by Sam Eastland
‘If I could ask, Comrade Stalin …’
‘What?’
‘Why did you assign her to the case at all?’ asked Pekkala.
‘I didn’t,’ replied Stalin. ‘The guard in charge of security at Nagorski’s facility put in a call to her directly.’
‘That would be Captain Samarin,’ said Pekkala.
‘He had to call NKVD,’ continued Stalin. ‘He couldn’t have called the regular police, because secret facilities are out of their jurisdiction. It had to be handled by Internal Security.’
‘I realise that,’ continued Pekkala, ‘but my understanding is that Samarin specifically requested Major Lysenkova.’
‘Maybe he did,’ replied Stalin. ‘Just ask him yourself.’
‘Captain Samarin is dead, Comrade Stalin.’
‘What? How?’
Pekkala explained what had happened in the woods.
Stalin sat quietly for a moment. His back seemed unnaturally straight, as if he wore a metal brace beneath his clothing. ‘And this fugitive, the one you chased through the woods, has still not been located?’
‘Since the death has been declared an accident, Comrade Stalin, I assume they have called off the search.’
‘Called it off,’ muttered Stalin. He picked up Lysenkova’s report. ‘Then it may already be too late. For this major’s sake, I hope not.’ He let the paper fall on to the desk.
‘I will speak to the Major,’ said Pekkala. ‘Perhaps she can help us with some answers.’
‘Suit yourself, Pekkala. I don’t care how you do it, but I want the man who shot Nagorski before he goes and kills somebody else I cannot do without. In the meantime, no one must know about this. I do not want our enemies to think that we have faltered. They are waiting for us to make mistakes, Pekkala. They are looking out for any sign of weakness.’
*
Pekkala sat on the end of his bed.
In front of him, on a small collapsible table, lay his dinner – three slices of black rye bread, a small bowl of Tvorok cheese, and a mug of carbonated water.
Pekkala’s coat and shoulder holster lay draped over his bed rail. He wore a pair of heavy corduroy trousers, their colour the same deep brown as a horse chestnut, and a sweater of undyed wool, the colour of oatmeal, whose shawl collar fastened across the neck.
His residence was a boarding house on Tverskaia street – not a particularly safe or beautiful part of town. In spite of this, over the past few years, the building had become overcrowded. Workers had flooded out of the countryside, looking for jobs in the city. These days, it was not unusual to find a dozen people crammed into a space which, under normal circumstances, would barely have suited half that number.
His one-room apartment was sparsely furnished, with a fold-up army cot, which took up one corner of the room, and a collapsible table at which he ate his meals and wrote up his reports. There was also a china cabinet, slathered with many layers of paint – its current incarnation being chalky white. Pekkala had no china, only enamelled cups and saucers, and only a couple each of those since he rarely had any guests. The remainder of the cabinet was taken up with several dozen cardboard boxes of .455 calibre bullets belonging to the brass-handled Webley he wore when he was on duty and for which ammunition was difficult to come by in this country.
Pekkala had survived on so little for so long that he could not get used to doing otherwise. He lived like a man who expected, at any moment, to be given half an hour’s notice to vacate the premises.
Tucking a handkerchief into his collar, Pekkala brushed his hands against his chest and was about to begin his meal when a floorboard creaked in the hallway. He turned and saw the shadow of a pair of feet out in the hallway. A moment later, as Pekkala heard a knocking on his door, an old memory flickered to life in his head.
He stood outside the Tsarina’s Mauve Boudoir, fist raised to rap his knuckles on the door.
To the Alexander Palace maids, who passed by with bundles of laundry, or trays of breakfast china or with feather dusters clasped like strange bouquets of flowers, he seemed to be frozen in place.
At last, as if the strength required for knocking on that door was more than he possessed, Pekkala sighed and lowered his hand.
Ever since the Tsarina sent for him that morning, Pekkala had been filled with uneasiness. She usually stayed as far away from him as she could get.
