The Bloody Meadow (27 page)

‘We heard nothing of it,’ Ivanov said, looking concerned. ‘They came through about fifteen minutes ago – heading for Krasnogorka. Not every day we get famous people
travelling on these roads.’

‘I see,’ Korolev said, disappointed but not surprised that the alert hadn’t reached him. ‘Do you have a radio?’

‘We do.’

‘Can you call ahead and request that the next checkpoint hold them?’

‘The next checkpoint is in Krasnogorka.’

‘That’ll do. There should be an alert out for them already – but just in case.’

‘You’re looking for this fellow Andreychuk, you said? Are you going to look over his truck?’

‘His truck?’ Korolev asked, confused as to what Ivanov was talking about. His face must have given him away because the boy pointed over his shoulder.

‘You don’t know? We found the truck – in Angelinivka. About an hour ago.’

Korolev turned to Slivka, who was waiting for his decision. Follow the truck or Lomatkin and Babel?

‘How do we get there from here?’ Korolev asked, making his decision. The border guards would hold Babel and Lomatkin for them.

‘Go straight ahead, you’ll see a signpost in a few kilometres.’

‘Thank you. One last thing?’ Korolev asked, extracting one of the photographs of Lenskaya he’d brought with him from the dashboard. ‘Have you seen this woman
recently?’

Ivanov looked at the photograph for a few moments, then shook his head.

‘No, and to be honest I’d remember a girl like that if she came through a checkpoint round here.’

Korolev took the picture back from Ivanov. Was that the thing he’d missed? How different she was? Now that she’d been in Moscow for twelve years, and America as well – that
here, in the land where she’d been born, she was as exotic as Barikada Sorokina?

‘Good to see you, Alexei Dmitriyevich,’ Ivanov said as Korolev pointed Slivka towards the road ahead.

‘I’ll remember you to your father.’

§

The signpost for Angelinivka seemed to have been used for target practice, on top of which what was left of the letters had been sanded by the wind to the point where they were
barely legible. Slivka slowed down and then halted, looking to Korolev for a final decision. He looked around them. There wasn’t a clump of brush big enough to call a bush for two kilometres
in any direction and the few winter-stripped trees that were visible looked like black skeletons praying to heaven for forgiveness. It was a grim enough place. The Lord knew he’d be glad to
get away from here and back to Moscow. And the thought of Moscow, a thousand kilometres away, reminded him of Valentina Nikolaevna and the way she’d put her hand on his chest when the NKVD
man had knocked on the door. He wondered what it had meant, that small moment of intimacy. It was something he’d avoided considering in the time since, but now, for some reason, the way
she’d looked at him and the feel of her hand pressing against him seemed like something to hold on to. He nodded to Slivka, who turned left towards Angelinivka.

The village itself, when they got there, barely deserved the name – two dusty lines of dilapidated buildings that met at a rutted crossroads. There was no sign of the border guard or the
truck Andreychuk had stolen. In fact there was no sign of anyone at all. Slivka drove slowly past the long low peasant houses, with wooden walls more grey than brown emerging from mud foundations
and straining under snow-topped damp thatch. A dog with legs as thin as whips tottered to its feet in front of them, baring its teeth but unable or unwilling to muster the energy to bark. Korolev
had seen more depressing places, but he couldn’t for the life of him remember when.

‘Where are the people?’ Slivka asked.

‘I don’t know, Slivka, but there’s the church – and that’s what Andreychuk and Lenskaya came to see.’

The church stood about a hundred metres past the last house in the village and around it stood the wooden crosses of a graveyard. As they drove towards it, Andreychuk’s truck came into
view, along with two cold-looking sentries, who unslung their rifles when they saw them.

‘Militia,’ Korolev said, holding out his identity card for inspection. A tall youth with an acned face looked down at the card, his brows contracting as he read it. His comrade,
another one barely out of his teens but half the other’s size, stood to the side, his rifle held at waist height aiming at a spot just behind Korolev’s ear.

‘Point that damned gun somewhere else,’ Korolev said, and the short boy’s eyes came to life. He turned to his comrade, who handed Korolev’s Militia card back to him as
though it was red hot.

‘You’re happy with my identification, are you?’ Korolev growled.

