After all the paperwork was complete, the customs officer searched the rest of the holdall. Killigrew felt the sweat dripping from his armpits as he waited for the man to discover the secret compartment containing the Lefacheaux revolver.
Finally, the officer snapped the holdall shut and handed it back. ‘Enjoy your stay in Russia, M’sieur Bryce.’
Killigrew walked out of the custom house and paused on the Point, at the east end of Vasilyevsky Island: just one of the islands in the delta of the River Neva on which St Petersburg had been built. It was a bright, sunny day in the middle of July, the light glittering on the river where it branched into two channels – the Bolshaya Neva and the Malaya Neva – passing on either side of the island to empty into the Gulf of Finland. A short distance upstream he could see the imposing bastions of the Petropavlovsky Fortress on the north side of the river – housing the Imperial Mint as well as the ‘secret house’ where political dissidents were incarcerated without trial – while to his right he could see the impressive waterfront of the mainland, dominated by the facades of the Winter Palace and the Admiralty building with its golden spire.
A rank of hackney drozhkies stood nearby: odd little four-wheeled carriages drawn by two horses, with a seat at the front for the driver and room for only one passenger, who sat partly in it and partly astride it. Killigrew climbed astride the first. ‘Dussot’s Hotel, pozhaluista.’
The driver grunted, chucked the reins, and the drozhky pulled away from the pavement.
Killigrew took out his cheroot case and held it up. In the reflection of its polished tin surface, he could see the man in the fur hat and black greatcoat flag down another drozhky, driven by an identically clad fellow. They pulled out into the street behind Killigrew’s drozhky, following at a distance. Nothing to worry about, he told himself: any English or French-speaking visitors to Russia would be of special interest to the spies of the Third Section.
Well, he was in harm’s way, now: if not in the heart of the Russian Empire, then certainly at its head. Despite his outward display of nonchalance during his interview by the customs officer, his heart had been racing, and it had still not slowed. One mistake, one false step, and it would all be over. There would be no trial, and certainly no handing him back to his own people in exchange for a captured Russian officer: a brutal, drawn-out interrogation in the cellars of the Kochubey Mansion was the best he could hope for, and in the unlikely event of his surviving that, he would be put up against a wall and shot. He had been in more dangerous situations than this, but usually with at least a shipmate or two to watch his back.
Sweating and looking pale was only going to draw attention to him too. He forced himself to put thoughts of capture, torture and execution from his mind. Back in London, his performances in plays to raise money for charity had been praised for their naturalness, which he achieved by making himself believe – for a couple of hours, at least – that he was the character he was playing. Only now he had to carry off his performance as an American journalist not just for a couple of hours but for days if not weeks.
The drozhky crossed the Bolshaya Neva on a pontoon bridge, passing between the Winter Palace and the Admiralty before heading up the Nevsky Prospect – three miles long, nowhere less than eighty feet in width – with its fine palaces, shops and apartment buildings, crossing two of the many waterways that laced the city. Most of the buildings were designed on elegant, classical lines, with few of the onion domes that Killigrew associated with Russia. But then, St Petersburg had been founded by Peter the Great, who had wanted to westernise the country, and Killigrew had read somewhere that St Petersburg was no more typical of Russia than New York City was of the United States. There could be no denying that St Petersburg was a fine-looking city, perhaps the most beautiful Killigrew had ever visited; but then, he had never been to Italy.
If the city looked beautiful, it was marred by the stench in the sultry summer air. He recognised the stink rising from the canals because it was little different from the stink from the Thames when he had left London: the stink of effluent. It assailed his nostrils the moment he reached the Petersburg side of the Bolshaya Neva, and stayed in them, making him gag. Small wonder the Tsar and his family preferred to spend the summer months at the summer palace in Tsarskoye Selo.
The driver reined in the horses outside Dussot’s Hotel. As Killigrew paid him, he saw the drozhky bearing the two men in greatcoats and fur hats park outside the town hall on the opposite side of the street. He had a feeling they were going to be his companions throughout his stay in St Petersburg, and he christened them Tweedledum and Tweedledee, after two characters in a John Byrom satire.