Pekkala did not know why she disliked him so intensely. He only knew that she did, and that she made no secret of it, his only consolation being that he was far from alone in finding himself out of favour with the Tsarina.
The Tsarina was a proud and stubborn woman, who made up her mind very quickly about people and rarely changed her opinion about them afterwards. Even among those whom she tolerated, very few could count themselves as friends. Aside from Rasputin, the Tsarina’s only confidante was the pouty, moonfaced Anna Vyrubova. For both of them, remaining in good graces with the Tsarina had become a full-time job.
Now she had summoned Pekkala, and he had no idea what she wanted. Pekkala wished he could have turned and walked away, but he had no choice except to obey.
As he raised his hand again to knock upon the door, he caught sight of a sun wheel carved into the top of the door frame. This crooked cross, its arms bent leftwards until it almost, but not quite, formed a circle, was the symbol the Tsarina had chosen as her own. It could be found carved into the door frames of any place she had stayed for any length of time. Her life was filled with superstitions, and this was only one of them.
Knowing there was nothing to be gained by postponing this meeting any longer, Pekkala finally knocked.
‘Come in,’ said a muffled voice.
The Mauve Boudoir smelled of cigarettes and the dense fragrance of pink hyacinth flowers, which grew in planters on the window sills. The lace curtains, a mauve colour like everything else in the room, had been drawn, turning the light which filtered into the room into the colour of diluted blood. The dreary uniformity of its furnishings and the fact that she never seemed to open the windows combined to make the space unbearably stifling to Pekkala.
Adding to his discomfort was the presence of an entire miniature circus made out of thin strands of glass, gold filigree and pearls. There were more than a hundred pieces in all. The circus had been specially commissioned by the Tsar from the workshops of Karl Fabergé and was rumoured to be worth the lifetime salaries of more than a dozen Russian factory workers.
The fragile figures – elephants, tigers, clowns, fire eaters and tightrope walkers – were balanced precariously on the edge of every flat surface in the room. Pekkala felt as if all he had to do was sigh and everything would come crashing to the floor.
The Tsarina lay on an overstuffed day bed, legs covered by a blanket, wearing the grey and white uniform of a nurse of the Russian Red Cross. It was the second year of the war and ever since casualties had first started pouring back from the front, the Great Hall of the Catherine Palace had been turned into a hospital ward and the Tsarina and her daughters had taken on the role of nurses to the wounded.
Soldiers who had grown up in thatch-roofed, dirt-floored Izhba huts now woke each day in a room of golden pillars, walked across a polished marble floor and rested in linen-sheeted beds. In spite of the level of comfort, the soldiers Pekkala had seen there did not look comfortable at all. Most would have preferred the more familiar surroundings of an army hospital, instead of being showcased like these glass circus animals, as the Tsarina’s contribution to the war.
There were times when, in spite of her hostility towards him, Pekkala felt sorry for the Tsarina, particularly since war had broken out. No matter how hard she worked, her German background had made it almost impossible to make any gesture of loyalty to Russia without the gesture recoiling upon her. In trying to ease the suffering of others, she had only succeeded in prolonging it for herself.
But Pekkala had come to realise that this might not have been entirely by accident. The Tsarina was drawn towards su
ffering. A particular nervous energy surrounded her whenever the topic turned to misfortune. Attending to the wounded had given new purpose to her life.
Now, with Pekkala standing before her, the Tsarina gestured towards a fragile-looking wicker chair. ‘Sit,’ she told Pekkala.
Hesitantly, Pekkala settled on to the chair, afraid that its legs would collapse under his weight.
‘Pekkala,’ said the Tsarina, ‘I believe we have got off to a bad start, you and I, but it is simply a matter of trust. I would like to trust you, Pekkala.’
‘Yes, Majesty.’
‘With that in mind,’ she said, her clasped hands pressing into her lap as if she had a cramp in her stomach, ‘I would like for us to work together on a matter of great importance. I require you to conduct an investigation.’
‘Of course,’ answered Pekkala. ‘What do you need me to investigate?’
