A Cold Red Sunrise

by Stuart M. Kaminsky

  “I like you,” Kola had said. “You’ve got a stomach for this.”

  “Shit,” Sasha had answered, his hair falling even further over his eyes. “Money.”

  “You’re not afraid of a little blood, are you, boy?” Kola had said.

  “You want to find out?” Sasha had hissed.

  “Join us,” Kola had said.

  “Just give him the money,” Yuri had whispered.

  “Why should I join you?” Sasha had asked.

  “You’d be a good front. Yuri and I look like robbers. You look like a kid. No one would be afraid of you. Can it hurt you to talk about it?”

  “We can talk,” Sasha said. “But I’m doing fine on my own.”

  They had talked; at least Kola and the kid had talked after the kid returned the money he had taken from Yuri. The kid agreed to join them for a while, to see if he made more money, if they were careful enough for him.

  “I like this boy,” Kola said to Yuri, putting a huge arm around Sasha’s shoulder.

  He’s turning queer, Yuri had thought, possibly with some jealousy that he did not acknowledge to himself. But Yuri had said nothing. Now, more than a week later as they entered the apartment and Yuri checked his hair, he was sure they had made a mistake. They had committed two robberies and Sasha had not engaged in the beatings that followed, had even claimed to hear someone coming before they could really teach a lesson to the second victim whom they had left about an hour ago with a closed eye and bleeding nose just outside the Dobryninskaya Metro Station.

  “Let’s split it up,” Kola said, closing the apartment door.

  Yuri could tell that Kola was not content. He had not finished with the victim, would be looking for a fight, someone to smash, and Yuri was planning to be careful so that it would not be him. Perhaps he could manipulate it so that Kola took out his rage and frustration on Sasha.

  “Yes, let’s split it,” said Yuri, moving to the wooden table in the center of the room. Sasha had sat in one of the three unmatched but reasonably comfortable stuffed chairs near the window.

  “Now,” Kola said and Sasha got up and joined the other two at the table.

  Kola, who held the money from the robbery, pulled it and a watch and ring from his pocket.

  “Fifty-four rubles,” he said. “Eighteen each. The watch and ring go to Volovkatin.”

  “Volovkatin?” asked Sasha.

  “Volovkatin. He has a jewelry store on Arbat Street, gives cash, hard rubles in hand for things like this,” said Kola.

  Kola had taken a few drinks before the robbery and he was talking too much. This kid might go back on his own and deal with Volovkatin without them. Kola should have kept Volovkatin to himself. Kola should eat something, but Kola pointed to the closet and Yuri knew that he wanted the vodka from the shelf.

  Yuri got up and swaggered toward the closet. If Kola kept drinking like this, Yuri might soon, but not too soon, have enough nerve to challenge him. Yuri Glemp knew he was smarter than Kola but smarter didn’t determine who was in charge. Soon, soon, if Kola kept drinking, things would be different.

  Behind him Kola whispered something to the kid and laughed. Yuri knew it must be about him, some joke. Yes, he would get Kola, but first he would get Sasha alone and take care of him. He clenched his fist in anticipation and opened the closet door.

  Before him stood a man who looked as if he were waiting for a bus. He was a square, squat man in his fifties with a nondescript Moscow face. The eyes of this man seemed to have a light dancing behind them. The man, who wore a brown shirt and a dark jacket, seemed to be quite at home standing in the closet.

  In the same split second, Yuri’s mind registered the figure before him and decided to do two things at once: close the door and turn for help. Both decisions were poor ones. As he tried to close the door, the bulky figure stepped forward, held the door open with his left hand and struck out at Yuri with his right hand. The blow hit Yuri’s midsection, sending him staggering backward into the room.

  Rostnikov stepped from the closet as quickly as his leg would allow him. The other two men in the room took in this barrel of a man and Kola rose quickly, pushed past the staggering Yuri and rushed forward with a smile. He roared at Rostnikov knowing that this man, be he police or burglar, was not to be reasoned with and Kola had no wish to engage in reason. He wanted to punish this man who had come from the closet. Kola, his arms out, threw his body into the intruder expecting to send the man staggering back into the closet, but when they met with a loud grunt the man did not stagger back, did not move. Kola was surprised but also delighted. He had expected it to be easy, perhaps unsatisfying. He thought vaguely that if this were indeed a policeman there might be other policemen nearby and if he were to get any satisfaction, have any chance of getting away, he would have to smash this man quickly, but he didn’t want it to happen too quickly.

