Death of a Dissident

by Stuart M. Kaminsky

  “The neighbors tell me you know something about the murder of Aleksander Granovsky,” he said, looking down two feet at the woman with his unblinking brown eyes. Her own were fluttering rapidly and she held the top of her dress as if in fear that this ghost was going to attack her.

  “It’s nothing,” she said, looking in the direction of her granddaughter and a teen-age boy who sat silently, pretending to pay no attention to anything but the books they held in front of them.

  “Tell me the nothing,” he said.

  “Well…” she began.

  “Now,” he insisted with a smile that chilled the old woman.

  “I did hear him…”

  “Granovsky?”

  “Yes,” she said. “I heard him arguing in the hall last night walking up the stairs. I was coming back from the market. Market Number forty-seven. They had cabbage, green cabbage—”

  “On the stairs,” Karpo interrupted.

  “They were arguing. He was threatening him.”

  “Someone was threatening Granovsky,” Karpo supplied. “Please call him Granovsky.”

  “I don’t know whether to call him comrade,” she replied in fear.

  “Do so,” said Karpo.

  “This man in black was drunk. He was shouting at Comrade Granovsky, saying he was disloyal, should be killed like a dog. Comrade Granovsky ignored him, and the man grabbed him. He’s a big man. Comrade Granovsky spat in his face. Or the man spat in Comrade Granovsky’s face. I don’t remember which. It was very brief. Then Comrade Granovsky pushed the man.”

  The retired librarian’s hands went out to demonstrate the push and stopped short of the stomach of Emil Karpo.

  “Then?” urged Karpo.

  “Comrade Granovsky hurried up to the sixth floor where he lives with the man behind him shouting. And that’s all I heard.”

  And, thought Karpo, many others must have heard it too and conveniently forgotten.

  “Who was this man in black? You know him.” The second sentence was indeed a statement and not a question, though Karpo only sensed that it should be.

  “His name is Vonovich, Mikel Vonovich. He lives down the hall in five hundred ten,” Molka Ivanova said. “He is a cab driver. A big man, as tall as you but bigger across.”

  Karpo moved to the door and heard a voice behind him which must have been the granddaughter’s.

  “Don’t tell him where you found out. Please.”

  Karpo closed the door behind him, moved down the hall, and found five hundred ten. There was no answer. Karpo had decided to get a key and examine the apartment and was turning to find the building manager when luck struck, but it is difficult to determine if it was good or bad luck for Emil Karpo.

  A huge, burly figure in black with a black beard came noisily down the corridor, almost filling it, and singing a popular song twenty years old. He was somewhere in his thirty’s and clearly drunk. He was about ten feet from his door before he saw Karpo.

  “What?” asked Mikel Vonovich in a voice surprisingly high for his size.

  “I’m from the police,” Karpo announced calmly. “I would like to talk to you.”

  Vonovich looked to the wall on his left, then to the wall on his right and finally at the tile floor.

  “What?” he bellowed.

  “To talk about last night,” Karpo repeated, taking a step toward the giant cabdriver.

  “Last night? Last night.” Something glowed in Vonovich’s grey eyes and a look of cunning crossed his face. Karpo, who was prepared for either a docile change of attitude, a feigned drunkenness, or even a physical attack was unprepared for what did happen next. Vonovich reached into his pocket swaying as he bumped into a wall and came out with something in his right hand. It was a gun and it fired in Karpo’s general direction. It was the second time in hours that Karpo had been shot at and once again, the shot had missed. Karpo fell against the wall, giving Vonovich enough time to turn and run down the hall into pools of light along the way—the plunge of a monster from folklore into the imaginary hell of the past. For a drunk, Vonovich moved with surprising speed.

  Karpo was after him in less than a second. Not a door opened in curiosity. Not a sound was heard. Through the exit door Karpo plunged, and he could see the massive dark figure dive into a cab, his own cab surely, parked on the street. Karpo ran for it with drawn gun and shouted for Vonovich to stop. He considered shooting the cabdriver through the window but knew he would probably kill him and that he might be needed alive.

