by Nick Louth
‘And this was filmed, I presume?’ asked Gillard.
‘Yes. I’m surprised that Talin didn’t sweep the room, because he’s normally very careful like that, but in any case, there was a camera behind the main mirror which perfectly captured what was going on.’
‘Was Talin married at the time?’
‘He was, to an American woman, though that wasn’t the issue. Somebody leaked the tape to a TV station owned by one of Sasha’s allies, and it played on a loop for months and months until everyone was sick of it.
‘Does Russian TV allow erotic content to be shown like that?’
Fein laughed. ‘No. And it wasn’t erotic at all, Craig, that is what was so damaging. It was rather pathetic.’ The expression on the financier’s face showed no obvious sympathy for the victim.
‘So Talin reckoned Volkov was responsible?’
‘He said as much. He threatened to have him killed.’
‘And was he responsible?’
Fein held up his hands. ‘I couldn’t possibly say. But as the old saying goes, if the cap fits wear it.’
‘You spoke to them both at the party, I presume?’
‘Yes. I sat in the same table as Sasha and Sophie, and then had quite a long conversation with Maxim during which Sasha came up to talk to him. I remember Sasha putting his hand on his old friend’s shoulder. Honestly, I think they were getting on fine, at that point. But who knows, perhaps something was said when they were in the library.’
‘Did Mr Volkov carry a gun, generally?’
Fein looked shocked. ‘Good heavens, no. I don’t think he even knew how to shoot. He did his conscription like everybody else, but because of his geology experience he was sent to the corps of engineers. His links to the Komsomol, the communist youth group, meant he became an officer almost immediately. Some things don’t change, you see. The only shots experienced by the engineers are the endless rounds of vodka that they down. The unit is mostly famed for its ability to throw lavish parties.’
‘Another thing that doesn’t change,’ Gillard said. ‘Did he ever mention to you about being worried about being killed?’
Fein blew a sigh. ‘Many times. When Berezovsky was killed, and Perepilichny, after the Skripal attacks too. We talked about it often. But the person he mentioned most often was her.’
‘His wife?’
‘During the divorce, yes. “Yelena Yakolina Yalinsky. Three Ys. Why, why, why did I marry her?” He said it many times, it was his little play on words. Of course, there were two sides to this marriage. She and Natasha are very close. We heard her side of it too. Yelena was mistreated, undeniably.’
Gillard waited for more details, but none were forthcoming.
‘If you want chapter and verse, speak to Natasha. She knows everything.’
‘I will, but can I first ask your assessment: is Yelena capable of murder?’
‘Capable? Certainly. Unlike Sasha, she enjoys hunting. She is a very good horsewoman, and a first-class shot. She’s very smart and well-connected. An incredible amount of the British export business to Kazakhstan came our way because of our connections to Yelena.’ When he said ‘our’, his eyebrows twitched, indicating that the word in question was actually ‘my’. My connections. Gillard could see exactly how the noble lord had come to be an indispensable tool for British economic diplomacy.
‘But as far as threats were concerned, he made no mention of any in the last few weeks or months?’ Gillard persisted.
Fein pursed his lips. ‘No. If anything, he seemed much more relaxed. That was the strange thing. At times in the past Sasha had genuinely become paranoid. But just recently, he had relaxed and become more normal.’ He shook his head. ‘It’s quite ironic isn’t it, given what subsequently happened?’
* * *
After Fein had made his excuses and left, Gillard drove his unmarked Vauxhall back along the damp and quiet City streets. His hands-free buzzed; the number indicated was the chief constable’s. He answered, with his usual sense of foreboding. ‘Yes, ma’am,’ he said.
‘Craig, I’ve made some progress with the security services. I’ve got Volkov’s satellite phone and have passed it on to Rob Townsend for analysis. MI5 claim no knowledge of your notebook or tape recorder. Ms Yalinsky is in Switzerland, apparently, on a skiing trip—’
‘Really? It’s a weird time to go skiing, just after both husband and lover have been murdered.’
‘Indeed. Be that as it may, she is only there until Sunday, when she plans to head back to Moscow. I think it’s important that we speak to her, so I’d like you to go to Geneva tonight.’
