Death on the Nevskii Prospekt

by David Dickinson

  ‘You could have a point there, Powerscourt,’ drawled de Chassiron. ‘At the very least you could be locked up for years before any case came to trial. Last night you were up on the roof of a railway compartment. Maybe in view of the fact that these people guard the roads and the railways you’ll have to leave on another.’

  ‘I’m damned if I’m going to crawl out of this country like a criminal,’ said Powerscourt. ‘The important thing at the moment is to rescue Natasha. I’m going to rouse Johnny Fitzgerald and then he and I are going to pay a visit to General Derzhenov at the Okhrana headquarters on the Fontanka.’

  ‘And what are you going to do when you get there? Pop yourself into one of those nice cells they have in the basement?’ De Chassiron looked as if he thought his friend had gone mad.

  ‘Let me try to put it into diplomatic language for you, de Chassiron. I am going, on behalf of the British Government, to conduct a negotiation aimed at the speedy release of Miss Bobrinsky who has been a great friend to the British Foreign Office and the British Government.’

  ‘That makes her sound like a spy, an English spy,’ said de Chassiron. ‘That might not do her any good at all. I think you have to let events take their course. There’s nothing we can do. Talk of going to the Okhrana is so much pie in the sky. Why should they lift a finger to help us?’

  ‘I think you are wrong there. In fact I’m sure of it. Derzhenov has already asked to see me to discuss my conversation with the Tsar. I propose to tell him something, but not necessarily all of what was said, in exchange for the immediate release of Natasha.’

  ‘But he’s not going to interfere with another of Russia’s intelligence agencies.’ De Chassiron sounded very certain.

  ‘My dear man,’ said Powerscourt with a smile, ‘this is one of the problems of having competing intelligence agencies. They usually hate their rivals far more than they hate their enemies. I bet you the Okhrana loathe the late Major Shatilov and his organization. Anything they can do to bring them into disrepute brings more power to the Okhrana.’

  ‘And how much do you propose to tell him? More than you propose telling our Ambassador here, or myself? That would be rather treacherous conduct.’

  ‘That’s unfair,’ said Powerscourt angrily. ‘You know perfectly well that I am specifically instructed to give the results of my investigation to the Prime Minister and to him alone. At present, however much I might want to fill you in, de Chassiron, I just can’t do it. Anyway, we shall see,’ said Powerscourt, rising from his chair. ‘Please come too, Mikhail, Derzhenov speaks very good English but I have no idea who else we might meet on the way.’

  Derzhenov was alone in his office on the fourth floor. The villainous Colonel Kolchak, Powerscourt thought, must be kicking people to death in the basement cells.

  ‘How good of you to call, Lord Powerscourt!’ the head of the Okhrana purred. ‘And you must be the famous Johnny Fitzgerald. And Mikhail, of course, in case I forget my English. You come just as you said you would, Lord Powerscourt, the morning after your interview with the Tsar. How kind! How very kind!’

  Powerscourt felt as though a month had elapsed since his interview with the Tsar. ‘Now then, my friend,’ Derzhenov went on, ‘I understand you have had some interesting adventures since your interview. Is that not so? Interesting adventures?’

  ‘I will tell you about those in a moment, if I may, General Derzhenov. But most of all I want to ask for your assistance.’

  ‘My assistance, Lord Powerscourt? How can the son of a humble schoolteacher possibly be of assistance to the representative of the greatest empire on earth?’

  Powerscourt felt that American or German historians might take issue with the last statement but he did not think the time or the place were appropriate for a discussion on the rise and fall of empires. ‘It is a very simple matter, General. It concerns a young lady called Natasha Bobrinsky. She is a friend of Mikhail. She has been helping us in a general sort of way, in the inquiries about Mr Martin, for example. She has done nothing whatsoever to harm or betray her country. She is employed part-time as a lady-in-waiting to the Empress at the Alexander Palace at Tsarskoe Selo. For the past few days she felt she was being followed by members of the Imperial Guard, Royal Palaces Security Division. This morning she has disappeared.’

