A bullet to the shoulder had apparently become a very long and painful running joke in the life of Vitus Bethel. As he screamed bloody murder, which did not seem very far away at this moment, Vitus began to wonder whether his arm would ever be out of his sling. He also began to realize that although being shot in the shoulder seemed like a harmless enough wound for the heroes of action films and bad fiction, it still hurt like hell.
"Oh relax, Vitus," said Ivanovich. "It's only your shoulder. You'll be fine."
If Vitus had the ability to move his arm at that particular moment, he would have used it to strangle Ivanovich if only for those words. As it turned out, however, karma had its own way of catching up to Malcolm Ivanovich. From his current position, huddled up in a fetal position atop a pile of charred wooden furniture, Vitus noticed a small speck on the dark suit of one of the henchmen. He could just barely see it and thought his eyes might be playing tricks on him at first, and then the dot started moving. It passed from cloth to flesh, and now Vitus could make it out clearly--a red dot like a laser sight. Vitus knew what was about to happen. He stayed down, drawing his legs up toward his body and closing his eyes very, very tightly.
He could hear Ivanovich saying, "What's that on your face?" Then came the sound of six rifle shots in rapid succession and the sickeningly dull thud of several heavy things hitting the ground around him.
Then for a moment, there was only silence, the sort of silence that begs for some--any--noise to be made. It was soon answered. Vitus at first began to hear a low moaning that crescendoed into a full wail accompanied by the words, "My shoulder. Oh God, my shoulder."
Vitus looked up to see Ivanovich's small frame doubled over beside him, and sure enough, he bore the telltale bloodied sign of a bullet hole in his left shoulder. With every ounce of strength left in his being, Vitus lifted himself from the rubble, using his only good arm, and stumbled over to the figure that, only moments before, had been so unbearably smug and self-assured. With a sudden burst of energy, the antique-dealer began repeatedly kicking the fallen collector on his wound while shouting such choice phrases as, "Oh, relax. It's only your shoulder. You'll be fine."
Once he had completely exhausted himself, Vitus collapsed on his back. He lay there in the warehouse ruins, panting, waiting, hoping that this was, in fact, a rescue. A smell began to seep from the rim of his nostrils all the way into his brain; it was the odor of burnt things and fresh blood--tolerable at first, but it became agonizing once he realized he could not move no matter how hard he tried. It was as if the holes in his shoulder were still filled with guilt and bullets that weighed him down, pressing him to the earth so that there was no chance of escape anymore. Life, it seemed, had finally caught up to Vitus Bethel.
He heard footsteps, the sound of heavy boots crunching into charred dirt. There was more than one set, and they marched so hard and fast that Vitus could no longer discern how many people were coming toward him.
"You okay, kid?"
Vitus rolled his head toward the source of the voice and saw his crew standing around him. My crew, he thought to himself. Something about those words felt right, and in that moment, it was all he could think about.
Philip knelt down and examined the antique-dealer's new wound.
"He's losing blood fast."
"I'll be all right. Just help me up."
Jenn said nothing as she wrapped her arms around his chest, hoisting him up and supporting him with her own warm hands. Hayes put Vitus' good arm around his neck while Philip prepared a makeshift bandage and wrapped it around the antique-dealer's bleeding shoulder. Vitus, in the mean time, gestured to his now silent, former captor, now huddled on the ground beside him.
"He's still alive," said Vitus.
"I know," said Philip.
"Oh. Just seems a little anti-climactic, is all."
"What were you expecting?"
Vitus shook his head. "I don't know. Something more exciting. Possibly an explosion."
"Getting shot can be exciting."
"Not as much as you might think."
"Life isn't always exciting, Vitus. Sometimes things just happen, so be glad you're still alive," said Philip. "Besides, we may yet go out with a bang."
"What about him?" asked Jenn. Though she was overcome with the sudden urge to kick Ivanovich again while he was down and injured, she stayed with Vitus, where she felt she belonged. "You're not going to let him go, are you? Because if so, I swear to God, I will pummel you with my bruised and battered boyfriend."