  The cab ignition caught and Vonovich pulled away, skidding in the snow and almost hitting a woman and a young boy.

  Karpo looked around for a car to commandeer, but there was nothing in sight but a streetcleaning truck brushing away the accumulating snow. Karpo ran to it, gun in hand.

  The driver, a dark man with a grey stubble on his face, let out a gargling sound. Karpo leaped up next to the man.

  “You see that cab,” he said, pointing with his gun. The streetcleaner added. “Follow it. I’m a policeman.”

  “I can’t catch a car with this,” the man said logically.

  “You can the way he is driving. Look.”

  “But—”

  Karpo took the man’s face in his free hand and turned it toward his own. They locked eyes for an instant, and the man pulled back.

  “I’ll catch him,” he said dryly.

  And the chase was on. The streetcleaning truck lumbered slowly forward, straight, sure, unswerving. The cab, with its drunken driver, sped for a few dozen feet, skidded, turned, stalled, started again, bounced off parked cars and hurried away.

  “We will catch him,” said the streetcleaner, warming to the chase. Karpo grunted.

  It was late at night and traffic was light when Vonovich went backward in a skid and flew over the curb into a small park. His cab stopped just short of a pond where a few people were skating. They scattered, clutching each other. Half a block behind, Karpo leaped out of the streetcleaning truck and ran in the direction of the screams. Vonovich had abandoned his cab by the time Karpo arrived, gun in hand, to frighten the skaters. He didn’t have to ask where Vonovich was. He could see him sludging forward through the park like an enormous bear.

  “Stop,” the policeman shouted, but the bear did not stop. It headed out of the park down a street toward the warm hole of a Metro station with Karpo behind. Karpo couldn’t see Vonovich after he disappeared into the Komsomol’skaya Metro station, but he couldn’t wait. He ran in just in time to see the drunken cab driver hurl himself over the stile without paying his ten kopeks and roll across the floor with a mighty “grummpf.”

  It was then Vonovich pulled out his gun and fired blindly in the general direction of the policeman who was pursuing him. The bullet struck Karpo in the right shoulder, knocking him back against the stairs. He could hear Vonovich hurrying, slipping down the stairs toward the platform.

  “You, stop,” came a voice over Karpo. “Don’t reach for that gun.”

  It was a brown uniformed policeman leveling a pistol at Karpo who, now wounded, looked even more cadaverous than usual.

  “I’m a police inspector,” said Karpo.

  “Yes,” said the policeman, putting away his gun. “I recognize you. You’re Inspector Karpo. Let me help—”

  “No,” shouted Karpo. “Get to the other exit. There is a big drunken man with a black beard. He is not to get away. Shoot him if you must. I’ll watch this end. When is the next train?”

  The policeman looked somewhat confused and tried to think.

  “I don’t know. Not soon. Half an hour, perhaps.”

  “Find out,” said Karpo. “No. I’ll find out. You get to the other exit. Move.”

  The policeman ran back up the stairs into the night, and Karpo reached for his gun. His shoulder was bleeding moderately through his coat, and his arm was numb, but his legs were fine. He went down the stairs and found a schedule on the wall. If it was right, and the Metro usually did run on time, he had time enough to call Rostnikov.
He pulled himself up the stairs and made his way slowly to a public phone he had seen on the street. While watching the exit, he called Rostnikov. He looked back at the dark trail of blood spots and wondered if he should take a chance on putting his gun away and packing his wound with clean snow.

  Fifteen minutes later Rostnikov had arrived. He had no trouble finding Karpo. Police cars stood at both entrances to the Metro station. Karpo sat in one of them, his arm temporarily bandaged by a policeman.

  “How are you?” Rostnikov asked, sliding into the back seat next to Karpo.

  “I made a mistake,” said Karpo, between his teeth. “I had the chance to kill him, but I didn’t take it.”

