were deflating rapidly. His jacket seemed, to Magdalena, to be sticking inches out beyond those once-strong, once-wide shoulders of his and drooping down. Magdalena could tell: Sergei realized that this little Sidney Munch had outsmarted him… him, the mighty Russian who could handle anybody, and certainly a little con man like Munch… and now Munch had tricked him into performing precisely the self-abasing, humiliating dancing-bear number he wanted him to perform—
And he had signed the release! He had surrendered his rights like the most pathetic mark who ever lived!
Sergei shot Munch one last malevolent stare and said in his low, seething voice, “I hope you heard me. I didn’t ask you not to show that film. I said that you will not show it. Suing is not the only thing that can happen. Other things can happen. You will never see that film on television.” Magdalena couldn’t see Sergei’s face, but she could see Mr. Munch’s as he looked at Sergei. His face was frozen, except for his eyelids, which blinked blinked blinked blinked.
“Mr. Korolyov! Mr. Korolyov!” It was John Smith, coming up behind them. Sergei gave him a look that could kill, but the pale reporter, thin as an earphone wire, was relentless. “Mr. Korolyov—before you go! You were awesome just now! You—well, I know you’re leaving, but could I give you a call? I’d like to give you a call, if that’s—”
John Smith recoiled in midsentence. The look on Sergei’s face seemed to take his breath away. This was not the mere look that kills. This was the look that kills and then smoke-cures the carcass and eats it.
They left the mansion and began walking back to the gatehouses. Sergei stared straight ahead—at nothing. The look on his face was as morose as any Magdalena had ever seen on a human face, even at Jackson Memorial Hospital in the moment of freefall that precedes death. He began muttering to himself in Russian. He was still walking beside her, but his mind had departed to another zone.
Magdalena couldn’t stand it. She broke in: “Sergei, what’s wrong? What are you muttering about? Come baaaaaack!”
Sergei looked at her crossly, but at last he began speaking English. “This little midget, this bastard, this Munch—I can’t believe I let that happen! That little ball of American scum—and I let him trick me! He knew exactly how to put ‘me’ into his stinking reality show—and I didn’t see it coming! He makes me look like some idiot brawler from the streets! One minute I’m the big—what is the American word? donor?—and they honor me for giving tens of millions of dollars’ worth of paintings to a museum—and now I’m a fool who sinks so low as to appear on this garbage ‘reality show’! Do you know what Flebetnikov said when I leaned over him to see if he was still breathing, still had a heartbeat—I was afraid he was dead! But thank God he’s still alive. He can barely talk at all, but with this pitiful voice he whispers into my ear, ‘Sergei Andreivich, I did not mean it.’ He didn’t have to say any more. The look in his eyes—he was pleading. ‘Sergei Andreivich,’ he’s saying, ‘please forgive me. They tell me, “You got to go start a fight.” ’ Poor Boris Feodorovich. He’s broke, he’s desperate. He needs the money they offer him. Then they start making hints. If he performs well on this show, maybe they give him a ‘reality show’ of his own. Maybe they call it The Mad Russian?—I don’t know, but now I see how these slimy Americans work. They force Boris Feodorovich to drag me into their cesspool by attacking me—physically! Once he swings his pathetic punch, I’m in their filthy show, like it or not. I, who showed such contempt for this Munch—he tricks me like any other poor lokh. I can’t believe this! Some slimy little American!”
They were now at the end of the walkway, approaching the twin gatehouses. The gatehouses looked enormous in this dim electric dusk. It didn’t so much illuminate them as suggest their size… an edge of slate on the roofs… the white architraves around the windows… the shadows in the deep relief of some sort of plaster medallion with fanciful figures in it.
At the very end of the walkway, the big blonde, “Savannah,” was still at the card table. The light was just enough to illuminate her as she sat with her back toward them… her sleeveless dress, the whiteness