Motherland: A gripping crime thriller set in the dark heart of Putin's Russia

by G. D. Abson

  ‘A cockpit?’

  Yulia inhaled again. ‘Yeah, one of those. They’ve got it hanging from the ceiling with a dummy inside holding a hammer and sickle.’

  Natalya shook her head. She hated all that postmodern bullshit where the past was sanitised and served up as entertainment. ‘If they want to re-live the good old days they should put the waiters in charge and stack the place with corpses.’

  Yulia rolled her eyes in a gesture that reminded her of Anton’s “whatever”. Natalya was being rebuked for being too uncool to appreciate irony.

  ‘Then what?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Did you share a taxi home, go for a nightcap somewhere, or maybe screw some boys?’ She watched to see if Yulia was shocked by the language.

  ‘Oh I see.’ She was unperturbed. ‘No, Zena was drunk and left.’

  ‘On her own?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Seriously? You let her go home on her own?’ Natalya shook her head.

  ‘Yes. There was a guy in the club. We were dancing together. I went to the toilet and when I came back Zena’ – Yulia did another eye roll then raised pencil-point thin eyebrows – ‘I caught her trying to put her tongue down his throat.’

  Yulia reached for an ashtray on a table by her bed. ‘Zena was lonely, I tried being nice to her and she repaid me with that.’

  Natalya held up her palm. ‘We’ll get to that. Do you remember what time she left?’

  Yulia shook her head. ‘Around one o’clock, I think. I was wasted too.’ she took a drag on her cigarette and watched Natalya write on the pad. ‘I carried on dancing with Maxim – that’s the name of the boy – then when I got back to our table the drinks had gone and some strangers were sitting there.’ Her brows came together, triggering delicate frown lines between her eyes.

  ‘This Maxim, did he and Zena swap numbers or talk?’

  She let out a haughty laugh. ‘He wasn’t interested in her. Besides, it was too noisy and I was only gone for a moment.’

  ‘Did you go back with him?’

  ‘No, I had work the next day and needed to sleep. The Metro was closed by then so I got a taxi home—’

  ‘Alone?’

  ‘Yes. And I just made it before they raised Liteyny Bridge. Another ten minutes and I’d have been stuck in Tsentralny for the night.’

  ‘Then what happened?’

  ‘Nothing.’ She sucked on the menthol cigarette. ‘I went to bed and was late getting to work the next day…yesterday.’

  ‘So why did you report her missing?’

  ‘I kept thinking about the bridges. Zena lives on Vasilyevsky Island and the Lieutenant Schmidt and the Palace are raised before the Liteyny. I was worried she hadn’t got home….she was really drunk too. I tried calling but her phone was ringing and ringing. I tried messaging, email…nothing.’

  ‘Was anyone else there who took an interest in her?’

  Yulia flicked the ash from her Karelia into the ashtray. ‘There were some army boys on leave but they were doing their own thing.’ The frown returned. ‘There was a waiter who was being familiar. A charmer.’

  ‘I don’t want to be rude.’ Yulia extended the hand with the cigarette in an exaggerated stretch, ‘but is there much more of this? I need to shower and meet my friend.’

  Natalya’s voice was brisk and businesslike, ‘When I’ve finished. Who was Zena seeing?’

  ‘You mean a boyfriend?’

  ‘Any sexual relationship. Did she have anything casual going on or maybe something long term?’

  Yulia shook her head. ‘Zena was hopeless. She was shy until she got drunk, and then she made a fool of herself.’ She lifted her delicate shoulders in a shrug as if to say, “and that’s what got her into trouble.”

  ‘No one at all?’

  ‘No one. She wanted a boyfriend but had no confidence. It should have been easy for a girl like her.’

  ‘You mean with the kind of money she had?’

  Yulia suppressed a sly smile. ‘Of course. But Zena wanted them to love her for herself.’ She shook her head quickly as if the idea had been absurd.

  ‘Is that wrong? Natalya asked.

  ‘Doesn’t everyone use what they have? Brains, body, looks, or money? You think I’m going to stay here forever?’ She pressed her lips together then glanced around the room to emphasise the point. ‘As soon as the right opportunity comes along I’ll be gone.’

