The Family Hightower (28 page)

The letters are all over Moldova the next day, delivered by Feodor's boys. They're in Chisinau and Balti, in Orhei and across the countryside. A manager named Ion gets an envelope slipped under the door of his apartment. It has a mark on it that indicates it's from the Wolf. He opens it fast, before his wife can see it. Inside is a wad of American dollars and a printed note.
We suspect that Evgeny Razin, your underling, has been informing on the organization to the authorities and that a police raid of the organization is imminent. If you have any indication that this is true, including an increased police presence around your activities, you are sanctioned to dispatch Mr. Razin as soon as possible. We trust that the compensation in this envelope is enough to convince you of the seriousness of the threat and to secure your vigilance. You will receive double this amount again if you are required to carry out this order and do so.
The wad is thick; the denomination on the top is pretty high. Not everyone believes the letter they get, of course. But enough do to set the whole organization on edge, stretching the connections between everyone inside the network. And they're all afraid enough, of the enforcers, the spies, their superiors, and the Wolf himself, that nobody says anything, at least for the first few hours. Sylvie knows that'll change. For all the money she's thrown at the scheme, the lie at the center of it is rotten; it's decaying fast, and the longer she waits to use it, the more it's going to smell. But she guesses that for the next two days, they'll all feel like they're in incredible danger, and the truth is that almost all of them are. About the only person who's safe is Mercedes, which means he almost pissed his pants in the seat of a barbershop for nothing. He's safe because Sylvie doesn't want to assassinate a public official, and because she's a good enough judge of character to understand that without the organization around him, he'll be harmless. It's the Wolf who isn't; getting him will be the most important of all, if she wants her and her family to be free. She's counting on creating enough chaos to get him, for once, to lose his cool. To forget one of the protocols that keep him out of harm's way. To make himself vulnerable. It's the one part of her plan that requires her to be, above all, lucky.

But for now, a lot still has to happen. Which is why, as soon as she's talked to Feodor and they've agreed on their plan, Sylvie calls Agent Easton and Agent Guarino again.

“What's the FBI's relationship with police in Moldova right now?”

“It depends,” Agent Easton says. “On the city, on the province, on specific police chiefs. There's a lot of red tape and bureaucracy to deal with over there.”

“What if I could hand you an entire organization?”

“That would be incredible.”

“When could you start to act on the information?”

“As in, a raid of some kind? Not soon. But beginning to investigate? Sure. Why do you ask?”

“Because if the investigation were to start, say, tomorrow, I would need protection very soon after that.”

“You got it.”

She hands over the information. Names. Addresses. Phone numbers. Everything she has. The information moves fast, from the FBI to Interpol, to local police in Moldova. Some of those police officers have been paid off. Some of them just don't have the manpower or the firepower to do anything with what they're given. But some of them can do something. They start spying on the addresses they can reach, and they try to be inconspicuous about it. Agent Easton and Agent Guarino are delighted; for them, it's a huge breakthrough, and they go out for a quick dinner to celebrate before they go home to their families. It also feels like the beginning of a long process for them. There's entering Sylvie in the witness protection program deep. They're thinking somewhere in Nevada or Arizona. And there are the many, many leads to follow, the trips to take, the people to interview.
We're still being used somehow,
Agent Easton says,
and I wish I could see how. Yeah,
Agent Guarino says,
but there's only one real way to play the cards she's given us, right? Besides, isn't it something that we started moving this boulder forward, at last?
He holds up a wineglass. He doesn't know he's using the wrong metaphor: They've started a fire. They just can't see the smoke yet.

