“Yes, Baron, but not everyone listens to a Chinese. I might as well say I’m a friend of the czar.”
The Baron didn’t answer. He had nothing else to offer.
At home, he and Li Ju were surprised to discover Andreev slumped in a chair by the stove. His lank hair covered one eye and he was unshaven. “Good evening, Baron.”
“You’re never idle. Unusual to find you relaxing here.”
“This is a commercial venture. Although the warmth was worth the wait.” He grinned, pulled his hair behind his ears.
Li Ju disappeared into another room, as Andreev wasn’t a favored guest. But the Baron welcomed him as a distraction after the day’s events. There was always a sense of circling with Andreev, as he positioned himself as the bestower of information and favors. The Baron raised his voice, asked the servants to bring vodka. “So you’re delivering a commercial proposal?”
“I’ve come to the aid of your cook. First, I urge you to order extra caviar, smoked sturgeon, and eel. They keep indefinitely in storage, as we know from our sainted Russian mothers.”
“Please continue, Andreev.” There was pleasure in recollecting food shared at the family table.
The servant brought vodka and two glasses on a tray.
“Also order pickled beets, mushrooms, and cabbage. Hard cheese. Horseflesh. Dried apples, berries, peaches, apricots.”
“I understand vodka never spoils. Is there a reason to hoard anything else?”
Andreev raised his glass to the Baron. “Many reasons. I’m a fortune-teller. I predict opportunity. It’s as clear to me as a sunrise or a cheating heart.”
“My wife consults fortune-tellers. She collects good-luck charms. She’d worship a saint’s relic if there were one at St. Nikolas Cathedral.”
“There probably isn’t a genuine saint’s bone in all of China.”
“So you’re the pious man who can separate a true from a false relic?”
“For a fee. Or I could have a relic made for you. Guaranteed.” Andreev enjoyed his own joke.
Perhaps he could explain how to recognize when luck vanished or changed direction. Could this be learned or was it innate, like right- or left-handedness or the ability to identify scents? “People follow any lucky sign these days.”
“Don’t trust luck. Listen to me. I tell you as a friend that things will become scarce soon. Prepare for uncertainty. The hospitals and government officials have ordered enormous quantities of supplies that fill up the CER trains. There are restrictions and inspections. Bad weather slows deliveries.”
“It sounds as if the world is ending.”
“Only Kharbin as we know it. Word spread about Dr. Mesny’s death from plague. And other deaths. When people who work for the CER railroad learn about the number of dead here, there will be trouble. Engineers and trainmen will refuse to deliver food or wood or anything to Kharbin.”
“The government has a way of forcing cooperation.”
Andreev laughed. “I hear the only cure for plague is death.”
The Baron’s expression revealed no information.
“News will spread,” Andreev said. “Mark my words.”
He made a decision. “The poor are deliberately kept ignorant. Officials try to keep the deaths hidden. The Chinese and Russian governments believe there are no consequences. General Khorvat fears only protest or riots, because there aren’t enough soldiers to keep control.”
“That’s why General Khorvat ordered a huge supply of barbed wire.”
The Baron swallowed his vodka without tasting it. He struggled against a feeling of exposure. Perhaps that was the way the bacilli entered the body, exploiting a weakness just as the wind finds a crack in the wall. “I’d like you to do something for me.” He went to the table where he practiced calligraphy, searched through the papers, and returned with a notebook. “I’d like to place an order. I need alcohol, lime powder, rubber gloves, green soap, cotton gauze, carbolic acid, hypodermic needles, cotton operating caps. A sterilizer from my usual supplier in Germany.”
The Baron paid Andreev a small amount, not enough to entirely compensate him for all the supplies and his discretion. Like other Kharbinskiis, Andreev operated on a system of guanxi, credit based on trust and honorable relationships. Their unspoken agreement was the Baron’s access to medicine and mercy if Andreev should become sick. He would turn up, like a black pebble.
Andreev nodded. “Good. I’ll double your order. I’ll keep a single order of everything for myself in reserve for the future. Make space in your storeroom for the shipment of foodstuffs. You won’t regret it. The dried apricots are especially sweet this year.”
“Our cook will be pleased.”
“Now I have a favor to ask of you.” Andreev leaned forward in his chair, nervously turning the empty vodka glass in his hand. “An innkeeper told me a stranger had hidden something outside near his building. It could be valuable. I need your help to recover it. I trust you.”
The Baron quickly agreed just to escape this conversation. The vodka had loosened a raw state from his fatigue. It was late. Andreev would spend the night as his guest, as it was too cold to travel home. They’d hunt for Andreev’s mysterious treasure in the morning before the Baron went to the hospital.
The next day, after a brief negotiation, the innkeeper accepted Andreev’s payment, a fistful of rubles and yen. He led Andreev and the Baron through the claustrophobically low-ceilinged inn, unlatched a back door, and waved at a small structure, a shed, in the field near a neighboring building.
“You’ll find what you seek there.” The innkeeper handed Andreev a lantern.
Andreev frowned. “We also need a second lantern, blanket, and rope.” The innkeeper agreed to follow them with the extra equipment, then quickly shut the door behind the two men.
The Baron tightened the fur hood on his jacket. “He probably has a grudge against the neighboring innkeeper.”
They crossed the field, the Baron first, Andreev behind him, his head lowered against the wind, fitting his boots into the other man’s footprints in the snow to ease his passage.
They reached the shed, made of boards roughly nailed and stacked together. It had no windows, no door. Andreev kicked at several loose boards until they toppled silently backward into the snow, forming a dark nimbus.
The men squeezed through the small opening between the boards into the shed.
Andreev whispered, “There’s a well here.” Then he cursed himself for his caution. The lantern grated against the thick stone wall around the well as he set it down, its light magnifying their shadows on the boards behind them.
A winch held an ice-covered rope that made a taut line into the well. A faint, cold odor radiated from the silent space.
Still breathless, they leaned into the well, white puffs of their breath filling it like a cauldron. Andreev held up the lantern and its slant of light revealed an indistinct pale shape suspended deep inside the well.
“Andreev, whatever is down there cannot be saved. There’s no treasure here. Leave it.”
“You made a promise. Let’s finish what was started. It will be quick work. Then tea and vodka. Or just vodka.”
“Someone stored provisions in the well. Or a bag of rice.” The Baron knew that Andreev expected to discover something valuable, wanted to possess it himself.
The Baron pulled on the winch handle until the frozen rope stubbornly rolled up, ice splintering off it in a transparent shower. The heavy burden at the end of the rope scraped the side of the well, setting off an echo.
The men cranked the winch handle hand over hand together, fearing the strain of the weight would break the rope, thin and frayed in places, as it slowly moved.
“Gently, gently. But quickly, quickly.”