"He's not going anywhere," said Philip.
While Hayes and Jenn helped Vitus aboard the boat named Bess, Philip disappeared with Ivanovich, reappearing only after the antique-dealer had begun to regain his strength with a lukewarm bowl of soup.
"Sorry about that," said Hayes. "I knew we should've gotten that microwave when we had a chance."
Vitus didn't mind at all. In fact, looking back in the years to come, he would rate this soup as the best he'd ever had. His wound was quickly cleaned and re-bandaged, his arm once again hung in his sling like a dead thing. When he'd finished dressing Vitus' shoulder, Philip handed the antique-dealer something small from his pocket. It was the derringer he had previously liberated from Ivanovich's collection.
"I thought you might need this."
"Thanks," said Vitus, but he had more to say--a question that had been eating at him since he had laid in the rubble with fallen bodies all around him and all the time in the world to contemplate his existence. "When we reached you on the radio, you said you were heading back to the manor."
"That's right."
"Why?"
"To pick up the settee," said Philip.
"You were going to go through with the trade?"
"Well, we were hoping to keep both you and the settee, but yes, we would have gone through with it."
"But it means so much to you. It meant so much to Jacobi."
"You're part of our crew, Vitus. You and Jenn both. We wouldn't leave you behind."
There were those words again, following him, haunting him. Our crew. Jenn cleared her throat. She stood behind them with another bowl of soup in her hands.
"I'll leave the two of you alone," said Philip. "Oh, and Vitus, do me a favor and give your sister a call. I made her a promise."
"Oh God, Vera. Was she okay?" Vitus asked, frantically.
"She's fine. I told her everything would be okay. Now enjoy the show." At that, Philip stood up from the picnic table and vanished into the boat's cabin.
"Thanks, but I really don't think I could eat another bowl," said Vitus as Jenn sat down beside him.
"What? This is my soup, shoulder boy. I got kidnapped, too, you know."
"Right. Sorry," said Vitus with a grin. "So what do we do now?"
Vitus didn't elaborate, but Jenn knew what he meant. He was asking whether they should stay or leave. Ivanovich had been taken care of, and the promise Vitus had made to the rest of the crew had been fulfilled. They were free--free to go anywhere they wanted. Figuring out exactly what they wanted, however, seemed to be the problem.
She shrugged as she slurped her chicken noodle soup. "I don't know," she said. "Ivanovich is gone, but Rasputin is still out there. I get the idea that he has a very long memory, too. This might be the safest place for us, for the time being."
Vitus nodded. "For the time being."
They sat quietly for a moment, mulling over what they had become. Vitus spoke first.
"Our friends are murderers and thieves. What does that make us?"
"It makes us us," said Jenn. "We've done the same things they have. We've had to. Out here it's all about surviving. That doesn't make us bad people."
She sounded confident. Vitus liked that about her.
"It makes me think about all those stories where the heroes end up becoming villains or villains end up becoming heroes, except there's no clearcut black and white. I never saw this coming. I guess you're right. It's all gray out here," said Vitus.
They stared out across the water where Ivanovich's yacht drifted aimlessly. They could just barely make out the squirming figure tied to the chair on the top deck. It was a sight that made the both of them smile. Then there came a small flash of light.
"Here it comes," said Vitus. He put his one good arm around Jenn and held her tight.
With a building rumble and an enormous bang, the yacht exploded. It was a burst like fireworks--bright and colorful, lighting up the darkening sky with flares of white and yellow and red. The antique-dealer and his partner barely saw it. It merely served as the backdrop for their kiss--long, deep, draining, and explosive in its own way. Their timing may have been cliche, but they didn't care. The moment was all that mattered. They held each other as the light dimmed, replaced only with the glow of distant fire. The night slowly surrounded them, giving them a place to hide and a place to belong, embracing but not consuming.
"This isn't at all what I thought it would be at first. I thought, Oh, this might be fun and exciting. Yeah, it's not. It's all looking over your shoulder with a heavy dose of gun-pointing. Not exactly my style."