She paused for a moment. ‘The Tsar.’
Pekkala breathed in sharply. ‘I beg your pardon, Majesty?’ The wicker seat creaked underneath him.
‘I need you,’ she continued, ‘to look into whether my husband is keeping a mistress.’
‘A mistress,’ repeated Pekkala.
‘Yes.’ She watched him closely, her lips formed into an awkward smile, ‘You know what that is, don’t you?’
‘I do know, Majesty,’ replied Pekkala. He also knew that the Tsar did, in fact, have a mistress. Or, at least, there was a woman who had been his mistress. Her name was Mathilde Kschessinska and she was the lead dancer of the Russian Imperial Ballet. The Tsar had known her for years, since before his marriage to the Tsarina, and had even bought her a mansion in Petrograd. Officially, he had broken off ties with her. Unofficially, Pekkala knew, the Tsar kept in contact with this woman. Although the full extent of their relationship was unknown to him, he knew for certain that the Tsar continued to visit her, even using a secret door located at the back of the Petrograd Mansion, so that he could enter undetected.
Pekkala had always assumed that the Tsarina knew everything about this other woman. The reason for this was that he did not believe the Tsar to be capable of keeping any secret from his wife. He lacked the necessary guile, and the Tsarina was far too suspicious to allow an affair to continue undetected.
‘I regret,’ said Pekkala, rising to his feet, ‘that I cannot investigate the Tsar.’
The Tsarina appeared to have been waiting for this moment. ‘You can investigate the Tsar,’ she told him as her eyes lit up. ‘The Tsar himself gave you the right to investigate anyone you choose. That is by Imperial Decree. And, what is more, I have the right to order this investigation.’
‘I understand, Majesty, that technically I am permitted …’
‘Not permitted, Pekkala. Obliged.’
‘I understand,’ he continued.
She cut him off again. ‘Then it is settled.’
‘Majesty,’ pleaded Pekkala, ‘what you ask, I must not do.’
‘Then you refuse?’ she asked.
Pekkala felt a trap closing around him. To refuse an order from the Tsarina would amount to treason, the penalty for which was death. The Tsar was at army headquarters in Mogilev, half-way across the country. If the Tsarina wished it, Pekkala could be executed before the Tsar even found out what was wrong.
‘You refuse?’ she asked again.
‘No, Majesty.’ The words fell likes stones from his mouth.
‘Good. I am glad we are finally able to see –’ the Tsarina held out her hand towards the door – ‘eye to emerald eye.’
The knocking came again, but there was something unusual about it. The knuckles were striking halfway down the door.
At first, Pekkala could make no sense of it, but then he smiled. He stepped over to the door and opened it just as the little girl on the other side was about to knock again. ‘Good evening, Talia.’
‘Good evening, Comrade Pekkala.’
Before Pekkala stood a girl about seven years old, with plump cheeks and a dimple in her chin, wearing a khaki shirt and dress, and the red scarf of a Young Pioneer around her neck. In a fashion popular among girls in the Communist Youth Movement, her short hair had been cut in a straight line across her forehead. Smiling, she gave him the Pioneer salute: the knife edge of her outstretched hand held at an angle in front of her face, as if to fend off an attack.
Conscious of how much he towered over the girl, Pekkala got down on one knee so they were looking each other in the face. ‘And what has brought you here this evening?’
‘Babayaga says you are lonely.’
‘And how does she know that?’
The child shrugged. ‘She just does.’
Pekkala glanced back at his dinner laid out on the table – the lumps of bread and bowl of watery cheese. He sighed. ‘Well, Talia, it just so happens that I could use a little company right now.’
Talia stepped back into the hall and held out her hand for him to take. ‘Come along then,’ she said.
‘One moment,’ said Pekkala. He pulled on his coat which, although it had been cleaned, still looked the worse for wear after his journey across the proving ground.
Joining Talia out in the corridor, Pekkala caught the smell of evening meals – the fug of boiled potatoes, fried sausages and cabbage.
