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  “On our way to Stavropol. Reassigned from the Eighth Army to the Sixth Division.” Apollo’s face was friendly and bland.

  “Papers,” demanded the officer. At his harsh tone the others interrupted their card game long enough to cast another glance at the trio.

  “Left behind when Mamontov surprised us at Manyich two weeks ago. Attacked us while we slept in the village. We retreated in our underwear that day. Had to scavenge some clothes after that.” Apollo gestured at their burkhas and mountain trousers.

  The officer scrutinized them carefully, and then the one whom Apollo had already measured by eye as the owner of his new uniform snapped, “What did Comrade Lenin say about the right of self-government of the peoples?”

  “Self-government until independence!” Apollo answered earnestly.

  “What does communism lead to, economically speaking?”

  “From the domain of temporary economical anarchy to that of systematic production,” Apollo continued fluently, thanks to the barrage of leaflets the Reds were constantly dropping from their few aircraft. The Bolshevist dogma had been perfect for starting fires.

  Apparently Apollo passed the interrogation, for the officer beamed with satisfaction at his own cleverness and poured him a glass of vodka. “Have a drink, comrade.”

  Apollo took the glass and sat down, motioning for Karaim and Sahin to do the same.

  “Do they have papers?” the Red officer inquired, nodding toward the mountain men.

  “No, theirs are gone, too. We’ll get new ones in Stavropol.”

  “Are they Bolsheviks like you, comrade?” The officer knew the Caucasians were irregulars for both armies, fighting generally not for political principles but for plunder.

  “They barely speak Russian, comrade,” Apollo replied. “Lenin’s ideology, even if they could understand it, would concern them little.” He smiled faintly. “They kill for the joy of killing; their allegiances are purely personal.”11

  The Red officer was an ex-peasant from the Don region, one of the inogorodnie12 who had lived under Cossack rule all of his life. He was familiar with blood-thirsty warriors and had a healthy respect for them. Leaning over, he whispered out of the corner of his mouth, “Will they obey you?”

  “Absolutely.” Apollo nodded solemnly. “We’re blood brothers.”

  The Red officer’s eyes widened in alarm. He had heard of the ceremony in which warriors cut deeply into their forearms and then mingled their blood. For a simple peasant from the Don, such exotic barbarism was threatening. It wasn’t that he, as a peasant, was particularly benign, but he preferred beating someone to death or shooting them. The various forms of torture practiced by the mountain tribes had been conveyed in terrified whispers by the peasants of his region. With another apprehensive glance at the two hawk-visaged, dark-skinned warriors in black, their arsenals on their persons, he hastily decided it was time to leave.

  “Going so soon?” Apollo affably inquired when the officer rose.

  “We’re on our way to Stavropol, too—and behind schedule.” His eyes flicked nervously.

  “Let me buy you a drink. Surely you can stay a bit longer?” Apollo pushed the vodka bottle toward him.

  “No, no, we must be on our way.” The officer was moving away from the table. Two of his men came to their feet as well, but the other three eyed the vodka bottle longingly. Apollo refilled their glasses.

  “One quick swallow, comrades.” He winked, his manner sympathetically friendly. The three men tossed the liquor down as the officer and two soldiers were leaving. “One for the road,” Apollo said, shoving the bottle toward them. He gave one swift glance to the door. The officer and soldiers had reached the outside. Looking at Karaim and Sahin, Apollo nodded once. Before the three Red soldiers could react, Apollo, Karaim, and Sahin were on their feet, kinjals slashing. The drunken soldiers died in their chairs.

  “The others will be back in a second,” Apollo tersely said. “The door.”

  Karaim had no more than run to the door and flattened himself beside it when one soldier reappeared. He walked one pace into the room, his eyes sweeping the interior. Recognition dawned. He opened his mouth to scream but the sound never came. Dark hands moved with flashing speed and the soldier’s head jerked before he slid to the floor. Four down, two to go. Apollo smiled grimly. Karaim flexed his long fingers.

  By this time the two remaining outside had decided all was not right. The sound of horses galloping away indicated their flight.

