Field of Mars (24 page)

‘I don't know—'

‘They're not expecting you at work, did you know that?'

‘Ah . . . no, ahh . . .'

‘They're not expecting you because there's a note from your doctor. We fixed it up.' Tomlinovich smiled, shook his head sadly. ‘Now look, I thought we had an agreement? You said you were going to talk, eh? So, tell me all about how, when, and where you first met the baron.'

‘I don't—'

‘Ah-ah-ah . . .' Tomlinovich said, and then he hit him, hard this time in the centre of his chest. It knocked him out and when he came back the air was still crackling and Tomlinovich was in mid-lecture. ‘. . . so there's no escape. You should be forthcoming. That's the sensible thing, obviously. If you help us perhaps we can work together. Was it about the money? How much did he give you? We know he put through the Gagental contracts for you? For your bosses? We want their names. He was holding out, wasn't he. Was he after more?'

‘Wait . . . money? What?' Ryzhkov asked, involuntarily. For a moment he wondered if he was dreaming the whole thing.

‘So . . .' Tomlinovich nodded. ‘You maintain that you knew nothing about the baron, you are not an associate of his, you are not part of the cabal, you know nothing of the contracts, you're involved in none of it? This is your side of the story?' He was frowning, his wide mouth was turned down at the corners. He looked like an immeasurably sad circus bear tricked out in expensive clothing. He came over to the bed again, was about to raise his foot. ‘We can make you talk, boy.'

‘Well, then . . .' Ryzhkov did his best to smile and shrug but his wrists were handcuffed to the bedstead.

‘Hard-headed,' someone said from the shadows; the fellow who'd shot him it sounded like. For a moment they just looked at each other. The tree scraped along the glass, a faint shrieking noise. Tomlinovich heaved a great sigh. ‘Last chance,' he said quietly. And Ryzhkov could tell that he meant it.

‘I don't know anything about this petroleum scheme or contracts or whatever it is.'

‘No?'

‘I was following him because . . . because of what he did to the girl. Trying to bring a case against him, so . . . There were two of them. I'm looking for the other one now, the one that threw her out of the window.' He said it flatly, not even looking at them. It came out sounding like an admission of failure; he was a policeman who had tried to play by the book, but sometimes, you couldn't. Sometimes you didn't, sometimes,
many
times, it wasn't possible to fix things. And he hadn't. And now he'd been caught.

Tomlinovich came back into the light; his face was twisted in frustration. ‘What
girl
? What in hell are you talking about?' He stepped over to the bed and grabbed Ryzhkov by the shirt collar, pulled him up off the bed, the handcuffs riding up the rods so that his arms were pulled back behind him.

‘Start at the beginning, boy. One step at a time,' he said and then dropped him back on to the bed.

And so he told them. All of it. About stumbling on to the murder, about Lvova, Ekatarina, about Bondarenko, and his visit to the Iron Room, about the boy and his wife. He listened to himself as he told them, almost amazed at how detached he was. His voice oddly controlled, sounding like a priest reading from some ghastly scriptural passage. Thousands died, cities were burned, pestilence, famine and burning sulphur, all of it ending up as dry facts, like a laundry list. So detached that the horror was all burned away. And so, he told it all, as objectively as he could make the sounds come out of his mouth. The only thing he managed to do was leave Vera out of it entirely. At least he could do that much, he told himself. At least that.

When it was all over Tomlinovich sat there for a long moment, nodded and then stood up. He stood there staring at the floorboards for a moment, then put one hand on Ryzhkov's shoulder like a father consoling a son over some sporting defeat.

‘You better start praying,' he said, as he left the attic.

It took them all that day, through the night until the next morning to check on what he'd told them. They came and went grim-faced, saying nothing; gave him food and unhooked one wrist. He slept. The smallest of them, and probably the most dangerous, was Dziga. He uncuffed him so he could shit in a bucket they'd brought up and then stood there watching and making jokes. He had bad teeth and a big smile and a brown, nearly bald head that had scars with little twisted stumps of black hair growing out of it. He looked like an acrobat who had escaped the circus to become a dishwasher. When he finished Dziga took the bucket away. ‘Don't spill any,' Ryzhkov called after him as he went, and drew one of his sharp little laughs.