Jenn sat on the edge of the bed, watching Vitus dress. His shoulder was much better now, but it still hurt when he used that arm for prolonged periods of time. He'd taken to the sling, though, deciding that instead of hindering him, it gave him an edge. No one would ever expect trouble from a man with a bad arm. He tightened the know of his necktie, examining it closely in the mirror, and deciding that he could do better, he pulled it loose and began again.
"What were you expecting?" he asked.
"I don't know," she replied. "I thought maybe I'd get to wear some slinky dresses and seduce strange men. You know, that kind of thing."
"You want to seduce strange men?" Vitus stared at her reflection in the mirror with raised eyebrows.
"Only for personal gain."
"Yeah, that makes me feel a lot better."
She threw a pillow at his back.
"I meant so that maybe I could drug him and snatch some blueprints or something. I don't know. Espionage stuff," she said.
"I don't think we're spies, dear."
"Oh, then what the hell are we?"
"I'm not sure," said Vitus. "I've been tossing the word caper around. What kind of people go on capers?"
"Thieves, maybe?"
"No, see, you're thinking heist. But I thought the same thing at first, too."
"How about no-goodniks? That's nice and non-specific."
Vitus nodded. "I can live with that. Did you sell all your paintings?"
"Most of them. Philip wanted a few for the museum. He said Mister Jacobi would have approved."
"That's great! Next time we're in the area, we'll have to swing by and see them."
Satisfied with his tie, Vitus slipped on a tan waistcoat and made some final adjustments to his collar.
"How do I look?"
"Amazing," said Jenn.
"Good. Now come on, we've got a caper to plan."
Vitus left the bedroom, descended the stairs, and opened the front door, exposing a small Alaskan street that they never thought they would see again. Waiting out front was a yellow taxi but nothing else. There were no burly men in dark suits waiting for them--that they could see, at least. The antique-dealer and his partner had no doubt that they were being watched. They were special. They were valuable. But most of all, they were dangerous, and Rasputin now knew that. They each ate a slice of toast as they descended the front steps, and then the both of them were whisked away by the taxi, which shot off like a rocket in the direction of Anchorage and a waiting crew.
"Oh relax, Vitus," said Ivanovich. "It's only your shoulder. You'll be fine."
If Vitus had the ability to move his arm at that particular moment, he would have used it to strangle Ivanovich if only for those words. As it turned out, however, karma had its own way of catching up to Malcolm Ivanovich. From his current position, huddled up in a fetal position atop a pile of charred wooden furniture, Vitus noticed a small speck on the dark suit of one of the henchmen. He could just barely see it and thought his eyes might be playing tricks on him at first, and then the dot started moving. It passed from cloth to flesh, and now Vitus could make it out clearly--a red dot like a laser sight. Vitus knew what was about to happen. He stayed down, drawing his legs up toward his body and closing his eyes very, very tightly.
He could hear Ivanovich saying, "What's that on your face?" Then came the sound of six rifle shots in rapid succession and the sickeningly dull thud of several heavy things hitting the ground around him.
Then for a moment, there was only silence, the sort of silence that begs for some--any--noise to be made. It was soon answered. Vitus at first began to hear a low moaning that crescendoed into a full wail accompanied by the words, "My shoulder. Oh God, my shoulder."
Vitus looked up to see Ivanovich's small frame doubled over beside him, and sure enough, he bore the telltale bloodied sign of a bullet hole in his left shoulder. With every ounce of strength left in his being, Vitus lifted himself from the rubble, using his only good arm, and stumbled over to the figure that, only moments before, had been so unbearably smug and self-assured. With a sudden burst of energy, the antique-dealer began repeatedly kicking the fallen collector on his wound while shouting such choice phrases as, "Oh, relax. It's only your shoulder. You'll be fine."
