The Hunters

by Chris Kuzneski

  Cobb smiled, impressed.

  Jasmine noted his reaction and took a deep breath. ‘That is what some biographers have said as well, but others have put forth the idea that he was a saint who cheated death.’

  ‘A whoring, alcoholic, game-playing saint?’

  Jasmine, who felt physically inferior to Sarah, hated where this was going. History was her area of expertise and she knew if she didn’t stand her ground and protect her role on the team, then these interruptions would continue for the rest of the mission. To shut Sarah down, Jasmine went for her weak spot. ‘Many theologians believe that sainthood is achieved through trial. It is not necessarily inborn. It is something that is earned over time, not stolen by a thief in the night. That’s the easy way to get through life.’

  Sarah winced. ‘Excuse me?’

  Jasmine didn’t back down. ‘Sorry. No offense intended.’

  Sarah stood back from the computer, even more insulted by the insincere tone of the apology. ‘I would think not since we’re both trying to steal this treasure.’

  ‘Actually,’ Jasmine stressed, ‘I’m trying to find it, not steal it.’

  Cobb sensed they weren’t going to work this out on their own. He could see the aggressive tension in both of their bodies, particularly Sarah’s. ‘Take a breather,’ he said to her.

  ‘Glad to,’ Sarah muttered as she left the train car.

  ‘Man,’ McNutt said, as if the confrontation hadn’t occurred, ‘I get the feeling that Rasputin was a guy who really didn’t want to die.’

  Cobb smiled. Sometimes McNutt’s bubble was a useful place.

  ‘Prince Felix wanted to live, too,’ Jasmine reminded them. ‘After the abdication three months later, he immediately decamped to Crimea.’

  ‘How “immediately”?’ Cobb wanted to know.

  ‘No way of knowing for sure, but within weeks, possibly a fortnight, possibly less.’

  ‘Surprising how much you can get done under house arrest,’ Cobb said. ‘Three months could be enough time to have made plans, written letters.’

  ‘Undoubtedly,’ Jasmine said. ‘From Crimea, the family - including the prince - was able to secure passage to Malta on a British warship. From Malta, they went to Italy and London before eventually settling in Paris.’

  ‘When?’ Garcia asked.

  ‘That was in 1920.’

  ‘Two, three years after attacking Raspy,’ McNutt noted.

  ‘Wow,’ Garcia teased. ‘You didn’t even have to use your fingers or toes.’

  ‘Cut it out,’ Cobb said before McNutt could respond. He didn’t need another pissing contest. Or a dead computer guy, which is what Garcia would be if McNutt got a hold of him.

  ‘How do you think the prince paid for all that?’ Papineau asked Jasmine.

  She thought about it for a while. ‘There was some talk that he took jewelry and rare art from their palace before they left.’

  Cobb glanced at Papineau. ‘Does that theory sound right to you?’

  ‘Yes,’ Papineau mused, leaning back in his chair. ‘Prince Felix was both an honorable man and a man of action. He must have known that securing the Romanov riches from invaders as well as his own enraged family would be impossible under those circumstances.’

  ‘But maybe not the Romanian treasure,’ Cobb said.

  ‘How long have you known this, about the prince?’ the Frenchman demanded.

  ‘I still don’t know it,’ Cobb replied. ‘But once I stopped thinking about how to find the treasure and started to think about how it could’ve been lost …’

  ‘No one but a member of the royal family could’ve gotten it out of town,’ Jasmine said. ‘There are always royal loyalists in any revolution. Not even the highest-ranking general would have had that much pull.’

  ‘And the prince was going to be on an exile train regardless,’ Papineau marveled.

  ‘Yep,’ Cobb said. ‘So I wouldn’t worry about grave robbers. I bet they stopped looking for crumbs a long time ago. What was it that Sherlock Holmes used to say?’

  ‘“When you eliminate the impossible,”’ Garcia immediately quoted, ‘“whatever’s left, no matter how improbable, has got to be the—”’

  He never got to finish. At that moment a small red light on his workstation began to flash, a strident buzzer began to bleat, and the ceiling screens began to swing down.

  ‘What is it?’ Papineau snapped.

