Amazon.com description: Product Description: Novgorod the Great, ancient city of a thousand saints, August 1833. A young widow and a prosperous merchant encounter each other by chance in an inn kept by a man whose antipathy to all guests is matched only by his violent loathing of poets. But during a night spent in each other's company, filled with dawning hope, revelation, unfortunate accidents and pickled eggs, several remarkable stories unfold. The story of John Cochrane, pedestrian traveler extraordinaire, and deceased husband of the young widow Ksenia; of his infamous father, who spent his life defrauding governments and upsetting Napoleon; of Ksenia Loginova's perilous 6,000-mile journey across Siberia and the unwelcome attentions of a troubadour; of the merchant Horatio who reflects on love, slavery and arithmetic. Among other matters discussed at length in the small hours of the night are carnivorous Colombian elephants and the questionable motives of travelers . . .