The Russian Cage Page 6

  Felix had had enough. I opened my mouth to ask one more question, but he shook his head.

  “You’ve learned enough about me and the Savarovs,” he said, finishing his food to point out that his mouth was busy doing something else.

  “Where’s your carpet sweeper?”

  Felix pointed to a closet. I got his carpet sweeper out and ran it over the rug and the wooden floors. It looked better by the time I was ready to put the sweeper away.

  Felix had been right when he told me I needed to eat. I washed the dishes to show I was grateful.

  He didn’t protest.

  “So, what’s your plan?” I asked, sitting down opposite him.

  “I must explain a few things,” Felix said. “First off, the tsar has secret police, the same way his father did in Russia. Their job is to look for plots. Anything that goes against the government is an affront to the tsar. It’s not as dreadful as it was in Russia, but there are penalties.”

  I nodded.

  “Alexei may very well be ignorant of the fact that Eli is in jail. But if we break Eli out of his cell, we’ll be disrupting the law, and we may face very unpleasant consequences.”

  “Even though Alexei has every reason to like Eli and trust him.”

  “Alexei does like Eli. He’s used to Eli sitting by him when he’s sick, Eli arranging for the transfusion. And the blood comes from donors Eli tracked down.”

  “So why hasn’t the tsar asked where Eli is?”

  “Eli’s father was a traitor. Even though Prince Savarov’s plot was foiled, even though his older sons made amends and vows and gave gifts, even though Prince Savarov died mysteriously far from home…” Felix arched an eyebrow at me.

  I looked out the window.

  “Alexei’s favorite minister urged Alexei to remove Eli at least temporarily, to show he wasn’t soft. That even favorites would be punished if they were connected to treason. Bogdan and Dagmar were likewise banished from court for a time, even for all their gestures of atonement and protestations that they were not involved in their father’s plot.”

  “I bet that’s a lie.”

  “I know it is. Bogdan and Dagmar are much more like their father than his second family. Veronika is a better woman than the prince’s first wife, though she isn’t of as high a birth. Vladimir’s first wife, Evdokia, was a real Lady Macbeth, for sure. More to the point, Evdokia was the niece of Grand Duke Alexander’s second wife.”

  I didn’t know who Lady Macbeth was, but I could figure she’d been a bad woman in some book. Seemed like she was from Shakespeare. Mother had made us read Romeo and Juliet in school, and I think one other one.

  “Evdokia was too mean to live, I have been told. But she died a natural death, in childbirth, with a baby who also died,” Felix said.

  Eli’s family history made my own seem simple. “It still doesn’t make sense, if the tsar likes Eli, and the tsar believes Eli didn’t have anything to do with the plot, and Eli helps to keep Alexei alive, that the tsar doesn’t know where Eli is. Is he even looking for him?”

  “No, it doesn’t make sense.” Felix sat back, his small bony hands clasped behind his head. “Sometimes I think that the backers of the grand duke have a point. Alexander would never be ignorant of one of his followers being jailed.” He was looking up at the ceiling. I followed his gaze. He needed to get him a broom and go after those cobwebs.

  “But Alexei is the rightful tsar,” I said, testing the waters. I didn’t care who was tsar. I cared about Eli’s safety and freedom. Under Grand Duke Alexander, Eli would be doomed.

  “If only Alexei were more forceful and his wife more popular,” Felix muttered.

  “What’s wrong with his wife?” I’d been told this before, that she wasn’t a hit here in America. She was a far cry from his first wife, a very wealthy girl from Dixie who had died without giving him a child. Caroline was royalty (one of the Scandinavian countries), and she’d had a son by Alexei. Her position should be solid.

  “Caroline.” Felix kept his head tilted back, but his eyes were on me. “She’s not a bad sort, and if she was in Russia, back when things were the way they were, she’d be fine. But Caroline has no clue that she actually needs to be popular. I also know that she thinks her family sold her off to get rid of her since she was soiled goods. But rather than being grateful that she’s managed a good marriage to an emperor from a pure line, Caroline apparently feels she deserves a better country than the Holy Russian Empire.”

  Sounded like Caroline deserved a swift kick in the pants.

  “In fact,” Felix said, and he straightened and focused to make sure I was listening. “In fact, Caroline is taking a walk tomorrow in the botanical gardens, her grigori guard tells me. And you should, too.”

  I must have looked blank.

  “Just go,” Felix said, clearly irritated with my stupidity. “You’ll know what to do when you see it happen.”

  “And that’s your plan? I show up in the gardens and wait to see what happens?”

  He nodded, looking smug.

  “I have a plan a lot better than that.” I was really disappointed. “I thought you would be telling me some wonderful plot. Instead… walking in the gardens.”

  “Oh? Please do tell me this wonderful idea.”

  When Felix sounded this sarcastic, I wanted to never speak to him again. He made me feel stupid and obvious. “Felix, I don’t understand you. You say you want to get Eli out, and he’s your future brother-in-law. But you don’t want to go directly into a plan to get him out. Instead, you want me to approach something I can’t predict, from the side, not even head-on. Why can’t you just explain things as we go along?”

