Ivan Dobnik - Vilenica

114 · György Dragomán
Zeus broke into a smile. “Sure it is. I said I’d take you two over the border,
and that either happens like this or it doesn’t happen at all. But if you don’t
like it, that’s fine, too. If you want, I’ll take you back to the nearest town.
But I can’t give back the money. Sorry, but that’s the deal. Talk it over, decide
for yourselves.” Zeus turned his eyes back to the bears. The man said
something very loud, at which the woman started to shout, but the man
kept at it, too, and then the woman suddenly gave him a slap. The man
fell silent. Turning at the sound of the smack, Zeus saw the man’s face turn
slowly blue, more from the cold than from the blow, it seemed; at which
the woman said something to the man, who nodded. The woman looked
at Zeus. “All right,” she said, “we’ll give it a try.”
Zeus gave a wave of the hand. “All right,” he said. Reaching again into the
cooler, he tossed them the green army shoulder bag. “Go ahead and pack
your stuff in there. Then come on, we’ll go to the back, where I’ll open up
the door and we’ll go inside to the bears. The important thing is to move
slowly, and once you’ve sat up on them, hold those bellybands tight. The
bears will only start off when I whistle. They’ll go for the smell of water,
the creek is on the other side of the border. Up till then they know which
way to go; and once they’ve gotten there, they’ll start drinking right away,
and that’s right when you should get off their backs. Being drugged up and
all, the bears are pretty fast, and you don’t want them bringing you back.
Walk along the creek bed downstream to the first bridge. Then you’re on
the main road; you can keep the rubber boots, but leave the wetsuits under
the bridge.”
Zeus waited for them to finish packing. Then he left the bus, and they followed;
the man brought the bag. It was dark. The mud squished around
their heels as they went to the rear of the vehicle. The man’s boots must
have been a bit too big, for he almost fell before the woman grabbed his
arm. Zeus pulled a chain to lower the ramp, a sheet of roof iron nailed
over some boards that creaked its way down. And then, turning the winch,
Zeus opened the back door of the bus. Standing there in the dim light
streaming out of the cage, he turned to his clients and took two thick, document-stuffed
envelopes from his pocket. “Getting across will be a cinch,”
he said, handing them over, “but be careful, they can ask for your papers
anywhere up to thirty miles from the border. Not that you’ll get far with
these Kazakh diplomatic passports. No, they’re just good enough to win
you some time. The best thing would be if you say you got AIDS, because
then you’ll automatically be granted refuge status on medical grounds. But
for that you need the virus, too. Lucky for you, you went with an old pro
like me. For another twenty percent I can take care of that for you, too.”
Reaching into his pocket even before he finished speaking, Zeus pulled out
two syringes and held them out toward the woman, who said something
to the man, who firmly shook his head. “We have no more money,” said
the woman.