He picked a run-down-looking hotel with a lot of trucks parked in front of weathered doors. He buttoned the tux jacket to hide the blood that now formed a Rorschach test on his shirt. There was a heavyset woman with bottle-blond hair behind the desk, a cigarette hung from her lower lip as if affixed there with glue. She was staring at an old-style tube TV that sat on the counter. The images showed mobs in the street, police in riot gear, bricks and stones and Molotov cocktails being thrown. Occasionally the picture would cut back to an older man in a suit behind the ubiquitous news desk. He and his female counterpart sounded serious, but Franny had no idea what they were saying. Then he recognized that equestrian statue. The riots were occurring in Talas. At first his reaction was indifference—couldn’t happen to a nicer shithole. Then he remembered the fear and the gnawing rage he’d felt in that hospital, Baba Yaga’s ominous warnings, and he felt a lot less dismissive.

The clerk continued to ignore him and watch the television. This time he was going to have to speak.

“Uh, hi. Need a room. Two beds.” He should have left it at that, but he found himself adding, “I’m an American. Came to visit my grandma. We got lost that’s why we’re so late—”

“Don’t care,” the woman said. “Four thousand five hundred tenge.”

“Uh, wow, okay.”

“You got dollars?”

“Yeah.”

“I’ll take twenty-five of those instead.”

“Okay.”

Franny returned to the van and pulled out a bundled stack. Everything in the bag were hundreds. “Well crap.” He folded a bill between his fingers and thought; made up his mind. Returning to the lobby he held the bill so the woman could see the denomination.

“How about this. I need a clean shirt and pants, socks and underwear, a razor and shaving soap, some pain pills and antibiotic ointment and bandages. Oh, and something to eat. I get that from you and you get this hundred to cover the cost and another hundred when you deliver.”

The woman shifted the cigarette to the other side of her mouth. “Deal.” She slid a key across the desk to him.

“Don’t call the cops.”

“You think I’m an idiot? They would just take the money from me.”

Franny nodded, swept up the key, and left. Parking in front of the room he unlocked the door and left it standing open while he went back for Baba Yaga. She weighed next to nothing, but it was still almost too much for his shoulder and side. By the time he carried her through the door his legs were shaking and tears of pain were rolling down his cheeks. He collapsed onto his knees and dropped the old lady. She gave a moan, and a babble of Russian. Her eyes rolled back and Franny panicked.

“Oh, shit, oh, shit, oh shit, don’t die.”