Livingstone, Zambia. Rufus is living in a low-slung house in town, behind a tall cinderblock wall that was painted white and yellow maybe ten years ago and has been chipped away at ever since, by the rain, the rocks that passing trucks kick up, the cars themselves. Three years ago, a drunk taxi driver backed right into the place, messed up his bumper and a piece of the wall, but got away without anyone seeing him; he hasn't been back down that street since. The house is a pretty simple affair: tile floors, white walls. Some square wooden furniture Rufus bought in town. A few carved hippos on the coffee table that he bought in the central square—he traded them for two American dollars and an empty plastic water bottle—just to give the place a little touch of home. He's almost the only white guy in town. There are the owners of the two backpackers' hostels and the couple of backpackers who were just passing through but got roped into working for them. There are the owners of a couple of the businesses on the main drag, a restaurant and a souvenir shop. There are also what Rufus thinks of as the exploitation scouts: All along the long, straight road from Livingstone to the Zimbabwean border, which passes right over the canyon the Zambezi tumbles into to make Victoria Falls, some white people with money have plans to build a series of very exclusive hotels. Rufus pretty much hates this idea, it and the giant land-clearing construction equipment it brought along with it. He doesn't know where these white people are from. Maybe they're Europeans, or South Africans, or both. But they stand out more than he does, and Rufus feels like he's a lit candle every time he walks down the street. The Livingstonians know he doesn't work for one of the businesses they can see. Not for the fancy hotel at the end of the main drag, where the traffic doesn't obey all the laws and has to dodge baboons besides. Not for any of the other small businesses, most of which are run by Indians. They get the impression that he's either a criminal or just sitting on a big pile of money, and they lean toward the pile because of the way he dresses, as ever, in linen clothes, and because of his ridiculous salt-and-pepper mustache. He's earned a nickname, Yankee Doodle Dandy, which is a term of endearment. Rufus has stuck around longer than any of the other Americans the people in town can remember, and he's done his best to ingratiate himself. He's not like some of the white people around Livingstone, who almost act as if they're under siege, driving from place to place in an air-conditioned truck with tinted windows, spending as little time as possible outside. Rufus is out during the day, walking around, buying overripe fruit and cassava, shooting the breeze with the friends he's made when he meets them in the shadow of the broken-down colonnade that the British built and nobody has the money to keep up. He's out at night in the club that pumps out highlife music on the stereo as loud as it can, playing cards over coldish bottles of
Mosi, winning and losing money fair and square. Not long after moving to Livingstone, he's broken into and held at gunpoint while the home invaders liberate him from his cash. The people in Livingstone expect him to leave after that. Instead, he shows up at the club the next day, has a talk with the right people, gets himself the right talisman for his door. He's never broken into again. The people in town nod when they talk about it.
Yankee Doodle Dandy knows how to live here,
one of them says.
Mmm,
says another.
But why do you think he's here at all?

When Rufus hears Peter's voice on the other side of the metal gate to the house, his heart fills, almost cracks under the pressure. He rushes to the gate and opens it, expecting that it won't be his boy, because he can't get his hopes up too much. But it's him, it's his son. He's covered in a thin layer of light dust, on his skin, in his hair, and he's been wearing the same clothes for two days. He looks so good. The father can still see the kid he knew in him, and he's so proud of the parts of him that he doesn't recognize at first, the man that Peter's becoming. Rufus can't even speak; he just opens his arms.

“I've been here for hours, looking for you,” Peter says.

“Come in, come in,” Rufus says. He wants to hug his son so much, but doesn't know how. “Are you hungry?” he says.

“No, I just ate.”

“Why did you do that? You know I always have food.”

That's not true,
Peter wants to say, but decides it's a little hurtful, and keeps it to himself.

“Bad timing, I guess,” Peter says.

They come into the house. Peter throws his backpack down.

“Sit down, sit down,” Rufus says. “It's so good to see you. Tell me how you are. How long are you staying for?”

“Dad, we need to talk.”

“Do you need work? It's fine if you do, I know a reporter in town if you still want to do that. Maybe he can throw some work your way. If not, I also know—”

“Dad. Dad. We need to talk about your family.”

Now it's Rufus who sits down.

“Oh,” he says. He runs his fingers through his hair and closes his eyes. When he opens them again, his face looks like he hasn't slept for a week. Then, in a tone of voice Peter's never heard in him: “What's happened now?”

And Peter begins to talk, telling his own story. For the first time in his life.

 

 

Chapter 18

Sylvie's
on the steps of the house, looking into the garden. Two suitcases are next to her, a floral pattern on them that went out of style decades ago; they belonged to her mother. Behind her, in the threshold to the house, there's a man on his knees, attaching wires to the lock.

