Despite what the Bolsheviks claimed, God was still in His heaven. He was still holding them all in His hand. He would make this war, like all wars, to cease. Zivon’s job, as it had always been, was to be still, steady. To watch. Learn the patterns. So he would know when stillness should give way to action.
“Mr. Marin! Good afternoon.”
Three weeks in England, and still the English words, the English pronunciation of his name, sounded strange to his ears. But he turned and smiled at the tall captain behind him. “Good afternoon, Captain Blackwell.”
As strange as English sounded to his ears, it felt stranger still on his tongue. He spoke it well enough, but it never felt quite right as it emerged, not as his German and Greek and French did. And he wasn’t sure he’d ever be able to truly think in it, though he was doing his best. He’d gotten permission from Admiral Hall to spend the first hour of work reading a newspaper, to get his mind accustomed to English words.
The other cryptographers seemed baffled by this practice. He’d be happy to explain his reasoning if anyone ever asked. But they were content to stare and whisper instead.
Captain Blackwell had never looked at him as though he were a display in a museum, at least. “How fortuitous that I’ve run into you.” The captain smiled, and it looked like a lonely shaft of sunlight through the clouds ever-present in his eyes. “I’ve been meaning to ask you to join my family for dinner one evening.”
Zivon’s brows lifted. He hadn’t shared an actual meal with someone in weeks. “I would be delighted, Captain. I thank you. Name the day.”
The captain chuckled. “How’s this evening for you? Another of my guests just cancelled—he’s a bit under the weather, it seems—and my wife does detest an empty seat at the table. But if you already have plans, next week or the week after would work just as well.”
How gracious of him to even consider that Zivon had plans, when surely he’d seen that their colleagues viewed him more as an oddity than a friend. Zivon knew his own smile was self-deprecating. “Tonight would be lovely.”
“Excellent.” A few of the clouds in his eyes shifted, though they didn’t exactly flee. “I’ve a car outside. I’d be happy to drive you to your flat to tidy up and then to my home. It’s close, I believe?”
Zivon nodded. “That is most kind. Thank you, sir.”
“Next. May I help you, sir?”
The captain nodded, directing Zivon’s attention back to the queue, where his turn had come. He put on what he hoped was an easy smile and approached the clerk behind her gleaming wooden counter. “Good afternoon.”
If only he could speak without an accent. The woman’s smile flickered, dropping into a momentary frown before she remembered herself. “Good afternoon, sir. How may I help you?”
He opened his briefcase and withdrew the crisp paycheck. “I would like to open an account and deposit this.”
Now the woman’s brows winged upward. No doubt she had a hard time reconciling his speech—clearly Russian—with Admiralty pay. He knew the feeling. But she produced another smile, unconvincing as it was, and said, “Of course. I’ll just need to see your references.”
“I beg your pardon?” His chest went tight, holding captive the air already in his lungs and barring out any fresh influx. References? “It is my money. I ought to be asking you for references.”
Laughter belted out behind him, and he felt someone drawing near. Captain Blackwell, he soon realized, who leaned in and said, “I’m his reference, Miss Knight. And Admiral Hall. Let the man give you his money.”
The woman’s face relaxed into a smile. “Of course, Captain. My apologies, Mr. . . .” She glanced down at the check again. “Mr. Marin.”
How had he become mister again? He had been a kapitan in the Imperial Navy. He’d been at the very center of the intelligence community, second in command, friends all around him, respected by his every colleague. He’d dined with Czar Nicholas, who had promised to make him chief cryptographer when Popov retired at the end of the year—a position that would have come with the honorary title of Admiral-General. Admiral-General at thirty! A far cry from the humble beginnings of a schoolteacher’s son. A far cry from this.
Well, Matushka had always warned him against the dangers of pride. Now he couldn’t even open a bank account without the mercy of strangers.
But he was alive. He’d found a new home. He wouldn’t resent the demotion. He would thank God for it. Embrace it. Follow the advice of his Lord and take the lowest place at the table. He would work for his people instead of himself. Help end the war. Help restore order.
For a moment, he was back on the train, imagining what he couldn’t remember—screeching and squealing and lurching. He was calling for his brother, reaching for him, grasping nothing. For a moment, the blackness was over him, a heavy blanket that whispered of death—at the hands of the war that had damaged the tracks, if not the Bolsheviks who despised him.
Then he blinked, breathed, and saw the bank clerk again, bent over the paperwork, chattering to Captain Blackwell. To his ears it sounded like nothing but babble. The words on the paper she slid across to him could have been in cuneiform for all the sense they made.
Another blink, another breath. Be still, and know that I am God. He counted the air in, counted it out, and the panic edged back just a bit. Their words became words, as did the ones on the page. English words.
He picked through them until they began to make sense and then filled in the information they were requesting. His name. His address. His place of employment. Simple answers that felt far from simple.
With Captain Blackwell signing something, too, as his reference, Zivon finally had his money safely in the hands of the bank. After indicating that he’d await his impromptu host outside, he exited back onto the busy street and drew in a deep breath.
He leaned against the stone wall behind him, letting the world rush by for a moment. Let the patterns of speech and movement soothe him.
It couldn’t soothe for long. Despite the command for stillness, his mind spun. He visualized the map he’d been studying that morning. Tracing out the path to the church he’d yet to visit, where fellow Russians and Greeks would meet together. He wanted to go. Needed to go. But couldn’t, not yet. He didn’t know which Russians were friends, which had ties to the Bolsheviks. And he couldn’t risk word reaching home that he was here. He didn’t think Lenin’s organization was ordered enough to have sent operatives after him . . . but they might if they realized who he was. What he’d done. That he knew their plans, knew their hopes.
He had to guard himself. His identity. Take care with every introduction.
But he needed help. Needed someone with friends in France to help him search for what he’d lost. His album. His papers.
His brother.
He’d considered asking Hall for that help today—but Hall didn’t yet trust Zivon. So could Zivon trust Hall? He’d nearly spoken of it, but the words wouldn’t come.
No. First he would try his own people—a few, carefully chosen. He would go to the embassy, using the false papers Evgeni had gotten for him. A different name for his face. He knew well that the ambassador had no ties to the Bolsheviks—not with his ties to nobility, instead. Nabokov was an imperialist, through and through, outspoken in his admiration of how Britain ruled its empire. Vastly opposed to anything socialist. Nabokov could be trusted that far, at least. And Nabokov would know his counterparts in France. Perhaps they could help.