As if on cue, Audrius placed it on the bar. The captain took a sip and gave another sigh, this one of satisfaction. Then he studied the Count for a moment.
“Are you Russian?”
“To the core.”
“Well then, let me say at the outset that I am positively enamored with your country. I love your funny alphabet and those little pastries stuffed with meat. But your nation’s notion of a cocktail is rather unnerving. . . .”
“How so?”
The captain pointed discreetly down the bar to where a bushy-eyebrowed apparatchik was chatting with a young brunette. Both of them were holding drinks in a striking shade of magenta.
“I gather from Audrius that that concoction contains ten different ingredients. In addition to vodka, rum, brandy, and grenadine, it boasts an extraction of rose, a dash of bitters, and a melted lollipop. But a cocktail is not meant to be a mélange. It is not a potpourri or an Easter parade. At its best, a cocktail should be crisp, elegant, sincere—and limited to two ingredients.”
“Just two?”
“Yes. But they must be two ingredients that complement each other; that laugh at each other’s jokes and make allowances for each other’s faults; and that never shout over each other in conversation. Like gin and tonic,” he said, pointing to his drink. “Or bourbon and water . . . Or whiskey and soda . . .” Shaking his head, he raised his glass and drank from it. “Excuse me for expounding.”
“That’s quite all right.”
The captain nodded in gratitude, but then after a moment inquired, “Do you mind if I make an observation? I mean of the personal sort.”
“Not at all,” said the Count.
The captain slid his drink down the bar and moved a stool closer.
“You seem like something is weighing on your mind. I mean, you set that brandy in motion about half an hour ago. If you’re not careful, the vortex you’ve created will drill a hole right through the floor and we’ll all end up in the basement.”
The Count set the snifter down with a laugh.
“I suppose you’re right. Something must be weighing on my mind.”
“Well then,” said Richard, gesturing to the empty bar, “you have come to the right place. Since days of old, well-mannered men have assembled in watering holes such as this one in order to unburden themselves in the company of sympathetic souls.”
“Or strangers?”
The captain raised a finger in the air.
“There are no more sympathetic souls than strangers. So, what say we skip the preambling. Is it women? Money? Writer’s block?”
The Count laughed again; and then like other well-mannered men since days of old, he unburdened himself to this sympathetic soul. He described Mishka and his notion that Russians were somehow unusually adept at destroying that which they have created. Then he described Osip and his notion that Mishka was perfectly right, but that the destruction of monuments and masterpieces was essential to the progress of a nation.
“Oh, so that’s it,” said the captain, as if this would have been his fourth guess.
“Yes. But what conclusions would you draw from it all?” asked the Count.
“What conclusions?”
Richard took a drink.
“I think that both of your friends are very sharp. I mean it takes a good bit of dexterity to pull a thread out of the fabric all in one piece. But I can’t help feeling that they’re missing something. . . .”
He drummed his fingers on the bar as he tried to formulate his thoughts.
“I understand that there’s a little history of dismantling here in Russia; and that the razing of a beautiful old building is bound to engender a little sorrow for what’s gone and some excitement for what’s to come. But when all is said and done, I can’t help suspecting that grand things persist.
“Take that fellow Socrates. Two thousand years ago, he wandered around the marketplace sharing his thoughts with whomever he bumped into; and he wouldn’t even take the time to write them down. Then, in something of a fix, he punched his own ticket; pulled his own plug; collapsed his own umbrella. Adios. Adieu. Finis.
“Time marched on, as it will. The Romans took over. Then the barbarians. And then we threw the whole Middle Ages at him. Hundreds of years of plagues and poisonings and the burning of books. And somehow, after all of that, the grand things this fellow happened to say in the marketplace are still with us.
“I guess the point I’m trying to make is that as a species we’re just no good