'This is Irina Asanova with the news,' she said.
So she hadn't married, or else she hadn't changed her name. And her voice was both fuller and sharper, not a girl's any more. The last time he had seen her she was stepping across a snowy field, wanting to go and wanting to stay at the same time. The bargain was that if she went, he stayed behind. He had listened for her voice so many times since, first in interrogation when he was afraid she had been caught, later in psycho wards where his memory of her was grounds for treatment. Working in Siberia, he sometimes wondered whether she still existed, had ever existed, was a delusion. Rationally he knew he would never see or hear her again. Irrationally he always expected to see her face turning the next corner or hear her voice across a room. Like a man with a condition, he had waited every second for his heart to stop. She sounded good, she sounded well.
At midnight, when programming started to repeat, he finally turned the radio off. He had a last cigarette by the window. The church spire blazed like a golden flame against the grey, under the arch of the night.
Chapter Four
* * *
The museum had a catacomb's low ceiling and compressed atmosphere. Unlit dioramas were spaced down the walls like abandoned chapels. At the far end, instead of an altar, open crates held unpolished plaques and dusty flags.
Arkady remembered the first time he had been granted admittance twenty years before, and the ghoulish eyes and sepulchral tone of his elderly guide, a captain whose only duty was to instill in visitors the glorious heritage and sacred mission of the militia. He tried the light switch on a display. Nothing.
The next switch did work and illuminated a foreshortened Moscow street circa 1930 with the hearselike cars of that period, model figures of men striding importantly, women shuffling with bags, boys hiding behind lampposts, all apparently normal except for, lurking on the corner, a doll with his coat collar turned up to his hat brim, a miniature paranoid. 'Can you find the undercover officer?' the captain had proudly asked.
The younger Arkady had arrived with other high-school boys, a group picture of sniggering hypocrisy. 'No,' they chorused with a straight face while they traded smirks.
Two more dead switches, then a scene of a man skulking into a house to reach for an overcoat hanging in the hall. In an adjoining parlour a plaster family listened contentedly to the radio. A caption revealed that when this 'master criminal' was captured he had a thousand coats in his possession. Wealth beyond compare!
'Can you tell me,' the captain had asked, 'how this criminal, without drawing suspicion, carried these coats home? Think before you answer.' Ten blank faces stared back. 'He wore them.' The captain looked each boy in the eye so that everyone understood the sheer brilliance and inventive deceit of the criminal mind. 'He wore them.'
Other models continued the historical survey of Soviet crime. Not a tradition of subtlety, Arkady thought. See photos of slaughtered children, see the axe, see the hair on the axe. Another display of disinterred bodies, another murderer with a face half erased by a lifetime of vodka consumption, another carefully preserved axe.
Two scenes in particular were designed to draw gasps of horror. One was of a bank robber who made his getaway in Lenin's car, equal to stealing an ass from Christ. The other featured a terrorist with a home-made rocket that had narrowly missed Stalin. Find the crime, Arkady thought: trying to kill Stalin or missing him.
'Don't dwell in the past,' Rodionov said from the door. The city prosecutor delivered his warning with a smile. 'We're the men of the future, Renko, all of us, from now on.'
The city prosecutor was Arkady's superior, the all-seeing eye of Moscow courts, the guiding hand of Moscow investigators. More than that, Rodionov was also an elected deputy to the People's Congress, a barrel-chested totem of the democratization of Soviet society at all levels. He had the frame of a foreman, the silvery locks of an actor, and the soft palm of an apparatchik. Perhaps a few years ago he'd been just one more clumsy bureaucrat; now he had the particular grace that comes from performing for cameras, a voice modulated for civil debate. As if he were bringing together two dear friends, he introduced Arkady to General Penyagin, a larger, older man with deep-set, phlegmatic eyes, whose blue summer uniform was marked by a black armband. The chief of criminal investigation had died only days before. Penyagin was now head of CID and though he had two stars on his shoulder boards he was distinctly the new bear in the circus, taking his cue from Rodionov. The city prosecutor's other companion was a different type altogether, a jaunty visitor named Albov who looked less Russian than American.
