Revolution

Part Three

Part Three

Victor took the Metro from the Papineau station to Peel and walked to his office on MacTavish Avenue. The Soviet Consulate was housed in what was once the home of Alexander Simpson in the heart of Montreal's Golden Mile and Victor felt the ridiculous houses, neo-classic, neo-Gothic, Romanesque, Second Empire, Art Nouveau - sometimes all in the same house - fit the character of the city perfectly. The Americans called their mongrel society a melting pot and the Canadians were starting to call theirs a mosaic and Victor just saw them both as impure. 

Anna was in the office, working at her desk in the corner and she glanced up at Victor as he walked in. He stamped the snow from his feet, hung up his overcoat and walked towards her, hoping to chat a little, see what the young woman was doing this evening but Anna raised her eyes, motioning up and Victor stopped. 

Kharlamov wanted to see him. 

Upstairs to the big corner office. Mrs. Pianet was sitting at her desk by the door like a guard and Victor stopped and said hello and Mrs. Pianet said, "Go right in, he's expecting you." 

Victor said, "Thank you," and opened the door and walked into the office. 

Andrei Kharlamov sat behind his desk, his face obscured by a file he was reading.  

Victor cleared his throat and waited by the door. 

And waited. 

The old man let him stand there for a few minutes until the awkwardness would almost have to be addressed and then without moving the file away from his face said, "You left the office rather abruptly." 

Victor said, "Yes, turns out it was nothing." 

Kharlamov put the file down on his desk and motioned to the chair, waited until Victor sat down and then said, "Dr. Berezin will be here in two days, is your operation ready?" 

"Yes, he's been contacted, made an offer." 

"Good. You're pleased with your operative?" 

Victor said, yes, "She'll have no trouble getting close to him." 

Kharlamov nodded. 

Victor said, "She won't push him too hard," and Kharlamov said, "But hard enough, I trust," and Victor said, yes, but he wasn't sure how hard was hard enough. Berezin was speaking at McGill University, at a conference of physicists and there had been rumours he might be open to remaining in North America. His wife was terminally ill and they had no children. Victor was surprised the scientist had been allowed to attend the conference and now Victor looked closely at the old man, searching in vain for some emotion, some reaction to let him know how Kharlamov felt about any of this. Victor had been in Montreal for nearly a year, the second-in-command behind Kharlamov and still he had no idea if the old man trusted him. 

Or, for that matter, if he could trust the old man. 

Then Kharlamov picked up the file and said, "Watch your operatives closely, there may be something going on," and that was the end of the meeting.  

Victor stood up and walked out of the office.

---

"I sometimes wonder," Victor said, "how much of this is an act for you?" 

Beasely turned on the barstool and said, "What?" 

"Are you really a revolutionary working for the downfall of America, a sincere Black Panther, or are you just a drug dealer, in it for the, as you say, chicks." 

"I've never said 'chicks' in my life." 

"Still, all those months in London I never saw any Black Panther actions." 

"That was mostly fundraising." 

They were sitting at the bar in the Bridge Tavern in Point St. Charles, early evening before the place would fill up with Irish dock workers looking to get into fights. Victor drank his Dow beer from the bottle, as comfortable in the grimy tavern as he would be a few hours later in the Ritz Carleton hotel with his wife. Maybe more comfortable. He said, "Yes, fundraising, that's why I'm here." 

"I figured. I've got hash, some very good acid and I'm getting some good Thai Stick next week." 

"What I wonder," Victor said, "is how much of these funds you raise make it further than your own pocket?" 

Beasely put his own bottle of Dow on the bar and leaned back a little, giving Victor his death stare, saying, "You sure you want to ask that in here?" 

"You think because you pay off these Irish for your shipments coming through the dock they're your friends?" 

"I don't think I need friends," Beasely said, "but I know if this was the last place you were seen alive not a single man in here would remember you." 

Victor held the stare, looking back into Beasely's eyes, searching for any waver, for the slightest hint of hesitation, anything to let him know that Beasely was anything other than what he said he was, a draft-dodging Black Panther. 

Beasely didn't budge. 

Victor shrugged, said, "This is my business, it's a habit," and Beasely said, "That what it is?" 

Victor turned back to the bar and picked up his beer, thinking how in this business if you couldn't read people you wouldn't survive very long. And Victor was a survivor. Still looking in the mirror behind the bar he said, "Your friend from back home got himself in a little trouble," and Beasely said, "Oh yeah?" 

"Nothing that can't be dealt with, but that's one reason I need the extra hashish." 

"Hey," Beasely said, back to business, "whatever you need it for, you need it for." 

Beasely took a drink from his beer bottle and Victor glanced at him thinking the last time he heard an American make that kind of repetition was a Marine working at the US Embassy in London they were turning and he wondered if Beasely was a draft dodger or if he was AWOL. Might be something to look into, might be something better to have on the American playing at revolutionary if he ever needed to show him that it wasn't a game. 

Victor said, "How about hashish today, we'll see about the Thai next week." 

Beasely said, "End of the week." 

Victor stood up and said, "It was good to see you again," and Beasely said, you, too. They shook hands, Victor palming the two tens into Beasely's hand, and then he picked up the pouch of Drum Tobacco that had appeared on the bar. 

"Until next time." 

Victor walked out, bundling up against the cold winter air and got into his car. He pulled out onto Wellington and glanced to his right, to the Victoria Bridge and south to the US border not thirty miles away.  

The he pressed on the gas and headed down through the Wellington tunnel coming out half a mile later and turning left, heading up Peel, up the hill and back into one of his other lives.