The American led the way, tiptoeing along a flagstone passage and into the inner courtyard. There was light in the window of the opposite wall and the whirring sound of an electric fan. After quietly edging around the perimeter, the three of them slowly eased their eyes over the sill of the open window.
Chatterji’s gasp was understandable, Piatakov thought, and fortunately masked by the sound of the fan. Inside the room a young woman was sitting astride the master of the house, the tableau lit by a host of flickering candles. He was moaning with delight as she eased to and fro. Long black hair hung down her naked back, and her small breasts shone with sweat in the yellow light. It was a highly erotic sight, Piatakov thought, until he noticed the expression on the girl’s face, which was cold, indifferent, almost bored. She might have been riding a rocking horse in a nursery, and idly wondering which toy to play with next.
Another short passage led into the house, where the door to the room stood half-open. Brady pulled out his Colt and walked in.
The girl saw him at once; she stopped moving but said nothing. The man asked her something, then opened his eyes. Wider and wider.
“Be very quiet,” Brady said softly, reinforcing the request with a flex of the gun. Piatakov hoped the man understood Russian.
He did. “Who are you?” he half-whispered. When the girl abruptly pulled herself free of his shrinking penis, he grabbed one of her hands in his, as if they needed each other’s protection.
“I’m Ali Baba,” Brady said, “and you must be one of the forty thieves.”
The room was certainly luxurious: the floors thickly carpeted, the walls hung with silk tapestries. Gleaming ornaments sat on several tables.
“I sometimes wonder if our revolution was only a dream,” Brady said conversationally, putting the Colt back under his belt.
“No, no.” The Uzbek pushed the girl aside and sat up, pulling a robe around himself. He was about forty, Piatakov thought, and no stranger to privilege. “You don’t understand,” the man said indignantly. “I am a member of the city soviet.”
Brady and Piatakov both burst out laughing. Chatterji was still staring at the girl, who stood to the side, watching them through expressionless eyes. “Cover yourself,” the Indian told her angrily in English.
She didn’t understand him. Piatakov picked up what looked like a robe and offered it to her. He also felt uncomfortable, both sexually aroused and ashamed to be so. She couldn’t have been more than fourteen.
“Well, comrade,” Brady said sarcastically, “the party requires another generous contribution.”
“But I am a not a rich man,” the Uzbek said.
Brady’s look around the room was an eloquent rebuttal. “Coins,” he said succinctly, holding the man’s eyes.
The Uzbek had a sudden realization: “You are the men they are searching for!”
“Don’t you mean ‘we?’”
“Yes, of course, we.”
Brady shook his head. Piatakov wondered if the Uzbek was aware of how little life he had left. Not a great loss to the party.
The man was taking an embroidered purse from the table that held most of the candles. “How much?” he asked.
“All of it, comrade.”
“But…”
“You won’t be needing it.”
The man’s eyes widened in understanding; his mouth opened to cry out, but the sound was choked off by the knife sliding up through the ribs and into the heart. “Allahu akbar,” Brady murmured, wiping the blade on a chair.
Piatakov was watching the girl, whose eyes were no longer devoid of expression. She took a quick step forward and spat in the dead man’s face.
Brady eyed her with what might have been amusement, then went back to examining the contents of the purse. “Good enough,” he said finally. “This should get us to Afghanistan.”
“We must kill the girl, too,” Chatterji interjected.
Piatakov was outraged. “No!” he almost shouted with a violence that surprised even him.
Brady gave him a hard look, then turned to the Indian. “She’s his enemy,” Brady said, gesturing toward the dead man on the floor, “not ours.”
“But what if she runs to the Cheka the moment we’re gone? We must at least take her with us,” Chatterji insisted.
“That seems sensible,” Brady said quietly, looking at Piatakov. “We can leave her in a village.”
“Dressed like that?” Piatakov asked.
“She’ll be fine,” Brady said. “It’s not that cold.”
Piatakov took the sash from the dead man’s robe and passed it to her, indicating that she should use it to tie up the one she was wearing. She smiled faintly and did as he suggested.
The three of them retraced their steps across the inner courtyard, the girl walking with them unconcernedly. No one had thought to gag her, Piatakov realized, but apparently there wasn’t any need—she showed no sign of making a fuss. They stood in the yard for what seemed an eternity until Brady led out three saddled ponies, their hooves muffled with sacking.
Piatakov mounted his, and Brady hoisted the girl up in front of the Russian, muttering, “Your baby, I believe.” Piatakov was acutely conscious of her perfumed hair just beneath his face and of the warmth of her body through the thin robe.
“What’s your name?” he asked in Russian, not really expecting an answer.
“Haruka,” she said.
The other two mounted, the Indian looking slightly uneasy, though the ponies were docile enough. They walked them down the dark alley, the dust and muffles reducing the sound of their passage to almost nothing. At the crossroads they turned southeast and continued along past the foot of the avenue of mausoleums. The moon was high now, the blue domes shining in its glow. The girl’s hair shifted in the breeze.
They walked the ponies for an hour, drawing a wide circle around the southern edge of the town. When they struck the dirt track that ran westward alongside the railway, they stopped, got down, and took off the muffles. According to Brady’s watch, it was almost two in the morning.
Once they had all remounted, the American started down the track, Chatterji close behind him. Piatakov held the reins loose for several moments, then put his hands on either side of the girl’s narrow waist and gently lowered her to the ground. When she gave him a questioning look, he pointed her toward the town.
She turned to see what he meant, then looked back up and raised her hand to touch his leg.
He watched her walk off with a sharp sense of loss and then wheeled his pony to follow the others.
The clock in the lobby claimed it was half past midnight. Komarov paused at the foot of the stairway to yawn, then slowly began to climb, marveling at the survival of the rich carpet, heedless for the moment of the vital role it was playing in silencing his approach. Maslov was a few steps behind him.
As his eyes came level with the floor above, Komarov brought himself to a halt. At the end of the dimly lit corridor, a man was opening a door with the kind of elaborate caution that suggested it wasn’t his room. After a cursory glance around, he disappeared inside.
“Wait here,” Komarov whispered to Maslov. Taking his gun from its holster, Komarov advanced down the corridor on the balls of his feet.
He reached the door, which was standing slightly ajar. Inside the room it seemed dark. There was no sound.
Komarov pushed the door back slowly, and there was the man, standing over the bed in a pale wash of moonlight. A knife gleamed in his hand.
He seemed at a loss.
“Put it down,” Komarov said softly.
The man’s head jerked up in surprise, but his shoulders sagged when he saw the gun. He placed the knife down on the empty bed.
“Now come with me.” Komarov backed into the corridor, turning so the would-be assassin would come out of the room between himself and Maslov.