  Derzhenov frowned deeply at the mention of the Imperial Guard. ‘And you would like my help to find her?’ he asked. ‘Is she one of the – how do I put it? – the Bobrinsky Bobrinskys?’

  ‘She is,’ said Powerscourt, ‘and with your help I am sure she would be released by lunchtime.’

  Derzhenov laughed a rather alarming laugh. ‘I’m not sure about that, Lord Powerscourt. I think you are exaggerating my powers. But tell me,’ Derzhenov began running the tips of his fingers together, ‘what information do you bring me this morning, the morning after your interview with the Tsar?’

  What was Natasha Bobrinsky worth? How much should he tell the head of the Okhrana? None of it? Some of it? All of it? Powerscourt had been running these questions through his mind on the way to the Okhrana headquarters. He still had no answers. He knew nothing that would endanger British national interests. In fact, some of what he knew damaged Russian national interests rather more than his own. Yet somehow he found the prospect of telling his secrets to the head of a foreign intelligence agency who was not allied to Great Britain very hard to take. It would have been different if it had been the urbane head of the French secret service, weaving elegant plots with his Watteau in the Place des Vosges.

  ‘If I tell you, General, will you secure the release of Miss Bobrinsky?’ said Powerscourt, hoping to be saved by the non-specific nature of his statement. But Derzhenov was too wily a bird to fall for that one.

  ‘I’m afraid, my friend, you will have to do better than that. I might promise to secure the release of the young lady – if I can – and you would tell me nothing. Why don’t you tell me what transpired and then I will tell you what I might be able to do to release the young lady.’

  ‘But then,’ now it was Powerscourt’s turn, ‘I could tell you all I know and get nothing in return. Assuming,’ he smiled at the General, ‘you were an unreasonable man. Which you’re not.’ Oddly enough, Powerscourt was certain that this man opposite, who whipped his prisoners for fun, who had the more unfortunate of them killed in ways that replicated classical paintings, would, nevertheless, keep his word.

  ‘We could go on like this all day,’ said Derzhenov. ‘I suspect that in our careers we often have. Lord Powerscourt, I ask you to trust me. If you tell me what happened and I think you are telling the truth we will see what can be done with this Natasha Bobrinsky. If you do not trust me, then I suggest you leave now. That way you will not compromise yourself or your mission. Your knowledge will remain with you. Miss Bobrinsky will remain locked up. But I hope you do not leave.’

  There was a pause. Neither Johnny Fitzgerald nor Mikhail spoke. Then Powerscourt held out his hand. One part of his brain said, You’re shaking hands with a mass murderer. The other part said, ‘Very good, General. I accept what you say. Let me begin with the original nature of my mission to St Petersburg, the question of who killed Roderick Martin.’ Powerscourt saw that Derzhenov had begun taking copious notes. Perhaps he and his information were going to end up as dusty footnotes in the Okhrana files. Information supplied by the English investigator Powerscourt.

  ‘The last we knew of him was that he left the Tsar at about ten o’clock. The Tsar declined to say anything at all about the nature of their conversation. Martin appeared to vanish until the appearance of his corpse on the Nevskii three or four hours later.’

  Powerscourt paused and poured himself a glass of water. Water shall wash away their tears, he said to himself. ‘I now know what happened to him. He was apprehended by members of the Imperial Guard, Royal Palaces Security Division under the control of a Major Shatilov.’

  ‘This Major Shatilov, Lord Powerscourt, have you seen him lately? A little bird tells me
he has gone missing.’

  ‘I’m not sure I have anything to add to that,’ said Powerscourt blandly. ‘As I say, Mr Martin was taken into custody by the Major in a house on the outskirts of Tsarskoe Selo.’

  Derzhenov was still writing. Powerscourt waited patiently until he had finished before he went on. ‘Major Shatilov was most anxious to know the nature of Mr Martin’s conversation with the Tsar, almost as anxious as yourself, General. It’s strange how all the intelligence agencies should want the same piece of news, it really is.’

  There was a cackle from Derzhenov. ‘Just get on with the story, Powerscourt. What did Martin tell him?’

  ‘He didn’t tell him anything.’

  ‘So what did Shatilov do then?’

  ‘He beat him to death with a knout, General.’