  “He killed Granovsky?” Rostnikov asked.

  “Don’t know,” said Karpo. “Very possibly. But now he is down there with a gun. There are other people down there and he is drunk, perhaps mad.”

  “And?” asked Rostnikov trying to make his leg comfortable.

  “We have about ten minutes or less till the train arrives and he gets on it.”

  “In that case, you better tell me what I need to know,” said Rostnikov. And Karpo did just that, quickly and efficiently.

  When the briefing had finished, Rostnikov emerged from the car and headed for the Metro entrance, nodding at the armed police officers who guarded it. They were all uniformed. He was about to go down the stairs when he heard the voice of Sasha Tkach behind him.

  “Wait.”

  Rostnikov turned and watched the young man run toward him, his breath forming white clouds as he hurried forward.

  “You know what we have?” Rostnikov asked.

  “Enough,” said Tkach and the two men went down.

  The two policemen took the stairs down, talking about nonsense, the weather, life, and not looking but looking at the same time. Vonovich was easy to spot. He paced along the platform with his hands in his pockets. Certainly, he was holding his gun. A few people sat on benches talking or reading.

  The first series of Moscow Metro stations built in the 1930s are comparable in design to the most decadent of castles. No two stations are alike. Komsomol’skaya, designed by two renowned artists, is one of the most baroque. It is 190 meters long and nine meters high. Its vaults are supported on seventy-two pillars. Massive mosaics depicting Russia’s military past decorate the station illuminated by a series of elaborate hanging chandeliers.

  Vonovich looked into the darkness down the track urging the train to come, and from the distance in the tunnel, there did come the sound of a rushing, noisy train.

  Vonovich looked with suspicion at the two newcomers, who ignored him, spoke of trains and tracks, and looked at their watches impatiently. Because the short, heavy one walked with a limp, Vonovich felt somewhat reassured.

  The train came hurtling out of the darkness, and both Rostnikov and Tkach knew the time for deception was over.

  They walked behind a pillar, still talking, and both drew their guns.

  “We do not kill him unless we must,” Rostnikov whispered. Tkach nodded.

  “Vonovich,” Rostnikov shouted, and his voice echoed and rose above the incoming train. The boarding passengers looked around in confusion, and the heavy pacing man stopped and looked first at the train and then in the direction of the two men, who had gone behind the pillar.

  “Vonovich, raise your hands and step away from the track, now!” shouted Rostnikov.

  Vonovich answered with a wild shot that hit one of the massive chandeliers, sending a snow of glass to the platform. Passengers screamed and the train, which had pulled into the station, paused only for an instant with passengers inside pressing their noses to the window to see what was happening. The motorman chose not to open the doors and sped on, leaving Vonovich confused. His coat was open and swirling, and he didn’t know which way to run or whether to try to hold the train back with his bare hands.

  Instead, he ran for the far exit, away from the voice of the policeman, over the outstretched form of a workman who covered his head in fear and pressed his nose to the floor.

  Tkach stepped out from the pillar and was prepared for pursuit, but Rostnikov held him back.

  “Wait, he has nowhere to go.” Then to the half-dozen people on the platform. “Stay down. Stay where you are.”

  Vonovich, his coat flowing open and letting out grunting sounds, hurried up the stairs and less than five seconds later came scrambling down again, obviously checked by the sight of armed police on the street.

  Tkach watched the trapped man with the gun sway as he considered running down the tunnel.

  “If he goes on the track,” said Rostnikov, “shoot him.”

  But Vonovich did not. He turned his eyes back at the two policemen and began to shuffle in their direction. The shuffle turned into a run and the passengers on the platform rolled away, one woman plunging with a scream off the platform and onto the track.

  Tkach and Rostnikov stepped out into the path of the rushing creature.

  “If his gun comes up,” said Rostnikov, “shoot. If not…”

  But Vonovich was upon them. Tkach could feel himself shoved to the side by some animal force. He tried to keep his balance but went over a bench. Behind him he heard a loud groan and he scrambled up, gun leveled to help Rostnikov. What he saw was something he would never forget.

