Page 89 of The Collector
“He looks like he just returned from the trenches of Bakhmut,” said Luzhkov beneath his breath. “With the exception of the makeup, of course. I suppose he didn’t have time to remove it after taping tonight’s inspiring message to the Russian people.”
“Last night’s broadcast was rather unsettling.”
“His insistence that we use our vast nuclear arsenal against our Ukrainian cousins? Unfortunately, it’s not as farfetched as it sounds.”
“You don’t really think it could happen, do you?”
“I’m afraid that even I’m not privy to such information. But I have a feelinghemight know.”
Luzhkov pointed out the overcoated man who had just entered the room. It was Nikolai Petrov, the secretary of the Security Council of Russia.
The tolling of a bell summoned the guests to the chandeliered banquet hall for dinner. The table at which they gathered was the length of a rail car and ablaze with the light of a hundred candles. Waiters in traditionalkosovorothatunics charged their wineglasses with Château Margaux, and their host made a fiery toast about the war in Ukraine that Magnus quietly translated into Danish for Ingrid.
As luck would have it, she had been seated next to the English-speaking child bride of the robber baron, who spent the remainder of the evening lamenting her family’s reduced circumstances. There were other tales of sanctions woe around the table—tales of yachts and homes seized, of bank accounts frozen, and of Western travelbans and residence visas summarily revoked. None blamed the Russian president; they didn’t dare. A dozen of their ilk who had criticized the war had died under mysterious circumstances, with “apparent suicide” being the most common explanation. A slip of the tongue at a Rublyovka dinner party could well prove fatal.
Dmitry Budanov, for one, found the talk of lost luxuries unseemly. One of the world’s richest television journalists, Budanov had lost a yacht and both of his villas on Lake Como to sanctions. But they were a small price to pay, he said, for the restoration of Russian greatness and the destruction of NATO and the decadent, gender-confused West.
“All of which can be achieved,” he droned on, “if we take the steps necessary to prevail in Ukraine.”
“And what steps are those, Dmitry Sergeyevich?” asked a male voice from somewhere along the table.
“The steps of which I speak nightly on my program.”
“The nuclear option?”
Budanov nodded gravely.
“And when the Americans destroy our army in Ukraine?” It was the chemical mogul, Boris Primakov.
“Then we will have no choice but to respond in kind.”
“And when they retaliate?”
“They won’t.”
“How can you be so sure, Dmitry Sergeyevich?”
“Because they are cowards.”
“A game of Russian roulette?” asked Gennady Luzhkov. “Is that what you’re suggesting?” Receiving no answer, he turned to Nikolai Petrov. “And what does the secretary of the Russian Security Council have to say on the matter? Does he share the opinion of our esteemed television host that the Americans would never use their nuclear arsenal against us?”
“What I think,” said Petrov, rising slowly to his feet, “is that it is time for me to take my leave.”
“Perhaps you could give us a brief update on the fighting before you go,” suggested Yuri Glazkov.
Petrov’s terse response provoked a round of rapturous applause. Ingrid, however, had no idea why; Magnus had stopped translating in order to reply to a text he had just received.
“What did he say?” she asked over the din.
Magnus slipped the phone into the breast pocket of his jacket before answering.
“Evidently, Russian forces are advancing on all fronts.”
It was after midnight when the party finally ended, and the roads of Rublyovka were slick with newly fallen snow. Magnus drove at moderate speed with both hands on the wheel. Ingrid unlocked his phone and read his most recent text messages. Then she thumbed the phone to sleep and watched the snow falling on the beech trees lining the road.
“Who were you texting with during dinner?” she asked indifferently.
“No one important.”