He took his holdall and entered the hotel. ‘I’d like a room for one, please,’ he told the concierge in French. He had not bothered to send a telegram ahead to reserve a room: most of the St Petersburg aristocracy moved into their country dachas during the summer months, and the city was relatively quiet at this time of year.
‘I’ll need to take your passport, sir.’
Killigrew handed it over: that was the way they did things in Russia, and there was no point drawing attention to himself by making a fuss; besides, he had a feeling that when he left he would do so in a hurry, without going through official channels.
‘How long will you be staying, M’sieur Bryce?’
Killigrew smiled ruefully. ‘Indefinitely.’
‘That is no problem at all, M’sieur. If you’d care to sign the register?’
Killigrew was careful not to sign his real name out of force of habit. The Latin Letters looked strange and out of place amongst all the names written in the Cyrillic alphabet, although he noticed there were a few other Western Europeans staying at the hotel.
‘Could you check to see if there are any messages for me?’ Killigrew was not expecting any this early in his visit, but while the concierge had turned his back to check the pigeonholes, it gave him a chance to riffle through the preceding pages of the register. No sign of a Wilhelm Bauer, though – not that Killigrew had expected it to be that easy.
The concierge turned back. ‘Here’s your key: room two hundred and twelve. Do you need any help with your bags?’
‘Thank you, I can manage.’
A pretty chambermaid showed him upstairs. The room was generously proportioned and comfortably furnished, with an icon of St Christopher on the wall above the bed. Killigrew crossed to the window and glanced out: Tweedledum sat on the drozhky parked across the street, but there was no sign of Tweedledee.
He gave the room a cursory search for bugs, but as far as he could see it was free of cockroaches, bed-lice, silverfish and other nasty creepy-crawlies.
This will do nicely,’ he said, tipping the chambermaid generously.
‘If there is anything else I can do for you, just give the bell rope a tug.’
‘I’ll let you know if anything comes up,’ he assured her.
She left him to his unpacking. He stripped to the waist and scrubbed himself at the washstand, before changing into his evening clothes: a black swallowtail coat and matching trousers. Taking his revolver from the secret compartment at the bottom of his holdall, he slipped it into the inside pocket of the coat, before studying the cut in front of the cheval glass. Once Killigrew had explained his requirements, Henry Poole of Savile Row had been very accommodating in that respect: there was no trace of a bulge. He did not expect to need the gun so soon, but doubtless the agents of the Third Section would give his holdall a more thorough search than the one it had received at the custom house, along with the rest of the room, in his absence.
He put on his greatcoat, buttoning it up to the throat to cover the white muslin cravat so Tweedledum and Tweedledee would not realise he was in evening clothes, and after putting a little talcum powder on the catches of his holdall and a hair across the doors of the wardrobe, he locked the door of his room behind him and made his way downstairs, carrying his wideawake.
Tweedledee sat on a couch in the entranc
e hall, pretending to read a newspaper. Ignoring him, Killigrew handed his key back to the concierge and stepped outside. He paused to put his hat on at a jaunty angle and lit another cheroot before he set off, walking east along the Nevsky Prospect.
He had walked ten yards down the boulevard before a couple of gendarmes descended on him. His legs turned to water as one of them laid a truncheon across his chest.
‘And what do you think you’re doing?’
Killigrew felt nauseous, wondering what fatal mistake he could have made so swiftly. It did not matter: it had been foolish of him to think he could pull this off. Still, there was nothing for it but to bluff it out to the last.
‘Just going for a walk,’ he said, his heart pounding. ‘There’s no law against that, is there?’
‘Perhaps not.’ The gendarme indicated the cheroot between Killigrew’s fingers with his truncheon. ‘But there is a law against smoking in public on the streets of St Petersburg.’
Killigrew’s astonishment managed to overwhelm the feeling of relief that coursed through his veins, making every nerve in his body tingle. ‘You’re joking!’
The policeman narrowed his eyes. ‘You’re not from around here, are you?’
