Black Knight in Red Square (24 page)

Rostnikov found a stairway as quickly as he could, made his way up two flights, and caught the passenger elevator down to the lobby where the KGB men could pick him up again.

Choosing a taxi required some care. Fortunately, the first one he hailed was driven by a bearded young man with a massively bored look on his face.

“Kropotkinskaya Embankment,” Rostnikov said, settling in the back seat. “The swimming pool.”

The driver twisted around to examine Rostnikov briefly, trying to imagine what this creature would look like in a bathing suit. And then he drove.

“I have taken down your license number and your name,” Rostnikov said to the driver a few blocks later. He had not bothered to look back for the KGB men.

“My number?” asked the driver.

“I am with the police, Chief Inspector Rostnikov.” He held his identification up for the man to see in the rearview mirror.

“What have I done?” the driver whimpered. “If this is about that girl, I didn't know she was a—”

“It's not about the prostitute you front for and not about the illegal vodka under your seat,” said Rostnikov. “When you drop me, I shall pay you enough to return to the Hotel Rossyia. There you will go to the service loading dock, and pick up six pieces of luggage. The man in the freight office will know about this. You will then take the luggage to Sheremetyevo International Airport and check it through for the seven
P.M.
Lufthansa flight to West Berlin in the name of Wolfgang Bintz.”

“I can't remember all that,” the man protested.

“I've written it down,” said Rostnikov. “I'll give it to you when we get to the pool.” He did not want the men in the trailing KGB car to see him hand the driver anything but the fare. They might stop the driver and question him.

“All right,” the driver said, sullenly pulling on his beard.

“If you fail to do this, Rasumi,” Rostnikov said, “you will be in deep trouble and it will involve more than a few bottles of vodka or a prostitute.”

“I'll do it,” the young driver said quietly.

“Fine.” Rostnikov sighed, and leaned back, and they said no more during the trip. When they arrived at the pool, Rostnikov paid him only slightly more than the trip would cost. Too high an overpayment might make the man suspicious.

When he had pulled away, Rostnikov turned toward the pool. It had been a dozen years since he had been in the pool. As a young man, he had been forbidden to swim there by his father. The pool had been built on the site of the massive Church of the Savior, and his father remembered being part of the crew that had been ordered to destroy the church in 1931. His father was not a religious man, but he did not like the Stalinist move to destroy the old and put up the new.

“It's too much like Mussolini in Italy,” he had said once as they walked down the street, and Rostnikov's mother had almost cried in fear as she begged him to be quiet.

When Rostnikov did finally go to the pool after his father died, he felt guilty that he enjoyed it. It is the largest open-air pool in all of Europe, and there are often as many as two thousand people in the water at a time.

The water is changed three times every day by a huge filtering station, and the temperature is controlled for year-round swimming. Even on the coldest winter day, swimmers can splash about comfortably and watch the steam rising into the frigid night air.

Rostnikov paid his fifty-kopecks admission fee and went into the changing rooms. It was crowded this warm July day, and it took him only a few minutes to find what he was looking for. A rotund man with a pleasant red face was leaving with a small freckle-faced boy who was probably his grandchild.

“Pardon me,” said Rostnikov, stepping in front of them and smiling to keep them from panicking. The smile on the man's face faded quickly, and his grip tightened on the little boy.

“I'm here with my grandson,” Rostnikov said apologetically, “and I forgot my bathing suit. It was stupid, I know.” He hit his forehead with the flat of his hand. “I see that you are on your way out and I'm sure your suit would fit me. I'd be happy to pay seven rubles. I don't want to disappoint the boy.”

Rostnikov looked across the crowded changing room at a thin child of about six. He lifted his hand and waved to the boy, who didn't see him.

“It is a strange request,” the man said, looking down at his own grandson.

Rostnikov shrugged. “It would be a great favor,” he said.

“All right,” the man finally agreed. He let go of the boy's hand and fished a damp pair of blue trunks out of his sack. Rostnikov fished out seven rubles, and they made the exchange.

“Thank you,” he said, knowing that the man had made a fine profit.

