As long as monetary instruments are circulating within the country, there must be people who have a lot of them.
But how do you find such a fox?”
Ostap sighed heavily.
He must have been dreaming of finding a wealthy individual for quite some time.
“It is so nice,” he said pensively, “to work with a legal millionaire in a properly functioning capitalist country with long established bourgeois traditions.
In such places, a millionaire is a well-known figure.
His address is common knowledge.
He lives in a mansion somewhere in Rio de Janeiro.
You go to see him in his office and you take his money without even having to go past the front hall, right after greeting him.
And on top of that, you do it nicely and politely:
“Hello, Sir, please don’t worry.
I’m going to have to bother you a bit.
All right.
Done.”
That’s it.
That’s civilization for you!
What could be simpler?
A gentleman in the company of gentlemen takes care of a bit of business.
Just don’t shoot up the chandelier, there’s no need for that.
And here . . . my God!
This is such a cold country.
Everything is hidden, everything is underground.
Even the Commissariat of Finance, with its mighty fiscal apparatus, cannot find a Soviet millionaire.
A millionaire may very well be sitting at the next table in this so-called summer garden, drinking forty-kopeck Tip-Top beer.
That’s what really upsets me!”
“Does that mean,” Balaganov asked after a pause, “that if you could find such a secret millionaire, then . . .?”
“Hold it right there.
I know what you’re going to say.
No, it’s not what you think, not at all.
I won’t try to choke him with a pillow or pistol-whip him.
None of that silliness.
Oh, if only I could find a millionaire!
I’ll make sure he’ll bring me the money himself, on a platter with a blue rim.”
“That sounds really good,” chuckled Balaganov simple-heartedly. “Five hundred thousand on a platter with a blue rim.”
Balaganov got up and started circling the table.
He smacked his lips plaintively, stopped, opened his mouth as if he was going to say something, sat down without uttering a word, and then got up again.
Ostap watched his routine nonchalantly.
“So he’d bring it himself?” asked Balaganov suddenly in a raspy voice. “On a platter?
And if he doesn’t?
Where is that Rio de Janeiro?
Far away?
I don’t believe that every single man there wears white pants.
Forget it, Bender.
With five hundred thousand one can live a good life even here.”
“Absolutely,” said Ostap smiling, “one certainly can.
But don’t get worked up for no reason.
You don’t have the five hundred thousand, do you?”
A deep wrinkle appeared on Balaganov’s smooth, virginal forehead.
He looked at Ostap uncertainly and said slowly:
“I know a millionaire.”