So much for getting any time with Sam. ‘All right. I still have to speak to Natasha Fein today. I’m on my way to her home now.’
‘How is the forensic side going?’
‘We’ve got lots of information but no conclusions. The most obvious explanation would be that the two businessmen shot each other, but that doesn’t accord with the ballistics, which shows the vast majority of the shots were fired by a weapon that we don’t have.’
‘I asked MI5 about the missing gun, and they gave a kind of collective shrug.’
‘They don’t have it?’
‘So they say. The good news is that no suspicious contaminants or radioactivity were detected.’
‘Nice of them to tell us so many hours after we would have been exposed to them.’
Rigby laughed. ‘I hope you’ll enjoy speaking to the outgoing Mrs Fein.’
‘What are you trying to tell me, ma’am?’
She laughed still more loudly. The detective suspected he was the subject of some kind of in-joke. ‘Seriously, Craig. Be careful with her. Be circumspect. Use your judgement.’
* * *
Virginia Water is one of the most exclusive districts in Surrey’s millionaire belt. Sandwiched between the Wentworth golf course and the famous lake and gardens which give the area its name, the heavily wooded neighbourhood is both opulent and discreet. Gillard twice missed the Feins’ home, which was reached on a narrow and unmarked laurel-lined track between two large houses. The track only became an asphalt drive a good hundred yards from the road and opened out into manicured parkland dotted with horse chestnut trees. The house itself was a 1930s mock-Tudor mansion with extensive outbuildings and converted stables. Gillard self-consciously straightened his tie and brushed the shoulders of his jacket as he approached the front door. A teenage girl in riding hat and jodhpurs was just emerging.
‘Are you looking for Mum? She’s in the pool, over there.’ She pointed to the stable block. Gillard made his way across. The stable door was, as the saying goes, wide open, but the characteristic chlorine smell and echo of a swimming pool made it clear he was in the right place. The detective walked down the tiled corridor towards the sound of splashing and emerged into an enormous glass-domed room with an Olympic-sized pool as its centrepiece. Someone was ploughing up and down at an impressive rate, streamlined front crawl lengths that would certainly not shame any member of a competitive swimming club. Gillard took in the potted palms and ferns which lined the place and gave it the feel of a colonial dining room. There was no one else around.
It was only when the swimmer diverted from her lengths to cross the pool obliquely to him that Gillard realised she was entirely naked. A head of dark hair broke the surface as she reached for the ladder at his feet.
‘Detective chief inspector, so good to see you.’
‘And you, Mrs Fein.’ She began to climb out, and he backed away, partially to avoid getting wet. He tried hard to keep his eyes on her face and away from her perfectly sculpted body. But he was male. He failed, and she knew it. The smug feline expression said it all.
‘Want to join me? There’s heaps of towels and, if you need one, spare costumes.’ Her arm movement, like a little bit of backstroke, spattered droplets all the way up his trousers and shirt. ‘Sorry.’
He smiled. ‘If you don’t mind, I’m quite pushed for time. I was told you were joining your hus
band in New York tomorrow morning.’ He gazed around the edge of the pool, looking for the towels she had alluded to. She padded along to a parasoled table, and picked up a large bath towel, which she slung over one shoulder.
‘Follow me.’ He did so at a distance, watching the well-oiled swing of her hips. ‘You British are so uptight,’ she said over her shoulder. ‘Nakedness is such a privilege, if you have the space, the warmth and the seclusion. There’s nothing quite like it for swimming, to feel water caressing every part of your body.’
Gillard could now see exactly the nature of Alison Rigby’s warning. The woman was clearly an exhibitionist. Naturally, it helps if what you have is worth seeing.
‘I’ll stay out here until you’re ready,’ he said.
‘No need. I don’t mind.’ He made no move to follow her into the changing room, where she left the door open. ‘Yelena said some very interesting things to me at the party. About the divorce,’ she shouted out. Gillard stood by the open door, not looking inside, but he could hear the shower going, its thunderous roar drowning out whatever it was she was saying.
‘I can’t hear you,’ he called out. The reply was loud, but obscure. He waited a minute, still unable to discern the words, but determined not to be lured into the changing room. Her husband’s mention of kompromat was still fresh in his mind, and he wouldn’t be at all surprised if there were cameras here. He couldn’t immediately think why she would want to put him in a compromising position, but he didn’t want to take any chances.