Rodionov dismissed the displays and cartons with a wave and told Arkady, 'Penyagin and I are in charge of cleaning out the Ministry archives. These will all be junked, replaced by computers. We joined Interpol because, as crime becomes more international, we have to react imaginatively, cooperatively, without outdated ideological blinkers. Imagine when our computers here are hooked up to New York, Bonn, Tokyo. Already Soviet representatives are actively assisting in investigations abroad.'
'No one could escape anywhere,' Arkady said.
'You don't look forward to that prospect?' Penyagin asked.
Arkady wanted to please. He had once shot a prosecutor, a fact that lent relations a certain delicacy. But was he thrilled by that prospect? The world as a single box?
'You've worked with Americans in the past,' Rodionov reminded Arkady. 'For which you suffered. We all suffered. That's the tragic nature of mistakes. The office suffered the loss of your services during crucial years. Your return to us is part of a vital healing process that we all take pride in. Since this is Penyagin's first day at CID, I wanted to introduce him to one of our more special investigators.'
'I understand you demanded certain conditions when you returned to Moscow,' Penyagin said. 'You were given two cars, I hear.'
Arkady nodded. 'With ten litres of petrol. That makes for short car chases.'
'Your own detectives, your own pathologist,' Rodionov reminded him.
'I thought a pathologist who wouldn't rob the dead was a good idea.' Arkady glanced at his watch. He had assumed they would leave the museum for the usual conference room with baize table and double sets of aides taking notes.
'The important point,' Rodionov said, 'is that Renko wanted to run independent investigations with a direct channel of information to me. I think of him as a scout in advance of our regular forces, and the more independently he operates, the more important the line of communication between him and us becomes.' He turned to Arkady and his tone became more serious. 'That's why we have to discuss the Rosen investigation.'
'I haven't had time to review the file,' Penyagin said.
When Arkady hesitated, Rodionov said, 'You can talk in front of Albov. This is an open, democratic conversation.'
'Rudik Abramovich Rosen.' Arkady recited from memory. 'Born 1952, Moscow, parents now dead. Diploma with distinction in mathematics from MoscowStateUniversity. Uncle in the Jewish mafia that runs the racetrack. During school holidays, young Rudy helped set the odds. Military duty in Germany. Accused of changing money for Americans in Berlin, not convicted. Came back to Moscow. Carpool dispatcher at the Commission on Cultural Work for the Masses, where he sold designer clothes retail out of cars. Freight-yard director at the Moscow Trust of the Flour and Groats Industry, where he stole wholesale by the container load. Up to yesterday, managed a hotel souvenir shop from which he ran the lobby slot machines and bar, which were sources of hard currency for his money-changing operation. With the slot machines and the exchange, Rudy made money at both ends.'
'He lent money to the mafias, that's it?' Penyagin asked.
'They have too many rubles,' Arkady said. 'Rudy showed them how to invest their money and turn it into dollars. He was the bank.'
'What I don't understand,' Penyagin said, 'is what you and your special team are going to do now that Rosen is dead. What was it, a Molotov cocktail? Why don't we leave Rosen's killer to a more ordinary investigator?'
'Why would he agree to carry a radio for you?' Albov spoke for the first time. His Russian was perfect.
'Rudy had a phobia. He was hazed in the Army. He was Jewish, he was overweight and the sergeants got together and put him in a coffin filled with human waste and nailed him in for a night. Since then he had a fear of close physical contact or dirt or germs. I only had enough to put him in camp for a few years, but he didn't think he could survive. I used the threat to make him carry the radio.'
'What happened?' Albov asked.
'The militia equipment failed, as usual. I entered Rudy's car and tinkered with the transmitter until it worked. Five minutes later he was on fire.'
'Did anyone see you with Rudy?' Rodionov asked.