  ‘Is that why you lied to her?’

  ‘What? I didn’t say anything.’ Natalya noticed the shift in tone. Yulia the boutique girl was losing her veneer.

  ‘You told her you were a student at the State University.’

  ‘I don’t remember that. Maybe she misunderstood.’

  Natalya held up her iPhone. ‘You created a profile on VKontakte saying you were a student; you even posted pictures of the Smolny Convent campus. There are only four friends on your page but my guess is none of them are real. The server has a backup so don’t think of deleting anything. Now you want to tell me what you were up to?’

  Yulia sneered, ‘Look around you. Do you think a girl like Zena would be interested in me if she knew I lived here and worked in a shop?’

  ‘Is that your answer?’

  ‘It’s the truth.’ The smile had gone, now Yulia looked offended. ‘I reported her missing, didn’t I?’

  ‘You did. Now I want you to explain why you refused to give your name and address at the station.’

  ‘Why? Because I didn’t want to get in trouble. Isn’t that what you do? You find someone you like for the crime and—’

  ‘Has a crime been committed here, Yulia?’

  Yulia pointed at her with two fingers, the cigarette lodged between them. ‘See, that’s what I’m talking about. My father was a carpet wholesaler, he ended up in prison because a competitor wanted him out of business. He’s still there now, rotting away. The police, the judge, they all took their share. I won’t let you do that to me.’

  There was one question left, and now Yulia was too angry to cooperate. At least it explained the hostility she had felt on the stairs.

  ‘There are people like that, but I’m not one of them.’ She looked at her notepad and flicked back to see what she’d written in Zena’s apartment; the word “ZAGS” had been circled. ‘I’m nearly finished.’

  Yulia tilted her head back to finish the last of her Coke. ‘You promise you’ll find her?’

  ‘I can’t, but I’ll do my best. I promise you that.’

  Yulia glared but there was less defiance now. ‘Ask me another one.’

  ‘OK, was Zena depressed? Did she say anything that made you worry about her?’

  ‘Maybe distracted sometimes…and a little lonely.’

  ‘Enough to take her own life?’

  Yulia thought for a moment. ‘No, not the type.’

  Natalya looked at the pad. ‘Can you tell me why Zena went to a ZAGS two weeks ago?’

  ‘I don’t know anything about it.’

  ‘She was too young to get married and, as you say, she didn’t have a boyfriend anyway. Also, it’s unlikely she went there to register a child or get a death certificate. Perhaps she was there to attend a wedding? It’s easy enough to verify.’

  Yulia had smoked her cigarette down to the filter and the last piece of ash fell away as she stubbed it out. ‘I really don’t know.’

  The silence grew as Natalya studied the girl’s face, convinced that for the first time in the interview she had seen a lie. Even Anton was a better liar and he was awful. Yulia was quiet, scared to embellish her answer and make it worse.

  ‘Thanks for the coffee, Yulia. One last question and then I’ll leave you alone.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Can I look inside your wardrobe?’

  Chapter 7

  The morning had nearly gone, and what did she have to show for it? Details of the clothing Zena Dahl was wearing; the name of the bar she had been drinking in; the approximate time she had left?
All useful information for the local police but nothing to justify the continuing involvement of the Criminal Investigations Directorate. She jogged down the stairs, resting at the main entrance to catch her breath. According to her phone it was 11:35 a.m.; there was a little time left before she needed to report to Colonel Vasiliev and only one lead to follow up.

  The sunshine had gone and the sky was grey when she parked on Ligovsky Prospekt. The street was busy with shoppers but she had no trouble finding the bar Yulia had described: the front was painted Tsar’s green, and a three-metre-wide sign above it displayed Cheka in the Latin alphabet with the lettering altered to resemble Cyrillic. On either side of the word were the obligatory red stars. She was about to knock on a camouflage-patterned metal door when it was opened by a man in a ridiculous vintage secret police uniform. He was tall, perhaps one metre eight-five, and already looked fatigued. The White Nights did that to most people: the parties; the car horns and revelry that went on into morning; the endless light gleaming through curtains and killing any notion of slumber. By September everyone was exhausted enough to sleep through the winter – maybe that was the intention.