‘Absolutely, Comrade Captain,’ he said.

‘Good,’ Korolev said, opening the door, pleased to see he had at least three inches on the two sentries, and a good deal of weight to boot.

‘When did you find it?’

‘An hour back, Comrade Captain.’

‘I thought your people searched the village last night,’ Korolev said to the taller guard.

‘Yes, Comrade Captain. At eight o’clock and at eleven, but it wasn’t here then.’

Korolev walked over to the truck, noticing the thin even layer of snow on top of the bonnet. It had been there for a while.

‘Are you searching the area?’

‘Two sweeps have gone north and south on a three-kilometre width, Comrade Captain. Men every twenty metres.’ The guard pointed across the fields to where some men with rifles could
be seen walking in line some distance away. ‘And we’ve been through the village as well, and the church of course.’

Korolev looked up at the dome of the church. Close up it was clear the facade had suffered since the arrival of Soviet Power, and not just the paint either – bullet holes marked the stone
walls in a steady line, on top of which the crucifix was gone from the dome and, to judge from the chipping around the stump, it too had been the target of the machine gunner’s attention.

‘Why is the village empty?’

‘They were moved to the
kolkhoz
farm up the road last week, Comrade Captain. Soviet Success. It’s about four kilometres away.’ Again he pointed, this time along the road
that led away from the village and to a new future. ‘They’re knocking this place down. It will be fields by the summer.’

Clearly no one had told the emaciated dog about the move.

‘We should look inside,’ Korolev said.

The church’s interior was even colder than outdoors – the solid, still cold of a meat locker. Predictably it had been desecrated. Who knew who’d done it? Party activists
who’d come from the cities to lead the peasants to collectivization by example, and had ended up forcing them to it at gunpoint? Soldiers? Border guards? It didn’t matter now –
the damage had been done. They picked their way through the debris gingerly – to judge from the stench the place had been used as a latrine – but there was nothing to indicate the
caretaker had been there, or his daughter.

Stepping outside again, Korolev looked at the two sentries, huddled in the lee of the truck, inhaling warmth from cigarettes they protected with both hands. Korolev nodded towards the
worn-looking wooden Orthodox crosses in the cemetery – crosses that were from a different time when such a symbol wasn’t considered to be a political statement. After not more than a
minute’s searching, they came across the recently tended grave of Anna Andreychuk.

‘His wife?’ Slivka asked.

‘Possibly,’ Korolev said, running a finger along the wooden plank that spelt out her demise. No cross for Andreychuk’s wife under Soviet Power. So was this the reason for the
visit Andreychuk had made with his daughter to this place? A final act of remembrance before the village was bulldozed and forgotten? At least Andreychuk’s wife would still be here when the
Lord came looking for her on the day of judgement. Nothing else would. Not the house she’d been born in, nor the church where she’d worshipped. Even the marker on her grave would be
removed when they turned the cemetery into tillage.

They were just getting back into the car when a soldier came running from the fields.

‘We’ve found him,’ he shouted breathlessly to the sentries, ‘down by the river. Dead.’

FROM A DISTANCE the body looked like nothing more than a pile of crumpled clothing, the worn boots only a foot away from the wide river’s bank. The only thing that marked
Andreychuk out as anything other than rags was the puddle of frozen blood that surrounded him.

‘Has anyone touched the body?’ Korolev asked the captain commanding the detachment.

‘If anyone has, it was before I got here,’ he replied. ‘I was a Militiaman myself for two years, in Omsk.’

Korolev watched the wind turn the white hair on the dead man’s head. Then he looked across the river.

‘You did well,’ he said after a long pause. ‘Can you get a message to Dr Peskov at the School of Anatomy in Odessa? I’d like him to see the body as it was found.’
He studied the sky – it was clear for the moment. Hopefully they wouldn’t have to cover the corpse. ‘We’ll need a forensics team to come out as well; Peskov can pass the
message on.’

As the captain left, Korolev turned his attention back to the river bank, approaching a little closer to examine the dead man. Andreychuk’s face – robbed of life – seemed
thinner, the beard more dishevelled. His eyes were open and Korolev resisted the temptation to lean down and close them.

‘Only the crayfish becomes more beautiful with death,’ he muttered to himself.

