The Charm School

They replied in the negative.” He threw the paper on the table.
    Charles Banks said, “We made the same inquiry of State and also received a negative. So right there we have to wonder about Mr. Fisher’s story.”
    “Do you?” Hollis continued, “We were talking about trust. In my business, as in Seth’s, rule number one is trust no one, including your own people.” Hollis poured himself a glass of mineral water and added, “So I went to our library here yesterday and found a book written by a former Navy flier who was a POW in Vietnam. In the book was an appendix listing some one thousand men who are still unaccounted for. Among them is an Air Force major, named Jack Dodson.”
    No one spoke.
    Hollis said, “I know my query elicited a negative, but I don’t know if yours did. I think someone is playing games.”
    Alevy said, “Sam, leave it alone.”
    Charles Banks added, “Colonel, we are conducting an official investigation through diplomatic and other channels. In the meantime, neither you nor Miss Rhodes are to concern yourselves with this unless requested to give testimony. This is obviously beyond your respective duties.” He added, “The ambassador would like a written report of your activities and whereabouts from the time you left Moscow yesterday afternoon. Thank you for taking care of the remains.”
    Hollis stood. “Mr. Banks, please tell the ambassador that unless or until I receive orders from my superiors to the contrary, I will pursue my own line of investigation into this matter.”
    Lisa stood also. “Charles, an American citizen named Gregory Fisher died under mysterious circumstances in the Soviet Union. Furthermore, Gregory Fisher told me on the telephone of another American citizen whom he met in a pine forest north of Borodino and who was apparently on the run from Soviet authorities—”
    Seth Alevy interrupted. “I recall on the tape that Mr. Fisher mentioned the woods, but I don’t recall him saying anything about a pine forest.” He tilted his chair forward and looked at her, then at Hollis. “
What
pine forest?”
    Hollis replied, “We must compare notes one of these days.” Hollis left.
    He waited for Lisa at the elevator. He gave it two minutes, then five, then took the elevator down alone.

 
14
    Sam Hollis walked up Kalinin Prospect, Moscow’s answer to Fifth Avenue. At the corner of Tchaikovsky Street, a line of hopeful diners waited in front of the popular Arbat restaurant, and Hollis had to make his way around them. Moscow’s rush hour was in full swing, everyone lugging bags, trying to buy anything that was for sale. Muscovites, peasants, and townsmen from the hinterlands descended on central Moscow daily for what they called shopping, though Hollis thought it more resembled the sack of the city.
    Hollis stopped in front of the window of
Podarki Pyatero
—Gift Shop Five—and examined his reflection. His dark blue overcoat of wool was Moscow-standard as was his narrow-brimmed black hat and his oversize briefcase, which was useful for carrying fresh produce and meat when available. He supposed he blended in superficially, but he knew that Muscovites picked him out as a Westerner. Aside from his facial features he knew he carried himself differently than the people around him, and he remembered what Lisa said about how Russian men walk and a joke someone in the embassy told him when he’d first arrived: Two Muscovite men were walking down the street. One was carrying a huge bundle on his back and was bowed and stooped by the weight, taking each step as though it were his last. The other Muscovite was carrying nothing at all and was bowed and stooped, taking each step as though it were his last.
    Hollis went inside the gift shop. It was not crowded as were the shops selling necessities, and the section in the rear that accepted only Western currency was empty.
    Hollis picked out a carved wooden bear balancing a ball on its foot and a small aluminum
znachok
—a lapel pin—on which was a profile of Lenin. He handed over six American dollars, and the clerk, claiming she had no American coins for change, pushed some foil-wrapped chocolate toward him. Hollis had a dresser drawer full of chocolate change. “I’ll take pence.”
    “Nyet.”
    “Centimes.”
    “Nyet.”
    “Green stamps. Anything, but no more chocolate.”
    “Nyet.”
    Hollis stuck his purchases in his overcoat and went back into the chilly dusk.
    Kalinin Prospect was a recently widened