by Robin White
“So?” said Goloshev. “How did Petrov seem to you?”
“Worried.”
“He won’t have anything to worry about if those stones aren’t recovered. His neck is on the block.”
Levin thought, We’re not going to protect him?
Goloshev lit another cigarette, sat back, and sent a long stream of smoke jetting at a picture of Brezhnev. “How many diamonds are missing?”
“One year’s supply of gem rough. Four million carats.” He thought of the glittering piles in the sorting room. “It’s got to represent billions of rubles.”
“That’s just the beginning.” Goloshev tapped ash into a red ceramic tray. “And his meeting with Volsky? What was it about?”
The beginning? “Petrov expected a report on conditions in the diamond zone. Instead, Volsky threatened to stop shipping diamonds to the State Committee unless payments were made.”
“Typical.” He sucked down the last of the cigarette. “Then?”
“Petrov turned him down and left. Volsky followed a few minutes later. He was shot by someone posing as his driver. Possibly Volsky’s own aide.”
“Also typical. What about the real driver?”
“Already dead. His body was dumped three blocks away. The murder weapon was a Baikal 27 shotgun. No ID.”
“Again, no surprises.” Goloshev toyed with a pencil. “What about the audit? Why did Petrov perform one?”
“He was worried that Volsky’s threats to siphon diamonds off directly from the mine might be real. The Siberian Delegate had a connection there.”
“We’ll have to find Volsky’s man, of course. Now let me ask you. Do you think Petrov is guilty?”
“He’s guilty of trusting Kristall too far. He’s been accepting boxes of stones for a year without bothering to look inside them.”
Goloshev nodded gravely. “Kristall. Volsky. Inside connections. All these fucking Siberians. Petrov trusted Kristall too far all right. As for Volsky, he did everything but admit his guilt. There’s the matter of offshore accounts.”
“Petrov’s?”
“Volsky’s. He met with a foreign lawyer at Ekipazh. His card was found on the body. We’ve interviewed him and learned that he managed accounts in the Cayman Islands in Volsky’s name.”
So Volsky was dirty. It wasn’t exactly a distinguishing characteristic these days. “Then who ordered the killing?”
“Whoever was taking the stones. Volsky was going to ruin things with his demands. Bang. What’s one corpse in this city?”
Levin thought, a threat. A foreign lawyer’s confession. A killer dispatched from the wild east. It wasn’t proof, but it was believable. “Has the foreign lawyer been detained?”
“It’s better. He’s cooperating.”
“Then we should be able to recover Volsky’s account.”
“Dust.” Goloshev opened a file folder. “Volsky tore a billion-dollar hole in the state’s pockets and we don’t have much time to mend it. Two weeks, actually.”
“You said a billion?”
“Fourteen billion, fourteen days,” said Goloshev. “The International Monetary Fund is supposed to send us a loan next month. Before, they trusted us to use their money correctly. Now they’re playing a more political game.”
Too late. “What’s the connection to the missing diamonds?”
“The IMF demanded the new loan be secured with something real, something valuable. Something like . . .”
“Diamonds?”
Goloshev squinted as though Levin had switched on a bright light. “You’d think our President would look at the Closet before he pledged it. But no. He does things his own way, and we’ll all have to live with it. Two weeks from tomorrow, the IMF arrives. Do I need to spell out why they must not find the Closet empty?”
No. It would be another August 1998. Another ruble meltdown. Could Russia survive a second blow like that? Levin had his doubts. “But the Closet isn’t empty. Petrov said there were another thirty-three rooms filled with diamonds.”
“What do you think Russia has been living on since 1998? They’re empty, Levin. That’s why the world must never learn these four million carats are missing.”
“But they are missing, General.”
“We know it. They don’t. We must proceed quickly to recover them. Petrov’s pointing his finger at Siberia. He’s probably right.”
“There’s just one thing that doesn’t fit.”
Goloshev raised his eyebrows. “Well?”
“Volsky made a call to the Kremlin before he was killed. He requested the records for an American company licensed to import Siberian diamonds. Petrov told me it doesn’t exist.”