  “Damn,” Apollo swore. “Strip two of these for yourself. I want the officer.” While Karaim and Sahin turned to their task, Apollo strode toward the door. “Catch up with me,” he tossed over his shoulder. Passing the bar, he laid three gold roubles on the countertop. The proprietor and local customers had silently disappeared at the first sign of violence, but Apollo knew they’d be back soon to strip the remaining corpses.

  Leaping onto Leda, Apollo coaxed her into a racing gallop through the dingy streets of the village. Bending low over her neck, he crooned gentle, cajoling words and Leda responded with more speed. Within a verst he caught a glimpse of his prey; he knew Leda could overtake them. Members of the Red Army were not known for their equestrian prowess.

  The officer was slightly in the lead of the twosome, which suited Apollo perfectly. When he was within twenty yards of the soldier in the rear, he drew his kinjal from its sheath at his belt, stood in his stirrups, balanced the knife, judged, and threw. It was a difficult target with both horses going full out. The blade hurtled straight through the air, its Dagestani steel penetrating the back of the fleeing soldier clean on target. The man gave a brief cry and slumped over his horse’s mane. A mountain maxim passed briefly through Apollo’s mind: A rifle may miss, a pistol may jam, but the dagger is always true. His expression altered infinitesimally in agreement.

  Apollo leaned over to retrieve his dagger. The soldier’s body fell to the ground as Apollo galloped after the officer. Casually he wiped the bloody blade on the black sweep of his burkha and sheathed it. No blood on this next one. He wanted the uniform.

  As Leda closed the gap, the officer drew his pistol and fired at Apollo. Not wanting to return the fire, Apollo counted the shots and stayed out of range. A pistol wasn’t accurate unless steadied and fired at fairly close distance. If the Red officer hit him, it would be a miracle.

  When the last chamber was empty, Apollo gave Leda her head and the margin narrowed. Leaning out on one stirrup for the required leverage, Apollo measured the span with one practice arc of his saber, and as the two horses drew close Apollo swung the blade with all the power of his strong right arm. With skill, grace, and flawless coordination of horse and rider, the blunt edge of Apollo’s gold-hilted saber caught the Red officer somewhere between the ear and the collarbone and cracked his neck. The man was dead before he lost his stirrups and fell to the snow-covered road.

  Apollo pulled Leda up and jumped off immediately. Within seconds he had stripped off the officer’s tunic and slit his throat for good measure. Now there was one less Bolshevik left to kill and torture in the name of progress.

  Short minutes later, Karaim and Sahin came pounding down the road, their saddlebags bulging with army uniforms and hardware and extra horses on long leads behind them. They helped pull the dead men off the road, covered them with snow (the wolves would get them soon enough), and then the three men set out for Stavropol.

  “Picked up a few horses, I see,” Apollo remarked conversationally.

  “A pity to leave them behind,” Sahin said in Dagestani.

  “A pity,” Apollo agreed.

  “We can sell them in Stavropol,” Karaim said. Karaim always was in need of money since he was one of the more eligible bachelors in the mountain aul. Gifts for the ladies were expensive.

  “Let’s stop soon, then, and discard their army bridles and tack. We should get into our uniforms pretty damn soon, too, and check out our new identity papers. And I suppose I’d better take a knife to this hair, w
hat with the Red Army regulations. No reason to take any risks.” It was the understatement of the week, since they were about to ride into Stavropol and into the midst of ten thousand Red Army troops.

  When the Red officer with newly trimmed hair and his accompanying mountain irregulars—all dressed in hybrid uniforms, part Red army, part Caucasian warrior—rode into Stavropol late that afternoon, they found themselves surrounded by the press and throng of General Beriozov’s Sixth Division. The city was bustling with activity, crowded with soldiers as Beriozov regrouped his division before making the last push to the Black Sea.

  The three horsemen leading the string of extra mounts rode slowly through the muddy streets. On every side were Red soldiers: lounging against the buildings, walking the streets, riding by on wagons, horses, gun tachankas. Even an armored car with Cheka markings was loaded with extra troops clinging to the wide runningboards. None of the trio wondered, as perhaps more practical men might, how exactly they were going to extract themselves from this enemy stronghold.