Once he had completely exhausted himself, Vitus collapsed on his back. He lay there in the warehouse ruins, panting, waiting, hoping that this was, in fact, a rescue. A smell began to seep from the rim of his nostrils all the way into his brain; it was the odor of burnt things and fresh blood--tolerable at first, but it became agonizing once he realized he could not move no matter how hard he tried. It was as if the holes in his shoulder were still filled with guilt and bullets that weighed him down, pressing him to the earth so that there was no chance of escape anymore. Life, it seemed, had finally caught up to Vitus Bethel.
He heard footsteps, the sound of heavy boots crunching into charred dirt. There was more than one set, and they marched so hard and fast that Vitus could no longer discern how many people were coming toward him.
"You okay, kid?"
Vitus rolled his head toward the source of the voice and saw his crew standing around him. My crew, he thought to himself. Something about those words felt right, and in that moment, it was all he could think about.
Philip knelt down and examined the antique-dealer's new wound.
"He's losing blood fast."
"I'll be all right. Just help me up."
Jenn said nothing as she wrapped her arms around his chest, hoisting him up and supporting him with her own warm hands. Hayes put Vitus' good arm around his neck while Philip prepared a makeshift bandage and wrapped it around the antique-dealer's bleeding shoulder. Vitus, in the mean time, gestured to his now silent, former captor, now huddled on the ground beside him.
"He's still alive," said Vitus.
"I know," said Philip.
"Oh. Just seems a little anti-climactic, is all."
"What were you expecting?"
Vitus shook his head. "I don't know. Something more exciting. Possibly an explosion."
"Getting shot can be exciting."
"Not as much as you might think."
"Life isn't always exciting, Vitus. Sometimes things just happen, so be glad you're still alive," said Philip. "Besides, we may yet go out with a bang."
"What about him?" asked Jenn. Though she was overcome with the sudden urge to kick Ivanovich again while he was down and injured, she stayed with Vitus, where she felt she belonged. "You're not going to let him go, are you? Because if so, I swear to God, I will pummel you with my bruised and battered boyfriend."
"He's not going anywhere," said Philip.
***
While Hayes and Jenn helped Vitus aboard the boat named Bess, Philip disappeared with Ivanovich, reappearing only after the antique-dealer had begun to regain his strength with a lukewarm bowl of soup.
"Sorry about that," said Hayes. "I knew we should've gotten that microwave when we had a chance."
Vitus didn't mind at all. In fact, looking back in the years to come, he would rate this soup as the best he'd ever had. His wound was quickly cleaned and re-bandaged, his arm once again hung in his sling like a dead thing. When he'd finished dressing Vitus' shoulder, Philip handed the antique-dealer something small from his pocket. It was the derringer he had previously liberated from Ivanovich's collection.
"I thought you might need this."
"Thanks," said Vitus, but he had more to say--a question that had been eating at him since he had laid in the rubble with fallen bodies all around him and all the time in the world to contemplate his existence. "When we reached you on the radio, you said you were heading back to the manor."
"That's right."
"Why?"
"To pick up the settee," said Philip.
"You were going to go through with the trade?"
"Well, we were hoping to keep both you and the settee, but yes, we would have gone through with it."
"But it means so much to you. It meant so much to Jacobi."
"You're part of our crew, Vitus. You and Jenn both. We wouldn't leave you behind."
There were those words again, following him, haunting him. Our crew. Jenn cleared her throat. She stood behind them with another bowl of soup in her hands.
"I'll leave the two of you alone," said Philip. "Oh, and Vitus, do me a favor and give your sister a call. I made her a promise."
"Oh God, Vera. Was she okay?" Vitus asked, frantically.
"She's fine. I told her everything would be okay. Now enjoy the show." At that, Philip stood up from the picnic table and vanished into the boat's cabin.
"Thanks, but I really don't think I could eat another bowl," said Vitus as Jenn sat down beside him.
"What? This is my soup, shoulder boy. I got kidnapped, too, you know."
"Right. Sorry," said Vitus with a grin. "So what do we do now?"
Vitus didn't elaborate, but Jenn knew what he meant. He was asking whether they should stay or leave. Ivanovich had been taken care of, and the promise Vitus had made to the rest of the crew had been fulfilled. They were free--free to go anywhere they wanted. Figuring out exactly what they wanted, however, seemed to be the problem.