“He would know, wouldn’t he?”
“Then why would Volsky demand its records? If Volsky was trying to cover his tracks, and those tracks lead to America, we could contact the FBI for help. They have a Moscow office now and . . .”
“No. American assistance means American interference. Think. The IMF is located in Washington. So is the FBI. You want to tell one hand what must be kept secret from the other? There must be no mention of the missing stones to anyone. Especially not to any Americans. I hope that’s completely understood.”
“Yes.” But he thought, Well, no. If someone was sending diamonds to America, wasn’t it wise to find out who? “Then we’re left with Volsky’s aide.”
“Keep me informed.”
“Yes, sir.” He’d been dismissed. Levin was out in the hall again and stopped. He’d forgotten to mention the tape.
Chapter 8
The Evidence
Levin parked the Zhiguli in an open-sided metal shed behind his apartment house. He grabbed the copied security videotape from the seat, the Styrofoam container of borscht from Na Skoruyu Ryku, and slammed the door shut.
Another 1998. Levin remembered August of that year only too well. The IMF turning its back to Russia, the wild scramble to withdraw money from banks already emptied by those in the know. The equally mad rush of foreigners to the airport, willing to buy a ticket to anywhere, at any price. The “young reformers” who’d steered the economy to a cliff and then, with an almost drugged stoicism, driven it over the edge.
True, things were different now. Russia owed the IMF billions. They might not wish to see their biggest debtor collapse. If Russia went down, it might take the IMF along.
It was a curious kind of hope.
The back door to his five-story building was protected by two heavy locks and thick steel-plate bearing marks from an arms factory. Levin was amazed the weight didn’t pull the door off its hinges. Maybe they were tank hinges.
Inside, the entry was cold and dark. The floor was made from yellow-and-black linoleum, cracked and peeling, gritty with decades of dirt. Light came down from a single fixture up on the third floor. His own floor. His own bulb, too, scavenged from his office. He trudged up the stairs. He could pick out the odors of boiling cabbage, sizzling oil, the heavy smell of lamb.
The building had once been a kommunalka, a dingy warren of rooms overcrowded with people and underequipped with plumbing. A contractor had converted it to separate apartments, two to a floor, though the walls were so thin they only suggested privacy. Noises and smells were still community property.
His door was covered with sheet metal bought at an open stall at the building materials market at Kashky Dvor. The bazaar was patrolled by police and run by the Solntsevo mafiya, who made sure the goods were the best, and the customer always left happy. It was better than a government seal of approval.
As he grabbed the doorknob, he heard a heavy thump.
“Sasha?”
He opened the door and reached in to feel for the light. He heard a second thump, this time from the small bedroom. He toggled the switch on.
It wasn’t the elaborate lair of a New Russian biznisman. But it had come a long way from its days as a bleak communal flat. There was a sofa, a low table, a cabinet with a good stereo, a Sony television. The kitchen held pots and
dishes, neatly stacked.
And on the floor, a corpse. A tangle of shredded flesh, a protruding bone, strips of metal foil, a spreading stain.
“Sasha!”
The basset hound poked a nose from Levin’s bedroom. His tail thumped against the wall.
“What have you done!”
The thumping slowed.
Once, the corpse had been a roast chicken. Levin examined the body with a forensic eye, and concluded there was more to this crime. He placed the container of borscht on the counter, tossed the security tape from Ekipazh onto the table, and looked into his bedroom.
Bones littered the floor. The blanket was splotched with grease. He heard a thump from beneath the bed. “Stay there all night,” he said, and left to assemble dinner. It was amazing, when you thought about it. If Levin shared his flat with a person who behaved like this, he’d have him arrested.
Soon, Levin was on the sofa with crackers, cheese, sliced sausage, and a container of borscht. He drank it straight from the cup. Levin picked up the remote control. The television hummed to life. Next, the VCR. The screen glowed blue. He hit play.
A snout intruded in the space between the back of his knee and the sofa, pushing at his leg.
“You’re out of prison, but you’re still on probation.”
Sasha leaped onto the cushion and curled against Levin.
