head scarves manning the booths at Turkey Row. For the uninitiated, the market presented a thoroughly bewildering array of stalls against which hordes of stout shoppers pressed their impressive bellies.
After asking directions from several people, Bourne made his way through the clamor and throb to Egg Row. Orienting himself, he moved to the third stall from the east end, which was typically crowded. A red-faced woman and a burly man-presumably Yevgeny Feyodovich-were busily exchanging eggs for money. He waited on the man's side of the stall, and when his turn came he said, "You are Yevgeny Feyodovich?"
The man squinted at him. "Who wants to know?"
"I'm looking for brown eggs, only brown. I was told to come here and ask for Yevgeny Feyodovich."
Yevgeny Feyodovich grunted, leaned over, said something to his female partner. She nodding without breaking her practiced rhythm of packing eggs and shoveling money into the outsize pockets of her faded dress.
"This way," Yevgeny said with a flick of his head. He pulled on a ratty wool peacoat, came out from behind the concrete barrier, led Bourne out the eastern side of the market. They crossed Srednefontanskaya Street and entered Kulikovo Pole Square. The sky was white now, as if a colossal cloud had come down from the heavens to blanket the city. The light, flat and shadowless, was a photographer's dream. It revealed everything.
"As you can see, this square is very Soviet, very ugly, retro, but not in a good way," Yevgeny Feyodovich said with a good bit of ironic humor. "Still, it serves to remind us of the past-of starvation and massacres."
He kept walking until they arrived at a ten-meter-high statue. "My favorite place to transact business: at Lenin's feet. In the old days, the communists used to rally here." His meaty shoulders lifted and fell. "What better place, eh? Now Lenin watches over me like a bastard patron saint who, I trust, has been banished to the lowest fiery pit of hell."
His eyes squinted again. He smelled the way a baby smells, of curdled milk and sugar. He had a beetling brow below a halo of brown hair that curled every which way like a wad of used steel wool.
"So it's brown eggs you desire."
"A large amount," Bourne said. "Also, a constant supply."
"That so?" Yevgeny parked a buttock on the limestone plinth of the Lenin statue, shook out a black Turkish cigarette. He lit it in a slow, almost religious ritual, drawing a goodly amount of smoke into his lungs. Then he held it there like a hippie enjoying a doobie of Acapulco Gold. "How do I know you're not Interpol?" he said in the soft hiss of an exhale. "Or an undercover operative of SBU?" He meant the Security Service of Ukraine.
"Because I'm telling you I'm not."
Yevgeny laughed. "You know the ironic thing about this city? It's smack up against the Black Sea but has always been short of drinking water. That in itself wouldn't be of much interest, except it's how Odessa got its name. They spoke French in Catherine's imperial court, see, and some wag suggested she name the city Odessa, because that's what it sounds like when you say assez d'eau backward. 'Enough water,' see? It's a fucking joke the French played on us."
"If we're through with the history lesson," Bourne said, "I'd like to meet Lemontov."
Yevgeny squinted up at him through the acrid smoke. "Who?"
"Edor Vladovich Lemontov. He owns the trade here."
Yevgeny started, rose from the plinth, his eyes looking past Bourne. He led them around the plinth.
Without turning his head, Bourne could see in the periphery of his vision a man walking a large Doberman pinscher. The dog's long, narrow face swung around, its yellow eyes staring at Yevgeny as if sensing his fear.
When they reached the other side of the statue of Lenin, Yevgeny said, "Now, where were we?"
"Lemontov," Bourne says. "Your boss."
"Are you telling me he is?"
"If you work for someone else, tell me now," Bourne said shortly. "It's Lemontov I want to do business with."
Bourne sensed another man stealing up behind him but didn't move, giving Yevgeny Feyodovich no sign that he knew until the frigid muzzle of the gun pressed the flesh just behind his right ear.
"Meet Bogdan Illiyanovich." Stepping forward, Yevgeny Feyodovich unbuttoned Bourne's overcoat. "Now we'll get at the truth, tovarich." With minimum effort, his fingers lifted the wallet and passport from the inside pocket.
Stepping back, Yevgeny opened the passport first. "Moldavian, are you? Ilias Voda." He stared hard at the photo. "Yes, that's