  ‘Is that so, Lord Powerscourt?’ Derzhenov looked up from his scribbling. ‘That’s very bad management,’ he said, shaking his head, ‘people shouldn’t die from a single session with the whip.’

  ‘Maybe he had a weak heart, General Derzhenov. Maybe it was because members of the British Foreign Office don’t live in a world where people are beaten to death with whips. They’re not used to it.’

  ‘You could have a point there, Lord Powerscourt.’ Derzhenov was back writing again. ‘And you are sure the man Martin said nothing before he died?’

  ‘Not a word, General.’

  ‘Not a word? I see. But tell me, what is your source for this information? Where does it come from?’

  ‘Why, General,’ said Powerscourt, trying to look as innocent as possible, ‘it came from Major Shatilov himself.’

  ‘Really?’ said Derzhenov with great emphasis. ‘Was this the last action of the Major before he disappeared? Do you expect him to turn up early one morning on the Nevskii, rather like Mr Martin before him?’

  Powerscourt had decided some moments before precisely what he was going to tell the Okhrana man. He was going to tell him about Martin’s death as he had done. He was going to tell him about the last conversation Martin had with the Tsar in the sense that it now seemed that a flight to Norfolk was less likely. He would, if he had to, tell him about the death of Shatilov and the skirmish on the train. But he would not, out of a sense of loyalty to the Tsar, disclose anything about the haemophilia. He felt sure the Tsar would want that to remain private.

  ‘I wouldn’t know about that,’ said Powerscourt, reluctant to be drawn into detailed discussion on the man’s death. Though it was the bridge that killed him, a hostile prosecutor could easily make out a case against Powerscourt and his men.

  ‘I see, Lord Powerscourt,’ said Derzhenov, temporarily chewing on the end of his pen and looking closely at the Englishman. ‘Maybe we shall come back to this later. But tell me, what of Martin’s conversation with the Tsar?’

  So Powerscourt told him: the original approach from the Tsar to the English King asking if his wife and family would be welcome in England, the despatch of Martin, bearing the answer that they would be welcome in Norfolk, Powerscourt’s discovery of the place where they were to be accommodated, the final reluctance to take up the offer, for reasons as yet unexplained.

  ‘Did the Tsar tell you this himself, Lord Powerscourt? Were there just the two of you at the meeting?’

  ‘There were just the two of us, General,’ said Powerscourt, ‘and no, the Tsar did not tell me, I told him.’

  ‘You told him, Lord Powerscourt? But how did you know? You weren’t even there!’

  ‘Let me put it this way, General, I worked it out. I don’t want to say anything more about my methods, if you don’t mind. But the Tsar confirmed that it was more or less true.’ There’s no point, he said to himself, in rescuing Natasha Bobrinsky from the frying pans of Major Shatilov, heated to unbearable levels, no doubt, before being applied to stripped flesh, into the fires of the Okhrana, gridirons and reproductions of the martyrdom of St Lawrence a speciality.

  Derzhenov suddenly seemed to make up his mind. He stopped writing and carefully screwed the top back on to his German fountain pen. ‘Lord Powerscourt, I think there is more that you are not yet telling me. I believe you know more than you let on about the death of Major Shatilov. Let me just ask you one question on that subject, if I may. If he were to be found dead, would you say – assuming you were a guessing man, you understand – that he was killed in a fight or by accident?’

  ‘Being completely ignorant of the facts, General, I would not like to make any comment at all,’ said Powerscourt, beginning to sweat slightly.

  ‘I forgive you,’ said Derzhenov, smiling at his visitor. ‘There is one piece of information you have, I believe, which you are not telling me about, but I know it already. Fear not. I respect you for not telling me. Now then. Miss Bobrinsky, how shall I put this? You could tell her friends to expect her back in St Petersburg this afternoon.’

  And with that a beaming Derzhenov led them down the stairs and out into the fresh air. He shook them all warmly by the hand. For once there were no noxious smells or sounds of horror coming from the basement.

  ‘What on earth,’ said Johnny Fitzgerald when they were a good hundred yards clear of the building, ‘was that last bit about?’