  ‘We’re closed. Give it a few minutes.’

  She held out her identification card. ‘Senior Detective Ivanova, Criminal Investigations Directorate.’

  He stifled a yawn as he glanced at the card. ‘Can I help you, Captain?’

  She checked the rank on his fake uniform. ‘I hope so…Sergeant.’

  ‘It’s only—’

  ‘Yes, I know.’

  His red peaked cap tilted as he looked at her quizzically.

  ‘I assume you have this area under surveillance, Sergeant?’

  ‘Huh?’

  She raised her eyes to the camera above the doorway.

  He looked up too, then gave her a tired smile, warming to the theme. ‘Yes, Captain.’

  ‘And inside?’

  ‘Above the bar covering the tills.’

  ‘What was that, Sergeant?’

  ‘Sorry,’ he grinned. ‘Above the bar, covering the tills, Captain!’

  ‘That’s better. Mind if I have a look?’

  The grin slid from his face. ‘You need to check with the manager.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘And Captain?’ he offered.

  ‘No. And where is he or she?’

  ‘Sleeping. He comes in around ten in the evening and stays until the takings are checked. You can try Semion, he’s in charge when the boss is away.’

  ‘Thanks.’ She noticed the gun in his holster, and her gaze hardened as she looked back at him.

  He noticed. ‘Replica. It fires water.’

  She nodded as he pulled the door open. ‘Excellent, Sergeant.’

  He addressed her back, ‘Semion’s usually at the bar. Show him your ID and he’ll give you a drink on the house. Open to anyone above the rank of corporal.’

  ‘Thank you. Please return to guard duty.’

  The interior of the club was dark and humid, and in the corner a man stood over a record deck with a pair of headphones hanging around his neck. She walked towards the bar, thinking of Zena Dahl. If Yulia had told the truth, and there was good reason to doubt it, Zena had left around one a.m. That was early for a St. Petersburg club, when the dancing might be expected to go on until whatever passed for dawn.

  She stopped to take in the camouflage net walls and the cockpit of an early MiG jet fixed to the ceiling above the main stage. A waiter approached her; he was wearing Afghanka khaki field dress that she took as a sign the club management were having trouble sourcing Cheka uniforms. There was a bandolier strapped to his chest, modified to hold shot glasses instead of bullets. She held out her identification card as Lyapis Trubetskoy’s “Capital” started playing on the sound system. It was a rock number she loved, but the music made it impossible to maintain a conversation.

  ‘Have you seen this girl?’ She held up her iPhone to show him the picture of Zena with the glass of red wine from her VKontakte profile.

  He shook his head and grimaced to show he hadn’t heard, then twisted his body for her to speak directly into his ear.

  ‘She was here on Thursday. A Swede,’ Natalya yelled.

  He frowned.

  ‘Another girl was with her. Like a model: skinny, brown hair, good tits.’ She tapped Zena’s friend list and brought up Yulia’s picture. ‘Ignore the hair in this.’

  The waiter cupped his hands to her ear which wasn’t necessary. She felt his hot breath. ‘Swedish you say?’ He turned his head again for her to speak.

  ‘Like Abba and Ikea. Where we park our submarines.’ She turned and caught laughter in her ear.

  ‘Blonde?’

  Now she wasn’t sure if he was trying to help or recording a sexual fantasy. ‘Yes.’

  ‘Show me the picture again.’

  She tapped the screen of her phone to return to Zena’s image and held it up to him. ‘Here,’ she shouted.

  ‘You got others?’ he mouthed.

  She swiped the surface of her phone and another picture appeared of Zena posing with her father in a restaurant.

  He studied it, then shook his head. ‘No, haven’t seen her. You want a drink?’ He held up a bottle of Putinka in case she hadn’t heard.

  She wrinkled her nose. ‘On duty.’

  He performed a one-shouldered shrug. ‘Are you sure you’re police?’

  She put her mouth to his ear. ‘A loyal servant.’

  The waiter lingered and she left him for the bar; it was made out of sandbags encased in glass and three recent customers were loitering around it. They were being served by a barmaid who wore the same uniform as the doorman except hers necessitated a lower cut shirt to expose the tops of her breasts and her cap was fixed at a jaunty angle.

