"It's coming," he mumbled, finding it difficult to move his jaw.
"It had better be. Two weeks. You've got two weeks. And next time, just so you know, it won't be you we come for. It'll be your mother."
One of the men kicked him hard in the head, the boot catching his nose. He felt the warm trickle of blood down his face as the shadows faded, their cruel laughter rising through the air like steam.
Lying there, his head supported by the cold brick wall, he looked down at his bruised knees, his ripped and soiled coat, his scuffed shoes covered in shit. The blood dripped from his nose through his fingers and onto his front with the steady rhythm of an old clock marking time. Alone, he began to cry.
CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR
Dusk fell with a crimson mantle, lengthening shadows slipping furtively between the naked trees. As Tom stepped through the weaving gilt-and-black filigree of the entrance gates to the Catherine Palace, the first streetlights blinked on.
In a way, he was glad that Dominique had not made the trip out to the suburbs with him. He needed some time on his own to recharge his batteries and take stock. Although he knew she'd been trying to help by making him talk about his father, the conversation had left him feeling uneasy. The problem was that since her confession about her past, and the part his father had played in it, Tom had found himself wrestling with a gnawing feeling of jealousy. This was not an emotion he'd had to contend with before, and he was still having difficulty coming to terms with it.
What was clear was that, in the five years leading up to his father's death, Dominique had had the sort of relationship with his father that Tom had only ever dreamed about. And even if she was right about his father taking her in to compensate for the way he'd failed his own son, it still felt like a betrayal. He wondered whether she suspected as much, and if that had motivated the kiss she'd given him. She wasn't usually one for such open displays of emotion or affection.
Being in St. Petersburg certainly wasn't helping matters. Tom remembered the nights his father would tuck him into bed while telling him about this dazzling city, his eyes growing distant and dreamy as he described the glittering prize it had once contained; its star-struck history; its mysterious fate. Tom would listen, awestruck, scarcely daring to breathe in case he broke the spell.
The palace surged out of the gloom, the arched windows of its three stories encrusted with ornate stucco ornamentation, each separated from its neighbors by columns and sculptures that repeated along its one-thousand-foot length with monumental symmetry. Bands of turquoise scrolled down the white and gold facade like thick ribbons, as if the building had been gift-wrapped especially for him.
Tom ascended the main staircase, passed through the main door into the entrance hall, and turned left. He knew the way, having memorized it long ago from a plan in the book his father had given him. His pace quickened as he drew nearer, the White, Crimson, and Green Dining Rooms — sights he would normally have lingered over, absorbing their unrestrained opulence — warranting no more than a cursory glance. Even the masterpieces on display in the Picture Hall couldn't hold his attention for any longer than it took to traverse the polished parquet floor. Instead he was drawn, as if by magic, to the far doorway, his path lit by the enchanting glow emanating from the room beyond. The Amber Room.
It wasn't the original room, of course, consisting instead of a modern replica, crafted to celebrate the city's three hundredth anniversary. Even so, the result was no less stunning. The glittering walls spanned a spectrum of yellow, from smoky topaz to the palest lemon. And while most panels were undecorated, some were adorned with delicately crafted figurines, floral garlands, tulips, roses, and seashells that looked as if they might have been plucked from a distant beach or some exotic garden and then dipped in gold.
Only one other visitor was present, examining one of the panels on the far wall. A stern-faced attendant occupied a creaking velvet and giltwood chair near the entrance.
As he stood there, the Amber Room's warmth washing over him, an unexpected thought crept into Tom's mind. Despite its magnificence, he couldn't help but feel that he was somehow glad his father had never stood where he was standing now. After a lifetime of anticipation, to actually see it, as Tom was, might have come as something of an anticlimax to him. By foundering on the rocks of war, leaving only its whispered memory and a few faded photographs behind, the Amber Room had given birth to a myth. A myth that had immediately transcended the limitations of human observation and scrutiny, entering instead the world of the imagination, where its magnificence could never disappoint or be questioned. For that reason, if nothing else, this reproduction, while exquisite, could never hope to equal the sublime image people might conjure up in their own minds.
"It took twenty-four years…"
The other visitor had crossed the room to join him. Tom said nothing, assuming the man had taken him for a fellow tourist. "Twenty-four years to rebuild it. Amazing, is it not? See how it glows, how the surface both reflects the light and yet at the same time seems so deep you could plunge your hand in it up to the elbow?"
Tom turned to look at the man properly. From the side, he could barely make out the profile of his face, obscured as it was by a black bearskin hat pulled down low so that it skimmed his upturned collar. And yet there was something in the man's voice that he recognized, a spark of familiarity that danced around the edges of Tom's memory without his quite being able to place it.
"Hello, Thomas."
Slowly, the man turned to fix him with a pair of unblinking steely green eyes. Eyes that were at once familiar and yet totally foreign. Eyes that aroused feelings of hatred and of fear. And loneliness.
Harry Renwick's eyes.
"Harry?" Tom gasped as the spark exploded into a sudden blaze of understanding. "Is that you?"
Renwick, perhaps mistaking Tom's tone, held his gloved hands out, palms upturned, in welcome. "My dear boy!"
But Tom's surprise instantly evaporated, a cold, biting rage taking its place. His next words left no doubt as to his true feelings. "You fucking—" Tom took a step forward, his fist clenching at his side.
"Careful, Thomas," Renwick said softly, edging away. "Do not try anything rash. I would not want you to get hurt."
There was a scrape of wood, and Tom turned in time to see the frightened-looking attendant being bundled from the room by two shaven-headed thugs. Two more marched in after them, their coats open to display the guns casually tucked into their waistbands. The taller of the two made his way to Renwick's side. Tom recognized his massive shape as the man filmed leaving the hospital after Weissman's murder. The other, meanwhile, approached Tom and rapidly patted him down, before relieving Renwick of his bearskin hat and retreating across the room.
"I believe you have not yet had the pleasure of meeting Colonel Hecht?" said Renwick. "He is a… colleague of mine."
"What do you want?" Tom asked sullenly. Given the odds, he knew had no choice but to hear Renwick out.
"Ah, Thomas." Renwick sighed heavily. He remained the only person to call Tom by his full name, but then he had always eschewed abbreviation, acronym, or any other form of linguistic shorthand. "It is sad, is it not? After everything that has passed between us, the time we have spent together, that we should not be able to meet and talk as friends."
"Save it," Tom spoke through gritted teeth. "Our friendship was built on your lies. The day you betrayed me, we lost anything we ever had. You mean nothing to me now. So if you've come to kill me, let's just get it over with."