  Kola looked into Rostnikov’s eyes, saw the dancing light and had an instant of doubt, though he clutched the older man in a bear hug, a hug with which Kola had crushed the chest of at least three victims in the past two years. Kola could hear the man’s breath and was surprised that it was not in the least labored. Kola locked his hands and squeezed, imagining Sasha sitting in wonder and admiration. Kola grunted, watching for the fear and pain in the eyes of the man in front of him, but there was no pain, no fear. The man even seemed to smile or almost smile and Kola felt the veins on his bald head swell with strain. Still the man smiled.

  Behind him Kola heard Yuri catching his breath, hissing, “Turn him, Kola, so I can shoot.”

  Kola was enraged. He had lost face. Yuri could see that the bear hug which had never failed him before was not having its effect. And so Kola changed tactics. He let out a savage growl and stepped back with clenched fists to pummel the man in front of him, but he never got the chance to use his hands. Rostnikov reached out swiftly to grab Kola’s right wrist with his left hand and his corded neck with his right. Kola tried to step back and free himself from the grip of the smaller man but he couldn’t break free. He hit the man’s hand with his left fist and tried to ram his head into the placid face before him but Rostnikov yanked at his left wrist, bent over as Kola leaned forward, grabbed his leg and put his head under Kola’s arm. Kola found himself over the shoulders of the barrel of a man. He screamed in rage and humiliation but Rostnikov lifted him over his head and Kola found himself falling, flying toward Yuri who stood in front of Sasha. Kola hit the table, crushing it, sending wooden legs crashing, skidding into the air and across the room. Before he passed out, Kola thought he heard someone far away playing a balalaika.

  Yuri had danced back as Kola’s body shattered the table. He had stood back, gut burning from the punch he had taken, to watch Kola kill the intruder, but it hadn’t happened. Kola had been the one beaten. And so Yuri stood now, pistol held firmly, and aimed at the wide body of this man from the closet who stood in front of him. Yuri had no choice and wanted none. He would shoot if the man moved. He would shoot even if the man didn’t move. There was nothing to think about. He raised the gun and fired, but something had hit his hand and the bullet, instead of entering the intruder, thudded into the leg of the unconscious Kola who jumped, flopped like a fish with the impact.

  Yuri was confused, afraid. What had happened? What would Kola do when he was awake and sober and knew that Yuri had shot him? Yuri raised the gun again, unsure of who he should kill first, Kola or the man from the closet who was limping toward him. He was not given the opportunity to make the decision. Something hit his arm again and the pain made him drop the gun which fell gently into one of the cloth chairs. And then, as the washtub of a man reached for him, Yuri understood and looked at Sasha who tossed his hair back and punched Yuri in the face, breaking the bridge of his nose.

  Yuri staggered back in pain, hit the wall and slid down, reaching up to try to stop the blood that spurted from his nose.

  “Call down to Zelach,” Rostnikov said, checking his pocket to be sure his book hadn�
�t been damaged. “He’s waiting down in a car.”

  Sasha Tkach nodded and hurried to the window. An icy blast entered the room as he threw open the window, leaned out, shouted and nodded.

  “He’s coming,” Sasha said closing the window and turning back to Rostnikov. “I noticed him when we came in. I was afraid they would see him too.”

  “Yes,” sighed Rostnikov. “Zelach is a bit conspicuous.”

  Sasha looked at Kola’s leg while Rostnikov lifted Yuri from the floor after pocketing the gun that had landed on the chair. Rostnikov propped Yuri against the wall as Zelach and a uniformed MVD officer burst into the apartment, breaking the lock. Zelach and the young officer both held weapons. Zelach’s was a pistol. The young man held an automatic weapon that could have dispatched a regiment with a touch.

  Rostnikov sighed and motioned with his hand for the two to put the weapons away.

  Zelach, his mouth open as usual, looked around the room as Rostnikov went back to the closet to retrieve his coat and hat.

