If you’re just joining this story, you may want to start from the beginning.
This story follows the first in Jenn’s Rediscovered series, Last Assault on Oak Island.
Lauren found her new room beyond adequate for mere creature comforts. Carlos kept the room service hopping the next day with requests she never made. Somehow, however, the attendant arrived every two hours with all sorts of oddities; a pirozhki with cheese, potato, and veal sausage filling at ten o'clock, followed by a smoked duck croissant at noon. A dab of golden oscietra caviar with green onions, lemon, and crackers came at two, complete with a side of vodka bearing drowned anise seeds in the glass bottom.
By four o'clock, she was beyond full, her palate jaded, when the lamb-stuffed grape leaves and yogurt arrived from an Old Town restaurant. Either the curator had grossly over-estimated her appetite or he was trying to make up for something.
Like keeping her at the wheel of an econo-box rental car in a foreign country until the wee hours of the morning, she guessed.
Or maybe it was an effort to keep her in the room running down the names of the ill-tempered men Padolski had given them last night while Carlos spent the gorgeous sunny day tromping through the Prague District in search of Yuri Straczynskie.
She had spent the entire morning tracking down Movitch, only to learn, after seventeen phone calls and extensive hand-to-mouth use of a Polish guidebook dictionary, that the dealer had died three weeks ago. In Jordan.
Sid Lewkowicz was even more elusive. It took an hour and a half of verbal grappling with assorted Tarnow phone operators for Lauren to understand Padolski's handwriting and slurred vodka-enhanced German had transformed Zig into Sid Lewkowicz. Yes, there was a Zig Lewkowicz—phone number, street address and shop name included—but a call to the shop relayed that the man himself wouldn't be available until after five o'clock.
Lauren sat back, taking a prejudiced nibble of the golden fish eggs. This was followed by an unplanned gulp of licorice flavored vodka, which was diluted further by a long swallow of the flat soft drink she had ordered two hours ago. So much for expanding her international palate today. Being buried in phone calls and scraps of paper was just not the ambiance for caviar challenges.
She moved to the wide hotel window overlooking the Vistula River running through the city. Near it three young boys were flying a kite, a hideous design that Lauren knew had to be the latest juvenile commercial craze. The kite flagged over the river, belligerently towing its land-bound young master as the boy leaned against the rising wind.
The kite flipped, bucked, swirled wildly. Suddenly the string snapped. The kite rose with newfound freedom, and then dove with finality into the water. The boys ran to the river edge.
Lauren wasn't close enough to see, but she imagined their collective expressions as the kite sank out of sight. Disbelief. Powerless frustration. Hurt. Loss and anger.
A woman joined them, a consoling arm going around the boy now crying. Lauren could imagine the comforting words. It was not the only kite in the world. There would be others at the store. Papa would buy one. Everything would be all right.
For an odd reason the scene reminded Lauren of Carlos when they came away from Fredericks' shop without the amber panels. She hadn't exactly been the gentle mother hen figure promising they could locate and acquire the next set of crates.
But the gamut of emotions was unsettlingly similar.
Rybak glared at Padolski.
"You're not with the Americans now," he growled across the table. "With me, you eat here."
Padolski looked around at the modest café and shrugged.
"I want to know what you told him. All of it."
"So you can relieve him of his acquisition?"
This put Rybak at a momentary loss. "Reubens has seen you already?"
"That is the Russian?"
"Don't be stupid with me."
Padolski feigned a look of innocence, and then his face broke into a laugh. "You have resorted to simple stealing. Is that what you plan for the American?"
Rybak's hands clenched on the uneven table. "Where did you send them? Movitch?"
"Movitch is dead." Padolski finished his beer. "This American has a handicap you may wish to use."
This brought a wicked grin from Rybak. "That extra will get you no more than I promised. I know about the girl."
Padolski felt robbed of what he had considered a pricey tidbit. "Then perhaps you know the names I gave them, too."
Rybak ordered them both another beer. He hated Roman Padolski, wished he could use someone else for this. It was impossible, he knew. Fredericks had unknowingly made that decision when he gave out Padolski's name. "No. I need your help and you know that." The words grated against Rybak's throat. "Did you tell them Movitch? That will slow them down. Who else?"
Padolski took a sudden interest in his beer. "Straczynskie has been active lately in—"
"Straczynskie hasn't the finances for such an acquisition. Nor the brain to steal it," Rybak added. "You don't believe he has it."
"I believe no one has it," Padolski clarified.
"Who else?"
Padolski studied Rybak's glass eye until the other man reached across the table for him. He sat back, holding up a hand. "Don't threaten me, Rybak." He nodded at him. "You should watch yourself. The girl is looking for amber rings."
Rybak scowled. "And I am looking for Americans. Who else did you tell them?"
Padolski relented. "Lewkowicz has been uncooperative lately. No response to messages from the Guild, I hear. Very selective with his clients. Too quiet at the auctions."
Rybak nodded. "Lewkowicz. Who else?"
"No one."
He stared at Padolski, judging his credibility.
"No one else," Padolski repeated.
Rybak's fingers tightened on his mug. "Now, this one is on me." He placed a large bank note on the table. "Did you see Reubens today or yesterday? And what did you tell him?"
Carlos and Lauren left Warsaw without being able to contact Zig Lewkowicz. Lauren had tried calling until six o'clock, even ringing his home address a few times, to no avail. At seven o'clock that evening they headed south to Tarnow. Carlos' efforts to locate and question Yuri Straczynskie had resulted in nothing. The man had, as Padolski predicted, panicked at Carlos' request and suggested half a dozen minor dealers in the vicinity. The curator had followed up on each name, and came away with nothing, save the waste of a beautiful day.
Thirty minutes into the drive, Carlos and Lauren encountered a rainstorm that slowed their trip to nearly half pace. By the time they reached the outskirts of Tarnow it was past midnight and still raining.
Ten minutes closer to the city, Carlos rolled down the fogged car window to read the sign of the only hotel boasting vacancies. Lauren stopped the Audi in a puddle of water larger than its wheelbase. He looked back at the worn guidebook.
"A knife and fork. Martini glass. Bottled water." He sighed and closed the guidebook, estimating Lauren's weary expression. "Good enough for tonight."
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