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“I’m good. Let me think about this, all right?”
“Don’t think too long or someone else will snatch it up. The Russians are looking at it even as we speak. Hey honey!” he yelled at the waitress and lifted his cup in the air. “Let’s have another round here.”
No, Simon would never have invited Kosta onto the Kallisto, no matter how well he dressed.
They drank a bit more coffee, Kosta asked the waitress if she had any galaktoboureko. “It’s this damn sweet tooth of mine,” he told her. “I guess that’s why you look so good to me.”
“Kosta!”
“What? I’m just complimenting a beautiful woman. You get that, don’t you honey?”
“We don’t carry galaktoboureko,” she said. “Would you like some more loukoumades?” She was clearly not amused by Kosta.
“No that’s all right. But if you wanted to slip me your phone number…”
She turned and walked away, her back rigid.
“I think I’m in there.”
“So there’s nothing really important in the shipment?”
“No, no, it’s all the sort of junk that collectors love, but it has no real historical value. A lot of ninth dynasty stuff. Pottery and a couple of statues.”
Simon wondered if Kosta had any clue what the ninth dynasty was, or if he was just throwing stuff out to try to muddy the waters a bit.
“Yeah, all right,” Simon told him. “Go on ahead. But let’s not make this a regular thing, all right?”
“If you don’t play, you can’t win, man,” Kosta told him.
He supposed that was true, but the idea made him uneasy. Much of what Kosta moved was simple contraband. There was a market for these things, and government interference kept people from having what they wanted. It was like bringing Cuban cigars into the United States had been, harmless, really, and giving people what they wanted.
“I saw the Kallisto in the harbor,” Kosta observed. “You sail all the way from Halithos?”
“I was entertaining a few friends.” He didn’t feel like saying too much.
“You ever going to invite me onto your boat?” Simon sipped his coffee and didn’t answer. It made Kosta laugh. “Yeah, I’m the guy you don’t want you friends or family to know about, aren’t I? The one who knows your secrets.”
“Let’s leave it as business, Kosta. It’s not good to mix the two.”
“If you say so.”
“I’ll transfer the money to you tomorrow. Is that soon enough?”
“Perfect. I’ll be going down there myself to inspect the goods. I hear Egyptian girls are beautiful,” he added with what amounted to a verbal leer that made Simon want to shower. If the “import-export business” he ran wasn’t important to him on a number of levels — it not only brought in extra money, but the fact of it had made his parents proud – he’d have dropped Kosta in a heartbeat. Of course his parents had no idea that he sidelined in contraband; they thought it was on the up-and-up. They’d encouraged him, and now he was in too deep and didn’t know how to get out.
“Let me know when the cargo is sold,” he said. He folded the paper and set it on the table.
“Have a nice trip home,” Kosta said as Simon strode out of the cafe.
Kosta sat for a while, staring out at the crowds traveling up and down the street in front of the cafe. He didn’t have a lot of use for most people. If women were attractive, that was fine, if men did what he needed them to do, that was also fine. He didn’t much like children of any age. He liked animals. His mother had often said how odd it was that Kosta was so horrible to other people but so nice to animals that he wouldn’t even eat meat. He told her that animals were easy, they weren’t complicated and sly the way people were, but she didn’t understand. He supposed that as long as he continued to send money to her she didn’t have to understand.
He liked being around animals, he didn’t have to pretend around them. The cafe cat sensed that and settled itself in the chair Simon had vacated. They regarded each other cautiously, Kosta and the cat, then the cat closed his eyes, and Kosta smiled. A nap would be nice, he decided. Somewhere in the shade.
Simon had already paid the bill, but Kosta wasn’t ready to leave. It wasn’t the waitress, he’d lost interest in her even before Simon left. He liked the smell of the place, the aroma of coffee and under it, spices and honey, and the flowers on the tables. It was a nice cafe. He’d have to come back.
“Can I get you anything else?”
He looked up and smiled at the waitress. “How about a small coffee with honey?”