  “Call an ambulance for the one on the floor,” Rostnikov said. “Take the other one too. Have someone fix them up and bring the one with the broken nose to my office. Watch them both. Inspector Tkach will fill out the report. And find a jewelry store operator named Volovkatin on Arbat Street. Arrest him for dealing in stolen goods.”

  Zelach stood, mouth open.

  “Do you understand, Zelach? Are you here, Zelach?”

  “Yes, Inspector. Volovkatchky on Lenin Prospekt.”

  “Sasha,” Rostnikov said. “Go with him. Get Volovkatin.”

  “Yes,” said Sasha, moving toward the door.

  “There’s no phone here,” said Zelach looking around the room.

  “That is correct. There is no phone,” Rostnikov confirmed. “Why don’t you send Officer—”

  “… Karamasov,” the young man said.

  Rostnikov looked at the brown-uniformed young man with interest but saw nothing to be particularly interested in other than a literary name and shrugged.

  “Karamasov can call the ambulance and you can wait here and then accompany these two to the hospital. Sasha, you and Zelach go to Arbat Street. You understand?”

  “Perfectly,” said Zelach, blinking. “Oh, they called.”

  “They did. Who are they?” said Rostnikov, buttoning his coat, thinking about dinner, deciding to make another attempt tonight to reach his son Josef by phone.

  “Colonel Snitkonoy,” said Zelach, trying to remember an approximate message. “You are to report back to him immediately. Someone has died.”

  “Someone?” asked Rostnikov.

  Kola groaned on the floor and reached for his wounded leg. Yuri, his face bloody, looked as if he were going to say something, ask something, but changed his mind and moaned once. Karamasov looked around once more and hurried out of the apartment to make his call.

  “Someone,” Zelach repeated.

  It was late, but there might be time to get to MVD headquarters, meet with Snitkonoy and still get back home at a reasonable hour. It was annoying. He was no more than a five-minute walk from his apartment, but Rostnikov was accustomed to annoyances. He would walk to the Profsojuznaja Metro Station on Krasikov and finish his paperback novel on the train.

  “Anything else, Inspector?” Zelach asked.

  “Yes, don’t break down doors if you don’t have to. It is very dramatic but it makes unnecessary work for some carpenter.”

  “I’ll remember, Inspector,” Zelach said seriously, moving to stand over Kola who was now definitely waking up.

  Rostnikov clapped Tkach on the arm to indicate that he had done a good job. The inspector surveyed the room one last time, returned to the closet, retrieved the small stool and put it back in the corner near the sink where he had found it.

  He stepped past the broken table and broken robbers and headed into the hall on his way back for what he feared would be a long lecture from the Gray Wolfhound.

  One hour later, Rostnikov was uncomfortably seated at the conference table in the office of Colonel Snitkonoy, the Gray Wolfhound, who headed the MVD Bureau of Special Projects. Rostnikov had drawn a coffee cup in his notebook and was now thoughtfully shading it in to give the impression that some light source was hitting it from the left. He had been drawing variations on this coffee cup for several years and was getting quite competent at it. From time to time, he would look up, nod, grunt and indicate that he was pensively listening to the wisdom being dispensed by Colonel Snitkonoy who paced slowly about the room, hands folded behind his back, brown uniform perfectly pressed, medals glinting and colorful.

  The Gray Wolfhound believed that Rostnikov was taking careful notes on his superior’s advice and thought. This caused the white-maned MVD officer to speak more slowly, more deliberately, his deep voice suggesting an importance unsupported by the depth of his words.

  Rostnikov had recently been transferred “on temporary but open-ended duty” to the MVD, the police, uniformed and nonuniformed, who directed traffic, faced the public, and were the front line of defense against crime and for the maintenance of order. It had been a demotion, the result of Rostnikov’s frequent clashes with the Komityet Gospudarstvennoy Besapasnosti, the State Security Agency, the KGB. Before the demotion, Rostnikov had been a senior inspector in the office of the Procurator General in Moscow. The Procurator General, appointed for a seven-year-term, the longest term of any Soviet official, is responsible for sanctioning arrests, supervising investigations, executing sentences, and supervising trials. Too often, Rostnikov’s path had crossed into the territory of the KGB which is responsible for all political investigations and security. The KGB, however, could label anything from drunkenness to robbery as political.