'Everybody saw me with Rudy. I assumed no one would recognize me.'
'Kim didn't know that Rosen was cooperating with you?' Albov asked.
Arkady revised his opinion. Although Albov had the physical ease and blow-dried assurance of an American, he was Russian. About thirty-five, dark brown hair, soulful black eyes, charcoal suit, red tie, and the patience of a traveller camping with barbarians.
'No,' Arkady said. 'At least I didn't think he did.'
'What about Kim?' Rodionov asked.
Arkady said, 'Mikhail Senovich Kim. Korean, twenty-two. Reform school, minors colony, Army construction battalion. Lyubertsy mafia, car theft and assault. Rides a Suzuki, but we expect him to take any bike off the street and of course he wears a helmet, so who knows who he is? We can't stop every biker in Moscow. A witness identifies him as the assailant. We're looking for him, but we're also looking for other witnesses.'
'But they're all criminals,' Penyagin said. 'The best witnesses were probably the killers.'
'That's generally the case,' Arkady said.
Rodionov shuddered. 'The whole thing is a typical Chechen attack.'
'Actually,' Arkady said, 'Chechens are more partial to knives. Anyway, I don't think the point was only to kill Rudy. The bombs burned the car, which was a computerized mobile bank stuffed with disks and files. I think that's why they used two bombs, in order to make sure. They did a good job. It's all gone now, along with Rudy.'
'His enemies must be happy,' Rodionov said.
'There was probably more incriminating evidence about his friends on those disks than about his enemies,' Arkady said.
Albov said, 'It sounds as if you liked Rosen.'
'He burned to death. You could say I sympathized.'
'You would describe yourself as an unusually sympathetic investigator?'
'Everyone works in a different way.'
'How is your father?'
Arkady thought for a moment, more to adjust to this shift of ground than to search for an answer.
'Not well. Why do you ask?'
Albov said, 'He's a great man, a hero. More famous than you, if you don't mind my saying so. I was curious.'
'He's old.'
'Seen him lately?'
'If I do, I'll tell him you asked.'
Albov's conversation had the slow but purposeful motion of a python. Arkady tried to catch the rhythm.
'If he's old and sick, you should see him, don't you think?' Albov asked. 'You select your own detectives?'
'Yes.' Arkady was trying to answer the second question.
'Kuusnets is an odd name – for a detective, I mean.'
'Jaak Kuusnets is the best man I have.'
'But there aren't that many Estonians who are Moscow detectives. He must be especially grateful and loyal to you. Estonians, Koreans, Jews – it's hard to find any Russians in your case. Of course some people think that's the problem with the whole country.' Albov had the meditative gaze of a Buddha. Now he let it incline towards the prosecutor and the general. 'Gentlemen, your investigator seems to have both a team and a goal. The times demand that you let initiative have its head, not bring it to a halt. I hope we don't make the same mistake with Renko that we made before.'
Rodionov could tell the difference between a red light and a green. 'My office is totally committed to our investigator, of course.'
'I can only repeat that the militia wholeheartedly supports the investigator,' Penyagin said.
'You're from the prosecutor's office?' Arkady asked Albov.
'No.'
'I didn't think so.' Arkady added up the suit and the air of ease. 'State Security or Ministry of the Interior?'
'I'm a journalist.'
'You brought a journalist to this meeting?' Arkady asked Rodionov. 'My direct channel to you includes a journalist?'
'An international journalist,' Rodionov said. 'I wanted a more sophisticated point of view.'
Albov said, 'Remember, the prosecutor is also a people's deputy. There's an election to consider now.'
'Well, that is sophisticated,' Arkady said.
Albov said, 'The main thing is I've always been an admirer. This is a turning point in history. This is Paris in the Revolution, Petrograd in the Revolution. If intelligent men can't work together, what hope is there for the future?'
Arkady was still stunned after they left. Maybe Rodionov would show up next time with the editorial board of Izvestia or cartoonists from Krokodil.