  ‘Someone’s done something to the train,’ Garcia snapped back, his hands dancing across his keyboard as his computer screen filled with different images from outside. ‘The security cams I installed have been on-line for hours.’

  Cobb and McNutt flanked him instantly, their eyes intent on the screen.

  ‘Do you see all the workers who were there before?’ McNutt asked.

  ‘The four that Dobrev was breaking in, yeah,’ Cobb replied. ‘The two that delivered the license left right afterwards. Where’s Dobrev?’

  ‘There,’ Jasmine said from just behind them. She pointed at the corner of an image in the upper left of the screen. Dobrev was checking Ludmilla’s undercarriage, carrying the spanner he had used to save Jasmine.

  ‘Okay,’ Cobb said. ‘So what’s the prob—’

  They all snapped to attention when Sarah screeched like a wounded cat.

  She was outside, and she was in trouble.

  32

  A morgue is a morgue. It has no personality. It isn’t a cathedral where the deceased are remembered with tears and prayer. It is a collection of drawers and tables where the dead are all the same. They haven’t ‘passed’ or ‘gone to their reward’. There is nothing romantic, nothing hopeful at all. There is no modesty. Public faces and private parts are all equal here.

  They are dead.

  No matter where it is - in the oldest village or a brand new building - and no matter how much technology is employed, a morgue is a place where lifeless bodies are stored and dissected to see what the dead have to say to the living.

  Today, Marko Kadurik was talking to Colonel Borovsky.

  Situated in the cellar of the police station, this morgue was neither ancient nor cutting-edge. The fresh paint and new furniture that brightened the floors above had yet to trickle down into this dark, stone space. There were fluorescent lights in the ceiling, metal tables on the floor, and autopsy equipment in a long tray on the right. Several corpse cabinets lined the left wall. It was not like the morgues that Borovsky had seen on television or in the other countries he had visited overseas. Those places were always clean and antiseptic. None of them communicated the smell, look, feel, and choking weight of death like this place did.

  He glanced at Anna Rusinko, looking for signs of distress. She had led him down the stairs and into the morgue and was now watching his every move like a wide-eyed rookie.

  Remarkably, she appeared unfazed by her surroundings.

  As per his orders, the dead body of Marko Kadurik had been placed on the center table, a single sheet discreetly draping his body from the neck down. The first thing Borovsky did was pull back the thin covering with a flourish. Then he tossed it against the wall.

  The civilian morgue attendant, a pale-skinned youth dressed in a stained lab coat, swallowed hard. He was surprised by the behavior. ‘The mortal wound is on his head, comrade.’

  Borovsky looked at him dismissively. ‘The autopsy is complete?’

  ‘No, sir,’ the young man replied. ‘Not yet begun—’

  ‘But you are certain the head wound is what killed this man.’

  The youth stood there with an expression that said, Do you not see the exposed section of brain? But he wisely said nothing.

  ‘Truth cannot enter a closed mind,’ Borovsky said. ‘Old Russian proverb.’

  Anna looked at the attendant and motioned with her head for him to leave the morgue immediately. He did so without pause. When she looked back at her superior, he was examining every inch of the corpse.

  ‘Upstairs,’ Borovsky said flatly, ‘you
stated that the theory of this case was a consensus of your fellow investigators. Is that true?’

  When no answer came, Borovsky glanced at Anna, who was trying to figure out the best way to respond. ‘It’s a simple question,’ he said.

  ‘True, sir,’ she replied with obvious reluctance.

  Borovsky nodded. ‘We were taught as young children that religion is the opiate of the masses. However, I put it to you that lies are the true opiate. Repetition makes them seem real - just like religion. In this instance, the obvious solution takes on the mantle of truth and ruins an objective investigation. True?’

  ‘True,’ she said immediately.

  He made his way to the ruined skull. ‘Who do you think was the last man standing?’

  ‘We are still canvassing residents, sir, gathering infor—’

  ‘Who do you think was the last man standing?‘ he repeated without looking up. ‘You had two officers and four skinheads at the scene. Who do you think fell last: Gelb, Klopov, or one of the neo-Nazis?’

