He had sent money through Pavel.
He had called Pavel for updates.
Each time he asked to speak with Elena, Pavel gave him a reason she could not come to the phone.
She was sleeping.
She was at church.
She was too upset.
Eventually, Pavel delivered a typed note bearing Elena’s name.
It said she could not forgive the life Andre had chosen and did not want him to return.
Andre had obeyed because he believed staying away was the only gift she would accept from him.
Now he held eighty-six pieces of proof that she had been waiting.
“You said she returned my cards,” Andre said.
Pavel nodded quickly.
“She did.”
Clara opened the inventory photographs on her phone.
“The storage unit contained twenty-three unopened cards addressed to Elena.
Every envelope had been delivered to Mr.
Markov’s office first.
None had postal return markings.”
She enlarged one photograph.
Across the back of an envelope, someone had written a date and the initials P.M.
Andre stared at it.
Pavel took one step backward.
The guard at the service corridor moved closer.
“This proves nothing,” Pavel said.
“My staff handled thousands of documents.
Anyone could have written those initials.”
“Then perhaps the transfer ledger will help,” Clara replied.
Andre turned to the next section of the folder.
The ledger showed payments from the sale of Elena’s apartment and two Brooklyn rental properties.
More than $1.8 million had moved through three accounts before reaching the St.
Orlov Relief Foundation.
Each transfer appeared to carry Andre’s authorization.
Andre studied the signature beside his name.
“I never signed this.”
Pavel spread his hands.
“Your office authorized countless transactions while you were abroad.
You may not remember every one.”
“I remember my own signature.”
Naomi, the auction clerk, stepped forward again.
Her knees appeared to tremble, but she kept moving until she stood beside Clara.
“There is something else,” she said.
Pavel glared at her.
“Be very careful.”
Naomi swallowed.
“Lot 47 was not in the original auction catalog.
Mr.
Markov brought it to the hotel this afternoon in his briefcase.
He told me to enter it under an anonymous donor code and destroy the intake sheet after the sale.”
“Did you destroy it?” Andre asked.
“No.”
She retrieved a folded carbon copy from beneath the payment table.
Pavel’s signature appeared at the bottom.
For several seconds, the only sound in the ballroom was the faint clinking of glassware from the abandoned dinner tables.
Pavel looked around the room and seemed to understand that his audience had changed.
These were no longer donors admiring a respected attorney.