And what would become of the crates and dioramas of the militia museum? Were they really going to be replaced by a computer centre? And what would become of all the bloody axes, knives and threadbare overcoats of Soviet crime? Would they be stored? Of course, he answered himself, because the bureaucratic mind saved everything. Why? Because we might need it, you know. In case there was no future, there was always the past.
• • •
Jaak drove, skipping lanes in the manner of a virtuoso pianist going up and down a keyboard.
'Don't trust Rodionov or his friends,' he told Arkady as he shouldered another car to the side.
'You don't like anyone from the prosecutor's office.'
'Prosecutors are political shits, always have been. No offence.' Jaak glanced over. 'But they're Party members. Even if they leave the Party, even if they become a people's deputy, in their hearts they're Party members. You didn't leave the Party, you were thrown out, that's why I trust you. Most prosecutor's investigators never leave their office. They're part of the desk. You get out. Of course, you wouldn't get far without me.'
'Thanks.'
One hand on the wheel, Jaak handed Arkady a list of numbers and names. 'Plates from the black market. The lorry nearest Rudy when he blew up is registered to the Lenin's Path Collective Farm. I think it was supposed to be carrying sugar beets, not VCRs. There are four Chechen cars. The Mercedes registered in the name of Apollonia Gubenko.'
'Apollonia Gubenko,' Arkady tried it on the tongue. 'There's a round name.'
'Borya's wife,' Jaak said. 'Of course Borya has a Mercedes of his own.'
They looped ahead of a Lada whose windscreen was patched with pins, paper and glue. Windscreens were hard to come by. The driver steered with his head out of the side.
'Jaak, what is an Estonian doing in Moscow?' Arkady asked. 'Why aren't you defending your beloved Tallinn from the Red Army?'
'Don't give me any more of that shit,' Jaak warned. 'I was in the Red Army. I haven't been to Tallinn in fifteen years. What I know about Estonians is that they live better and complain more than anyone else in the Soviet Union. I'm going to change my name.'
'Change it to Apollo. You'd still have an accent, though – that nice Baltic click.'
'Fuck accents. I hate this subject.' Jaak made an effort to cool down. 'Speaking of d
umb, we're getting calls from a coach at Red Star Komsomol who says Rudy was such a club supporter that the boxers there gave him one of their trophies. The coach thinks it should be among Rudy's personal effects. An idiot but a persistent guy.'
As they approached Kalinin Prospect, a coach tried to cut in front of Jaak. It was an Italian bus with tall windows, baroque chrome and two tiers of stupefied faces – almost a Mediterranean trireme, Arkady thought. The Zhiguli accelerated with a burst of blue smoke. Jaak tapped the brakes just enough to threaten the finish on the bus's front bumper and raced ahead, laughing triumphantly. 'Homo Sovieticus wins again!'
At the petrol station Arkady and Jaak got into separate queues for meat pies and soda. Dressed like a lab technician in white coat and toque, the pie vendor whisked flies from her wares. Arkady remembered the advice of a friend who picked mushrooms – to stay away from those surrounded by dead flies. He reminded himself to check the ground when he reached the barrow.
A far longer queue, all male, stretched from a vodka shop at the corner. Drunks sagged and leaned like broken pickets on a fence. Their clothes had the greyness of old rags, their faces were striped red and blue, but they clutched empty bottles in the solemn knowledge that no new bottle would cross the counter except in exchange for an empty. Also, it had to be the right size empty bottle: not too big, not too small. Then they had to pass militiamen stationed at the door to check coupons for out-of-towners trying to buy vodka marked for Moscow. As Arkady watched, a satisfied patron left the store, cradling his bottle like an egg, and the queue inched forward.
There was a selection, which was what was holding up Arkady's queue: meat or cabbage pies. Since the filling was sure to be no more than a suggestion – a delicate soupçon of ground pork or steamed cabbage, a fine line within dough first steeped in boiling fat and then allowed to cool and congeal – it was a choice that demanded a fine palate, not to mention hunger.
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