  Anna exhaled, drew herself up, and tried to toe the station line. ‘My investigators suspect that the officers were attacked when they asked the skinheads to depart the area.’

  ‘Couldn’t the officers have demanded money? I understand there was cash in their hands.’

  Somewhat embarrassed, she said, ‘We believe it came from a meeting, perhaps a chance meeting, with a motorist moments before.’

  ‘A bribe,’ Borovsky clarified. ‘Money for them to look the other way.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Could the motorist not have been there still when the skinheads arrived?’

  ‘It’s possible,’ she agreed, ‘but we cannot track a hypothetical car since the officers did not report a traffic offense.’

  ‘Fair enough,’ Borovsky agreed. ‘But if a bribe did occur, perhaps the skinheads witnessed the transaction. If so, perhaps the officers attacked them to keep them quiet.’

  ‘It is possible,’ she admitted.

  ‘What else have your investigators suggested?’

  She continued with reluctance. ‘They believe the attackers succeeded in downing our officers before succumbing to their own wounds - wounds inflicted by Privates Gelb and Klopov in a vigorous attempt to defend themselves.’

  Borovsky frowned at their conclusion. ‘The skinheads had broken skulls and, in one case, a broken arm. What do you think our comrades used to accomplish that? Their fists?’

  She opened her mouth to paraphrase the investigators, then closed it again. ‘I couldn’t say for sure, comrade Colonel. I honestly don’t know.’

  Borovsky looked at her with satisfaction. Then with the hint of a smile, he quoted another proverb. ‘There is no shame in not knowing. The shame lies in not finding out.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Tell me,’ he said as he returned his focus to the victim. ‘What sorts of weapons were used in this attack?’

  Anna straightened, relieved to report facts rather than theories. ‘We found metal pipes, an AK-47 bayonet, and a large, jagged piece of masonry. All with blood residue.’

  Borovsky motioned for her to come over. She did so without hesitation.

  ‘What do you think made this head wound?’ he asked, pointing at the jagged hole in Kadurik’s skull. ‘The rock, the knife, or the pipes?’

  Anna examined the wound carefully. ‘It is too wide for the pipes or the knife.’ She paused to think, looking at it from every angle. ‘Yet the depression is too uniform for the masonry.’

  ‘Good,’ he said. ‘Knowledge is of no value unless you put it into practice.’

  ‘Russian proverb?’ she asked with a weary smile.

  ‘Anton Chekhov,’ he replied. ‘Continue.’

  ‘Now that I see it, I don’t think this wound was made by any of the weapons we found at the crime scene,’ she said.

  ‘Then we have a missing weapon,’ he said.

  ‘Yes, comrade Colonel, I believe we do.’

  ‘And when there’s a missing weapon, there’s a missing suspect.’ Borovsky straightened to his full height. ‘Perhaps the last man standing - is still standing.’

  She nodded, impressed. Multiple investigators had examined the body, yet Borovsky had proven their theories incorrect in a matter of seconds.

  ‘Comrade Rusinko, please take me to the crime scene.’

  * * *

  Anna drove Colonel Borovsky to the crime scene in an unmarked sedan. They conducted an exhaustive search outside before they asked the building manager to let them into Andrei Dobrev’s apartment. At first, there was a fleeting moment of dread when they grasped the extent of his massive collection of railway memorabilia and equipment, but then Borovsky grinned with anticipation and snapped on the plastic gloves he had pulled from his jacket pocket.

  It was obvious he loved a challenge, and so did she. She always had rubber gloves as well, and she joined him as they started going through every box, file, shelf, book, album, picture frame, and nook. What they were looking for was unspoken, but obvious. It was the weapon, or anything that might lead them to comprehend what had happened on the street outside.

  For that, no words were needed.

  After nearly an hour in which they rarely spoke, Anna broke the silence. ‘Comrade Colonel, I think I may have found something.’

  He withdrew his head from a low, dusty bookcase, happy for the break. He approached the policewoman, who was holding a velvet-lined rectangular box.

  ‘Or,’ she said, ‘to be more accurate, I have found nothing.’

  She opened the box to reveal that it was empty. But he understood. The box had clearly held something precious, and it was just about the only thing they could not find amongst the piles of maps, charts, books, plans, and paraphernalia.