“Almost done here,” he says. “Are you sure this is a good idea?”

“Yes, I'm sure,” she says. She doesn't bother turning around to say it.

“What if your sister comes by?”

“She doesn't have a key,” Sylvie says, “and besides, that door hasn't been locked in thirty years.”

“What if someone else comes by?”

“Nobody comes by,” she says.

The man looks at her and shakes his head. “All right,” he says, “all right. This is the last one.” There are wires all over the first floor of the house now. “I'm going to close this up. You have everything you need?”

Mmm hmm,
he thinks he hears her say. She's just looking into the garden, going back through the years. There's the memory of Joe Rizzi standing there with his hand on Muriel's throat. But so many more better memories. Her wedding on the back lawn, the lights down to the water. Her whole family together, all of them who were alive. It was the last time that happened, though none of them knew it then. Her years of marriage, quiet, peaceful, to a good man. Then years of her own quiet contentment, pushing her fingers into the soil, planting flowers. And further back into her childhood, of she and Rufus, far enough away from the house that they thought no one could see them, telling each other secrets. She understands why Rufus took off, understands even more why he never came back. There's never been anything for him here, nothing he wants. But she's missed him every day since he left. It still surprises her that the feeling is so strong, after all that she's become since they saw each other.

The man finishes his work, puts his tools away. Gets up. Checks three times that he has everything he came with, his tools, his wallet, his car keys.

“You sure you have everything?” he says.

“Yes,” Sylvie says.

“Want to take a look around?”

“I already did.”

Amazing,
he thinks. “All right,” he says, though he doesn't sound convinced. He's careful closing the door, gives the lock time to settle into position.

“Ready?” he says.

Sylvie turns her head to look at him. Picks up a suitcase in each hand.

“Let's go,” she says.

New Canaan, Connecticut. Henry's phone rings at two-thirty in the morning. The phone's on his nightstand, and he picks it up halfway through the first ring. He turns to look at Holly, again, to make sure she's still asleep. Then cups his hand over the receiver and whispers into it.

“Hello?”

“Henry, it's Muriel.”

“Just a minute, okay?”

He gets out of bed, goes to his office, picks up the phone, and leaves it on his desk. Goes back to his bedroom and hangs up the phone in there. Walks back to his office. His phones are old, even for
1995
; they still have cords on them, and he's willing to fight about it with anyone who decides to bring it up.
Aren't you tired of just standing in the kitchen to talk on the phone?
an acquaintance in New Canaan says.
On a cordless phone, you can talk anywhere in the house. No you can't,
Henry says. The unpredictable static on cordless phones irritates him, even as the businessman in him admires the cordless phone companies for convincing people to pay more for technology that doesn't work as well as what they already had. He's heard that cell phones are even worse—you can't hear on the phones very well, the person you're calling can't hear you very well either, and the phones drop calls without warning—but he knows they'll take off in just a couple years, whether they iron out the kinks or not.

“Muriel, it's late,” Henry says. It's awkward. He hasn't known how to talk to her for years, and he wishes he did.

She does too. “I'm sorry to be calling you. I'm so sorry. But I can't sleep, Henry. I can't get Sylvie on the phone. It's been a couple days. First Petey and now Sylvie. Henry, what's going on?”

Henry forces himself to wake up, because he needs to make sure he doesn't misstep. “I don't know,” he says. “But I'm sure they'll both turn up somewhere.”

There's a long pause on the other end of the line. He can hear how his sister's breathing; she's nervous, excited, angry. Something.
I wasn't convincing enough,
he thinks.

“Is that all you have to say?” she says.

“What else can I say? I don't know any more than you do.”

“Is that true, Henry? Is that really true?”

