Chapter Twenty-Two
They approached the hospital well before dawn, driving hurriedly through empty, yellow-lit streets: Moscow was utterly deserted and cold, a moonscape with houses. The talk was stilted, just one or two-word exchanges: Danilov knew only that it was a woman in her thirties, that the attack had happened quite near her home on a street named Granovskaya, and that she’d survived. Pavin was already at the bedside.
Cowley brought both their feelings into the open. ‘It was our fault. We spent all our time worrying about diplomatic niceties and gave him the chance to do it again! What the hell were we thinking of? It was all so obvious. We knew it could happen!’
‘She lived,’ repeated Danilov.
‘Luck. Nothing to do with us.’
Cowley was initially numbed by the hospital. But for the very occasional sight of a uniformed nurse or a white-coated attendant he would not have believed himself in a hospital at all. Rather it was like moving through a tiled but condemned underpass taken over by squatters, maybe in New York’s Little Italy or Washington’s Anacostia. There was litter underfoot and even beds in the corridors, humped with sleeping, snuffling people like he’d seen in documentaries on American television of homeless derelicts who had moved into public facilities due to be demolished. It took Danilov a long time to find an attendant sufficiently interested to guide them to the emergency section, where there appeared to be more staff: certainly more activity. Here there were no overflow beds in the corridors. Strip lighting gave better illumination than in some of the earlier parts through which they had walked.
Pavin must have seen them approaching, although neither saw him. The burly Major emerged from a minute, single-occupancy side-ward as they reached it. Considerately he spoke Russian slowly, for Cowley’s benefit. Her name – Lydia Orlenko – and an address to trace her husband, a metro train driver, had come from her handbag, which had also contained ten single dollar bills. She was a waitress at the Intourist Hotel who normally got home around 1 a.m., although that morning she hadn’t. She’d been found by a Militia foot patrolman, who’d heard her screaming. She’d been shorn by the time he reached her: he’d seen no one running away from the scene of the attack, in a narrow passageway between two housing blocks. She’d been hysterical, beyond any comprehensible speech: by the time she’d reached hospital she had relapsed into unconsciousness. Fortunately Pavin had arrived before surgeons began operating: he’d been able to ask the doctors to record some medical evidence as they worked. Her blood was B Positive. The wound matched those of Ann Harris and Vladimir Suzlev, five centimetres across at the point of entry of a knife sharp along one edge, five millimetres thick at the other. The difference from the two murders – an important factor in her surviving – was that this time the thrust had not been clean: the attempt had been between the eighth and ninth rib and from the right, like the others, but it had actually caught the upper rib, deflecting the passage to the heart, which had been missed completely. The intercostal muscle had been penetrated and the right lung punctured by a wound only nine centimetres deep. She was still under the effects of the anaesthetic but she was in good health, only thirty-two years old, and the surgeons were sure she was going to make a full recovery.
‘The husband and the patrolman?’ demanded Danilov.
Pavin gestured along the corridor. ‘In the waiting-room.’
The two men were sitting in silence, facing each other from opposite sides of the room, which was quite empty apart from chairs arranged around all four walls. The uniformed patrolman was smoking, papirosi, the butts of the hollow-tubed Russian cigarettes already around his feet. The husband was wearing a loud, brown-checked jerkin that reminded Cowley of blanket material, over oil-stained blue work overalls. Both men looked curiously at the American, instantly recognizing a foreigner.
Cowley let Danilov lead. The patrolman had been walking along Granovskaya when the screaming started. It had taken him a few moments to locate the alley, because it was so small. The woman had been propped up on her left elbow, hysterical, shouting nothing he could understand. He’d thought she’d been wildly drunk until he’d seen the blood. At the same time as seeing the blood he’d realized her hair had been cut off, in clumps, and strewn all around her. She became unconscious before the ambulance arrived. She’d been entirely alone when he reached her and he’d neither seen nor heard anyone running away. He’d obviously entered the alley from Ulitza Granovskaya: at its other end, it emerged into Semasko. He hadn’t thought to go on, to check that street for anyone: his concern had been to get help for the wounded woman. He was sorry if he’d done wrong.
Boris Orlenko was a nervous, sharp-moving man who spoke too quickly and stuttered because of it. He said his wife had been a waitress at the Intourist Hotel for five years: mostly she worked in the ground-floor coffee-shop but occasionally she helped out in one of the upstairs restaurants. She always walked home, even when she was on late shift, because they lived so close. He couldn’t understand why she had been attacked and wanted to know if they did. Why had her hair been cut off? It didn’t make sense. None of it made sense. She was just an ordinary person, with nothing worth stealing. They were both just ordinary people. He had to be at the terminus by six: would he be allowed to get away by then? If not he’d have to telephone somebody: it would cause problems at the depot. He could come back to see his wife when he finished work. That would be all right, wouldn’t it?
‘Did your wife ever speak of knowing people – anyone – from the American embassy?’ asked Cowley, coming into the questioning for the first time.
Orlenko fidgeted, uncomfortably. ‘The embassy? No. She knew Americans … not knew them, you understand. Served them, at the hotel. That’s all. I suppose some could have come from the embassy. She never said.’