“I'm happy we could help,” the man said, and led the boy away.

Four minutes later, Rostnikov, feeling extremely conspicuous even in the large crowd, went out of the changing room where he had deposited his clothes with the attendant, and made his way to the pool deck. He knew he was not a common sight with his washtub body and his heavy leg, but no one seemed to pay much attention. He slowly circled the pool along the metal railing, looking for Bintz and Ivanolva. He spotted the policeman first, leaning against the wire fence.

“Chief Inspector?” he said.

“Could I be mistaken for anyone else?”

“No.” Ivanolva was about thirty, good-looking, and well built. He would look far better in a bathing suit than I, thought Rostnikov.

“Where is the German?” Rostnikov said, backing away from a boisterous teenage couple who were pushing each other and giggling.

“I do not always understand youth,” said Rostnikov as the girl turned and plunged into the water, splashing a startled woman.

“They are playing,” explained Ivanolva.

“I recognize that it is recreation,” said Rostnikov, watching the teenage boy shout and leap into the water. “It is the nature of the joy derived from the game that I fail to appreciate.”

“I think—” Ivanolva began, but Rostnikov interrupted.

“The German,” he said.

“There,” said the younger policeman, nodding.

“Point to him,” said Rostnikov. “I'm not hiding. Look at me. Could I hide?”

Instead of answering what he hoped was a rhetorical question, Ivanolva pointed. Beyond the white bathing caps of two nearby women, Rostnikov spotted the German's white hair and massive body. Bobbing dutifully and not at all happily at his side, a bathing cap on her head, was Ludmilla Konvisser, the Intourist guide who had been assigned to Bintz.

“You are finished for the day,” Rostnikov said over his shoulder to Ivanolva.

“Yes, Comrade,” Ivanolva replied and went off as quickly as he could.

Rostnikov moved to the edge of the pool, squatted, and put a hand in the water, prepared to make a face at the cold, but the temperature was fine, so he sat at the edge of the pool and eased himself in. He made his way through the maze of bodies and sloshed in front of Bintz, whose eyes were shut. Ludmilla spotted Rostnikov and said, “Chief Inspector, what—”

Bintz's eyes opened and Rostnikov noted that there was no fear or surprise. He seemed to expect to see a policeman in front of him.

“Tell me, Inspector Comrade,” he said in English, “do you find it as easy to float as I do?”

“It is our bulk,” said Rostnikov, also in English.

Bintz nodded and closed his eyes again before speaking.

“A whale and a walrus afloat on a Sunday afternoon.”

Though not particularly fond of being called a walrus, Rostnikov had to admit to himself that the image was apt.

“Can we talk?” Rostnikov asked, making it clear that it was an order.

“Could I refuse one who follows me to the depths?” Bintz said, opening one eye.

“Comrade Konvisser,” Rostnikov said, looking at the young woman, “could we…”

She nodded, plunged under the water, and swam away.

“A good-looking young lady,” Bintz said, closing his eyes again. “Very
krasse' vliyaya
, is that the word? But very cold. Why are so many young Russian ladies cold?”

“She has a job,” Rostnikov explained, “and it does not pay to be too friendly with foreigners. Young Russian ladies are not cold.”

“What,” grinned Bintz, “is your basis for comparison?”

“I admit I have none,” Rostnikov agreed, looking about for his KGB tail and Bintz's. “You know you have been followed?”

Bintz laughed, eyes still shut, only his head bobbing on the surface. The two men were surrounded by the clamor of voices, but they were close enough so that they could speak in low tones and make each other out. A woman elbowed Rostnikov and moved away without apology.

“Besides your young man,” Bintz said, “there is a very serious gentleman with glasses wearing a suit and tie standing just behind the fence in the corner behind me.”

Rostnikov saw the man without turning his head.

“KGB?” Bintz asked, opening both eyes.

“Yes,” said Rostnikov.

Bintz grunted, his guess confirmed. “There is someone else who may be watching,” he said. “Did you know that?”

“Yes,” said Rostnikov.

“Are you here for the reason I think?” Bintz said.

