The American And The Russian (Benny Watts) [The Queens Gambit]

Part 26 The Door

I got dressed and sat at the table looking at the door, It had been four hours since Benny called and watching the moments tick by on the clock only worried me more. Where was he? What was going on? What did he mean? I tried to force it out of my mind sitting here in the haunting quiet. Until it was suddenly interrupted by a loud and forceful bang on the door. A knock, but done so hard it was as if they tried to break down the door, I didn't move knowing the door was locked up tight the metal of the door shaking in the frame as the loud knock came again, I held my breath feeling my heart beat out of my chest hearing it echo in my ears, as the door knocked louder and more forceful. I got up from the chair slipping off my shoes to carefully and silently step across the icy cold stone of the basement floor, I walked to the steps of the door holding the railing there looking as the door knocked again the lock rattling from its testing. I tried with all my might not to scream, As I listened

"Dumayesh', ona tam?" a voice asks, I knew that voice, he was one of my security men

"Vam ne kazhetsya, chto ona slishkom umna dlya etogo?" Another voice asks

"Net, ona dostatochno glupa, chtoby vse yeshche zdes'."

"Davayte budem ser'yeznymi, yesli on tozhe poluchil soobshcheniye, kak vy dumayete, ona dostatochno glupa, chtoby vse yeshche byt' zdes'? kak tol'ko ona poluchit yego soobshcheniye, ona sdelayet beguna, ya govoryu vam, chto eto mesto pusto"

"YA vse yeshche khochu proverit'"

Another louder knock came before there was silence.

The next sound I heard was the clicking and clacking of metal on metal and I saw the light that usual cascade through the keyhole was being blocked and flickering, I looked around for somewhere to hide, Damn this stupid basemnt apartment and its lack of rooms! I stepped and quickly and quietly as I could across the floor into the bedroom quickly hiding under the bed pulling the duvet over the side to hide me as I heard the door unlock and click open.

I heard there flat footed heavy steps down the steps and onto the stone floor of the apartment, there was two men for sure. I peaked out from under the covers a tiny bit as I saw the figures of two men in long grey coats slightly blurred by the glass bedroom window they stood in the apartment looking around investigating objects and paperwork, One came into the bedroom so I hid myself away putting a hand over my mouth to muffle my breathing he lifted the covers checking the mattress but he didn't look under here, He then moved putting his hand under the bed and I as quietly as I could move out the way of his hand his fingers only inches from my hair he searched around about to move closer-

"Prikhodite posmotret' na eto?" The other called so he returned the duvet how it was and left the bedroom going out into the apartment

"U nego bylo drugoye mesto, eto ob"yasnyayet, chto on arendoval yeshche dva mesta, a ne zdes'? B'yus' ob zaklad, ona v odnom iz nikh." The man explained

Another Apartment? Benny had other apartments? That he didn't tell me about?

"Togda nam nuzhno spustit'sya tuda, no pozvat' kogo-nibud' syuda. YA khochu znat', chto kto-to idet ili vykhodit iz etogo zdaniya" He explained before I heard another noise a familiar sound of pills in a bottle "Pozvoni yemu. Ona ne prinimayet lekarstva." the voice said before I heard there hurried steps leave slamming the door shut behind them. I waited under that bed for an hour to make sure they weren't still here, or still looking in the windows waiting for me. I climbed out and tenderly stepped across the floor of the apartment it was empty the door closed having locked itself behind it as it always did, things about the apartment moved and scattered in odd places from there searching, My bottle of pills sat on the table in the centre of a half played chess board and on top of if something that made a horrific fear grow inside of me, more then having my security inches from me, more then Casak knowing I was off my pills, more then the idea they where this close to narrowing down where I was. It was that on the icy floor among papers and books sat the dinning table and its chairs, the chess board sat on it the pieces ascue from me messing with it, Benny's coffee cup on one side my own apple juice glass on the other, My pill bottle on the board the rainbow of coloured capsules tinted a slightly more yellow colour from the plastic of the bottle the white screw on lid done tightly with my name across the rim, as if left for me to find, Ontop of the bottle on the flat lid cover, Sat A silver ring. The Wide rim polished on the inside from skin contact, the flat face on the outside with the shaped edges. Benny's ring. I had never seen him parted from it the whole time I had known him, even when being here with him I had never really seen him take it off except for a shower or a bath and even then it would sit on the sink and be put back on his right ring finger as soon as he could.

I knew this was a message from them. From Casak. And I knew what it meant.

They had Benny.