Paw and Order (25 page)

“Who's we?” Bernie said.

“The Russian-American Investment Advisory Council,” said Sonia.

Bernie laughed. I wasn't sure what he was laughing at—and Sonia looked pretty clueless on that score, too—but it was always nice to see him in a good mood.

“Do svidaniya,”
he said, a totally new one on me.

We went outside, got in the car, drove down the block, did a U-ee, and parked in a shady spot with a not-too-distant view the Russian-American Investment Advisory Council town house.

Day started to fade. Bernie and I sat side by side, just enjoying darkness taking over. After a while, a big black car double-parked by the town house, had barely stopped before the town house door opened and two men hurried out, both carrying roller bags. They jumped in the black car and it took off.

“Next stop, Moscow,” Bernie said. We stayed where we were. I went over the Moscow thing in my mind, and was still going over it when the town house door opened again and Sonia came out, wearing a backpack. She crossed the street and walked our way real fast, eyes straight ahead, everything about her intense. Bernie got out of the car and stepped onto the sidewalk. Sonia almost bumped into him. He grabbed her wrist, held it in a way I could tell was not particularly forceful for Bernie, but her struggles got her nowhere.

“Let me go,” she said.

“Scream for help,” said Bernie.

But Sonia did not.

“You should have gone with the others,” Bernie told her.

“The goddamn flight was full,” Sonia said. “I'm on the next one.”

“Nope,” said Bernie. “And your life as you knew it is over.”

THIRTY-TWO

T
his is how we like to roll, and almost always do: Bernie behind the wheel and me, Chet the Jet, in the shotgun seat. Sometimes—not very often, you might say, but way too often, in my opinion—we need room for one more. That means somebody—Bernie, this extra and somewhat troublesome person, or me—has to ride on the little shelf in the back, which is where I now was, Sonia having taken my place in the shotgun seat. Bear in mind that I'm a hundred-plus pounder, and Sonia was one of those slender young ladies who'd topple right over if just bumped lightly. The problem of how to administer that light bump from where I was occupied all my thoughts.

Meanwhile, we hadn't actually moved, were still parked on this nice shady street, like we had nowhere to go and nothing to do. I knew that wasn't right. First of all, where was Suzie? Second of all, there were lots of other problems, too many to sort out.

“Ever killed anyone?” Bernie said, eyes straight ahead.

Sonia, who'd been staring straight ahead as well, turned quickly in his direction. Was that a tear track on her face? I hadn't heard her crying; maybe she was one of those silent criers, a mysterious kind of subgroup. All I knew for sure was that tears taste salty. “Of course not,” she said. “What do you take me for?”

Bernie turned to her, but slowly. “That's what we're determining,” he said. “Ever cause anyone to be killed?”

“No.”

“Ever fail to prevent someone getting killed?”

Sonia's gaze, still aimed in Bernie's direction, took on a faraway look. Bernie's gaze did the reverse, if that makes any sense, closing in.

“No,” Sonia said, at last and very softly.

“Close call, huh?” Bernie said. Sonia's neck turned red, something you see in women but never men. What was it about? You tell me. “Don't worry about it,” Bernie said. “If people could just get the easy calls right, we'd be fine.”

Sonia nodded, very slightly. “What are you going to do with me?”

“That's what we're determining.” Hadn't Bernie just said that? Once I had a dream where a bowl of steak tips appeared and I scarfed them all up and then—presto! The bowl was somehow full again. This was like that, except not so tasty.

“I don't understand,” Sonia said. “I don't even know who you are.”

“I'm the loose cannon,” Bernie said.

How great did that sound! But why just him? I wanted to be a loose cannon, too. I thumped my tail on the horrible shelf where I was marooned, just once, but heavy enough to send a message.

Bernie's eyes flickered my way, and he went on. “What's going to happen to your two buddies from the office when they get back to Moscow?”

Sonia shrugged.

“I'm guessing their careers are over,” Bernie said.

She nodded, just a little nod, hardly noticeable.

“Do you have family back there?”

“Not close.”

“You like it here?”

Another very slight nod.

“Here's the deal,” Bernie said. “Help us find Suzie Sanchez, and I'll do what I can for you.”

“What does that mean?”

“Not much. But what's your alternative?”

“You could let me go.”

“Not happening.”

She glanced sideways, toward her door.

“And that would be pointless,” Bernie said. “No one outruns Chet.”

You won't hear anything truer than that, amigo! I was considering unwedging myself from my perch and giving the back of Bernie's neck a quick lick, when Sonia looked my way.