‘What was that?’ Slivka asked.

‘Nothing. Just a stupid saying.’ He didn’t feel comfortable repeating it and fortunately she didn’t press him. The entry wound was in the nape of the neck, and while
there was a revolver in Andreychuk’s hand, it seemed unlikely that he would have shot himself in such a way. This looked like murder to Korolev. He leant forward to look more closely at the
gun. A Nagant. Could it be a souvenir of Andreychuk’s fighting days? Korolev had carried a Nagant himself when he’d fought for the tsar, and another when he’d fought for the Red
Army in the Civil War. They were still standard issue for the Militia and the army, and Korolev was an exception in that he carried a smaller Walther he’d acquired from a Polish officer back
in ’twenty-two – but then there were different rules for detectives. Andreychuk’s weapon looked as though it wasn’t long from the factory, but he didn’t like the
barrel one bit. It looked shorter than the army version and, as far as he knew, these short-barreled Nagants were only issued to the Militia or State Security. He pointed it out to Slivka.

‘It looks like it could be one of ours,’ she said, peering down at it. ‘Easily checked, though. It will have a serial number and there’ll be a record.’

‘Well, let’s see what we can find out about it.’

It looked as if the dead man had been kneeling when he’d died, and the body had fallen forwards and onto its side. Korolev mimicked holding a pistol behind his head to see if suicide was
even remotely possible.

‘Don’t do it, Alexei Dmitriyevich. The case isn’t over yet,’ Slivka said in a dry tone. He almost smiled, putting his hands back in his pockets and looking again at the
corpse. Snow covered parts of the body, and more had gathered along the dead man’s side where the wind had pushed it.

‘Time of death, Slivka, that’s what we’re looking for,’ Korolev said as the border guard captain returned. ‘Comrade Captain, when did it stop snowing? He obviously
died before then. And there’s snow on the truck as well.’

‘I’m not sure. Before six anyway, it hasn’t snowed since I started on duty. I’ll check with the sentries at the nearest control point.’

‘I’d be grateful.’ Korolev glanced across the field towards the church. There were tracks in the snow here and there.

‘There were no tracks around the truck when we found it,’ the captain said, as if anticipating his thoughts. ‘They were the first thing I looked for.’

Korolev nodded and turned to Slivka.

‘Stay here with the body until Dr Peskov and the forensics boys arrive. Don’t let Firtov and the Greek start till Dr Peskov has had a good look and, likewise, don’t let Peskov
take the body away until they’ve done their work. We’ll need a proper autopsy done in Odessa, but ask him for his preliminary impressions.’

‘Of course, Chief.’

‘And show Lenskaya’s photograph around – see if any of these border guards recognize her. Or Andreychuk for that matter. Someone must have seen them when they visited last
week.’

Slivka nodded and he put a hand on her arm for a moment by way of thanks.

‘Comrade Captain.’ Korolev turned to address the border guard officer. ‘Have you tracking dogs nearby?’

‘I can have some here within thirty minutes,’ he said, curiosity narrowing his eyes.

‘I’d like to see if they could trace the dead man’s steps from the church. Just to make certain. And to see if he was alone when he arrived, or if he brought his killer with
him.’

‘We’ll see what we can do.’

‘Thank you, Comrade.’

Korolev took the keys to the car from Slivka and walked back across the field towards the church, wondering what Lomatkin would have to say about Andreychuk’s escape from the station and
his death beside the Dnester with a bullet in the back of his neck.

§

It didn’t take Korolev long to drive to Krasnogorka, and any concerns he’d had about tracking his quarries down were soon allayed – Lomatkin and Babel’s
car was parked beside a border guard checkpoint just before the road entered the town. They looked round as he approached and Korolev was not surprised to detect anger in Lomatkin’s animated
reaction. Damned Korolev this, damned Korolev that, he didn’t doubt. They were probably half-frozen by now – come to think of it, he wasn’t that warm himself after walking around
graveyards and fields.

‘Captain Korolev, Militia CID.’ He held up his identification card for the border guard sergeant to inspect. ‘You’re detaining those two for me.’

‘We are. That Lomatkin fellow has been threatening all sorts, Comrade Captain.’

‘We’ll see about that. Have you somewhere I can talk to them?’