Legends

There was another interval of silence. Then a discreet electric current reached the lock in the door and it clicked open the width of a finger. Martin pushed it wide open and strode into the warehouse. He heard the door click closed behind him as he headed down the cement passageway lined with calendars from the 1980s, each with a photograph of a spread-eagled movie starlet flirting with nakedness. In the glass enclosed cubical at the end of the passageway, a young woman with pointed breasts and short hair the color and texture of straw sat behind a desk, painting her fingernails fuchsia. Martin poked his head through the open door. “You will be Doris Rainfield,” he guessed.

The woman looked up, intrigued. “Samat went and told you ‘bout me, did he, dear?” She batted the fingers of her right hand in the air to dry the nail polish. “I like Samat, I do. Oh, he’s one for putting on airs, waltzing in with that topcoat of’is flung over ’is shoulders like it was some kinda cape or other. He looked like the sheik in one of them Rudy Valentino silent period pictures, if you get my drift.”

“I do get your drift, Mrs. Rainfield.”

The woman lowered her voice to share a confidence. “Truth is I’m not Mrs. Rainfield. I used to be Mrs. Rainfield but I got myself legally hitched six weeks and three days back to Nigel Froth, which makes me Mrs. Froth, doesn’t it, dear? Do you recognize the name? My Nigel’s a world class snooker player. Made the quarter finals of the U.K. snooker championship last year, lost to the bloke who came in second, he did, which was a feather in ‘is cap, I’m referring to Nigel’s cap, not the bloke who came in second’s cap. I still use my first husband’s name at the office because that’s what Mr. Rabbani calls me. All the paperwork ‘ere is in the name of Rainfield and he says it’d be a bloody pain in the you know what to switch over.”

Martin leaned against the door jamb. “Does Mrs. Rainfield act any differently than Mrs. Froth?”

“I s’pose she does, now that you mention it. My Mr. Froth fancies me in miniskirts and tight sweaters, he does. Mr. Rainfield wouldn’t ’ave let me outa me house dressed like this. It’s a lot like Samat’s cape, isn’t it, dear? What you wear is who you want to be.” Fluttering unnaturally long lashes, Mrs. Rainfield pointed out the door at the bitter end of the passageway with her eyes. “Through there, then cross the warehouse on a diagonal and you’ll fall on Mr. Rabbani’s bailiwick. His factotum, an Egyptian named Rachid—trust me, you won’t miss him—minds the door.”

“Is Rachid his real name or is it a matter of Mr. Rabbani not wanting to redo the paperwork?”

Mrs. Rainfield giggled appreciatively.

Martin said, “Thank you” and started down the corridors created by stacks of cartons, all of them stencilled with the word “Prosthesis” and “Arm” or “Leg” and a measurement in inches and centimeters, along with a notation in smaller print that the articles had been manufactured in the United States of America. Above Martin’s head, diffused sunlight streamed through skylights stained with soot and bird droppings. A heavy-set man with unshaven jowls and untidy hair, clearly the body guard, loomed beyond the last cartons. A handwritten nametag pinned to the wide lapel of his double-breasted suit jacket identified him as Rachid.

“You carrying?” he inquired, sizing Martin up with eyes that conveyed indifference to the visitor’s fate in the unlikely event he resisted inspection.

Martin played a role he wasn’t accustomed to: innocent. “Carrying what?”

Rachid snapped, “Something the municipal police might mistake for a handgun.”

Grinning, Martin spread his legs apart and raised his arms. The bodyguard frisked him very professionally, passing his hand so high up the crotch that he grazed his penis with his knuckles, causing Martin to shudder.

“You ticklish, then?” the bodyguard remarked with a smirk. He inclined his head in the direction of a door with a neatly lettered plastic placard on it that said “Taletbek Rabbani—Export.” Martin knocked. After a moment he knocked again and heard the scratchy voice of an old man call out weakly, “So what are you waiting on, my son, a hand delivered invite?”