The blue screen went black.
It was the gated entry to Ekipazh. The tape was stop-action, the movements jerky, sudden. A small split screen showed a second view taken from a camera Levin hadn’t noticed that afternoon. One mounted low, meant to record license plates.
The soundless scene had a dreamlike quality, or perhaps a nightmarish one, since Levin knew what was going to happen.
A lumbering black Chaika appeared in the wide-angle view. The close-up showed an official license plate. The wide-angle shot narrowed to examine the face of the driver, Gavril. The time was shown in small white numbers at the bottom right of the screen.
Where’s Nowek? He wasn’t in the car. He hadn’t arrived with Volsky, unless he was hiding from the camera.
The basset edged closer to the dinner plate, stretched.
Several more arrivals were recorded, the cars, and the people in them, conforming absolutely to type: BMW. BMW. Lincoln. Jeep. Mercedes. Inside each, a New Russian and his expensive girlfriend.
Levin sped through them, then stopped and backed up. A difference. A black Land Rover, tall on its suspension, ready to prowl the Moscow savanna. Inside, a different face. Not Nowek. A foreigner. Levin could tell without knowing how he knew. Maybe it was the lawyer Goloshev mentioned? He jotted down the plate number and let the tape run again.
An empty stretch of tape, a street slowly turning white with snow, and then, the Land Rover. This time, leaving. He checked the elapsed time. Five minutes. It wasn’t much of a stay at the fanciest club in Moscow. Perhaps a drop off? The tape rolled on.
Chairman Petrov’s Mercedes hurried out through the gates. If the IMF wanted some real collateral, the government could seize every official Mercedes in the fleet.
Seven minutes later, a small car turned down the snowy lane. A cab. It left dark tracks in the street. It stopped a respectful distance from the gate. The back door opened.
Levin leaned forward. The security camera didn’t zoom. It didn’t pan. It didn’t budge. It had become a fixed, dead eye. Where were the guards?
A figure approached the gate. He was carrying something under his arm. A newspaper? Levin paused the tape. Nowek.
He let the tape run. The low camera recorded Nowek’s legs. The main screen showed the cab backing away, disappearing down the street, hopping from frame to frame like a flea.
One second, two. Levin was about to press fast-forward when something black hurtled through the low camera’s field of view. A black Chaika skidded into view across the small, split screen. Halfway down the lane it slammed into the curb and came to a stop. A person jumped out, then fell. The nightmare accelerated. The driver emerged carrying a shotgun.
Levin held his breath, not even blinking his eyes. One moment Volsky was halfway to his feet. The next, a white flash, a mist expanding from Volsky’s body. The next frame, and the Siberian Delegate was down, the gunman standing over him. There was Nowek, running. The weapon rose. Volsky stirred. The barrel pointed back down. Levin watched. Another frame, another flash, another gray cloud streaked with white.
The killer dropped the weapon and ran down the lane. A militia patrol car appeared. He got in. The car vanished.
Nowek held Volsky in his arms. There he remained until the flash of another militia car made him raise his head.
Levin stopped the tape. There had been just two departures since Volsky arrived: Petrov, and the Land Rover. Gavril, the driver found knifed a few blocks away, had to have been in one of them.
He stared at the screen. He didn’t know about the lost diamonds, or Volsky’s role in their disappearance, or what Golden Autumn might be, if anything at all. But the man the militia arrested for his murder hadn’t pulled the trigger.
Levin reached for another cracker. He looked down. “Sasha!” The plate was empty. The basset hound was gone.
Chapter 9
The Resurrection
Nowek knew what was coming, but it was still terrifying. Unlike other, simpler nightmares, this one had been real.
It was two years ago, the second warm night of spring. Winter was dying, and mounds of plowed snow had congealed into rock-hard ice that blocked the gutters and drains. The streets flooded, overflowing onto the sidewalks. It was the small town of Markovo, down by the River Lena, in the rundown industrial district called the Black Lung. He was still Mayor Nowek, not that it meant much. Clearly, the man trying to kill him was unimpressed.
