The Magic Circle Katherine Neville (top 100 novels of all time TXT) 📖

unheated, unappealing quarters, unpacked a few items, and turned in for the night.

There was a soft tap at the door. I glanced at my travel clock on the bureau of the cold, sparsely furnished room. I hadn’t reset it yet from Vienna time, so ten-thirty meant it was after midnight in Leningrad. Wolfgang had made it quite clear that tiptoeing about with the intention of hanky-panky was strictly off limits according to Soviet etiquette. So at this time of night, who on earth could it possibly be?

I sashed up my robe over my pajamas and went to unlock the door. “Svetlana” was standing outside, looking oddly shy and awkward compared with her former boot-camp persona. Her eyes flicked sideways and she shot me a purse-lipped look, which I supposed was the Soviet idea of a smile.

“Pliss,” she said in a low voice, almost confidential. “Pliss—somevon vish spick viss you.” She was gesturing sideways with her hand, as if actually expecting me to step out the door, leave my uncomfortable but relatively secure icebox of a room, and follow her in the dead of night to some unspecified rendezvous.

“What someone?” I pulled my robe more tightly up to my chin as I stepped back a pace, my hand still firmly on the door handle.

“Somevon,” she insisted in a whisper, glancing around nervously. “Hiss wery oorgent, he must be spicking viss you now—at vonse. Pliss to come viss me—he iss down the sterrs—”

“I’m not going downstairs, or anywhere else, unless you tell me who wants to speak with me,” I assured her, shaking my head firmly for emphasis. “Does Professor Hauser know about this?”

“No! Must not to know nossing!” she said—in a tone that could only be interpreted, in any tongue, as real fear. What in God’s name was going on?

Now Svetlana was digging in her pocket, and she pulled out a card on heavy paper, waving it under my nose for just a moment before quickly tucking it away again. I’d barely had time to read the two words printed on it: Volga Dragonoff.

Good lord! Volga—my uncle Laf’s valet! Could something have happened to Laf in the few days since I’d seen them at Sun Valley? But what else could Volga be doing here, hunting me down at midnight in the north of Russia? How did he get so cozy with Ms. Keys-to-the-Kingdom that she’d toss her rule book out just for him?

To make matters worse, my sturdy Soviet bodyguard was acting more than suspicious. Her anxious eyes darting everywhere, she made the pliss-to-follow gesture to me again, making me pretty damned nervous myself. But deciding I’d better learn exactly what was going on, I grabbed my fur-lined boots from beside the door, shoved them on my feet, yanked my heavy coat over my bathrobe, stepped out into the hall, and let Svetlana “officially” lock the door behind me. I could see my breath in the dim fluorescent light as I followed her along the corridor; I pulled on my gloves as we went down the two flights of stairs.

Volga was waiting there in the lobby, bundled in a dark, heavy coat. As I went to greet him, and looked at his craggy, sober face that never smiled, I realized that in the twenty-odd years I’d known this valet, factotum, and inseparable companion of my uncle, we’d probably spoken fewer than two dozen words to each other—which made this unexpected late-night tryst even more bizarre.

Volga bowed to me, glanced once at his watch, and spoke a few words in Russian to my escort. She crossed the lobby, unlocked a door, flicked on one dim bank of lights, and left us alone. Volga held the door for me to enter first, and we went inside. It proved to be a vast dining hall filled with long tables already set up for tomorrow’s breakfast. Volga pulled out a chair for me, then sat himself, took a flask from his pocket, and handed it to me.

“Drink this. It is slivovitz mixed with hot water; it will keep you warm while we speak.”

“Why are you here in the middle of the night, Volga?” I said, accepting the proffered flask, if only to warm my hands. “Nothing’s happened to Uncle Laf?”

“When we did not hear from you yesterday, nor did you arrive last night at the maestro’s home in Vienna as expected, he became alarmed,” Volga said. “Today we thought to contact your colleague in Idaho, Mr. Olivier Maxfield, at your office. But due to the time difference—eight hours—it was too late when we learned that you had already left Vienna for Leningrad.”

“So where’s Uncle Laf?” I asked, butterflies still hovering in my stomach. I unscrewed the flask and had a swig of the hot liquor; it did seem to warm me a bit.

“The maestro wished to come himself to explain the urgency of the situation,” Volga assured me, “but his Soviet visa was not refreshed. I am Transylvanian, though; the Rumanian government has a ‘friendship pact’ with the Soviet Union making it possible to come here at brief notice. I arrived on the last airplane from Vienna, but the entry procedure causes further delay. I apologize—but the maestro insisted that I see you at once, tonight. He sends this note to confirm what I say.”

Volga handed me an envelope. As I slipped out the note to unfold it, I asked, “How on earth did you get that lady storm trooper to let me out of my cage for a rendezvous with you at this time of night?”

“It was fear,” Volga said cryptically. “I know these people; I understand their ways very well.”

I made no comment as I read Laf’s note:

Dearest Gavroche,

Your failure to arrive here suggests to me that you have ignored my advice and last night perhaps done something foolish. Nevertheless, I send you my love.

Please listen with great attention to everything Volga has to tell you, for it is quite important. I should have shared it all with you before departing Sun