‘No, I’m an American.’
‘Ah! American, eh? Well, you’re not in the land of liberty any more, sir. I’m afraid we must ask you to accompany us to the superintendent’s bureau.’
‘You’re arresting me for smoking?’
‘The law is the law.’
Killigrew dropped his cheroot on the cobbles and crushed it beneath the toe of a half-boot. ‘Perhaps an on-the-spot fine would clear the matter up?’ he suggested, passing them both a few kopecks.
The two gendarmes exchanged glances. ‘Well, maybe we can overlook this matter just this once, seeing that you are a foreigner,’ said one, slipping the coins in his pocket. ‘But don’t let us catch you doing it again.’ He touched his truncheon to the peak of his cap. ‘Mind how you go, sir.’
‘Thank you.’
Killigrew hurried on his way, wondering what kind of despotic, paternalist society outlawed smoking on the streets. Banning smoking in restaurants he could understand – not that he knew any restaurants where smoking was banned – but in the open air? What deranged lunatic had thought up that one?
Still, the encounter had reminded him of one important fact: it was not as if he was trying to pass himself off as a native. Ignorance of the local laws could be excused, up to a point. Even in Russia, they had to give foreigners some leeway.
He continued east along the Nevsky Prospect, crossing the Fontanka Canal via the Anichkoff Bridge. He had a knack for visually memorising any map he studied for a minute or two, and had looked at a map of the city – hopefully not too out of date – on the journey from Britain.
There was a constant stream of speeding carriages on the boulevard, and he took his life in his own hands just by trying to cross. He smiled: it would be ironic to have come all the way to St Petersburg, risking torture and execution at the hands of the Third Section, only to be killed trying to cross the street. But that was life: it might as easily be ended by a speeding carriage or the cholera as by the enemies of his country, so there was no point worrying and playing it safe; life was too short to be spent fretting about the prospect of death. He would worry about it when it happened; for all he knew, it might turn out there was nothing to worry about anyway.
He managed to negotiate the traffic without any accidents. At the junction of Nevsky and Liteiny Prospects men sat on stools to be shaved by itinerant barbers, while porters and craftsmen touted for business. Killigrew threaded his way through this lively throng and turned right down Vladimirsky Prospect as far as Kuznichsky Street, where he entered a covered market.
The market bustled with shoppers, mostly the wives of the middling sort or the servants of the great houses in the city, purchasing food for their masters; evidently the poorer folk did their shopping elsewhere. The place was noisy with stallholders calling out their wares and thick with the delicious odours of smoked sausages, fish and freshly baked bread. Killigrew pretended to browse amongst the stalls, noting that Tweedledum had followed him inside; presumably it was Tweedledee’s turn to wait outside with the drozhky.
Killigrew doubled back on himself. Seeing him approach, Tweedledum turned away hurriedly and pretended an interest in some sausages hanging from a butcher’s stall. Killigrew walked straight past him; as soon as he had gone by, Tweedledum followed quickly. Killigrew turned left, and then doubled-back again. Again Tweedledum was forced to come to an abrupt halt and studied some matryoshka dolls on a toy maker’s stall as if he had never seen such a thing before.
Killigrew smiled, reassured that the Third Section did not know who he really was or what he was doing in St Petersburg; if they had, they would certainly have assigned someone other than this buffoon to follow him. He made a sharp about-face and Tweedledum, who had been hurrying up behind him with the ends of his unfastened belt trailing, snatched a colander from an ironmonger’s stall and inspected it with a critical eye. Killigrew made as if to walk straight past, and then stopped right next to him. To avoid meeting Killigrew’s eye, Tweedledum turned his back to him and held up the colander, peering at it as if making sure the holes went all the way through.
Killigrew glanced down at the trailing buckle on the belt of Tweedledum’s greatcoat. Next to his hand, a saucepan hung from one of several nails hammered into the wooden strut supporting one corner of the stall’s awning. He took the saucepan off the nail, turned it this way and that as if thinking of making a purchase, and then put the pan down on top of a casserole dish on the main display.