See, he and Sylvie have been lying to Muriel for years. She doesn't know that Sylvie's still involved, the way their father was involved; in
1985
, when Muriel asks Henry how it is that Sylvie can still maintain the house, and Henry can't dodge the question anymore, he gives Muriel the answer he and Sylvie cooked up years before: Sylvie gave Henry the money left over from Rufus's share—after the house was covered—and asked him to be very aggressive in investing it, to try to make some big money.
So I did,
Henry tells Sylvie then,
and we had some excellent years. Sure, the late seventies were a little touch and go. But the past few years have been exceptional, very good years for Sylvie.
Then Henry says what he's almost sure will end the conversation.
You know, you could get in on it, too, if you wanted.
It appeals to the hippie left over in Muriel, the one who gave birth to Petey on the bus outside of the hospital, who still holds a profitable activity at arm's length like it's a piece of rotten chicken, because she can't get her mind off wondering who's getting exploited to give her what she has. And it works.
Oh, no,
Muriel says.
You know I'm not interested in that kind of thing.
She never asks again, and Sylvie and Henry never tell her anything. Every couple years they've talked about it, and while they can't deny that they enjoy keeping a secret from their sister a little bit, they've also agreed that it's for her protection.
Muriel's got too big a mouth to know what's going on,
they say.
Like mother, like son.

But now, maybe because they're nearing the end, the end of the game, it looks to Henry like the whole thing's been flipped on its head. That the longer Muriel's in the dark, the more in danger she is, because the fire that Sylvie's starting is going to spread everywhere, and Muriel needs to know it's coming. If he keeps the lies going, he'll read about Muriel next in the
Cleveland Plain Dealer,
an awful, inexplicable murder. Maybe of the rest of her family, too, and whoever else happens to be around. He wishes he could talk to Sylvie right now, to get her agreement on what he's about to do, but he knows she's made herself unreachable.
Here's hoping I don't fuck up everything, Sylvie,
he thinks.

“Is it really true?” Muriel says again. He hasn't answered her yet.

“All right, Muriel,” Henry says. “No. No, it's not true.”

He can tell she's surprised before she starts talking.

“What do you mean?”

“Well,” Henry says; and then he tells her everything, pretty much from the beginning. It takes about an hour and a half. Muriel says
oh my God
a lot, and
I don't believe you,
and
how could you have kept all this from me,
and, at first,
wait until I tell my husband,
until Henry says he'll stop talking right now if she breathes a word of it to anyone. There's some crying. But by the end she knows just what kind of trouble her son is in, what kind of person Henry and Rufus and Sylvie have always been. How much she and her family are in danger.

“What do you expect me to do with all this?” she says. She sounds almost like a teenager again, Henry thinks. Just before the boyfriend and the bus.

“I don't know, Muriel,” Henry says. “Just be careful.”

“How do I know when I'm safe?”

Her voice is so small that Henry spares her his real answer:
The truth is that you've never been safe.
He thinks about it a second longer.

“I'll call you when everything's okay. Okay?”

“Okay.”

“Okay?”

“Yes.”

“Good. And Muriel? I'm sorry we kept all this from you.”

“I know you are,” she says.

“Look, don't act hurt. We've always just been trying to protect you.”

“I know you have.”

She's too angry for Henry to get anywhere right now, and he knows that what he's saying sounds too much like self-justification to work anyway.

“All right,” Henry says. “Take care of yourself, all right?”

“All right.”

“And I really will call you, okay?”

“Okay.”

“Good night.”

“Good night.”

He sleeps for another two hours. Holly gets up and can tell it's been a rough night for him. Makes him a cup of coffee. He sits for a while at the window in his kitchen, scanning the woods, the driveway, the road. The cars passing by. He's waiting for one of them to stop, and for three men to get out who aren't going to be scared off by anything. Who aren't going to leave until what they've been paid to do is done.

“Holly?” he says. “How do you feel about going into the city for a little bit? Like five nights or so?”

“That's a great idea,” Holly says. “We haven't done that in so long. When should we do it?”

“Today,” Henry says.

“What?”

“Why not?” he says. “Who's going to stop us?”

She smiles, walks over behind him, and puts her arms around him. Kisses the top of his head.
Sounds like fun,
she says.
A lot of fun.
He smiles back. Wonders when he'll have to tell her everything, too, and whether she'll still be around when he's done.