It must have been a good fifteen minutes later when Natasha Fein emerged, wearing a loosely tied bathrobe. ‘Anyway, I think that could have some bearing on the case, don’t you?’
‘I think I’d like you to repeat it somewhere where I can take notes.’
She shrugged and pointed to a poolside table. He got out his digital recorder and notebook, and she sat opposite him.
‘Lady Fein, can you clarify your role at Westgrave Hall?’
‘Yes. As you probably know, I run a concierge company. I’m effectively a freelance facilitator. I helped organise the passage of the fossil from RAF Brize Norton to here. I helped organise the party, and generally made things happen in the way that Sasha would like. But I was also a friend.’
‘To both Mr Volkov and his former wife, I understand?’
‘Yes, and their children. Even after they fell out, I worked hard to keep the line of communication open between them. I’m a bit like the red hotline telephone used in the Cold War.’
‘I see. And what was it you were saying to me, from the changing room?’
‘Just that Yelena wanted to settle the divorce case. A final judgement on the case was due early in the new year, but there was a big snag. And this, detective chief inspector, is absolutely confidential. Yelena wanted to have a child with Maxim Talin, and being quite far-sighted, had frozen her remaining eggs in liquid nitrogen some years ago when the marriage to Sasha was failing. She used a Swiss clinic to store them for her, but last year, when Sasha discovered it, he spent over three billion Swiss francs buying the entire pharmaceutical company that owned the clinic. And then he used various legal barriers to bar her from access to her own eggs.’
‘That’s rather spiteful.’
‘Indeed. She was furious, and began a legal retaliation. That’s when I got involved as a go-between. I could see that this wasn’t going to be good for anybody. It took months, and Sasha was driving a hard deal, getting Yelena to relinquish part of her stake in the minerals company. She was willing to do it to get the eggs back. Then, in the final few days, there was a disaster. There was a power failure at the clinic, and all the freezers failed. Everything was lost.’
‘Was it Volkov?’
‘Yelena thought so, but he denied it, swearing so on the lives of his children, and I believe him. He’s not a good liar. But Yelena, well, she’s never got over it. Some things no amount of money can replace.’
‘And the divorce deal?’
‘It got rejigged. She now insisted she was keeping all her stake in the mining firm rather than just half of it, and Sasha, who it has to be said was riven with guilt, agreed. So we had a deal, just a week before Christmas. There was plenty of distrust, naturally, but all the paperwork was ready to sign after the party.’
‘I’ve already asked your husband, but perhaps you can tell me if Volkov expressed any worries about his personal security in the period running up to this party?’
‘He was worried about lots of things: the quality of the caviar, about nailing down the contract for our star attraction Ms Beyoncé Knowles, and the immigration technicalities for the bloody circus performers—’
‘—but no worries about his own safety?’
‘Not that he mentioned. Of course he had years ago, before the rapprochement with the Kremlin. But he felt safe, and from everything I hear from my own contacts back in Moscow, he was safe.’
‘Obviously not, in the end.’
She paused. ‘Horrible, just horrible. I thought I’d never be in this situation again, after Boris.’
‘I’m sorry?’
‘Boris Berezovsky. I did a similar job for him as I did for Sasha. They say he committed suicide, but I never believed it. Never. Unlike Sasha, he kept needling the Kremlin. It was very foolhardy.’
Gillard wondered whether she would be considered a bad omen. To lose one employer is unfortunate, but two… ‘From what I’ve heard you worked more closely with Mr Volkov than anyone else.’
‘I suppose that’s true.’
‘And how would you describe his state of mind in the weeks before his death?’
‘He was excited, overall. He’d fallen head-over-heels in love with Sophie, quite understandably. And had finally stopped being maudlin.’
‘Why maudlin?’
‘Oh, he was terribly homesick. I don’t think he really got Britain, as such. Surrey was always a useful bolthole, but I didn’t think he would ever love the place. He missed the open spaces, the forests, the warmth of good friends. Britain is so crowded, and the people are so grey, they always limit themselves. In some ways Sasha was terribly sentimental, terribly nostalgic.’
