The pale Russian youth whom Odile had engaged as her driver displayed neither fear nor pity as he sent his battered panel truck hurtling through the streets of north Moscow, and he now assailed her additionally with the plot development of a movie in which he seemed to be inviting her to invest. Odile spoke no Russian and he no French, so he framed these imaginings in an imperfect English that from time to time required him to take both hands off the wheel and, for her benefit, shape the vectors of his desire in the air before them. It was a slate-gray afternoon in March that threatened snow.
Odile, having been in Moscow for three days, found herself quite ready to leave. Assuming the success of the present outing, her fifth of the day, she and her partner, Thierry Colin, would in less than three hours be boarding the train that would return them to Paris. Though she had no regrets about agreeing to this venture, all was not well at home, and only her driver's studied recklessness kept her from brooding over her troubles.
In due course, they arrived intact at an open cobblestone square off Tsvetnoy Bulvar, not far from the circus and the old Central Market, now padlocked. Along the square's eastern periphery ran a row of dilapidated kiosks, only one of which, lit feebly within, might conceivably be open for commerce. Her driver stopped a short distance away, executed a brisk three-point turn, and backed his vehicle up to the mouth of the scorched-looking structure. The day's business had taught them that it was impolitic to leave the engine running, as prudence might otherwise dictate, and he hastened now to shut it off.
After taking a moment to collect herself, Odile got out of the truck and headed with as much aplomb as she could muster to a spot behind the kiosk where three men stood smoking in the frigid air. They didn't look particularly surprised or happy to see her.
"Good afternoon," she said in English. "I am told you are well stocked with the merchandise I require today. Perhaps we can discuss it."
The spokesman for the group, a compact, muscular youth barely out of his teens, considered her carefully. "You like drugs, sweet-pie? Hash from Afghanistan?" He smiled accommodatingly. "Or maybe you like big American refrigerator? Anything you need, gorgeous, we fix you up."
Odile had left Paris somewhat impulsively and hadn't thought to pack for the weather. She had been cold since Warsaw, her pleated plaid overcoat was self-evidently French, and the offer of refrigerators struck her as an insult of some kind. She shrugged and said nothing.
As if they had been waiting for just this signal, the other two men approached a steel storage bin appended to the kiosk. One produced a key, and, cursing immoderately, set about unlocking it.
"We have also souvenirs, patriotic mementos. Maybe this is what you come for? Very good merchandise. Kick-ass."
In fact it was what she'd come for, and she was annoyed to realize that the men had known this from the start. Russia more and more impressed her as a place of thundering redundancies, and in the spirit of this recognition she had learned to state her purpose clearly.
"I am looking for May Day flags of the Soviet years. If they are the right kind, I will buy them all from you in dollars." She waited a beat while they inspected her person thoughtfully. "The money is in the truck with my driver. If I like them, he will pay you. He has a gun."
These words had an instant and enlivening effect, and shortly four grandly oversized Soviet banners, perhaps nine feet on their longer side and made of red velvet, lay spread out on the cobblestones for Odile's comsideration. Fringed extravagantly with fine gold braid, they bore across their faces, along with the lately defunct hammer and sickle, a multitude of meticulously appliqued decorations in satin, cotton, and lightweight wool. Each flag was unique, depicting the several architects and contractors of Soviet communism grouped together in attitudes of slighly pained farsightedness. Different periods were represented, and the personnel varied accordingly. One flag featured a likeness of Stalin, who by a quirk of handicraft, gazed slyly at the viewer with an expression of robust good humor. He seemed to be sharing a joke.
"Very interesting," she said after examining the merchandise. "How do I know they're real?"
A small silence ensued as all present pondered the question.
"I will tell you," her interlocutor finally said. "Straight up, no bullshit. In all of Moscow you do not find flags like these. Handmade by Russian factory workers to be entered in May Day competition for whole Soviet Union. These are objects of . . ." He turned to the man who had unlocked the van. "What is English word, Leonya? Cultural . . ."
"Patrimony," the man pronounced with satisfaction. "Highly illegal."
"To take them out of Russia is a crime, but we do not take them out of Russia because we are not criminals. Our business is business--this is obvious to everyone. So enough studipities." He blew into his fists a couple of times for warmth and calculated. "I will sell you these four very fine artistical objects at the price of--" his ice-blue eyes scanning the sky for counsel "--at the exclusive price of eighteen hundred American dollars cash, no tax. Almost a gift."
Odile sniffed. As it happened, she'd been given standing instructions to pay whatever was asked, and though mildly shocked by such intemperance she had purchased twenty-six flags over the past three days, never parting with more than three-thousand for any single one. Her employer had given her a fifty-thousand-dollar stake to work with, and this would be the last of it. "Okay," she said at last. "Pack them up and we have a deal."

[ . . . ]