Our Woman in Moscow(86)

Already the nurse is motioning me to follow her out of the nursery. I trail along behind her. I’m afraid I’ll drop the baby, so I hold on tight as we turn down a couple of corridors and somehow end up in Iris’s old room, from which they wheeled her last night. She lies in her bed, wan and bloodless, but her eyes fly open when I walk in after the nurse.

“Brought you something,” I tell her.



Iris says his name is Gregory, and who am I to object? That was our father’s name. She looks at his shifting mouth and says he’s hungry. She and the nurse exchange some words that turn terse. The nurse happens to be taking her blood pressure, and frankly I think it’s unwise to provoke an argument at such a moment, but whatever the issue in dispute, Iris seems to prevail. The nurse flounces away with her collar and bulb, and Iris pulls aside the hospital gown and starts to feed the baby.

“They think it’s barbaric to nurse your young. She wanted to get a nice bottle of scientific milk for me.”

“I happen to agree with the nurse, but it’s your baby.”

Iris looks up and smiles. “Don’t sass, or I’ll name you godmother.”

“Oh, that’s rich. Put the child’s spiritual welfare in my hands, why don’t you.”

“I just might, if only to keep you from bolting again.”

“Me? You were the one who bolted.”

I nod at Gregory, who seems hard at work. His tiny hands grip her breast and his mouth works frantically.

“Seems to be an expert,” I observe. “His mother, too.”

“Well, I should hope I know what I’m doing by now.”

She’s so weak. She hardly moves, except to keep the baby secure against her breast. I think of the freshly stitched wound beneath the hospital gown and the firm, fluent way she spoke to the nurse, not like the old Iris at all. She feels my stare and looks up.

“What’s the matter?”

“Just thinking of something your husband said. How much you wanted another baby, all of a sudden.”

“What, me? I’m just a housewife, remember?”

Something about her tone of voice sends my memory racing back to the night before last, and what I said to Fox—the question I asked—before he . . . well. Call a spade a spade. Before he distracted me.

“Just a housewife,” I repeat.

“Speaking of which, what’s happened to my husband? I would have thought he’d have arrived by now.”

“There’s been a delay, I think.”

“Oh? What kind of delay?”

“Fox is on the case, don’t worry. Probably the little nippers are misbehaving. I’ll report back with all the news.” I rise from my chair. “You just rest, do you hear? Let me do all the worrying, for once.”

“Just like you used to,” she says softly.

I lean down, smooth back her sticky hair, and kiss her forehead.

“Just like I used to.”



I don’t speak a word of Russian, but I do have my sister’s street address written down in both English and Cyrillic on a sheet of paper I keep in my pocketbook. I find my way outside—nobody stops me—and light a cigarette while I wait for a taxi. It takes some time, but one pulls up to discharge a passenger, and I hail it the same way I would hail a taxi in New York City. I give him the address and he doesn’t ask any questions, just nods and takes off.

At this point, it doesn’t require a seasoned intelligence agent to sense that something’s off. I know it in my bones. It isn’t just my nagging suspicions about Iris and Digby; it’s Kedrov’s disappearance—it’s Digby’s silence—it’s the fact that nobody seems to be following this taxi as it speeds through the streets of Moscow to the Digbys’ apartment building. Surely Fox and I weren’t that convincing in bed the other night? What’s happened to the fabled Soviet paranoia?

Or am I just too blind to see who’s watching?

And maybe it isn’t the wisest idea in the world to bolt across town in a Soviet taxi, either, but some peculiar inner urgency propels me to disregard such risks. I roll open the window and suck on my cigarette. The summer morning rushes past, the clear new sunshine speckled with pigeons. I wish to God I knew what I was doing.



I have some rubles in my pocketbook, thanks to Fox’s foresight. I pay the driver and walk into the lobby of the apartment building as if I own the place, which is the only way to walk when you’re scared to death.

The elevator jolts and creaks and lumbers slowly upward, just as it did two days ago. When the doors clang open, I turn left and abandon all pretense of nonchalance. I find the right apartment—at least, I hope so—and knock hard. Wait, and knock again.

At last, I hear footsteps. Then silence, as the occupant stares through the peephole at me. The knob turns, the door opens, and there stands young Kip like the man of the house, unable to disguise his relief at the sight of me.

“Well, hello! I just wanted to stop by and bring the good news. Is your father here?”

“Y-yes. Come in, please.”

I step through the door and look around the foyer. “Have you just woken up? Guess what happened in the middle of the night. Your mother gave you a new baby brother! His name is Gregory and he’s absolutely enormous, and he can’t wait to meet you.”