“How long will this take?” I kept my questions short to not give insight into my insider knowledge.
“We expect to have a decision at the end of May, before the summer holidays. We would then start building maybe one year from now. One can’t start construction in Russia in the autumn. The ground will freeze too soon and you can’t lay a good foundation that won’t sink in the spring. We have these problems all over Siberia with buildings that sink in the spring. Each year they sink another few centimeters,” he was sounding more and more educated and knowledgeable.
“This is, of course, a huge project. Do you have partners or investors?” I knew I should not have asked this question as soon as it left my mouth.
“Yes, we have investors who are ready to help with the hotel building once the land is secure,” he answered without giving details.
“Are you financing that land purchase yourself with the help of a bank?” What was I asking?
“No, no banks. Banks are criminals too. They will find a way to rob me of my land if I borrow the money from them,” he answered with the enthusiasm in his voice evaporating quickly.
“Well, your car imports and your electronics imports for Russian prices certainly have not been able to create profits enough to purchase this much land. You don’t have any foreign investors who will help secure the financing?” For some reason, I could not stop asking these questions, I knew I was on thin ice now, but the adrenaline of the hunt had gone to my heart already. I almost had him in my net.
Mr. P. replied gruffly to my impertinent questioning, ’No, I don’t believe in foreign money. They will have too much control over Russia if we keep borrowing from them. I have some money my father left to me that I will use to pay for the land.”
With that comment Mr. P. began to roll up the technical drawings, briskly without care, and slid them back into the plastic tubes and put them away behind his desk from where he had retrieved them. As he walked back towards me at the couches he did not sit down again, to signal that the interview was over. Getting the hint, I quickly gathered up my notebook and pen and put them in my book bag and stood up to meet Mr. P.’s eyes. He did not extend his hand for a farewell handshake as I extended mine. He kept his hands in the pockets of his slacks.
“I am sorry, but the interview must now be over. I am very busy and must get back to my work. Tatyana will show you out.”
18. Shark Tank
It was the end of April and the evenings were becoming longer with daylight and twilight lasting until almost nine o’clock in the evening. Gone were the days of thick coats and double layers. I was so happy to hear my babushka say that shapkas after mid-April were not to be worn any longer. Evidently, it was bad for men’s hairlines if they wore their fur hats in warm weather. She was full of those types of traditional wives’ tales and I added this one to a list of them that I was keeping. The last snow showers had been in the second week of April but they were just passing flurries on a few cold, wet days when the wind and clouds came from the north. The wind was now blowing warm air up the river valley, making the days and evenings as pleasant as any I could remember.
As I strolled up Minin Street to Frunze Street to meet with Del and Els that Friday evening I was deep in thought about what to do with the information that I gleaned from my discussions with Mr. P. He may have been an uneducated, maybe even dishonest businessman but there was nothing that I could pinpoint from what I had learned about him that indicated that he was hurting the everyday Ivan Ivanovich on the street. In fact, he made a strong case for his ends justifying his means. Even if had been getting his car parts off the back of somebody’s truck, at the least he had been providing a service that benefited other entrepreneurs in the city, helping others make a living by being able to fix their cars quickly. Perhaps Mr. P. was the wrong example on which to base my model of how the little shark becomes the big shark. He seemed rather adamant that those types of charlatans were only destroying Russia and looking out for themselves. Igor Ivanovich seemed to be, on the surface anyhow, building an enterprise that not only made him rich and influential but that helped move the local economy along in a very unsure time. During this period of economic chaos in Russia it was impossible for anybody to work completely within the law, and as Del rightly pointed out, the laws were changing every two or three months. What was perhaps illegal when it started was the catalyst for showing law makers that the laws had to change. I hoped that Del would be able to help me pick apart this new information and make some sense of it.
When the elevator doors opened on what I expected to be the fifth floor and the Sannings’ apartment door, I had to double check that I had punched the right button. Perhaps I had mistakenly pressed 3 instead of 5? I punched the 5 again to see if the elevator would close and take me higher, but it didn’t. I stood for a moment puzzled. I stepped back into the elevator and selected 0 to take me back to the ground floor. Perhaps I had entered the building through the wrong stairwell. Most Russian apartment buildings have multiple entrances on the ground floor along the length of the buildings, each entrance representing a stairwell or elevator shaft. I poked my head outside the ground floor entrance to check that there wasn’t one more door to the left as the Sanning’s apartment was on the fifth floor of the last stairwell from the street. As I looked left all I saw was a wall of cinder blocks about two and a half meters tall. On the other side of that low wall was Upper Embankment street. I was in the right place. I rode the elevator again up to the fifth floor and deliberately knocked a measured three times on a newly installed, rust-colored steel security door. The knock echoed on the landing and up and down the stairwell. I waited.
From behind the doors, I heard the faint voice of Del asking in Russian, “Who is there?”
“It’s the plumber, I’ve come to fix the sink,” I replied in a put-on Brooklyn accent to make fun of the whole situation.
I rolled my eyes as I waited for Fort Sanning to open its doors. I half expected to see Del holding a double-barreled shotgun and chewing on a stubby cigar in the side of his mouth, wearing a cowboy hat and a patch over one eye. It all seemed very overdone. As I heard the bolt of the steel door finally release, I pulled the door toward me. Stepping out of its way and peering around the edge I said, “Open sesame?”
“Very funny, plumber man. Come on in,” he bellowed. Del was in a good mood.
Without a coat, scarf and shapka to hang up I walked straight into the living room through the dark hallway but bumped my left arm on something protruding from the wall. That hadn’t been there that last time I had visited the apartment.
“That’s new, isn’t it? I said as I stopped to inspect it and rub my arm that had bumped it. “What is it?” I asked as I stepped through the doorway into the living room. Els was in the kitchen off to the left.
“It’s a panic button,” Del said matter-of-factly, “It is an alarm that sets off bells and lights here in the apartment, the landing… and in the police station.”
“Wow, you’ve got a burglar alarm wired to the police station? How far away is it from here?” I was puzzled.
“Minin Square, just a few minutes away, but we also have a police car stationed downstairs at night for the time being as well in case it happens again,” he said distractedly.
“In case what happens again? Del, what happened?” I began to get a very worried feeling in my gut and waited for him to explain what was going on.
“A few nights ago, a group of three of four thugs forced their way into the apartment just before Els and I were going to bed,” he said as if telling me a bedtime story.