“I always wanted a dog.”

“Breeders contact me about Chet from time to time.”

Breeders? About me? I wondered what that was about. It sounded extremely interesting, definitely something to sort out, nail down, get my mind around. While I got going on that, a back-and-forth started up between Bernie and Sonia.

“. . . and I could have one of the puppies?” she was saying when I tuned back in.

“Pick of the litter,” Bernie said.

Then came a long silence. A strange feeling came over me, a feeling of being very small and cuddled up in a sort of ball with others of my closest kind, also very small. Not sure what that was about, but I could just about smell it; in fact, I could.

Sonia took a deep breath. Was this an interview? Was Sonia a perp? I watch for deep perp breaths when Bernie's doing one of his interviews: it means we're winning. We like winning, me and Bernie.

“I never knew anything about Lizette and Jean-Luc, other than rumors of their existence,” she said. “None of us did, except for Ludmilla.”

“That's what you called them? Not the Urmanovs?”

Sonia nodded. “By the time they surfaced, they'd been in so deep and so long they weren't really the Urmanovs anymore.”

Bernie turned the key. “Where to?” he said.

“It's only a guess,” Sonia said.

“I bet you're a good guesser.”

“That makes you one of a kind,” said Sonia. “But there's a place they use, Ludmilla and Lizette.”

Bernie put us in gear and we were on the move, the seating arrangement still messed up. But at least Sonia was sharp enough to realize that Bernie's one of a kind. Me, too. We're one of the same kind, if I haven't mentioned that already.

• • •

Chesapeake Bay? Was that it? I tried to keep track of what Sonia was saying, not easy with so much to look at now that we were out in dark country, water over on Bernie's side, darker than the land except when the clouds moved away to let the moon shine down, and then countless tiny watery moons appeared. All that, and I haven't even gotten to the smells, many of them salty, and probably won't have time. But here's something interesting: when the moon went back behind the clouds, the smells got stronger. What's that all about? The moon sniffs up lots of smells so there's less for everybody else? That was as far as I could take it.

“. . . sleepers,” Sonia was saying. “It was an operation that dates back several administrations in our bureau. They lived completely normal American lives, had no contact at all with any kind of control. And then Lizette finally found something useful to do.”

“Who knew about it?” Bernie said.

“What Lizette was up to? Only Ludmilla at first, then the rest of us.”

“Meaning at your cute little setup on A Street.”

Sonia nodded.

“What about on our side?” Bernie said.

“Our side?”

“The American side. Did anyone on this end know about Lizette and Jean-Luc?”

Sonia was silent.

“Eben St. John, for example,” Bernie said.

Sonia turned to him. “I knew nothing. Not until after the fact.”

“You're protesting your innocence too much,” Bernie said. “It arouses doubts.”

“I'm telling you the truth,” she said, her eyes tearing up. The moon came out and shone on a tendril of hair that wound around her ear, a very nice sight.

“It's your only hope,” Bernie said.

She pulled back, as though trying to increase the space between her and Bernie. Who would want to do that?

“How did Eben find out?”

“I don't know,” Sonia said. “Please believe me.”

We entered a small town—gas station, motel, a few stores and houses, nothing lit up except the motel.

“Slow down,” Sonia said. “It's the next left.”

“And then?”

“First gravel driveway after you reach the bay. The house is on a bluff.”

Bernie stopped the car. “Any chance Ludmilla's gone back to Russia?”

“Only if she's found Jean-Luc. She's been looking for him twenty-four seven.”

Bernie backed up, into the motel lot, empty except for us. “Rent a room. Don't leave. We'll come back for you.”

“And if you don't?”

“Then you're screwed,” Bernie said.

Sonia got out of the car and turned to Bernie. “I'll—I'll do anything you want,” she said.

“You're losing me,” he said, stepping on the gas. I wriggled through the small space and onto the shotgun seat before anybody could change their mind about anything.

• • •

We took the next turn. The road led down a gentle slope to the water—what had Sonia called it? The bay?—and then followed along beside it, and right away I saw a fish jump out of the water, all silvery in the moonlight—so close Bernie almost could have reached out and caught it—and plopped back in, leaving silvery ripples behind. When it comes to eating fish, they sometimes have very annoying bones inside, which I learned the hard way once, and after that the hard way again.

“Is there a Sonia in
Crime and Punishment
?” Bernie said. “Had to write an essay on it at West Point. C minus, as I recall, but it might have been worse.”

Missed all that, except for crime and punishment. No missing crime and punishment: it was our bread and butter. As for bread and butter, I prefer just the butter, right out of the package, or even in the package if pressed for time.