  ‘The bit about I know what you’re not telling me but I don’t mind? He means, I think, that he knows about the haemophilia. Quite how he knows, I can’t imagine. I just hope his organization is quite secure or the whole bloody Russian Empire will know about it before the end of the year.’

  16

  Lord Francis Powerscourt was sitting next to Rupert de Chassiron in the back row of the seats in the University of St Petersburg’s theatre at four o’clock the same afternoon, waiting for a play to begin. Natasha Bobrinsky had indeed been released from captivity and had gone home to recover from her ordeal. She and Mikhail and Powerscourt were to meet for dinner at a hotel on the Nevskii Prospekt where they had dancing in the evenings. Johnny and Ricky Crabbe had disappeared on an outing to some distant place where the local birds could be seen to best advantage, way out near the tip of Vasilevsky Island. Afterwards, Powerscourt had learned to his horror, Ricky was going to take his new friend back to his own quarters and introduce him to a range of different vodkas. De Chassiron was slightly apologetic about the play.

  ‘Don’t expect anything fancy like you would see in the West End, Powerscourt. Don’t expect anything very much at all. The students are all on strike – the English Department only got permission to put this on because it is not part of the course. The English professor is very keen on drama and he has translated this play himself. He put on another one by the same author last year and I came to see it. This one’s called The Cherry Orchard and it had its first performance last year in Moscow.’

  ‘Should I have heard of this author, if the professor is so keen on his work? Is he famous?’

  ‘He’s not famous, not yet anyway,’ said de Chassiron, ‘he’s dead now, poor man. He was a doctor called Chekhov, Anton Chekhov. He was still quite young when he died.’

  If they had been back in London such an amateur production would probably have irritated both Powerscourt and de Chassiron. The professor’s translation appeared to be more than competent, but some of the student actors seemed to have been spending more time on revolutionary activities than they had on learning their lines. When you added the fact that the prompter appeared only to have a copy of the play in Russian rather than English, the difficulties, for Powerscourt at least, were compounded. And some of the cast had a less than perfect grasp of the English language so that much of the dialogue passed him by.

  Nonetheless he thought he had the hang of the main points of the story. The Cherry Orchard belonged to a Mrs Ranevskaya who is returning home from Paris at the beginning of the play. The estate and the Cherry Orchard will have to be sold to pay off the family debts unless she agrees to cut all the trees down and build villas for the new middle class on the site of the orchard and live off the rental income. A local merchant, risen from the ranks of the for
mer peasants, offers to help her do this, but she refuses. There are two of her daughters, one adopted, and her brother in the cast, all going to be affected by the sale. There is an aged servant called Firs who regrets the passing of the old days of the serfs when everybody knew their place. There is a perpetual student called Trofimov who boasts of not being thirty yet. All of these characters, Powerscourt felt, were out of place. They didn’t seem to belong to their own time, to their own space. They were displaced persons in what had become, for them, almost a foreign country. They floated precariously between the old world of the Ranevskaya estate and the different world they would inhabit when it was gone. Very near the end the stage was empty, with the sound of all the doors being locked with their keys, and all the carriages leaving. The silence was broken by the striking of a solitary axe against a tree, a rather melancholy sound. The old servant appears. He has been forgotten, left behind. Suddenly Powerscourt felt very strongly that the Cherry Orchard, for Chekhov, was Russia. The old order of long ago, of masters and serfs, has long gone. Nobody is sure what is going to replace it. Russia is being sold off to the new capitalist class, who will cut down the cherry orchards and build the villas while the previous owners complete their abdication of responsibility by going back to their lovers in Paris.

  ‘Life has gone by as if I hadn’t lived,’ says the eighty-seven-year-old Firs at the very end, ‘you’ve got no strength left, nothing, nothing.’ There is the distant sound of a string breaking, as if in the sky, a dying melancholy noise. Silence falls and the only thing to be heard is a tree being struck again with an axe far off in the orchard. The final curtain falls. The old order is being cut down. Powerscourt wondered what Dr Chekhov would have made of Bloody Sunday and the current paralysis in his country. Would he have any prescriptions? Or would he be content to describe the symptoms?