“I believe I am,” said Rostnikov.

“Would you mind telling me what that is so I won't make a complete
dummkopf
of myself?”

“World Liberation,” said Rostnikov. “I have reason to think you are involved in a terrorist act.”

Bintz shrugged, sending out a circle of waves.

“Ha,” laughed Bintz, but there was no mirth in his laughter. “Bintz doesn't kill real people. Bintz is known for the many he has slaughtered on film. For me, destruction and violence are ritual acts. When my people fall, they rise to act again another day, and my audience knows this. I know difference between movie blood and real blood. Movie blood washes away. This is exhausting my English.”

“What were you supposed to do?” Rostnikov went on.

Bintz looked around the pool for the first time and then back at Rostnikov.

“I was supposed to blow up this pool,” he said. “Can you imagine such a thing? There are children in this pool.”

“How were you to do this?”

“A button,” Bintz said. “A little black box, just like in an English movie.”

“When?”

“At seven.” Bintz shrugged. “The woman calls and says I am to do it at seven. I never saw her.”

“If you do not plan to set off the bomb,” Rostnikov said, sidestepping a man with glasses who floated by on his back, “what are you doing here?”

“I came to find the bomb and dispose of it. If I have a black box with a button, others might have a black box with a button. You don't believe me?”

“I believe you,” said Rostnikov. “I found your black box in your hotel room. If you meant to use it, it would be here, not there. You could have told the police,” he added, crouching down in the water and then floating on his back.

“It will be difficult enough to remain alive when that woman finds that I do not blow up this pool. I don't also confess to Russian police that I am involved with terrorists. But what difference? You have me. I swim, and we go.”

“The bomb?” asked Rostnikov.

“I am a maker of movies,” said Bintz with pride. “I work with pictures and spaces. I found the bomb by moving along the edge of the pool and reaching into all the drains. It is now inside my bathing trunks.”

Rostnikov stopped floating and looked at Bintz.

“I'm very cool,
nein
?” said Bintz. “Like Charles Bronson.”

“Very cool,” agreed Rostnikov.

“Don't worry,” he said. “I take great care. Even if one of them watches me, I have an hour. I must swim long enough so all of those trailing behind me single file can see that Bintz really wants to swim and is not here just for some mischief. But so…you are going to arrest me?”

“No,” said Rostnikov. “I'm going to save you. Let's leave, and I will explain. I trust Comrade Konvisser will not follow us into the men's changing room?”

“Unfortunately, you are right,” Bintz sighed. “Let's give them a sight, you and I, and get out of the pool together, huh? The level will go down an inch, and small children will stand at the shallow end with their noses above water.”

It was with some difficulty that Bintz managed to get Comrade Konvisser to leave him with Inspector Rostnikov for the day, but she finally agreed, and as they changed clothes in the men's room, Rostnikov outlined the details of his plan. Bintz gave him the enormous swimming trunks containing the bomb.

“Then you are agreed?” Rostnikov said, slipping on his trousers.

“The risk is mostly yours,” said Bintz. “A young man helped me take my pants off when I came in, but I am for obvious reasons unable to get them back on. Chief Inspector, if you would…”

“Of course,” said Rostnikov and, with the bomb jiggling under his arm, he helped the massive man get dressed.

Outside the pool, Rostnikov found a sewer outlet and bent to tie his already tied shoes. He dropped the trunks he had obtained from Bintz and let them tumble through the hole. It was most likely that neither of the KGB agents noticed. It was clumsy, but Rostnikov did not relish the idea of carrying the burden any farther.

They found a taxi and headed for a restaurant that Rostnikov had chosen carefully. In the cab, they didn't speak nor did they turn to see if their entourage was behind them.

Rostnikov had eaten in the restaurant once and had bad reports on it from others. In a city where service was generally poor in restaurants, the Destrovya on Arbat was in a class by itself. The meal would take several hours to serve. Best of all, Rostnikov knew from experience, there was a rear exit near the rest rooms.

“I think we will catch her,” said Rostnikov once they were seated by a surly waiter. “The woman who threatened you.”