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He opened another drawer, pulled out an old book, and leafed through it, revealing page after page of drawings, in his own hand. He had always been a good sketch artist, having learned the skill from his mother, who had earned her living as a street artist first in France and then in Kiev before ending up in a fishing village that was icebound five months of the year, married to a man who did not love her. Even now Waller did not know the full history of the pair and what had drawn them together. Reproduced in this book were many of the people he’d killed, their dead or dying faces done in charcoal, black ink, or pencil only. There was no color in this book. The dead did not require it.
The next book he slid out of his desk might have surprised some people who had known the old Fedir Kuchin. He hefted the Bible in his hand. The Soviet Union of course had been vehemently opposed to organized religion of any kind. “The opium of the masses,” as Marx had pointed out. Yet Waller’s mother had been French and a devout Catholic. And she had raised her son in her religious beliefs even though it was a very dangerous thing to do. She read the Bible to him every night while his usually drunk father slept.
What had first appealed to Waller about the readings was how much violence was contained in a book purportedly espousing peace and love. Many people were slaughtered in ways even the grown Fedir Kuchin would not have employed. Reciting the Lord’s Prayer with his mother each night, she had always emphasized one phrase above all others, lingering over it as though giving it its due.
“And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.”
Waller well knew the evil she was referring to: her husband.
His poor mother, good to the last. Yet what she didn’t understand about evil, her son clearly did. Given the proper motivation anyone was capable of terrible cruelty, baseless savagery, horrific violence. A mother would kill to protect her child or a child his mother. A soldier kills to protect his country. Waller had killed to protect both his mother and his country. He was good at it, understood quite clearly the mind-set required. He was not desensitized to violence; he respected it. He did not use it cavalierly. Yet when he did employ it, he couldn’t say that he didn’t enjoy the process, because he did. Did that make him evil? Perhaps. Would his mother have considered him evil? Clearly not. He killed for his country, his mother, and his own survival. When people struck him he struck back. There could be no fairer set of rules ever conceived. He was who he was. He was true to himself, while most people lived their lives as a façade only, their real selves buried under a platform of lies. They would smile at their friend before thrusting the knife into his back. Under those parameters who was truly the evil one?
The lion roared before it attacked, while the snake slithered in silence before sinking its fangs into unsuspecting flesh.
I am a lion. Or at least I used to be.
From a storage locker he pulled an old projection camera, set it on his desk, and plugged the power cord into an outlet. He opened his desk drawer and took out a projection reel with film wrapped around it. He snapped it into place on the camera, fed the film through the machine, pointed the camera at a blank concrete wall, turned down the lights, and flicked on the projector switch. On the wall appeared black-and-white images from over thirty years ago. Striding into view was a young Fedir Kuchin in full uniform. The present-day Kuchin smiled proudly when he saw his younger self.
On the wall the young Kuchin marched to the center of a compound with high fences of concertina wire and guard towers visible all around. He said something and armed men drove a dozen people forward into view, forcing them to kneel in front of Kuchin with thrusts from their gun barrels. There were four men, three women, and the rest children. Kuchin bent down and said something to each of them. Sitting in his desk chair, Waller mouthed these same words. This was one of his favorite memories. On the wall the black-and-white Kuchin led the children off to the side, away from the adults. From his pocket he took out candy and gave it to the frightened kids with rags for clothes, even patting one little girl on the head. From the pocket of his uniform the present-day Waller withdrew a decades-old disc of stale chocolate from that very occasion.
As the starving kids hungrily ate their treats, Kuchin walked back over to the adults, pulled his pistol, and executed each one of them with a bullet to the back of the head. When the screaming children rushed forward to hold their dead parents, Kuchin shot them too, sending his last bullet into the spine of a little girl who was cradling her dead mother’s head. The final image was Kuchin taking a half-eaten piece of candy from the dead fingers of a boy lying sprawled in the mud an
d devouring it himself. When the film reel finished playing and the wall became light again, Waller sat back with a level of pride and satisfaction that had once been his on a daily basis. That had been his job, and he had done it so well. No one in Ukraine had done it better.
He took off his uniform and hung it carefully back in his locker, smoothing out a few wrinkles in the fabric. Before turning out the lights and exiting, he glanced back at the flag and the photo of his mentor.
I just want something worthy of me again. Something that really matters.
He turned out the light, secured the door, and returned to the only life he had left. He was leaving for France shortly. Maybe he would find something there to make him care again.
CHAPTER
29
REGGIE HEARD the horn toot from outside. She checked her watch. She was running late. She peered out her window and looked down on the street below. Shaw was sitting on his Vespa near her front door. He was dressed in khaki pants and a white cotton shirt he wore untucked. Loafers minus socks were on his feet. She tapped on the window, got his attention, and held up two fingers.
She hurriedly finished dressing and clipped on her earrings. Next she tidied her hair in the mirror, though it wouldn’t make much difference after the ride on the scooter. She smoothed down the front of her dress. She’d chosen a formfitting one because of their mode of transportation. She didn’t need a skirt billowing over her head as they raced along the rural roads of southern France.
Finishing with her lipstick, she hurried down the stairs. She locked the front door and waved to Shaw.
“You look terrific,” he said.
“That was the goal,” she shot back. “You look very handsome in a carefree sort of way. So unlike a lobbyist. I’m duly impressed.”
“Good, because that was my goal.”
She climbed on the back and took the helmet he handed her, strapping it on.
“Pretty scooter,” she said, stroking the pale blue metal.
“Best way to get around here. Hold on.”
She gripped him around the waist and leaned into his back. With her hands around his middle Shaw felt a burst of electricity rush down his spine. He even jerked a bit, it was so visceral.
“You okay?” she said.
“Fine. Just sore from all that rowing.” He hit the throttle and they sped off going about twenty kilometers an hour. When they reached the main road he accelerated to double that.
“Okay, where to?” he called over his shoulder.