‘What about regular American customers? Someone who came a lot?’
The Russian shook his head. ‘No one. Not that she said.’
‘Do you think she would have done? Did she talk about the hotel?’
Orlenko frowned. ‘Not a lot. Just sometimes. You’re American, aren’t you? What’s she got to do with the embassy?’
‘Nothing,’ said Cowley, sighing. He looked to Danilov to take over, but the Russian detective shook his head, with nothing left to ask. To the seated men Danilov said: ‘You can both go: we know where you’ll be.’
‘No possible connection with the embassy this time,’ said Cowley in English, as the two filed out.
‘We didn’t know Suzlev concentrated upon embassy customers until we saw his wife a second time,’ Danilov pointed out. ‘It’s the woman here who’s important.’
It was another hour before Lydia Orlenko recovered consciousness and almost a further hour again before they were permitted into the minuscule side-ward. She was lying on her left, the side furthest from the wound, with a pillow behind her to keep her in position. There was an arched frame over the upper part of her body but beneath the bedding, keeping its weight off. Her shorn head was completely covered by the sort of protective mobcap that women wear for hygienic reasons in places where food is prepared. She had her eyes closed and was breathing deeply and Danilov thought she might have gone to sleep again.
‘Lydia?’ he said, quietly. ‘Lydia Markovina Orlenko?’ Her eyes flickered open, but heavily, without immediate focus. He was stooped low, close to her: her breath stank appallingly, fouled by the anaesthetic. ‘Can you hear me? Understand what I’m saying?’
She grunted, thickly.
‘I’m from the Militia: from Petrovka. I have to know what happened.’
She moved, very slightly, and there was an instant wince of pain. ‘Hurt.’
‘How were you hurt?’
Her eyes cleared, properly registering him at last. ‘Don’t know.’
There was a chair in the room, but Danilov ignored it, kneeling on the floor beside the bed. Cowley did the same, but with more difficulty, because of his size. There was no room at all for Pavin, who remained just insid
e the door, able to hear everything for his notes. Danilov said: ‘You finished work and left the hotel to walk home, as you usually do. What street were you on, approaching the alley? Granovskaya? Or Semasko?’
‘Semasko. From the hotel. Always.’
‘By yourself?’
‘Yes?’
‘No one with you?’
‘No.’
‘How about behind? Following?’
‘Didn’t see.’
‘Or hear?’
‘No.’
‘What happened at the passage?’
‘Went in. Always do. Dark, but I know it. Hurt me.’ Without warning or any movement of her body, to indicate the breakdown, the woman began to weep, a solitary tear path forming along the side of her nose.
She moved to wipe it away, but whimpered with the pain of the movement. Danilov felt for his own handkerchief and realized he didn’t have one. Cowley passed his along the bed and the Russian gently wiped the wetness away. He said: ‘It’ll hurt more if you cry. You’re safe now. Tell me what happened then.’
‘Someone behind me, very close. Very close and then pressing into me. Hand over my mouth, so I couldn’t breath: squeezing my nose. Hurt me. Pulled me backwards. Then awful pain. Something going into me. Felt like burning. Tried to scream but I couldn’t. Hand too tight across my mouth. Fell down. Awful pain. Then I can’t remember …’
She began to cough, whimpering again each time at the jar to her back. Danilov tried to help her to some water from the glass by the bedside, but she couldn’t drink properly and some spilled on to the pillow. As close as he was he detected the bruising on her upper lip and under her nose and remembered that Ann Harris and Vladimir Suzlev had both been similarly marked, according to the pathology report.
Tentatively Lydia Orlenko moved her head, keeping it on the pillow but looking down to include Cowley. ‘Who are you?’
‘Another policeman, helping me,’ answered Danilov, speaking for the other man. ‘You can remember, after falling down. You screamed. A patrolman came.’
‘Can’t remember falling down, after the burning in my back. I was just there. Like waking up. Felt him over me. Standing, looking down. Screamed and tried to hit him, to push him away. Did hit him. Heard him grunt when I hit him. Then he was gone. Screamed more then, to keep him away …’ There was a fresh outburst of painful coughing. She shook her head against more water and said: ‘Stop! I want the pain to stop!’
‘You’re doing very well,’ encouraged Danilov. ‘Telling us a lot of important things. You’re sure it was a man?’
She hesitated. ‘He wore trousers. And a jacket.’
‘No topcoat?’
‘Quilted jacket.’
‘Listen carefully,’ ordered Danilov, speaking very precisely. ‘You must tell us what he looked like: everything you can remember.’
At the door Pavin strained forward, notebook ready.
‘Nothing,’ said the woman, shortly.
‘No, Lydia Markovina. That won’t do. You must describe him.’
‘Didn’t see. Behind me, at first. Then I was on the ground. I could see trousers but not the top of him. I told you, it was very dark in the passage: completely dark.’
Danilov came forward, anxiously. ‘OK,’ he said, coaxing. ‘The trousers. What were they like?’
‘Just trousers.’
‘Colour?’
‘Dark.’
‘Blue? Grey? Black?’
‘Dark,’ she insisted.
‘Cloth? Or maybe jeans?’