“Here we go,” Bernie said, turning into a gravel driveway that appeared on my side. It took a long curve, headed back toward the sea, and there on a bluff overlooking the bay stood a small house, no lights showing. Bernie stopped the car and we walked the rest of the way, Bernie with the gun in his hand, me the way I am when the gun is in the picture, namely at my most alert. We reached the house, stopped, listened. I heard the lapping of little waves, an owl hooting far away, almost out of range, and nothing from inside the house. We started walking around it, passing a kayak leaning against the wall and a trash can smelling of sour milk, and came to the back.

There was a lot to take in at the back of this house, and take in quickly. First, the view, a wide-open view of the bay, with a boat not far off, a boat with a big cabin and light glowing inside. I thought I remembered that boat: something about horses, wasn't it? Also in the view was a little rowboat, on its way out to the cabin cruiser. Moonlight gleamed on the slicked-back hair of the rower, and the planes of his face were clear: Mr. York, a.k.a. Jean-Luc and maybe a.k.a. something else, a.k.a. being an annoyance that comes up in our business from time to time. A woman sat in the bow, facing toward the cabin cruiser and therefore away from us, but I knew it was Suzie, just from how she was sitting.

Nothing more to take in on the water, but out on the deck behind the house we had something else going on, what Bernie would call a complication, namely the cat's-eye woman, Ludmilla, standing by the railing that overlooked the bay, one of those cameras with a big long nose on a table beside her, the cat's-eye glasses perched up on her head, and a rifle in her hands. At least we knew all of the people in the scene, but no other positives came to me.

Steps led to the deck from the side. We went up them at our very quietest, losing sight of Ludmilla for a moment. When we got to the top, Ludmilla had the rifle in firing position, drawing a bead on the rowboat.
Pop
, before we could take another step: the soft pop of gunfire when a silencer's in play. A silencer takes away the sound, but not the power, a fact that surprised me in my rookie days. The power's still there, take my word for it. Out on the water, Mr. York went still and then slid down out of sight, the oars slipping from his hands.

Now we were on the move, big time. Ludmilla stuck another round—it looked like gold in the moonlight—into the chamber, and resighted very slightly, the muzzle now pointing right at Suzie. She was rising to her feet in the bow of the rowboat, eyes wide open, huge and dark. Ludmilla's trigger finger started to tense just as we hit her and hit her hard. Another
pop
, but the rifle was pointing straight up by then, knocked loose from her hands. Before it even hit the ground, we had Ludmilla pinned nice and motionless under us, although it took her a while to accept the motionless part. She even spat at Bernie, something I hate to see in a perp.

Bernie rose and jerked Ludmilla to her feet in his roughest way. We looked out toward the bay, but the moon was covered up again, and there was nothing to see except the glow of the cabin cruiser lights. Bernie put his free hand to his mouth like he was going to shout something, but then lowered it, staying silent.

“Your fucking dog's biting my ankle,” Ludmilla said.

“Shut up,” said Bernie. He looked at me. “Good job, Chet. That's enough for now. C'mon, boy.”

Meaning what?

• • •

Not long after that, I figured it out. Bernie was suggesting I let go of Ludmilla's pant leg. Nothing I'd done to her could possibly qualify as biting, which was where the confusion came from. I let go, got rid of a few bits, or possibly swaths, of khaki material that had somehow gotten caught in my mouth, and then we took Ludmilla inside the house.

Most houses have duct tape somewhere around the place. Ludmilla's was under the kitchen sink. We duct-taped her to a chair, feet, hands, and chest, Bernie doing the actual work and doing it fast.

“Why did he go rogue on you?” Bernie said, also talking fast. “Jealousy? He forgot the point of the exercise?”

“Beyond reminding you of my diplomatic immunity, I've got nothing to say,” Ludmilla said.

Bernie taped one last piece over her mouth. We'd duct-taped a perp name of Roly Polinski just like this some time back, and as we'd left Bernie had told him to sit tight, but he didn't do that with Ludmilla.

Out on the deck: no moon and nothing to see on the bay but the cabin cruiser's glow. We went around to the side of the house, picked up the kayak, and carried it down to the water. I knew kayaks from our trip to San Diego—we'd surfed, me and Bernie!—although I'd never actually been in one. But boats in general were coming up a lot lately in my career, and one thing was clear: riding in the bow—which is boat lingo Bernie taught me—is a lot like riding shotgun in the Porsche. In short: heaven, even if I'm not sure what heaven is, except I seem to be in it a lot.