They took away my passport and went through my wallet, eager to get at my personal identification. But they left me the cell phone, which led me to believe they were the guys I was there to do business with. They sure had a strange way of putting out the welcoming mat. I was then blindfolded and pushed and poked down the stairway, barely avoiding the broken woodwork along the way.
They shoved me into a car and piled in from both sides, pinning me uncomfortably into the back seat. The car rumbled along like it was missing a few cylinders, belching rancid fumes that leaked right back into the car. There was a lot of Russian being spoken, which didn’t make me feel any better. I couldn’t know if I had a minute, an hour, or the rest of eternity to spend with these guys. I’d been transported from a sexual fantasy to my worst nightmare in a matter of minutes.
It seemed we drove in circles before accelerating onto a highway and clearing out of town. Twenty minutes later we pulled off the road and two men on either side of me jumped out. One of them grabbed my arm and twisted it hard like he was trying to wrench it off.
“Okay,” I cried out, “you don’t need to pull so damn hard.” He let go, with some reluctance. “Thanks a lot,” I yelled as I stumbled out of the car. He shouted back in Russian and I heard him spit on the ground. I thought I’d better cool it with these guys.
They started right in with the pushing and shoving again, forcing me up a staircase into another apartment. I was thrown into a chair and someone pulled the blindfold off. The overhead light blinded me and it took a moment to adjust. When I looked around, it turned out to be another grubby dump – moldy walls, peeling paint, dust and dirt all around. One place looked like the next in this burg.
I found myself sitting across from a man in his late thirties or early fifties. It was hard to tell. They get old fast around here.
“Would you like tea?” He spoke in very clear English and with a brooding bass voice. “We make good tea in Odessa.”
“Tea?” I hesitated since I hadn’t expected the slightest bit of hospitality. “Sure, I would like some tea...can you spare a little vodka, too?”
“Da...yes, yes,” he returned excitedly.
He barked out some orders in Russian and one of his men began tending to a fancy samovar they’re so keen on. I’ve always wondered what tea would taste like from that contraption. He pulled out a small bottle of vodka from his leather jacket and handed it to me.
“Thanks,” I said, and proceeded to empty the contents in quick order.
“Good?” he inquired.
“Da,” I replied in my best Russian. He broke into a laugh. “Russian wodka better from America wodka,” he gloated. “Yes...of course,” I obliged.
“Da,” he returned with finality. I was getting to like that word.
I changed the subject. “Can you tell me why I was blindfolded and forced to come here like a hostage?”
“We want not you know address.” I got the gist. “Who are you?” I begged.
“Who? My name, Vitaly. I friend of Abramovich in California. He sent you, no?”
“Yes, he did.” I settled down on that note. The hostage treatment had me worried, after all.
“We do business together,” he boasted.
“Yeah, well...you didn’t have to kidnap me. That was goddamned unnecessary,” I fired off, knowing full well how invaluable I was to them.
“We do to everyone this. Not special, you.”
“Forget it.” I didn’t need to push my luck.
“We have art.” He got down to business.
“We bring tomorrow. Then you go Prague, no?”
“I’d prefer to see it now,” I said. He shrugged his shoulders.
Obviously the wrong guy to ask.
“We bring tomorrow.” He was quite adamant. “But I have to see it now.”
“Nyet...tomorrow.”
“Then I’ll have to contact Abramovich,” I said. “He wants to know the condition of the painting immediately. I should call while it’s still daytime in Los Angeles and tell him you will bring it tomorrow.”
I was lying through my teeth, but I needed to straighten a few things out with Abramovich before I went any further with these guys.
“Why? We sell him what he want, no?” Vitaly returned suspiciously.
There was something amiss here. I couldn’t reconcile hard-boiled hoodlums and high art. I could see them handling a Warhol or an overpriced Pollack, but not a genuine Dutch Master. It was as if a murderous drug cartel was looking to fence off The Dead Sea Scrolls.
“He told me to call him today,” I pressed on.
“Los Angeles time.” He studied me for a moment and softened. “Okay...you call.”
He stood up, not a tall guy but quite big, nonetheless. His shoulders stretched out in a wider arc than most men his height, while his neck filled up a lot of the space in between. He might have been a wrestler or body builder – you don’t just come out of the womb looking like that.
“We bring art for you...tomorrow,” he reiterated. “Also, say hello to David for Vitaly.” He stretched a big smile out just for me, revealing a line of gold-plated teeth.
“I will,” I smiled back.
He left the room while I sat around and finished off the excellent Samovar tea, sulking in paranoia. The rest of his crew were sitting around, too, guzzling vodka and watching me curiously. I couldn’t help thinking they were going to hurt me. They’d already bared their teeth and I didn’t like it.
The middleman is usually the one who gets knocked off after the hoods pocket the payoff. The murderers go happily on their way, ridding themselves of any trace that might lead back to them. That’s not just a Hollywood script - the newspapers are filled with stories like that.
I was scaring the hell out of myself. I couldn’t let them see that, so I put on a smile like I was having happy thoughts. It seemed to work. They smiled back. But I worried that I’d put too much faith in Abramovich and regretted getting myself involved with the likes of a Gilbert Schoen. He was a dying man who had nothing to lose and was probably gloating at the thought of outliving me, though not by much.
The fear factor was all over me now.
I had to calm down and set my mind on something else; I became curious about the expensive wardrobe these goons had on. They were all wearing custom-made lambskin leather jackets along with pricey denim jeans and Rolex watches strapped to their wrists. It’s what you see gangsters sporting in feature films these days. It looked like Hollywood had gotten some traction in the former communist utopias; style and not substance was winning their hearts and minds.
Conspicuous consumption was the flavor of the day, and they were swimming in it – flashing expensive apparel and jewelry at every turn. It was almost comical, like watching stock characters from an old Warner Brothers gangster film. But they were the real deal, and I sure as hell didn’t want to end up like the fall guy in one of those movies.