  As Leda picked her way daintily around the worst of the mud, Apollo did, however, speculate fleetingly on the unique impulses that had driven him into the center of the enemy camp. He could say he was simply performing a favor for a friend—honorbound, et cetera. It could be he was simply curious—in a slightly suicidal way, one might add—to discover the countess’s fate. While both explanations were reasonably credible in their own right, they accounted for but a minimum of the real truth. Apollo was, in fact, hoping—more than hoping; desiring desperately—to find Kitty for reasons of his own, reasons that centered around vividly palpable memories of lush Kitty, flushed from lovemaking, her laughing, sensuous, full-lipped mouth bending to caress his, or her soft voluptuous body arched beneath him. The memories, like some sweet torture, had been recurrent since December.

  Apollo’s search was in fact inexplicable in terms of success and logic, unorthodox in every sense of the word, but, like the quest for the Holy Grail, it was unshakable in its conviction, spiritually necessary, and sectarian only in the passion of its goal. Even that passion, powerful and unassailably determined, had antecedents in the knightly tradition.

  Over several glasses of liquor in one of the local cafes the question was where the devil to begin searching for the countess in a city this size. In the event that Kitty had managed to reach Stavropol, and in the event she had money, and in the event she wasn’t murdered for it, they decided she may have stayed at one of the hotels. When Aladino had been overrun almost four weeks ago, Stavropol had still been under White control. It was natural for Kitty to first seek refuge here. Unfortunately, it appeared that the city had fallen along with the districts near Aladino, and Beriozov and his Sixth Division had been ensconced here ever since.

  Apollo left to survey the hotels, leaving the Dagestanis at the Georgian Cafe drinking the aracq they favored. It was the strongest liquor in the world, especially when heated, and they were quite content. While nominally Moslem, the mountain men subscribed to a religious expediency; they understood the Prophet frowned on liquor, but they believed in his mercy, and man is weak. … In any case, they might as well relax and enjoy themselves. Neither would have been much help with Apollo’s inquiries anyway, since both spoke only limited Russian, and that with such cavalier inflections as to be practically unintelligible.

  Selecting the Hotel Russia—the most exclusive establishment—as a starting point, Apollo inadvertently saved himself considerable time. Approaching a small, freckle-faced youth who apparently helped with guests’ luggage, Apollo slipped a gold rouble into his grimy hand, saying, “I’m looking for a young lady with long blond hair, about this tall.” He drew his hand to one shoulder. “She has green eyes and may or may not call herself Radachek. Have you seen her in this hotel anytime in the last few weeks?”

  For the extravagant gesture of a gold rouble the boy would have scoured the town for a woman of that description, but as it turned out, Apollo’s question was quite commonplace. The young boy had inquiries concerning the lady several times a day. All the officers were interested in the pretty countess who shared General Beriozov’s suite. When did she go out for her carriage rides? Had she returned yet from either the morning or afternoon excursion? Was the general in or out at the moment? Answers regarding the lady’s whereabouts augmented his pittance of a salary enough to feed his mother and younger brothers and sisters.

  So the boy affably answered Apollo’s query. Had the lady been in the hotel recently? Certainly. She was upstairs in suite 17 right now. General Beriozov’s suite. “And comrade”—the boy was careful to use the correct form of address since a new clientele had taken over the hotel—“for a gold rouble, I’ll find out anything else you want to know.” He winked conspiratorially.

  Apollo nodded in an abstract way, comprehension scorching his brain, like a branding iron on tender flesh. “Perhaps later,” he said quietly, retracing his steps to the entrance, trying to deal with the shock. Upstairs? General Beriozov’s suite?

  The stunning news affected Apollo in a sudden, strange, and sharply antithetical way. He wanted to murder Kitty … and he wanted to rescue her. Pushing through the crowd of officers near the door, he discourteously shouldered his way outside, not caring whom he buffeted. Heads turned and mouths were about to offer complaint, but the sight of the tall, tawny-haired man, powerfully built and definitely angry, deterred the impulse.