‘With money you can recreate many things.’
‘Absolutely. I organised the planting of the spruce and birch woods at the back of the hall. It’s only eight hundred acres, unfortunately, but one day it might look like a small slice of Siberian forest. The hall he ultimately wanted to become full-on Romanov, but even he hasn’t got enough money to make all that happen. Even my most optimistic plan for the estate would need twenty years. But he wanted it yesterday. I mean, he wanted to plant hundred-year-old birch trees on the estate, and had located some in Russia that he planned to fly in. He wouldn’t accept the professional advice, which is that moving such mature trees would kill them. His childishness could be charming, but also terribly wearing. I worked to get him to understand that not everything can be solved by money. Sometimes you just need time. With trees, especially. You plant saplings and wait. But he wouldn’t wait.’
‘What was it that forced him to leave Russia in the first place?’ Gillard asked.
‘I think the final straw was the death from cancer of his great friend, Pavel Friedman. He had relied on Pavel for so many years. He was the brains behind their wealth. He was the last of Sasha’s allies, and the engine of their mining business. I think he decided to remove himself from the day-to-day running of the business, that’s all.’
Gillard looked at his notes, which were a little damp from the droplets flung out whenever Natasha emphasised her points. ‘Thank you, Lady Fein.’
‘You’re very welcome,’ she said. ‘Feel free to come for an off-duty swim, whenever you want. David is very understanding.’
Gillard blinked at the brazen juxtaposition of those two comments but decided to ignore them. It was time to head back to Westgrave Hall and look in a bit more detail at some of the events in the history of Volkov and Talin.
As he left he tried and failed
to eradicate the image of a naked, tanned Lady Fein from his mind.
* * *
After a distracted drive from Virginia Water, Gillard slipped the unmarked Vauxhall into a parking space near the Westgrave Hall portico. PC Zoe Butterfield was standing with her back to him, just a few yards away, chatting with Wolf. They seemed to be laughing and joking like old friends, and clearly hadn’t noticed him. At one point the Georgian security man rested a hand on her shoulder.
Gillard emerged from the car and slammed the door. They both jumped, and she dropped her clipboard onto the gravel. Wolf stepped back guiltily from her personal space.
‘Returning to the scene of the crime, Zoe?’
‘You made me jump, sir,’ she said, scooping up her clipboard. Wolf gave a cheery wave and made his way back into the main house.
‘Sorry about that. So, what has Wolf got to say for himself?’
‘Not much. He’s worried about losing his job. His residency status in the UK depends on it.’
‘He’s a funny guy, isn’t he?’
‘Absolutely hilarious,’ she said, with a grin.
‘Think he’s the murderer?’
‘Of course not!’ She looked outraged.
He’d proved his point, at least to himself. ‘Don’t get too close, constable. Don’t do a PC Woodbridge.’
‘Sir, what do you think of me?’ she said, straightening her hat, as if she’d been insulted.
‘It’s all right, Zoe, I trust your maturity and common sense, which is aided by the lack of testosterone in your half of the human race.’
She grinned again, and then turned, embarrassed, back to the task of cleaning the mud off the clipboard.
Gillard didn’t have long before catching his flight, but headed back to the Khazi, where he sat at his terminal and logged on. Lord Fein had, as promised, sent a web link to the kompromat humiliation of Maxim Talin. The link took him through to a satirical website in Russian, seemingly dedicated to great fails, with the relevant video near the top of the list. The view was from almost ceiling level of a large double bed in a hotel bedroom. An overweight naked male was lolling in bed, his dark hair all over the place, while one beautiful girl in erotic lingerie gamely tried to give him an erection, while another sat watching the TV and yawning. There was sound in Russian, which of course Gillard didn’t understand, but there were helpful subtitles in English. Talin certainly looked out for the count, probably on alcohol, and as portrayed here was no woman’s dream lover. The punchline came when the girl on the bed stopped bobbing her head up and down on Talin’s groin, looked at the unappetising morsel between her fingers and muttered to the other, ‘I’m wasting my time here’. It was the fact that the women were so obviously bored witless that made it so tawdry and humiliating.