The water was numbingly cold. Nowek scrambled to rise, but then something slammed against his head and he was under. Gelatinous bubbles streamed from his lips, his nose. Nowek managed to get a hand beneath him. He clawed at the boot on his chest. Struggling only used up his air faster.
The puddle was barely half a meter deep. Not much compared with Lake Baikal, or the River Lena, or even a bathtub. But plenty enough to drown in.
One minute, maybe two. How long can you hold your breath? There are scientific terms for what is about to happen, but what it comes to is this: a desperate brain steps up to the roulette wheel and plays the odds. Open your mouth and you might die, keep it shut and you will. And so there’s just one last bet to make, and it’s almost never a good one.
An involuntary gasp. A slug of water rushed down Nowek’s throat. It filled his chest with cold weight. He tried to spit it out. More water flooded in. The gag reflex was uncontrollable. With each spasm, his lungs grew heavier, colder. He was drowning. His ears roared. His forehead burned.
Nowek woke with a gasp, his face soaking wet with real water. He panicked. His heart stumbled. The harsh glare of a white bulb burning behind heavy glass poured down into his eyes. Gray concrete everywhere. Ceiling. Floor. Walls. A black scrawl: TECHNOROCK RULES! A cell. His. He looked up. A militiaman held an empty bucket. A single drop formed at the lip, quivered, fell.
“Impossible.” A voice from out in the hall. “He belongs to us.”
“Not anymore. Here.”
“So what? It’s our prison.”
“I don’t want your prison. I’m taking your prisoner.”
A pause, then “Major Levin, it’s not even nine o’clock. Contract Murders hasn’t talked to him yet.”
“They can talk to him at the Lubyanka. We’re taking Nowek to our P-4 facility. Maybe you’ve heard of it.”
“Never.”
“Let’s just say that when something sinks to P-4, it never rises. You can come and see it yourself if you’d like. I’ll give you a private tour.”
Nowek listened for an answer.
“On your feet.” A boot prodded Nowek.
Major Levin. Nowek burned the name into his memory, husbanding the information.
And from the Lubyanka. That made Levin FSB, or whatever they were calling themselves this week.
A youngish man with stylishly long blond hair, dark eyes, and a dark mustache appeared at the door. He was dressed in a suit, but no tie. He looked at Nowek. “Okay? Let’s go.”
Nowek’s pants were brown with dried blood. It flaked off as he bent a knee to stand. He held his hands out in front and the militiaman snapped the heavy cuffs back on. Nowek’s leg ached badly. He could scarcely put weight on it.
“What happened to his leg?” asked Levin.
“We didn’t do it.”
As Nowek limped down the corridor, a prisoner grabbed the bars with both hands and thrust his face, his tongue, his lips, into the gap. “Give me your boots, cookie. You won’t need them now.”
The militia sergeant waited at the stairs. He tossed a sheaf of official-looking papers at Nowek.
He stopped. Was he supposed to pick them up?
“Keep moving. You belong to Major Yid now.”
Two militiamen in winter greatcoats waited at the top of the stairs. One carried a leather-wrapped truncheon, a demokratizer, sent by a police organization in America. Who said humor was dead?
The front door to Gagarinsky Detention Facility 3 opened, and Nowek caught sight of the street beyond. He stopped, staring. The normal world. One day in Gagarinsky 3 and he’d already lost his sense of connection to it.
The snow was gone. Monday morning traffic choked the streets. It was warm enough to smell the rankness coming from the back of an open prisoner van. Its blue lights flashed. A small white car, a Zhiguli, was parked in front of it. A thin young man with unruly red hair sat in front.
Nowek paused, savoring the normal world, the light, the air. What was P-4, if not a hole in the world?
“What are you looking at?” one of the militiamen asked.
“The snow is gone. It’s not winter yet.”
“The flowers will be out before you see daylight again.”
How long was the trip from Gagarinsky to the Lubyanka? Long enough to recall Volsky’s words shouted from the shower, to remember Galena’s message waiting for him at the music store Melodiya, to hear the music rising from an ancient LP. The blast of a shotgun, and words whispered through melting snow and blood.