"Yes." Misha sighed and ran a hand over his face. A face whose furrows showed only too well the effect of too much vodka, too many cigarettes. "They will be adopted by proper families?"

"Nadiya will see to it. She loves children, you know. It's why she chose this work."

Misha managed a weak smile. "Perhaps she could find me an American family."

Gregor had to get him away from the window. He pointed to the valise, which was resting on an end table. "Go ahead. Check it if you wish."

Misha went to the valise and unsnapped the catch. Inside were stacks of American bills, bound together in neat bundles. Twenty thousand dollars, enough for all the vodka a man would need to rot his liver. How cheap it is these days to buy a man's soul, thought Gregor. On the streets of this new Russia, one could barter for anything. A crate of Israeli oranges, an American television, the pleasure of a woman's body. Opportunity everywhere, for those with the talent to mine it.

Misha stood staring down at that money, his money, but not with a look of triumph. Rather, it-was a look of disgust. He closed the valise and stood with head bowed, hands resting on the hard black plastic.

Gregor stepped up behind Misha's balding head, raised the barrel of a silenced automatic, and fired two bullets into the man's brain.

Blood and grey matter spattered the far wall. Misha collapsed face-down, toppling the end table as he fell. The valise thudded onto the rug beside him.

Gregor snatched up the valise before the pooling blood could reach it. There were clumps of human tissue on the side. He went into the bathroom, used toilet paper to wipe off the splatters from the plastic, and flushed away the tissue. When he walked back into the room where Misha lay, the pool of blood had already crept across the floor and was soaking into another rug.