  Natalya held her card above the customers; eventually the woman noticed. ‘Where’s Semion?’ she shouted.

  The barmaid finished serving a half-litre of Carlsberg then lifted the counter top. The two remaining customers scowled at Natalya until they took in the handcuffs and gun, then they pretended to be indifferent to her presence.

  Up close, the woman had red eyes and Natalya waited for her to pull out a used tissue from the waistband of her jodhpurs and blow her nose.

  ‘Hay fever. Damned plane trees.’ The barmaid tucked what was left of the tissue in her waistband then she tapped on the keypad of a door marked private and Natalya followed her inside.

  ‘Semion, the police want to speak to you.’ She addressed a man in another Cheka uniform who was puffing on a cigarette by a barred window.

  She closed the door and Lyapis Trubetskoy’s majestic song reached a climax. ‘Senior Detective Ivanova,’ she held out the card to Semion. ‘I’d like to see your security camera footage.’

  He turned to acknowledge her. ‘The manager isn’t here,’

  She tucked the card back in her wallet. ‘I know.’

  ‘He’ll be here tonight.’

  ‘Call him.’

  He wiped his brow, knocking his cap askew. ‘At this time? Seriously? He doesn’t get home until 7 a.m.’

  She gave him a hard stare. ‘It’s in the Criminal Code. I ask you respectfully, then you, respectfully, do it.’

  ‘It’s just that…Is it an emergency?’

  ‘Show me the footage here and I’ll decide?’

  He stubbed the cigarette against the wall then flicked it through the bars. ‘The hard drive is here, you’ll have to take the whole thing if you need it.’

  She pulled up a plastic chair while he switched a television on.

  ‘What are you looking for?’

  ‘I’ll start with the footage over the entrance. Two girls came in last Thursday’ – she extended the times Yulia had given her – ‘sometime between 8 p.m. and 2 a.m.’

  Semion shook his head and screwed up his face. ‘No good.’ He winced to convey sympathy. ‘The disk fills after twenty-four hours, then it’s written over.’

  ‘That’s ridiculous.’
>
  ‘We’ve only just started,’ he shrugged. ‘We were meant to get a long record option but the company didn’t—’

  She held up a hand to stop him wittering. It was the first time she had led an investigation into a serious crime, albeit one that was likely to be downgraded and thrown back to the local police, and she had made little progress so far.

  It was well after midday when she left the bar. She looked through the call history on her phone then tapped on Colonel Vasiliev’s number. Outside, the cacophony of traffic and people shopping was deafening. She heard Vasiliev’s mobile ring three times then his voicemail machine started in.

  ‘Colonel,’ she began, ‘this is Captain Ivanova, please call me when you get this and I will provide you with an update on the investigation.’

  She hung up, pleased that Vasiliev had bought her some time.

  Chapter 8

  Natalya found a space on Veselnaya Ulitsa and zipped up her leather jacket to keep the light rain off her blouse before jogging along the leafy side of the road, using the trees for cover. Outside Zena’s building a curtain twitched on the ground floor apartment. She waved at the window and waited until the door was opened a crack, observing that the old woman had changed her headscarf for a brown and orange one that did little to complement her burgundy-coloured hair and eyebrows.

  ‘Hey, you didn’t give me her keys back.’

  Natalya held up her card as rain spattered her face. ‘Police.’

  She hid her impatience while Zena’s elderly neighbour fiddled with her hearing aid to switch it on, then fixed it in place.

  ‘So, you’re not a friend of her father?’

  ‘No.’

  The old woman pulled open the door and she entered; the stench of old tobacco mingling with the smell of the wet tarmac outside. ‘Can I ask your name?’

  ‘Lyudmila Kuznetsova.’

  ‘Mrs Kuznetsova, my name is Natalya Ivanova and I’m a senior detective. May I speak with you, privately?’

  Kuznetsova turned without speaking and opened her apartment door as an invitation for her to follow. Outside Zena’s apartment, Natalya stopped and felt an impulse to knock on the door. She did, avoiding the buzzer where there might be fingerprints.