Читаем Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine. Vol. 50, No. 1 & 2, January/February 2005 полностью

“We won’t expect much from his son.” The station chief’s attention was moving on to something else, but Charles Marley had received his nod to see if Vladimir Davidovich could be recruited. The station chief looked up suddenly when Charles was at the door. “Maybe he will surprise us,” she said.


“It’s a nom de guerre, a cover name, isn’t it,” Vlad asked him the next time they met. “It’s too literary to be your real name. You know, Dickens. Marley’s ghost?”

“Someone should have told my grandfather — or his grandfather.”

“Everyone knows what a cultural attaché does.”

“When the political climate permits, I arrange exchange visits. Your ballet dancers for our bluegrass pickers.”

“Banjos.”

“Right.”

“Duh-duh-duh DUH duh. The movie’s been here. Must be pretty dull — the world’s in ferment, and you’re escorting hillbillies around Moscow.” They were at Proffer’s apartment again, alone, and Vlad was playing with him, enjoying his moment, knowing he had gotten someone interested — if not in himself, then in his father’s satchels of work.

“What I was thinking,” Marley said, “is I might try to get you some engagements in New York.”

The narrow face mocked the offer. “If I help you, you’ll see I play Carnegie Hall?”

“More like Queens College, if you’re as good as Proffer says. Or places in Iowa. It would be part of an exchange of students. Up to you what you made of it. And whether you stayed. How good are you?”

“Ask Melissa.” She was a young woman who came to some of the gatherings at Proffer’s apartment.

“At the piano.”

“I’m very good.” He grinned confidently, but the look in his eyes wasn’t so sure. “This is the nation of great pianists — and great alcoholics. I’m good enough for your Queens College, not quite ready for Carnegie Hall. In another year, maybe.”

“Proffer says you’re as good as Gilels was at your age.”

Vlad shrugged. “Proffer’s no music critic.”

“But he’s right?”

“Bound to be once in a while.”

“And you want out.”

“Oh, brother. You’ve seen through me.” The young man dragged his hand down his face theatrically. “I thought I kept that hidden.”

“You’ve been shouting it on the street corners,” Marley said.

“It gets lost in the din there. Everybody wants out, more or less. The KGB can’t arrest us all. Anyway, they’re busy plotting against each other.” He got up from the table where they’d been sitting. His elbows had rested on a magazine, Literaturnaya Gazeta. He turned several pages casually, then walked away. A foolscap sheet lay between the pages. With the heel of his hand, Marley swiveled the magazine and read the sheet. Before he finished, Vlad returned with a bottle of pepper vodka. He didn’t bring glasses. “What do you think?” he asked. He tilted the bottle to his lips, then passed it to Marley.

What Marley thought was: Are you sure you want to do this? But he was too professional to ask. He had other words ready. “You’re doing a service to your country, Vladimir Davidovich,” he said.

Vlad laughed and demanded the bottle back.


The station chief was pleased. “James Jesus,” she murmured, an expression she used often, which had nothing to do with divinity but invoked the memory of her favorite counterespionage officer, whose surname was Angleton. “This needs to be verified, of course.”

“Sure.” He had read the foolscap memorandum through twice, taking no notes. It appeared to be what Washington would call a talking paper, outlining the pros and cons of the military recommending a hard line against restive republics that wished to weaken their ties to the Soviet Union.

“It’s not much by itself,” she said.

“No.” Marley was having trouble suppressing a smirk.

“But if General Zavenyagin is privy to those discussions...” She snapped a glance that only caught Marley looking serious. “What does the kid want from us?”

“Vodka and promises,” Marley said. “He wants to tour the West playing Schumann.”

For just a moment, the station chief gave Charles Marley a blank stare, long enough for his mouth to drop open a crack at the discovery she didn’t know Schumann, and then her stare turned scornful because he was so gullible. Not a good quality in an agent, being easily led — her head shake made that plain.


He heard Vlad perform nine days later at the apartment of an apparatchik who liked to pretend she ran a salon. There were a couple of poets in residence, but everywhere Marley went there were poets, or men who planned to become poets and drank seeking inspiration. One of the apparatchik’s poets was a widely acclaimed dissident who had never been arrested. He was middle aged, wore faded jeans and a leather jacket, and had soulful eyes that lingered on young women. The hostess prevailed on him to recite, and when he compared the stars in the American flag to bullet holes, several of the Americans who were present applauded dutifully. One of the young women, with broad Slavic cheeks and a bitter mouth, grabbed her coat and left.

Перейти на страницу:

Похожие книги

Безмолвный пациент
Безмолвный пациент

Жизнь Алисии Беренсон кажется идеальной. Известная художница вышла замуж за востребованного модного фотографа. Она живет в одном из самых привлекательных и дорогих районов Лондона, в роскошном доме с большими окнами, выходящими в парк. Однажды поздним вечером, когда ее муж Габриэль возвращается домой с очередной съемки, Алисия пять раз стреляет ему в лицо. И с тех пор не произносит ни слова.Отказ Алисии говорить или давать какие-либо объяснения будоражит общественное воображение. Тайна делает художницу знаменитой. И в то время как сама она находится на принудительном лечении, цена ее последней работы – автопортрета с единственной надписью по-гречески «АЛКЕСТА» – стремительно растет.Тео Фабер – криминальный психотерапевт. Он долго ждал возможности поработать с Алисией, заставить ее говорить. Но что скрывается за его одержимостью безумной мужеубийцей и к чему приведут все эти психологические эксперименты? Возможно, к истине, которая угрожает поглотить и его самого…

Алекс Михаэлидес

Детективы