  Adrenaline was pumping through Apollo’s nervous system. His first impulse was to kill both the lady and her lover. Don’t ask for reason. He had never been a reasonable man.

  All his former anxieties turned to acid in his mind. He had been a fool, he thought grimly, risking his life—and those of Karaim and Sahin as well—for some elusive dream, for some sensual memories of a golden-haired beauty, memories he had half-convinced himself were some kind of love.

  He walked the streets, not taking the news at all well, oblivious to everything but the tormented chaos in his mind. How could she? How the hell could she? He wasn’t thinking very clearly, at first, but time and the chill March winds eventually calmed his initial fury over unreliable women, and common sense ultimately prevailed over baser masculine concerns such as territorial rights, outrage, and something very close to covetousness.

  There was no reason to immediately think the worst. There was a possibility, a good possibility, Kitty was no more than a captive. The young boy seemed to know her well enough, though. She must be seen outside the suite. Not too much of a captive, apparently.

  “Merde,” Apollo swore darkly. Capricious bitch, changing allegiances as swiftly as dressing for dinner. Still, he realized he could never rest until he knew for certain. Well … only one way to find out. A plan was set in motion. Not much of a plan, actually—more like barging into the lion’s den and then winging it.

  9

  That evening as General Beriozov and the countess were entertaining several guests at dinner, a servant announced a caller. “Colonel Zveguintzev to see General Beriozov,” he said.

  The general, his hostess, and guests all turned; eighteen pairs of eyes slewed round to the open door.

  Lean and striking, the visitor entered with the lithe, supple stride of a mountain cat. He stopped abruptly just within the room, his tall form and sensationally cropped silky head framed by the delicately gilded doorjamb, an image of raw masculine power limned within borders of cavorting putti. The intruder’s pale eyes surveyed the group quite at random and he spoke first in a quiet, deep voice, “Good evening, General; ladies and gentlemen.”

  One could not mistake Apollo, the figure or the face. From the first moment, Kitty had been struck dumb, immobilized and incredulous, but at the sound of the so-familiar voice, the stillness in the room was broken as the fork she had been holding clattered noisily onto the Sèvres porcelain. The general, exceedingly jealous, darted a dangerous glance at her while a murmur and rustle of shock flowed around the table.

  Apollo, who had excellent control of his facia
l muscles, stepped in quickly to cover the gaffe, saying in an indolent drawl, “How awkward. Countess Radachek, no doubt, has heard the greatly exaggerated accounts of my death on the western front. I assure you, madame,” he said, bowing slightly toward Kitty, his tawny eyes expressionless and smooth, “no apparition here. The reports were highly inaccurate.”

  Kitty wore cream moiré silk accenting the pallor of her skin, but the brilliant, blood red rubies on her white throat and at her ears drew Apollo’s gaze for a fleeting moment. (He knew it was one of those vignettes frozen in time, destined to be etched permanently in his mind, the sensation of large drops of blood on pure white flesh.)

  The startling pallor of Kitty’s face was duly noted by the general as well, and he viewed with instant displeasure the naked longing in her wide emerald eyes. The expression was gone in a moment, for Kitty, quickly collecting her wits, composed her features and attempted to hide the violent beating of her heart, the ecstatic joy flooding through her.

  The general’s pale gray eyes directed another searching look at both Kitty and the newcomer. “You know the countess?” Beriozov’s angry glance flicked over Apollo’s lean figure.

  Apollo received the harsh challenge tranquilly. “Years ago, we had mutual friends in Petrograd, sir,” he murmured politely. “Her husband, actually.” He leered slightly, hoping to convey just the right tone of derision.

  A kindred smirk appeared on the general’s face. “So … that accounts for the reaction.”

  “I believe so, sir. Fortunes change, so rapidly,” he said pleasantly. “And some, ah, adjust better than others,” he finished with a disarming smile.

  “Oh, Countess Radachek has adapted quite well, haven’t you, my dear?” The general patted her hand and Kitty controlled the impulse to snatch it away. Her face stiffened into a mask, behind which her eyes gave away nothing.

  “Why not be sensible?” she said in a light, dispassionate voice. Smiling thinly, she took a sip from her champagne glass.