He looked at the people around them. The ironmonger running the stall was haggling with a woman over the price of a kettle. The other shoppers were too intent on making their own purchases to pay any attention to Killigrew and his shadow. The commander hooked the buckle of Tweedledum’s belt over the nail, then turned and walked briskly towards the rear of the market.
Tweedledum hurried after him, but before he had taken two steps his belt brought him up short. Caught off guard, his legs kept walking while the shoulders of his coat pulled the top half of him backwards. He went over, the weight of his body pulling the prop out from the table of the stall. The whole lot went over, burying Tweedledum in a clattering avalanche of pots and pans. He tried to pull himself up by grabbing hold of another shelf, but that too broke away and more pots crashed down on him. Mindful that his quarry was going to get away, he struggled to his feet only to be seized by the irate ironmonger.
Killigrew slipped out at the back of the market and into a bookshop on the opposite side of the street. He took down a book from one of the shelves and leafed through it, peering out through the books displayed on the shelves in the window to where Tweedledum emerged from the market at a run, looking up and down in agitation. Tweedledee followed him out a moment later. The two of them had an angry exchange, and then ran off in opposite directions. Killigrew waited a minute or two before replacing the book on the shelf and emerging from the shop to cross back over the street into the covered market.
He made his way back to Nevsky Prospect, where he flagged down a drozhky to take him to Senate Square. He was driven as far as the Stroganoff Palace, where they turned left on to the embankment of the Moika – not another of St Petersburg’s canals, as some thought, but a river, for all that her waters flowed sluggishly between her built-up banks. They followed the Moika as far as Vosnesensky Prospect, which crossed the river at the Blue Bridge between the Mariinsky Palace and the scaffolding-covered edifice of the new cathedral – clearly modelled after St Paul’s in London – overlooking St Isaac’s Square.
According to one of the guide books Killigrew had read on the journey from London, it was the widest bridge in the world: with a breadth of 320 feet and a span of 135, it was almost three times wider than it was long. Here the agents of aristocrats and landowners haggled with serf dealers over the price of hu
ddled groups of wretched-looking folk dressed in rags. Killigrew had seen slave markets on the Guinea Coast, and that had been quite repulsive enough; yet somehow the spectacle of men dealing in the lives of their fellow human beings – men, women and children – as if they were cattle was even more shocking when you stumbled across it in a beautiful and supposedly civilised city like St Petersburg. It was a reminder that even if he did not agree with his government’s motives in fighting this war, Tsarist Russia needed a spectacular military defeat to make her realise just how out of step with the rest of civilisation she was. One of the serf dealers was positively whipping some of his ‘merchandise’ right there on the bridge, and Killigrew wondered what kind of society banned smoking on the streets, but still permitted flogging slaves.
Senate Square was on the other side of the cathedral. There Falconet’s equestrian statue of Peter I – made infamous as ‘The Bronze Horseman’ of Pushkin’s poem – glowered from atop its granite plinth over the ornamental garden at the west end of the Admiralty building. Here the Decembrists had tried to stage their abortive coup thirty years earlier, in a doomed attempt to force the new Tsar to initiate a programme of reform to drag Russia kicking and screaming into the nineteenth century. Ironically, the failed uprising had had the opposite effect, and Nicholas I had become one of the most ruthless and reactionary of tsars… and that was saying something. Now that Nicholas was dead, it remained to be seen whether or not his son, Alexander II, turned out the same way.
Killigrew dismounted from the drozhky and paid the driver, before making his way to the address Napier had given him, one of the fine mansions overlooking the Neva on the Angliiskaya Embankment. He pulled on the doorbell and it was answered almost at once by a footman in knee-breeches and a powdered wig, a tough-looking customer with a scarred face.
‘Da?’
‘I’m a friend of Chekalinsky.’ Killigrew had no idea who Chekalinsky was, only that his name was the shibboleth that would let him into Wojtkiewicz’s house as surely as ‘open sesame’ let Ali Baba into the forty thieves’ cave.
Killigrew and the Sea Devil Page 18