‘Cloth.’
‘You must have seen the shoes.’
‘Not properly. Not that I can think of. I think they were boots. Rubber.’
‘Long? Or short?’
‘Short. The sort that come up to the ankle.’
‘You could see up to his waist?’
‘I suppose.’
‘Was he fat? Thin? Medium?’
‘Don’t know. Medium maybe.’
‘When he grabbed you from behind you said he pressed into you. What about then? Did he feel either fat or thin then?’
‘Quilted coat,’ she reminded. ‘There was the fatness of the quilted coat.’
‘If you could see to his waist, what about a belt? Was he wearing a belt?’ Some belts had distinctive buckles, Danilov thought, hopefully.
‘Not that I could see: can remember.’
Danilov sighed. From his side Cowley whispered, in English again: ‘She said he was leaning down towards her.’
‘When you woke up, on the ground, were you on your face? Or your back?’ resumed Danilov.
‘Twisted. But more on my face.’
‘Then he turned you?’
‘Yes.’
‘How?’
‘Turned me,’ she repeated, with a hint of indignation.
‘Where did he put his hands? On your shoulders? Around your waist? Did he touch you privately, where he shouldn’t have done?’
There was almost a smile but it didn’t form. ‘Felt a hand on my shoulder. Then on my breast. Squeezed me there.’
Danilov nodded, glancing up to ensure Pavin was making the note, which he was. ‘So he must have been bent close over you? Why didn’t you see his face?’
‘I was on my face then!’ said the woman, close to indignation again. ‘I didn’t know what was happening. I was very frightened: kept my eyes shut. Didn’t want to see.’
‘There must have been an outline: an impression. How tall was he?’ As he asked the question, Danilov stood, gesturing Cowley up beside him. ‘As tall as me? Or as tall as him?’
‘You. Not as tall or as big as him.’
‘What about hair? All right, I know it was dark: you couldn’t see. I’m not asking about colour. But could you see a lot of hair? Or not? Could he have been bald?’ She wouldn’t know yet that she had been cropped, Danilov realized.
‘Nothing like hair. I think there was a cap. But not one with a peak. The type of woollen hats people wear to ski.’
‘The grunt,’ reminded Cowley.
‘You said when you hit him that he grunted?’
‘Yes.’
‘Where did you hit him? What part of the body?’
‘The chest, I think. That’s how I felt the quilted jacket.’
‘And it was a grunt? Not a word?’
‘No. And I don’t think I hurt him. I think he was surprised: almost frightened. A frightened cry.’
He would have certainly been both at the sudden eruption of someone he believed dead, accepted Danilov. ‘But you couldn’t recognize any meaning in the grunt or cry?’
‘No.’
‘Did it sound like a Russian voice? Or foreign?’
Her face furrowed, into a frown. ‘Don’t know. It was just a sound.’
‘She felt his hands on her face,’ said Cowley.
‘Tell me everything about the moment he grabbed you: put his hand over your mouth and nose,’ picked up Danilov.
Momentarily forgetting what would happen, Lydia Orlenko shuddered, but was stopped abruptly by the pain. ‘I couldn’t move, from the fright. It was horrible. Smelled. And felt clammy.’
Pavin was forward again, as they all were.
‘What do you mean, clammy?’ demanded Danilov.
‘How his hand felt, against my face. Clammy.’
‘You mean he was sweating?’
‘No, not sweating. Cold actually, but clammy too. Horrible.’
‘Gloves?’ suggested Danilov.
‘They didn’t feel like gloves: certainly not wool. His hands felt very smooth. And clammy. But something hard …’ Warned now, she was careful bringing her hand up, this time to just above her chin. ‘Something hard there. Hurt me.’
With the spot identified, Danilov saw a bruise additional to those on her nose and upper lip. ‘What about the smell?’
‘Tobacco. Definitely tobacco. Very strong.’
‘On his hands? Or on his breath?’
‘Don’t know. It seemed to be all around me.’
‘What about cologne?’ prompted Cowley.
‘Was there any perfumed smell? Scent; something like that?’ asked Danilov.
She frowned. ‘Maybe. I’m not sure. Just tobacco really.’
Danilov was silent for a few moments, trying to think of another pathway. Doing so he found questions he had failed to ask Pavin. He hoped the Major had maintained his customary routine. To Lydia Orlenko he said: ‘Didn’t you fight at all? Struggle when he grabbed you?’
‘No. I was stiff; couldn’t move. I just wanted to scream but I couldn’t. And he was strong. Jerked me backwards, suddenly. If I hadn’t been against him I would have fallen earlier, before the burning in my back. What’s happened to me? Am I badly hurt …?’ She blinked, at her own question, and her lip began to shiver. ‘… going to die?’
‘You’re not going to die,’ promised Danilov, urgently. ‘You’ve been stabbed but the doctors have seen to it. You’re going to get better.’ He guessed her more immediate concern was going to be the missing hair: there was no reason to upset her by telling her at this stage. He bent towards her, on the bed, and said: ‘Something else that is very important: and that you must be completely honest about. You won’t get into any trouble, about anything, if you’re honest.’
In the Name of a Killer Page 25