The two held hands as they walked down the pale green hallway with its ratty carpet to the apartment where Talia lived with her grandmother.
Until six months ago, Talia had lived with her parents in a large apartment in what had once been called the Sparrow Hills district of the city but had since been renamed Lenin Hills.
Then, one night, NKVD men arrived at their door, searched the house and arrested the parents. Until the time of their arrest, both had been model Communists, but now they were classed as Type 58. This fell under the general heading of ‘Threat to National Security’ and earned them each a sentence of fifteen years at the Solovetsky Labour Camp.
The only reason Talia and her grandmother even knew this much was because Pekkala, having been their neighbour for several years, had made inquiries on their behalf. As for the precise nature of the parents’ crime, even the NKVD records office could not tell him. Stalin had confided in Pekkala that even if only 2 per cent of the arrests turned out to be warranted, he would still say it had been worth arresting all the others. So many people had been brought in this past year, over a million according to the records office, that it was not possible to keep track of them all. What Pekkala knew, and what he could not bring himself to tell the grandmother, was that more than half of those people arrested were shot before they ever boarded the trains bound for Siberia.
Their family had once been farmers in the fertile Black Earth region of the Altay mountains. In 1930, the Communist party had ordered the farm to be merged with others in their village. They called it ‘collectivisation’. The running of this collectivised farm, or Kolkhoz, had then been given over to a party official who, with no farming experience of his own, ran the collective into the ground in under two years. The collective broke up and Talia’s family had drifted, like so many others, to the city.
They began working for the Mos-Prov plant, which supplied most of the electricity to Moscow. The husband-and-wife team immediately joined the Communist Party and rose quickly through its ranks. Before their arrest, they had been rewarded with special rations like extra sugar, tea and cigarettes, tickets to the Bolshoi Theatre and trips to the Astafievo resort outside the city.
According to Babayaga, the father had often spoken about the merits of ‘perekovka’; the remoulding of the human soul through forced labour in the Gulag system. Pekkala wondered what the father thought now that he was in one. Like many good Communists, the man probably believed that he and his wife were simply victims of some bureaucratic error, which would soon be corrected, at which time they could return to their old lives; any suffering he endured now would be rewarded on some distant day of reckoning, when errors were set straight.
Although the parents might have
been innocent of any charges brought against them, it did not mean that they had been arrested by mistake. They might have been denounced by someone who wanted their apartment, or who envied their marriage or whose seat they had taken on the bus which brought them to work. The accusations were seldom investigated and even the most preposterous stories served as justification for arrest. One man had been arrested for blowing smoke rings which, in the eyes of his accuser, seemed to bear a resemblance to the outline of Stalin’s face.
Pekkala suspected that the reason for their imprisonment had nothing to do with them at all and was only the result of quotas imposed upon NKVD, ordering them to arrest so many people in each district per month.
It was after the parents went away that Talia came to live with her grandmother. The old woman’s real name was Elizaveta, although she never used it and had chosen for herself instead the name of a witch from an old Russian fairy tale. The witch lived in the forest, in a house which turned round in circles at the top of two giant chicken legs. In the fairy tale, the witch was cruel to children, but Pekkala knew the little girl was lucky to have a woman as kind as Babayaga looking after her. Talia seemed to know it, too, and the name became a joke they shared between them.
The thing Pekkala noticed when he first walked into their apartment was what Babayaga called a Patriotic Corner. Here, small portraits of Stalin, as well as pictures of Lenin and Marx, were on display. Other pictures, of men like Zinoviev, Kamenev, Radek and Piatakov had been removed after the men in question were accused of Counter Revolutionary Activity and liquidated.
The Stalin corner was always on display, but in a closet by the bathroom, the grandmother kept small wooden paintings of saints. Each icon had little wooden doors which could be opened so that the icons could stand on their own. The wooden doors were inlaid with pieces of mother-of-pearl and curls of silver wire which looked like musical notes in the black wood.