June 26, 1993
Saturday
12:10 PM
Undeterred by a lack of funds, George downed his beer, pulled out the notebook and pen, and started scribbling: «Kolyan and Veronika here, the cop there. Wedge Kirill in here and hook Roma onto him… the Pioneers under Kolyan, Nastya there too… and where do Vadik and Verochka go?… Hold on!...»
Zhorik trailed off into unintelligible muttering. A blonde walked up, all pronounced curves and swells. Zhorik ran his eyes over the topography and jumped to his feet: — Nastyusha, good to see you! Sit, sit.
He waved toward me: «my business partner, Roman,» then toward her: «Chief accountant, Anastasia Igorevna.»
Anastasia Igorevna twisted her lips into something resembling a smile and perched on a chair, ready to flutter off and vanish at any moment. Zhorik paid no attention to her tense expression. Inquired:
— So who's your director?
— Yakov Semyonovich, only he never shows up, — Anastasia Igorevna rolled her shoulders, fretting over an establishment left to fend for itself.
Zhorik, studying his empty mug, asked:
— What's Semyonych do with his life these days? Weeding rocket cress out at the dacha?
— No. He's got two other restaurants, his own. That's where he spends all his time.
— Whose is this one, then?
— Owned by the labor collective. Yakov Semyonovich holds thirty percent here. He opened his own restaurants about three years back. Started as co-ops, then he re-registered them under himself after the coup. That's where he disappears to.
— I see. What's on the second floor?
— Our space too. Yakov Semyonovich rents it out, but to who and for how much, I don't know. I only deal with the official payments, and that's not much. Covers utilities and a bit for household needs. Expenses come out even.
— I see. And how are things with, you know, unofficial problems?
Anastasia Igorevna didn't understand the question. Looked at Zhorik in surprise, knit her eyebrows into a little peak, and, turning toward the bar, called out:
— Misha!
A mighty figure materialized behind the bar counter. Extraordinarily mighty, capable of handling any situation delicately labeled «unofficial.» Zhorik snorted, hunched over for a second, wrestled the fit back under control.
— No, no. Not that at all. How are things with the bandits? How do you handle protection? Rough times these days. Heard there've been problems.
Anastasia Igorevna's eyebrows settled back into place:
— Not my department. That's for Yakov Semyonovich, and he doesn't report to me. My job's small. Some hoodlums showed up two weeks back. Come every evening now, sit in that corner. Sit there a couple hours, eat a little something, and leave. Don't drink a thing, no point to them, — Anastasia Igorevna rolled her shoulders. Her bust rippled like an ocean wave, and her face took on an offended look. Seemed the chief accountant didn't count sobriety among a man's virtues. She'd have preferred her gentlemen bandits knocking back the hard stuff by the liter and flinging cash left and right, like in the movies. Ah, what fine-looking men they cast as criminal types, not like these bums without a proper pair of pants to their name…
Zhorik tracked the shifts in Anastasia Igorevna's expression — from mournful to dreamy and back to irritated — and soothed her:
— Here's the thing, listen: we'll clear the freeloaders out today, the police will show up, seal the place. Tell the labor collective to take a few days off. Sit at home, get out to nature, grill some shashlik. If Semyonych asks, tell him a whole new gang of bandits showed up. Real nasty ones, meaner than the last crew. Wiped out the old guys, buddy-buddy with the cops now, want to have a chat with him about life. My guess is Semyonych'll lose interest in the place pretty quick. No one to stick up for a minority owner here, way I see it. We'll set it up nice and proper, like we agreed. One more thing. Monday, tell the second-floor tenants, on the strict quiet, that the lease is going up in smoke. They can't be showing their faces here.
— How do you mean?
— Just what I said. Force majeure, murder, bodies, police, searches. They need to clear out while the going's good, so they don't get caught in the crossfire. Though, they could always just sit tight and wait for the cops to come knocking with interrogations and search warrants. That's the straight dope.
— What bodies? What cops? When?
— Bodies and cops today. Interrogations and searches this week. Clear what to say the day after tomorrow?
— ...m-m-more or less.
— Good. What time do the new guys show up?
— After five.
— Excellent. And one last thing. We'll knock back another beer. Put it on my tab.
Anastasia Igorevna nodded, stood up, walked behind the bar, exchanged a few words with the bartender, and left the room through an inconspicuous door. Zhorik watched the retreating mass of blonde flesh and clapped his hands:
— Alright, we're rolling now. Things are moving. The emergency exit leads out to an inner courtyard. Handy. Should take a look at the grounds and swing by the second floor. Finished? Come on, let's size up the layout!
Through the door behind the bar we came out into the restaurant's courtyard. Turned out to be a lot with six parking spots, hemmed in on two sides by brick fences. On the third and fourth sides stood the two-story restaurant building, shaped like an L. Gates were attached to the short leg of the building.
Zhorik paced the courtyard, up and down and side to side, spat at his feet:
— Ten by eight, don't love it. Good that the walls are blind, no windows.
I took a closer look. To the right and behind rose neighboring two-story buildings, whose walls had at first looked like tall brick fences. No sense I could make of why Zhorik disliked eighty square meters of gravel. Too embarrassed to ask. Rooms on the second floor above the restaurant had windows facing the yard.
Zhorik stood in the middle of the yard, deep in thought, glancing at a Volga-2410 parked in the corner, shifting his gaze to the second floor, then to me, standing under the awning. Suddenly Zhorik brightened:
— Hey, student, see the windows?
— Which ones?
— Above you.
— No, the awning's in the way.
— Wish I could get a look at the second floor. Fine, later...
We headed back inside and found a stairwell to the left of the bar.
Went up.
The second floor made no impression: chipped linoleum on the floor, gray wallpaper on the walls, water-stained ceiling, two lamps, five windows facing the yard, and, at the end of the hallway, another staircase, this one a proper front entrance leading out onto Kalyazinsky.
Zhorik paced back and forth, went down the stairs, rattled a door, came back up, counted the doors, the windows. At each window he'd pause in the pose of a marksman ready to hit a target down in the yard. Seemed to be planning either an ambush or, just the opposite, a defensive stand.
— All nonsense, this ambush, defense business. Seven seconds' worth of work. Notice there are eight offices here, and only six parking spots downstairs. In three or four months we'll have a revolt of the masses on our hands. Well, fine. We'll deal with the masses later, right now we prepare for the meeting. Timing's simple: five seconds to get up the stairs at a good clip. Two seconds to empty a clip. Let's go.
— Where? — I couldn't keep up with Zhorka's stream of consciousness.
— To see a good man. Word has it he can sell you anything that's legal to sell. And, for a small surcharge, anything that isn't. Gear for meeting sports delegations, say.
— What delegations? Don't follow…
— You will. Get moving...