  “You’ve probably been direct all your life,” Felix said, after a moment of silence. He didn’t sound like that was a good thing.

  “Yes, and why not?”

  “But I notice you have secrets you don’t talk about.”

  “Because they’re none of your damn business.”

  “Well…” Felix looked frustrated for a moment. “This is your damn business, but there are things I can’t tell you about. I just ask that you go armed when you go to the gardens. You always are, so I wasn’t going to bring that up. And understand that something may go wrong, and nothing may happen at all. Or you may be hurt.”

  “Oh, Felix. What else is new?”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  If Felix was expecting Peter to show up for our little consultation—I’d assumed Peter was coming, myself—he was disappointed.

  Instead, I got Felix’s broom and got the cobwebs down because they irritated me, and after that, Felix gave me a ride back to my hotel, taking a detour through the gardens so that I could see the route the empress’s party would be likely to choose for their outing. Felix said Caroline often took her walk between eleven and twelve o’clock but stayed on the palace grounds. Tomorrow she was going to venture out where the public could see her so they would be charmed. (In theory.) When we got close to the hotel, Felix glanced at the sidewalk, started, and drove right past the door.

  “What?” I hated not having my guns.

  “I saw a couple of people I know. They may be here by coincidence. But maybe they know exactly who you are, and your connection with Eli, and they want to kill you.”

  “Which people were they?”

  “The short woman with brown hair and big hips and the stout man with the homburg. He was wearing a red vest.”

  I had them in my mind now. I wouldn’t forget. “Names?”

  “Katharine Demisova and Derek Smythe.”

  “How come you don’t know which side they’re on?”

  “How do you define the sides?” Felix said. Smiling. Again.

  “Anyone not for Eli is on one side. Anyone for Eli is on the other.” Simple.

  “I’d have to say they are in the middle. I don’t think they care about Eli one way or another. I don’t think they know him particularly well. They’re in the Water Guild, they’re older than Eli, and they’ll
do whatever they’re told.”

  “Told by who?”

  “By their guild superior.”

  “Who is?”

  “Ivan Godunov. Calls himself Ike Goodyear now.”

  “Should I kill him?” I really needed something to do.

  “I can’t see the point of that,” Felix said, but only after he’d considered it. “Eli is air, you know. I am, too. Though I have some rare talents for an air.”

  I tried not to shiver. Felix was a reanimator. He could make the dead move and speak. It was a terrible drain on his life force, but he had made some bones into a real man and then turned it into a statue. (For all I knew, the statue was still standing in a small town in Dixie.) How that tied into air, I wasn’t sure. I also figured that Felix didn’t have a lot of friends because this “rare talent” was seriously frightening. Not that all wizards couldn’t do frightening things.

  “Felix,” I said, and then stopped. I had an idea that what I was about to propose wasn’t going to go over well.

  “Yes?” He turned his dark eyes on me, mockingly.

  “I want to see Eli. Is there any reason I can’t go to the jail and ask to visit him?”

  Felix gave me a long, long look. Finally, he said, “Lizbeth, you’re my secret weapon. It wouldn’t be wise to draw you to their attention, and you would surely do that by showing up at the jail and asking to see Eli.”

  It was like my soul was itching inside me, and the only way I could scratch it was by seeing Eli.

  Felix was still looking at me, but he wasn’t seeing me. He was thinking. He said, “I can’t stop you if you decide you are going to see him, no matter what. But I advise against it right now.”

  I nodded, trying to contain my disappointment.

  Well… it was more like misery.

  CHAPTER NINE

  I had to sneak into my hotel by the back door to dodge Demisova and Smythe. I have no notion why they didn’t separate so they’d be covering both doors. Maybe they figured I wouldn’t recognize them, not counting on Felix’s being with me. I sped up the stairs and spent a while taking a bath and trying to decide if Felix intended me to get my guns out of the safe for tomorrow.

  After I decided I’d carry my knives, because as far as I knew, there wasn’t any prohibition on that, I fell asleep. I dreamed about cobwebs.

  The next morning, I had knives up my sleeves and in my boots as I got to the botanical gardens. I was simmering. What was I doing here? Why did I give a damn about the tsarina and her stroll through the garden? Felix hadn’t given me any more direction than to tell me to be sure to be there.

  Before I’d met Felix, I’d thought Eli’s partner Paulina was the most irritating person I’d ever met. But I knew better now. Since Paulina was dead (at least, she’d been that way the last time I’d seen her), Felix was top of the list.

  At least the Japanese Friendship Garden was a pretty place to be bored. I hadn’t seen that area before, and I liked it a lot. Everything was planted and tended and green, trimmed, and neat. Maybe it really did look like Japan. There weren’t too many people in the area, so it was peaceful. I can always use a little peace.

  There was a restaurant, but I didn’t enter. Didn’t know what Japanese people ate for breakfast.

  I found a bench I could sit on to look into the pond close to the restaurant. It was full of big fish, really big fish. Probably not to eat, just to look at—and probably guarded somehow or other. Otherwise, people would have tried to poach them out of sheer desperation.

  I got less jangled every minute I watched them gliding through the clear water. Nice. I pulled my old jacket closer around me. It was a cool morning.