  Anna obviously didn’t think that this small box had housed a weapon large enough to inflict the wound that had killed Marko Kadurik, but from Borovsky’s reaction, she knew she had hit on something potentially significant. He stood, fascinated, his finger slowly and carefully following the small, circular indentation in the red padding.

  ‘A medal?’ she suggested.

  ‘Medals typically use cheap, lightweight metal. This was heavier. A coin, perhaps.’ He leaned closer, angling the box toward the light. ‘A coin that Dobrev felt was special.’

  ‘Do you think Gelb or Klopov might have taken it?’

  ‘You interviewed the occupants of this building. Did anyone mention the police searching any apartments?’

  She shook her head. ‘Perhaps they were afraid.’

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘In any group there is always one who destroys the silence of the others, one who has integrity. If the officers had entered, someone would have mentioned that.’

  ‘Some people on this floor reported footsteps and loud words in the hallway. We thought it might be the skinheads, calling on Kadurik.’

  ‘Our men searched the clothes and bodies of the victims?’

  ‘Thoroughly,’ she assured him. ‘There was no coin or medal or small memento of this kind. I read the itemized list.’

  They stood silently for a few moments. Anna watched him think, but she couldn’t read the parade of emotions that marched across his face like a procession in Red Square.

  Back at the station, Vargunin had seemed none too pleased when she had left with Borovsky. With a grimace on his face, Vargunin had stared at her while tapping on his watch as a warning. Her warrant officer knew that she had many reports to read, annotate, and file.

  ‘What shall we do, comrade Colonel?’ Anna finally asked.

  Borovsky thought for a moment, then snapped the box closed. ‘I think you should accept the new post I will offer you, Sergeant Rusinko. I think I will need your assistance in finding Andrei Dobrev, at any cost and with all speed.’

  33

  Cobb and McNutt were out the doors instantly, one on each side of the car. Garcia stayed glued to his screen, while Papineau charged back through the train. But Jasmine hesitated. She wan
ted to warn Dobrev about the threat but felt like she had been a liability to the team at his apartment, so she decided to stay put, leaning over Garcia to watch the security camera feeds on his screen.

  Cobb and McNutt dropped to the ground, both kneeling all the way down to get a better view beneath the train. They couldn’t get a completely clear look because of the truck frames that held the big, metal disc wheels, as well as the fuel tanks and air reservoirs that hung beneath the train, but it was a start.

  The only living thing that Cobb saw was McNutt, who was holding a Ruger Mark III pistol low in his hand. Complete with custom suppressor, the .22 caliber weapon looked bizarre - like a cross between the German Luger and the Japanese Nambu - but there was a reason it was nicknamed ‘Assassin’. It was virtually silent and, in the right pair of hands, deadly.

  McNutt had the ‘right’ pair of hands.

  ‘No killing,’ Papineau shouted on the move. Cobb and McNutt continued the sweep while Papineau raced above them, running across the semi-contained flatbed car. ‘We can’t afford to hide or dispose of a corpse this early in the game.’

  ‘And I can’t afford to be dead,’ McNutt snapped.

  Cobb saw McNutt - and his Ruger - from the corner of his eye.

  ‘You heard him,’ Cobb said. ‘We are running ABM.’

  The acronym stood for Anti-Ballistic Maneuvers: no firearms.

  McNutt wasn’t happy. ‘Whoever we’re looking for won’t be playing fair.’

  Cobb shrugged. ‘Maybe so, but you have your orders.’

  McNutt nodded and reluctantly stowed his weapon. The two men moved quickly in opposite directions, starting their complete search of the train.

  Papineau made a quick visual check of the flat car as he crossed it. The five-foot-tall, slatted fencing created a lip around the surface. Sections or entire sides could be folded, flattened, or removed. Nothing seemed to be out of place. ‘Anyone, is Sarah in view?’

  Cobb and McNutt didn’t answer since they had nothing to report.

  ‘No,’ Garcia said. ‘No visual or sound since the screech.’

  Not good, Cobb thought. That meant she was either down or in very serious trouble. Sarah was the type who’d find a way to make a noise, any noise, if she could.