  The massive man was struggling in the arms of Inspector Rostnikov. His legs were off the ground, churning, touching nothing. Vonovich’s left arm came across in a heavy swing and Rostnikov burrowed his own head into the bigger man’s coat and lifted with an expulsion of air. Tkach watched Vonovich come up in the air in Rostnikov’s arms, cradled like a baby, and then Rostnikov threw the creature like a bundle of laundry into the pillar. Vonovich’s gun scratched across the platform and came to rest near Tkach’s leg. Vonovich himself was clearly unconscious.

  As he moved forward toward the felled cab driver, Tkach could sense the passengers rising and could hear the woman who had fallen on the tracks calling for help. He could also see quite clearly that Rostnikov was smiling, a childish, satisfied smile, and looking up at a massive ceiling mosaic of an approving ancient Russian knight.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  “VONOVICH, HAVE YOU LIFTED WEIGHTS?” Rostnikov asked, sipping his tepid tea with loud satisfaction. Vonovich, on the other side of the desk, shifted uncomfortably.

  “There is no trick to the question,” Rostnikov went on. “I’m breaking the ice, making small talk. We could be here for hours and once I start with the difficult questions we might both get a headache. You, if I judge you right, will get surly. I will grow irritable. It won’t be pleasant, but if we can—”

  “I could tear you in half with my hands,” grumbled Vonovich. “You were lucky.”

  The huge man grabbed the cup of tea in front of him, buried it in his brown hand and brought it angrily to his mouth spilling much of it on the way. Rostnikov sighed and took another sip of his own tea, turned from the burning eyes of his prisoner and ran his finger along the scar on his desk made by the sickle. As long as he kept this desk, which would probably be the rest of his career, that scar would be there to remind him of this case. He was determined that it would be a reminder of success and not failure, but to achieve success he would have to deal with this oaf Vonovich.

  “I’m sure you could,” said Rostnikov. “Shall we start the lies?”

  “I have no reason to lie,” growled Vonovich. “I have given you all my papers. Everything is in order.”

  He reached up to scratch his head and lost his hat in the process. There was little room in the office to reach for it, and the huge man almost fell out of the wooden chair.

  Rostnikov shook his head giving himself—not his prisoner—sympathy. He had sent Tkach home; the boy had seen enough for one day. Karpo was in the hospital having his shoulder wound cared for. That left only Rostnikov. Now the case was his responsibility. And his pleasure.

  The bears like this were a challenge, but for Rostnikov the challenge of stupidit
y was like that of a target for a sharpshooter. It was a matter of professional execution rather than innovation. The smart ones were often easier to break. They tried to be too clever, tell too many lies. The smart ones knew it was a deadly game, and they were confident that they could hold their own. Ah, but the stupid ones—sometimes they clung to an obviously foolish, impossible story regardless of what Rostnikov said. And though they did not know it, they were right to do it.

  “What are you thinking?” demanded Vonovich, downing the last of his tea and putting his fur hat back on his head in an awkward position so that it would fall off if he moved or if gravity were simply given sufficient time.

  “I was wondering how stupid you are,” said Rostnikov.

  “You’ll see how stupid I am,” Vonovich said with a cunning smile.

  “Yes, I’m sure I will,” agreed Rostnikov. “Why did you run from the officer in front of your apartment door?”

  “I didn’t know he was a policeman. He looked like a killer. A robber.”

  “Yes,” agreed Rostnikov, reaching under the table to massage his stiff leg, “he does. So you shot at him and ran away. When you got to the street, why did you continue to run? Did you think a robber was openly pursuing you through the streets?”

  “That’s what I thought,” agreed Vonovich, his cunning smile looking particularly stupid to Rostnikov. “I thought he was a crazy robber. There are such things. A man gets a few drinks or something and…there was Czekolikowski who killed everybody in the Praga Restaurant for no reason last year.”