Stay, I Pray You

Part 4

As Anya was running back to her house, away from the palace, Gleb was about to leave for the palace. He set off for the palace, glad that he was finally able to catch the con men who had escaped from him a year ago.

When he arrived at the old Yusugov palace, Gleb didn't call their names. He quietly searched for them, keeping one hand on his pistol.

He walked through, searching the first floor and the grounds, and finding nothing. While he searched the first floor, another man searched the second and third.

***

After a half hour of searching, where he found nothing except for a hastily erased blackboard and a few books spread around, but Gleb decided to ask the people nearby if they had seen anything suspicious.

He asked an older woman first. "I saw a girl, around your age or younger, running to the palace and entering it, before leaving and running away a minute later. Then there were two men, one your age and one older coming out with luggage. They headed the same direction as the girl."

She then pointed towards the Neva river. "They went that way." Gleb was puzzled. Were they going to swim to Finland?

Gleb hurried to the riverside. He saw no one nearby except for a young girl string under the bridge. "Excuse me," he asked the girl, and she turned her head towards him. It was Anya.

***

"Anya, what are you doing here?" Gleb asked Anya. She looked away from him, and then started talking. "This is where I liv- like to go when I need to think. The river is calming." Gleb looked suspicious at her misstep, but brushed it off due to how nervous she looked.

"Let's take you home, Anya. It's getting late." Gleb said gently to the half-asleep girl. She stood up, then almost fell into his arms. "Anya, your house is far from here. Would you like me to drive you to your home?"

She nodded, too tired to do anything else. Gleb wasn't sure what to do. Was he supposed to pick her up and let her sleep in his arms as he walked to his car or walk with her?

After standing there awkwardly for a minute while thinking, he helped her get up and walk over to his car. She sat down in the back while he got in and started driving to the address he knew she lived in.

***

Gleb returned to his office, wondering about Anya's past, and her character. She seemed like a young woman who tried to care for herself, but still needed someone to guide her. He wondered if that was true. Women had tried to trick him into caring for them for money, jobs, and occasionally for train tickets. Those women he always arrested, much to their surprise.

He didn't think Anya was like that though. Gleb started to busy himself with paperwork to get his mind off of her. As he continued working, a paper fought his eye. 'Con men arrested trying cross Polish border'

A quick phone call later he found out that it was indeed Dimitri and Vladimir Popov, and that he was being sent to the border.

Gleb drove back to his apartment to begin packing. When he filled a single suitcase, he drove back to his office to grab papers and a gun, before heading to the train station.