They brought him a big plate of soup and a loaf of bread and after he'd got started Tomlinovich came in and took a seat. He had more paper to read from and a new man—a shorthand typist to take down all the answers. Basically Ryzhkov recounted his connection with Lavrik, the details of the surveillance, the progress of his attempt to bring charges in court. He didn't say anything about petroleum or cartels. After he'd finished the list of questions, Tomlinovich tipped back his hat and settled down in the chair.

‘Do you want some wine with that, eh?'

‘Why not,' Ryzhkov said between bites. He had to lean over to use the spoon. ‘That's no good,' Tomlinovich said as he watched him eat. ‘Dziga, put the shackles only on his feet. We'll catch him if he tries to shuffle away from us . . . You're not going to try to run away are you, boy?' Tomlinovich laughed. It came out as a series of wheezes.

They let him eat at the table and the one they called ‘Doctor' brought up a tray with two glasses of wine. When he finished the soup they brought him another plate. Tomlinovich took the time to go fishing. The tall secretary took it all down.

‘Have you ever visited Lavrik's firm, or spoken to members of his staff?'

‘You mean the banking place?'

‘Mendrochovich and Lubensky, 112 Nevsky. Ever been there?'

‘Walked past it, maybe.'

‘We were following Lavrik, that's how we saw you.' ‘Mmm.'

‘But now we don't know who to follow, you see? You shat in our eggs, boy.'

Ryzhkov shrugged and finished his second plate of soup. ‘Who are
you
anyway?' he said, standing and taking the glass of wine with him to the bed, exhausted from the meal and eager to fall asleep as soon as they decided to leave him alone.

Tomlinovich didn't quite answer the question. ‘I admit we were surprised to learn you were a
gorokhovnik
. Yes . . . And you're sure you don't have anything to add to that, eh?'

‘No.' Ryzhkov burrowed in the sheets and held his arm up for Dziga to chain it to the rail.

‘Yes, well you shat in our eggs, boy, and now you're going to eat them.'

‘Whatever you say.'

‘Everything has changed. We're thrown off the track. So now, things have stepped up, we have to move. We don't have time to coddle you, eh?'

Ryzhkov stared at the ceiling, almost at peace. He was trying to conjure up a picture of Vera. He could almost animate her, see her dancing in one of the Komet extravaganzas, her smile . . . genuine or not, it didn't matter. He wondered if they had put something in the wine. ‘Has it occurred to you that perhaps he
deserved
to die,' he said dreamily.

‘Undoubtedly he did,' Tomlinovich said softly. ‘But then again, who among us doesn't?'

Ryzhkov shook his head. Now he was dreaming of Vera dancing up on an orange-lit stage. Dancing just for him, watching him watching her. There were voices in the stairwell. Tomlinovich stood up, and so did the secretary. Vera made her exit and Ryzhkov opened his eyes to see a new fellow. Someone important. He looked like he had just come from an evening at the theatre. He smelled of women's perfume and cigar smoke and he was dressed in tails and decorations. Sleek. He took a chair beside Ryzhkov's bed and looked at him for a long moment.

‘We've been investigating your story, of course,' the sleek fellow said. The voice sounded like a mother giving her child the background to a lullaby she was about to sing.

‘The newspapers are describing the baron's death as the result of a “crime of passion” perpetrated by a jealous lover. This is plausible since the baron was known to have a series of liaisons, not only with children—although he did meet frequently with children, some of them the children of his friends and associates. Did you know that?' The new man could not keep the disgust out of his voice. ‘In some circles this is considered fashionable. Do you want a cigar?'

‘Who are you?' Ryzhkov said.

‘I'm Boris Fauré, Deputy Minister of Justice.' He opened his jacket and removed a wallet, held it open for Ryzhkov's inspection. It all looked official enough. A passport,
Fauré, Boris Grigorovich
, behind a leather flap, an engraved card with an address and telephone number that placed him somewhere deep within the warrens of the Ministry of Justice. The best part of town if you actually had to work—just off the Nevsky with easy access to the Passage market.