  After an hour, I saw a flutter of activity over by the road. At last, something was happening. Sure enough, the tsarina had arrived. Four cars parked on the margin of the road. A group of colorful people emerged. It was easy to make out which one was the tsarina. She was in the center.

  A flock of ladies surrounded Caroline. Six men, bodyguards of one sort or another, were in a loose circle around the women.

  All the women were wearing slim-fitting dresses with sweaters or light coats. Though all the men wore suits, the two groups didn’t match. The men were hired help: two vested grigoris, four gunmen carrying sidearms.

  I was envious of the gunmen.

  Like everyone else within eyeshot (a scattering of men and a woman pushing a baby carriage), I watched the royal party. The park was not busy—weekday, working hours. Most of the men in sight were gardeners, in fact.

  The group formed up and began to stroll. The men looked outward, as they ought. The women were looking at the pretty bushes and flowers, exchanging comments, pointing.

  Caroline was wearing a green suit with black trim, a black hat, and black leather shoes—heeled but not too high, right for walking in a park. She wore a very lightweight black coat. No purse. A tsarina wouldn’t need an identification card or cash. As you would expect of a princess, she was tall and blond and blue-eyed. Almost pretty. Her jaw was a bit too pointed, and her eyes were too close together. I figured you could overlook little things like that in a real princess.

  One of the women stood out because she was old. She walked well, though she carried a cane. Her pure white hair was put up in an elaborate circlet of braids, and she was hatless. Though I was sure she wouldn’t appreciate the comparison, she reminded me of my grandmother. If you looked up “dignity” in the dictionary, this lady’s picture would be right beside it. And she was vigilant.

  A gust of laughter came from the group. It was like hearing a flock of doves coo all at the same time. The tsarina must have said something real funny. Even the guards were laughing. But not the white-haired woman. Her smile was faint and remote.

  I guessed this public stroll was an attempt to make Caroline more popular. Here she was, the tsarina! Walking and talking like a common person! (If a common person could afford those clothes, good food every day, and regular baths.)

  All of a sudden, my arm hairs stood up. Something was about to happen. I scanned the vicinity for something amiss. I was closer to the pond than anyone else. There were a few random people scattered in the garden, some between the tsarina’s party and me.

  Mom and baby in stroller. Two men in suits talking about something serious. A few unemployed men who’d been sleeping rough. A Japanese man, concentrating on weeding a flower bed.

  And the wrong one, the pale, jerky man in a filthy corduroy jacket. Messy brown hair, stubbled face. He was between me and the tsarina’s party.

  He was the one.

  He reached inside his jacket. I began to run, ignoring the exclamations of alarm and surprise from the other people in the park. I saw the bodyguards had not yet drawn, could not understand how they could be so slow. Corduroy was pulling out his gun. His eyes were fixed on the tsarina. He never saw me coming.

  I leaped the last few feet to land on his back. I bore him to the ground. He grunted as the air was knocked out of him. The smell was foul. I grabbed his gun hand and beat it against the gravel of the path, over and over. With both hands busy, I couldn’t get my knife.

  Corduroy wouldn’t let loose.

  He fought like a madman. I couldn’t manage to knock the gun from his hand. It was a struggle to keep his arm pinned. If he shot me from this close, I would not live. If he shot the tsarina, I would have wasted all this effort.

  There wasn’t enough of me to hold the man down. He heaved me off of him and onto my back. As if I was out of the picture, Corduroy pushed himself to his feet with one hand, and the gun was going up in his other when a bullet went through his head.

  Well, about damn time.

  Like that, it was over. Corduroy collapsed in a bloody heap, one arm flung over me. I shoved him away, rolled, and stood, ready, knife in hand. There might be another attacker.

  No one else seemed to be offering to kill the tsarina. Everyone in sight was shrieking or milling around like chickens with their heads cut off or gaping at me. (That w
as what Tsarina Caroline was doing.)

  Even the bodyguard who’d actually shot Corduroy was looking at me as if I’d done it.

  My face was wet. I’d gotten his blood spattered on my cheeks and chest. At least I had avoided the stuff blown out the back of Corduroy’s head. That’s hard to get off clothes… and out of hair.

  Before I could say “Jack Robinson,” two bodyguards pounced on me. Now they were going to try to look efficient. They were trying to throw me to the ground again, when a voice full of command said, “Leave that woman alone.” Such was the force of the white-haired lady that the men instantly let go of my arms and jumped back. I nodded at her with some respect.

  “Caroline,” the woman said, very quietly.

  The tsarina came over to me. When she got close, I could tell she was shaking. I was, too, just a bit, and I’m used to action.

  “May I know who I’m thanking?” the empress of the Holy Russian Empire asked me.

  “Yes, ma’am,” I said haltingly, not sure how to address her. “I’m Lizbeth Rose, from Texoma. I’m glad I was able to help you.”

  “How did you come to be here today?”

  “I’m visiting San Diego because…” I stopped, because this was a moment to tell the truth—or not.

  Caroline raised her neat eyebrows.

  “Because my friend, Prince Eli Savarov, is in jail here.”