  Now Rostnikov worked for the Gray Wolfhound whose bureau, everyone but the Wolfhound knew, existed because the Colonel looked like the ideal MVD officer. Colonel Snitkonoy was trotted out for all manner of ceremonial events from greeting and dining with visiting foreigners to presenting medals for heroism to workers at Soviet factories. Colonel Snitkonoy’s bureau was also given a limited number of criminal investigations, usually minor crimes or crimes about which no one really cared. Rostnikov and the three other investigators who worked for the Wolfhound would conduct their investigations, and if the doznaniye or inquiry merited it, the case might be turned over to the Procurator’s Office for further investigation and possible prosecution.

  “Surprise, yes. Oh, yes,” said the Wolfhound, pausing at the window of his office and turning suddenly on Rostnikov who sat at the table across the room in the Petrovka headquarters.

  Rostnikov was not surprised, but he did look up from his drawing to make contact with Snitkonoy’s metallic blue eyes.

  “We will surprise them, Porfiry Petrovich,” the Wolfhound said. “We will conduct the investigation with dispatch, identify those responsible, file a report of such clarity that it will be a model for others to follow for years.”

  Rostnikov adopted a knowing smile and nodded wisely in agreement though he had no idea of what this performance was all about. Snitkonoy began to stride toward Rostnikov who turned over the page of his notebook with the unfinished drawing. Snitkonoy approached, polished brown boots clicking against the polished wooden floor. He stood over Rostnikov with a sad, knowing smile.

  “I have in this past month you have been with us come to rely upon you, Porfiry Petrovich. You and I have the same attitude, the same outlook on dealing with the criminal mind, coping with those who pose a threat to the ongoing struggle of the Revolution.”

  Rostnikov’s deep brown eyes met the Wolfhound’s soberly and he nodded in agreement, though he agreed with almost nothing the handsome military figure in front of him had said. Rostnikov had been with the MVD for more than four months. He was certain that his and the Colonel’s views of the criminal mind were not at all similar, partly because Rostnikov did not believe in a criminal mind. There were evil people, true—stupid, selfish, brutish people—even a good number of qui
te insane people, but few who thought themselves so. Mostly there were people who considered themselves quite decent, quite compassionate, quite reasonable. They got carried away with their emotions, beliefs or assumed needs and broke the law, sometimes quite violently. The only minds that Rostnikov thought might reasonably be identified as criminal belonged to certain kinds of bureaucrats who had the opportunity and desire to engage in ongoing illegal activities.

  As for the Revolution, Rostnikov had struggled with a nearly useless left leg for over forty years as a reminder of the Revolution that never ended. When he was fifteen in 1942, Rostnikov had lost most of the use of the leg in defending the Revolution against German invaders. No, the differences between the Wolfhound and the inspector known by his colleagues as the Washtub went beyond the contrast of their appearance, but, in spite of this, Rostnikov had developed a certain affection for the caricature of an officer who paced the room before him. There appeared to be no malice in the colonel and his naïveté was sincere as was his loyalty to those who worked under him whether they deserved it or not. All the colonel expected in return was admiration. So Rostnikov did his best to project admiration while retaining as much dignity as possible.

  “So,” said Snitkonoy standing to his full six-feet-three, “you understand what must be done.”

  “No,” said Rostnikov amiably.

  The colonel shook his head, a patient patronizing smile on his firm lips. He stepped to the polished dark table and leaned forward toward Rostnikov.

  “Commissar Illya Rutkin,” the Colonel whispered. “Do you know him?”

  “The name is somewhat familiar,” answered Rostnikov putting down his pad, beginning to sense a potential threat. Rutkin was, he knew, a relatively incompetent assistant to Party District Leader Vladimir Koveraskin, who was far from incompetent and had the reputation of a man to be avoided. Rutkin was an expendable, one of the dispensable underlings Party members keep around to throw to the KGB or whomever might come nipping for corruption or scapegoats. Koveraskin had something to do with keeping track of dissident movements, or at least he was rumored to have such a function.