Fauré clipped a small cigar and lit it for Ryzhkov. ‘As a story . . . for me it doesn't quite ring true. At any rate, we can thank God that the public is as stupid as it is,' he said. He tapped his ash on the floor and loosened his white tie. ‘You see, we were on the track of a financial scandal, before you—'

‘Shat in your eggs? Yes I know.'

‘I'll accept your apology, but it doesn't change things. It only makes things a great deal more difficult. For example we don't quite know what to do with you, Inspector.'

‘Ahh . . .' Maybe the soup was going to be his last meal after all.

‘We were following Baron Lavrik because we were trying to find his associate. One in particular and for now we will simply call him Mr X. It's this Mr X we want, he meets people, he puts combinations together. Sometimes legal, sometimes not so legal. This time he was working something up that broke so many laws he needed a veil of secrecy. It was Lavrik who provided the legal subterfuge, but it is Mr X who is the paymaster. We don't know who he is and we don't know where he gets his money. We were using Lavrik to find him, so . . .'

‘Ahh.'

‘Therefore, while you paint a convincing picture of a white knight consumed with the need to avenge the spirit of a murdered vertika, somehow we wish to take a more prudent course, you understand? We want to exercise caution. You could be a great actor, or a simple pawn. Maybe only something tossed our way to throw us off the track. I'm sure you understand this need for suspicion, given the sort of things you do in the Internal branch.'

‘Oh, yes. I understand,' he said quietly, watching the smoke curl towards the ceiling.

‘Splendid then. So . . .' There was a rustle of papers as Fauré pulled a letter from his pocket. It was a document typed on a single sheet of paper with a seal at the bottom. Fauré cleared his throat and began reading in his motherly way.

‘On this date and hour, I, by my authority as an officer of the Ministry of Justice, an officer of the Duma, and representative of the infallible will of his supreme majesty, Nicholas Romanov, hereby declare a charge against you, Pyotr Mikhalovich Ryzhkov, of murder.'

TWENTY-ONE

The suite of rooms at 40 Furshtatskaya, at the very end of one of the lower corridors, had taken a month to prepare. Entry to the corridors, guarded by custodians at the landings in each stairway, was controlled by numbered and coloured discs that one wore around the neck, like decorations for valour. To protect against theft the discs were signed in and out. To guard against counterfeit the shapes and colours changed every day.

The Third Branch's offices were at the fashionable headquarters at 16 Fontanka, but the Okhrana utilized several other buildings around the capital, including External's archives within the gargantuan General Staff building. All of them were cordoned off and guarded, but this suite was uniquely secure, for access to these rooms was restricted to
one
—General A.I. Gulka, the man who knew everything, the eyes and ears of the empire.

Tonight he was tired, dressed in formal clothing which had grown too tight, and as he walked down the corridor he jerked his collar open and heaved a great sigh. It was ironic. Now, when everyone who obligated themselves to him was comfortably asleep, secure with full bellies, he was only beginning to work. All through the holidays his family had been making demands, his mistress had run away to her ancestral home in Athens, and all his other political and social contacts had been pushed to the margins, and of course, the business of guarding Mother Russia from revolutionaries hadn't simply stopped because he'd been forced to play Father Christmas. But now, he was almost happy to be back on the job. As he turned the combination which would allow him to use his key in the special electric lock, he allowed himself a smile that on anyone else would have looked like a grimace of pain.

The first chamber was code named
Red
and he had appointed a single pair of Red Assistants who entered the room solely to pick up or drop off sealed bags into a metal box that was affixed to the connecting wall.

Gulka used another key to move deeper into the second room, into the
Blue
chamber. He switched on the lamps and re-locked the door behind him. The inner walls had been covered in cork panels, and held a series of photographs, maps, columns of paper that had been glued together, all of it representing Gulka's translation of Sergei Andrianov's great Plan.

Now he simply sat in a chair and stared at the wall for a few moments before beginning to sift through the two bags that had been dropped off in the day.

The first sealed bag was the evening report; it bore the serial numbers of the bags, including the one containing it, and the time and sub-department from which they had been received, the signatures of the officers concerned, and the time the Red Assistant had dropped them off. Gulka put the receipt in a drawer containing hundreds of others, and turned himself to the second bag. It was a report from the investigator responsible for his surveillance of Count Ivo Smyrba, or, in Andrianov's universe—Heron.