
‘Do you like it?’
‘How is Kato?’
‘I once wrote a poem for you, Lynx. I compared you to the moon.’
‘Why are you here, Soso?’ she snapped. Since their first conversation, she had judged him to value assertiveness. Now, she wished to provoke him. ‘It is dangerous to spread yourself so thinly.’
He touched his chin. ‘Life was ever dangerous. Do I need to tell you why it is, at this moment, particularly dangerous for you?’
Saskia looked down the enfilade. She wondered where Draganov could be. ‘Tell me.’
‘No,’ he said, ‘you tell me.’
She knew that Soso had a talent for appearing in control when he was not. So doing, he unbalanced his opponent until the reality mimicked its appearance. The technique had worked with informers, magistrates, and girlfriends alike.
‘You are here for the money,’ Saskia said. ‘Without it, you will be expelled from the Party. You think I know where it is.’
The curve of Soso’s grin flattened by a degree. ‘But you do know where it is. Here, Saskia? In this room? Beneath this model?’
Saskia shrugged.
He turned to the panels. ‘Behind this, an allegory of touch? Shall I break it? We can dance on the pieces. What do you say, Kamo?’
‘We can dance on the pieces,’ said Kamo. He kept his eyes on Saskia. ‘We’ll have our own little quadrille.’
‘Or,’ said Soso, ‘to keep fuss to a minimum, we can take your boyfriend instead and break him, dance on his pieces.’ The grin had gone. Now, only narrow eyes regarded her through the slits of the mask. ‘Kamo?’
Saskia did not move as Kamo put an arm round Pasha and pressed the gun into his ribs. Pasha was still entranced. Tears had fallen down his cheeks, though his eyes were not swollen, and his breathing was even. Saskia glanced around. The guests were no longer near the model. They had opened the tall windows to stand on the balcony for the fireworks.
‘Be careful,’ Saskia said. ‘You are handling the key to your future.’
Kamo looked at Soso. Perhaps because their masks made their natural rapport difficult, Soso said, ‘We can kill him. If she put the money here, she can take it. She simply wishes to spare the boy. Kill him and loosen her tongue.’
‘I will tell you,’ she said, removing her hand from the warmer. Its sight drew the attention of both men. ‘Where does a lynx store its spoils?’
Both Soso and Kamo looked around the room. Saskia watched them, smiling.
‘I am becoming impatient,’ said Soso.
She lifted her hand, and when she was sure that the men were looking at it, she raised her index finger and pointed at the ceiling. Kamo said, ‘Of course,’ and both of them looked up.
Saskia slowed her vision. She willed her mind to accelerate, to appreciate the small moments between the seconds. Kamo and Pasha were closest, and to her left. Soso was at her right. She crouched and swept her heel into the back of Soso’s legs. The impact lifted him from the ground. He was still falling when she moved into Kamo, punching down on the back of his hand. The gun clattered to the floor. She stepped aside as Kamo toppled Pasha’s body into her path. With the point of her boot, she punted the gun into the adjacent corner of the room and, keeping her weight on her left leg, leaned back to snap her foot against Kamo’s head. She was able to land the blow across his ear. She had time to catch Pasha and fall with him. He was a dead weight, as though he had fainted. They spilled against the floor, Saskia grunting with pain as she took the impact on her shoulder.