She shrugged as she slurped her chicken noodle soup. "I don't know," she said. "Ivanovich is gone, but Rasputin is still out there. I get the idea that he has a very long memory, too. This might be the safest place for us, for the time being."
Vitus nodded. "For the time being."
They sat quietly for a moment, mulling over what they had become. Vitus spoke first.
"Our friends are murderers and thieves. What does that make us?"
"It makes us us," said Jenn. "We've done the same things they have. We've had to. Out here it's all about surviving. That doesn't make us bad people."
She sounded confident. Vitus liked that about her.
"It makes me think about all those stories where the heroes end up becoming villains or villains end up becoming heroes, except there's no clearcut black and white. I never saw this coming. I guess you're right. It's all gray out here," said Vitus.
They stared out across the water where Ivanovich's yacht drifted aimlessly. They could just barely make out the squirming figure tied to the chair on the top deck. It was a sight that made the both of them smile. Then there came a small flash of light.
"Here it comes," said Vitus. He put his one good arm around Jenn and held her tight.
With a building rumble and an enormous bang, the yacht exploded. It was a burst like fireworks--bright and colorful, lighting up the darkening sky with flares of white and yellow and red. The antique-dealer and his partner barely saw it. It merely served as the backdrop for their kiss--long, deep, draining, and explosive in its own way. Their timing may have been cliche, but they didn't care. The moment was all that mattered. They held each other as the light dimmed, replaced only with the glow of distant fire. The night slowly surrounded them, giving them a place to hide and a place to belong, embracing but not consuming.
***
"This isn't at all what I thought it would be at first. I thought, Oh, this might be fun and exciting. Yeah, it's not. It's all looking over your shoulder with a heavy dose of gun-pointing. Not exactly my style."
Jenn sat on the edge of the bed, watching Vitus dress. His shoulder was much better now, but it still hurt when he used that arm for prolonged periods of time. He'd taken to the sling, though, deciding that instead of hindering him, it gave him an edge. No one would ever expect trouble from a man with a bad arm. He tightened the know of his necktie, examining it closely in the mirror, and deciding that he could do better, he pulled it loose and began again.
"What were you expecting?" he asked.
"I don't know," she replied. "I thought maybe I'd get to wear some slinky dresses and seduce strange men. You know, that kind of thing."
"You want to seduce strange men?" Vitus stared at her reflection in the mirror with raised eyebrows.
"Only for personal gain."
"Yeah, that makes me feel a lot better."
She threw a pillow at his back.
"I meant so that maybe I could drug him and snatch some blueprints or something. I don't know. Espionage stuff," she said.
"I don't think we're spies, dear."
"Oh, then what the hell are we?"
"I'm not sure," said Vitus. "I've been tossing the word caper around. What kind of people go on capers?"
"Thieves, maybe?"
"No, see, you're thinking heist. But I thought the same thing at first, too."
"How about no-goodniks? That's nice and non-specific."
Vitus nodded. "I can live with that. Did you sell all your paintings?"
"Most of them. Philip wanted a few for the museum. He said Mister Jacobi would have approved."
"That's great! Next time we're in the area, we'll have to swing by and see them."
Satisfied with his tie, Vitus slipped on a tan waistcoat and made some final adjustments to his collar.
"How do I look?"
"Amazing," said Jenn.
"Good. Now come on, we've got a caper to plan."
Vitus left the bedroom, descended the stairs, and opened the front door, exposing a small Alaskan street that they never thought they would see again. Waiting out front was a yellow taxi but nothing else. There were no burly men in dark suits waiting for them--that they could see, at least. The antique-dealer and his partner had no doubt that they were being watched. They were special. They were valuable. But most of all, they were dangerous, and Rasputin now knew that. They each ate a slice of toast as they descended the front steps, and then the both of them were whisked away by the taxi, which shot off like a rocket in the direction of Anchorage and a waiting crew.
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