Lazovsky didn’t join him; rather he put his fists on his hips and looked down at the Count with an unmistakable expression of competence.
“As I told you, in these situations the greatest risk is swelling. We have alleviated that risk. Nonetheless, she has suffered a concussion, which is basically a bruising of the brain. She is going to have headaches and will need a good deal of rest. But in a week, she will be up and about.”
The surgeon turned to go.
The Count extended a hand.
“Dr. Lazovsky . . . ,” he said, in the manner of one who wishes to ask a question, yet suddenly can’t find the means of doing so.
But the surgeon, who had stood in this spot before, understood well enough.
“She’s going to be every bit herself, Rostov.”
As the Count began to offer his thanks, the man in the black suit opened the door at the end of the hall once again, only this time it was for Osip Glebnikov.
“Excuse me,” said the surgeon to the Count.
Meeting halfway down the hall, Osip and Lazovsky conferred for a minute in lowered voices while the Count watched in astonishment. When the surgeon disappeared into the surgery, Osip joined the Count on the bench.
“Well, my friend,” he said with his hands on his knees. “Your little Sofia has given us quite a scare.”
“Osip . . . What are you doing here?”
“I wanted to make sure that you were both all right.”
“But how did you come to find us?”
Osip smiled.
“As I’ve told you, Alexander, it is my business to keep track of certain men of interest. But that doesn’t matter at the moment. What does matter is that Sofia’s going to be fine. Lazovsky is the best surgeon in the city. Tomorrow morning, he will be taking her to First Municipal, where she can recover in comfort. But I’m afraid that you can’t stay here any longer.”
The Count began to protest, but Osip raised a calming hand.
“Listen to me, Sasha. If I know what has happened tonight, others will soon know too. And it would not be in your best interest, or Sofia’s for that matter, if they were to find you sitting here. So this is what you must do: There is a staircase at that end of this hall. You need to go down to the ground floor and through the black metal door, which leads to the alley behind the hospital. In the alley, there will be two men waiting who will take you back to the hotel.”
“I can’t leave Sofia,” said the Count.
“You have to, I’m afraid. But your concern is perfectly understandable. So I have arranged for someone to stay with Sofia in your stead until she is ready to go home.”
At this remark, the door was opened to admit a middle-aged woman looking bewildered and frightened. It was Marina. Behind the seamstress was a matron in uniform.
“Ah,” said Osip, standing. “Here she is.”
Because Osip stood, Marina looked to him first. Having never seen him before, she met his gaze with anxiety. But then she saw the Count sitting on the bench and ran forward.
“Alexander! What has happened? What are you doing here? They wouldn’t tell me a thing.”
“It’s Sofia, Marina. She had a bad fall on the service stairs of the hotel, but a surgeon is with her now. She is going to be all right.”
“Thank God.”
The Count turned to Osip as if he were about to introduce him, but Osip preempted.
“Comrade Samarova,” he said with a smile. “We haven’t met, but I too am a friend of Alexander’s. I’m afraid that he needs to return to the Metropol. But it would be such a comfort to him if you could remain with Sofia until her recovery. Isn’t that so, my friend?”
Osip laid a hand on the Count’s shoulder without taking his gaze off Marina.
“I know it is a great deal to ask, Marina,” said the Count. “But . . .”
“Not another word, Alexander. Of course I will stay.”
“Excellent,” said Osip.
He turned to the uniformed woman.
“You’ll see that comrade Samarova receives everything that she requires?”
“Yes, sir.”
Osip offered Marina one more reassuring smile and then took the Count by the elbow.
“This way, my friend.”
Osip led the Count down the hall and into the back staircase. They descended a flight together without speaking and then Osip stopped on the landing.
“This is where we part. Remember: down another flight and out the black metal door. Naturally, it would be best if you never mentioned to anyone that either of us were here.”
“Osip, I don’t know how to repay you.”
“Alexander,” he said with a smile, “you have been at my service for over fifteen years. It is a pleasure for once to be at yours.” Then he was gone.
The Count descended the last flight and went through the black metal door. It was nearly dawn and, despite finding himself in an alley, the Count could sense the gentleness of spring in the air. Across the alley, there was a white van with the words Red Star Baking Collective painted in large letters on its side. An ill-shaven young man was leaning against the passenger door smoking. When he saw the Count, he tossed his cigarette and thumped the door behind him. Without asking the Count who he was, he went behind the van and opened the rear door.
“Thank you,” said the Count as he climbed inside, receiving no reply.
It was only when the door closed and the Count found himself bent over at the waist in the back of the van that he became aware of an extraordinary sensation: the smell of freshly baked bread. When he had seen the insignia of the baking collective, he had assumed it was a ruse. But on the shelves that ran along one side of the van were over two hundred loaves in orderly arrangement. Gently, almost in disbelief, the Count reached out to lay a hand on one and found it to be soft and warm. It couldn’t have been more than an hour from the oven.
Outside, the passenger door slammed shut and the van’s engine started. The Count quickly sat on the metal bench that faced the shelves and they were underway.
In the silence, the Count listened to the gears of the van shifting. Having sped up and slowed down as it came into and out of various turns, the van’s engine now accelerated to the speed of an open road.
Shuffling to the rear of the van with his back hunched, the Count looked out the little square window in the door. As he watched the buildings and canopies and shop signs flying past, for a moment he couldn’t tell where he was. Then suddenly he saw the old English Club and realized that they must be on Tverskaya—the ancient road that radiated from the Kremlin in the direction of St. Petersburg, and that he had strolled a thousand times before.
In the late 1930s, Tverskaya Street had been widened to accommodate the official parades that ended in Red Square. While at the time, some of the finer buildings had been lifted and set back, most had been razed and replaced with towers, in accordance with a new ordinance that buildings on first-rate streets stand at least ten stories tall. As a result, the Count would have had to strain to pick out other familiar landmarks as the van moved along. But he had stopped looking for what was familiar, and instead was watching the blur of facades and street lamps receding rapidly from his view, as if they were being pulled into the distance.
Back in the attic of the Metropol, the Count found his door still open and Montaigne on the floor. Picking up his father’s book, the Count sat down on Sofia’s bed. Then for the first time that night, he let himself weep, his chest heaving lightly with the release. But if tears fell freely down his face, they were not tears of grief. They were the tears of the luckiest man in all of Russia.
After a few minutes, the Count breathed deeply and felt a sense of peace. Realizing that his father’s book was still in his hand, he rose from Sofia’s bed to set it down—and that’s when he saw the black leather case that had been left on the Grand Duke’s desk. It was about a foot square and six inches high with a handle in leather and clasps of chrome. Taped on top was a note addressed to him in an unfamiliar script. Pulling the note free, the Count unfolded it and read: