by Sam Eastland
Stefanov had forgotten how heavy such weapons were, and this German gun was no exception. The weight of the spare magazines in their canvas and leather pouch dragged on his hip bones. The gunsling rubbed at his neck. Before long, in spite of the cool night air, Stefanov’s shirt was soaked through with sweat.
After an hour’s walk, just as Leontev had said, they came to the ruins of a house which was perched at the edge of a river. But there was no sign of any bridge or anyone to meet them.
‘Perhaps we followed the wrong path,’ said Churikova.
‘Maybe we should double back,’ Stefanov suggested.
‘There’s no time for that,’ Pekkala told him. Holding his rifle above his head, he made his way down the steep bank to the water’s edge. Carefully, he stepped out into the current, winced as the cold water poured in over the tops of his boots. He hoped that the river might be shallow enough to cross on foot, and the current weak enough that it would not carry them off. There was no way to know except to try it for himself. Pekkala was up to his thighs when the bottom dropped away sharply and he lost his footing. The current was stronger than he’d thought, and it swept him a short distance downstream before he managed to regain his footing. Shivering and soaked, Pekkala had just got back on the path when he noticed a movement in the darkness.
He raised the rifle to his shoulder and squinted down the sight.
Water dripped from the barrel‚ like pearls spilled from a broken necklace‚ as he squinted down the rifle sight. Seconds passed. Just as he was beginning to wonder if he was imagining things, the darkness took shape and a man stepped out on to the path, empty hands raised above his shoulders. ‘Pekkala?’
With a sigh, he lowered the gun. ‘Yes.’
‘I am Corporal Gorinov. Major Leontev ordered me to wait here and make sure you got across the bridge.’
‘But there is no bridge!’
The man grinned at Pekkala, his teeth flashing white in the gloom. ‘That’s where you are wrong, Inspector.’
Returning to where the others waited on the path, Gorinov stepped in amongst the ruins of the house.
‘He says there is a bridge,’ Pekkala whispered to them.
‘Then he has lost his mind,’ muttered Churikova.
Pekkala followed the man into the house, his steel-shod heels sinking into the rotten wooden boards.
Just ahead, a torch blinked on. Covering the light with his hand so that only a faint pink glow showed through his fingers, Gorinov bent down and lifted a trap door.
‘Where is this bridge?’ asked Pekkala.
‘Come see for yourself.’
Beneath the trap door lay a waist-deep hole, in which Pekkala could see a thing like a large truck wheel with a piece of metal welded vertically on to the rim. Gorinov took hold of the wheel and began to turn it slowly.
Accompanied by a clattering of metal cogs, two cables snaked out of the mud by the water’s edge, just in front of the house. Moustaches of river grass hung from the twisted metal line. Now the glassy surface of the river began to tremble. Gorinov spun the wheel faster. The sound of the cogs became a constant metallic buzz.
Churikova breathed in sharply. ‘Look!’ A narrow footbridge appeared from the black and hung suspended above the water, swaying gently in the moonlight.
‘Who built this contraption?’ asked Pekkala.
‘Before the invasion, there were many such projects under way. There were many who believed the treaty with Germany would not last. They ordered the construction of hidden bunkers, tunnel systems and bridges. This is one of the few that we actually finished. I’m glad it wasn’t built for nothing.’
One by one, Stefanov and Churikova crossed the river, holding tightly to the cables as they inched their way along. The planks of the footbridge were slippery, but nails had been hammered into the underside so that their feet could grip the points. Beneath them, the river slid by like an unfurling banner of silk.
Pekkala was the last to go.
Behind him, Gorinov stood ready with a large set of bolt cutters.
‘What are you doing with those?’ asked Pekkala.
‘My orders are to cut the cables as soon as you’re across.’
When Pekkala reached the middle of the bridge, he paused and looked out over the river. Mist clung to the banks. The long, ungainly body of a heron lifted from the shadows and took flight, passing so close over Pekkala’s head that he felt the air stirred by the beating of its wings.
As Pekkala set foot on the far bank, he turned and waved to Gorinov.
Gorinov raised one hand, his silhouetted fingers black as crow’s feathers. Seconds later came the grinding, snapping sound of the bolt cutters as they gnawed through the cables of the bridge.
Following the instructions
Following the instructions given to him by People’s Commissar Bakhturin, Kirov arrived at a house in the Moscow suburbs of Kuntsevo.
At first, the place appeared to be empty, but then Kirov noticed a chink of light in one of the windows and realised that they were covered by thick, dark curtains. The order for black-out curtains to be installed as a precaution against air raids had gone into effect months before, but a shortage of suitable material meant that the law had neither been properly obeyed nor efficiently enforced. Kirov was glad to see that at this house, at least, the inhabitants had taken the precautions seriously. The little things mattered to Kirov. It was why the clutter on Pekkala’s desk bothered him, made even worse by the fact that Pekkala, in defiance of all reason, still seemed to know where everything was. It was why Kirov’s younger brother had tormented him so effectively by leaving drawers slightly open around the house, a fault Kirov felt compelled to correct, no matter how hard he tried to ignore them. But Kirov had learned to live with his eccentricities, and even to profit by them. It was this attention to detail that had made Kirov a good investigator. In any other walk of life, he would simply have been considered a lunatic.
A moment later, a middle-aged man, his shoulders stooped from fatigue, stepped out of the house. He was carrying a briefcase and he had buttoned up his coat against the evening chill.
A woman, dressed for bed at this late hour, came with him to the doorway, kissed him on the cheek and closed the door behind him.
Even in this darkness, Kirov knew the man was not Serge Bakhturin, whom he had seen numerous times in the course of the trial that led to Serge’s conviction for issuing false bills of lading. Serge was tall and heavy-set, with a wide face and a thick neck. This man was too short, too old, too frail.
He’s probably an accountant on his way to a nightshift job, thought Kirov and, as he watched the man make his way towards the train station‚ he felt a surge of pity for this lonely figure, his days inverted into darkness, and wondered what it must be like for the man’s wife, so rarely to see him in daylight.
Kirov realised that Bakhturin must have misled him, and probably on purpose, but just in case he followed the man across the street, with the intention of questioning him. Perhaps the address Bakhturin had written down was only partially incorrect, or maybe this man had seen Serge on his way to or from work. He removed the pass book from his upper left pocket, ready to present his credentials to the man.
As the man approached the entrance to a pedestrian tunnel which ran beneath the road and emerged beside a railway platform for all trains bound into the city, Kirov called out for him to stop.
The man whirled about. On glimpsing Kirov’s gymnastiorka tunic, knee-length boots and pistol belt, his eyes widened with fear.
Kirov had anticipated that the man might be surprised. It was long after dark and the street was otherwise empty, but Kirov assumed that as soon as the man caught sight of his uniform, he would realise it was official business.
‘It’s all right,’ Kirov assured him. ‘I just have a few questions.’
The man gave a plaintive, wordless cry and stumbled backwards against the concrete wall of the pedestrian tunnel. With fumbling hands, he removed a walle
t from his coat and held it out to Kirov. ‘Take it,’ he whispered. ‘Just let me go.’
‘What? No!’ Kirov held open his pass book. ‘I am Major-’
‘Take it!’ the man shouted. The wallet quivered in his grip.
‘I don’t want your money. All I need from you. . ’
The man cried out again, dropped the wallet, and fled away down the tunnel.
Having decided against pursuing the terrified man, Kirov bent down and picked up the billfold. Then he crossed the road again and returned to the house where, he hoped, the wife had not yet gone back to bed so he could return what had been lost.
Kirov knocked on the door and, following regulations, took two steps back and undid the flap on the holster of his Tokarev. While he waited, he took a moment to glance down at his boots and nodded with satisfaction at the quality of their polish.
The door opened, spilling out the warm glow of an oil lamp on a table in the hall.
The woman stood before him. She was heavily made-up and the light of the oil lamp shone through her night dress, which Kirov now realised, was completely transparent. Beneath it, she was naked.
It took Kirov only a second to reassess everything he had thought over the past few minutes, including his sympathy for the overworked accountant.
‘Hello, Commissar,’ said the woman, in a voice which sent a shudder down his spine. ‘Would you like to come in?’
‘Yes,’ he replied curtly, and stepped into the hallway. Immediately, his lungs filled with a choking fog of cigarettes, perfume and nail varnish. The paint on the walls was a pinkish red, somewhere between the colours of new brick and salmon flesh. The old wooden floorboards had been stippled with stiletto heels. To his left was a room lined with a collection of tired-looking couches, on which sat women of a variety of ages and complexions, reading magazines or smoking. To his right, a staircase climbed up to the second floor. Kirov turned to the woman. ‘I am here for Serge Bakhturin,’ he said quietly, ‘That is the only reason I am here.’
Unlike the accountant, the woman neither fled nor panicked. Instead, she leaned towards him, resting her hand upon his shoulder and muttered in his ear. ‘Will it be possible to avoid causing a commotion?’
‘That depends,’ he replied in a whisper, ‘entirely on Comrade Bakhturin.’
She stood back and smiled, daring his eyes to stray from her face. ‘Top floor. The room at the end of the hall.’
‘Is there another exit from that room?’
‘Not without breaking your neck.’
‘Are the doors locked?’
‘Never.’
Before he headed up the stairs, Kirov handed over the accountant’s wallet. ‘One of your customers dropped this.’
‘It’s about time he left a tip,’ she remarked as she plucked it from his fingers.
As Kirov climbed the creaking steps, he removed the Tokarev from its holster. Quietly, he drew back the slide and chambered a round in the breech. He could feel his heartbeat pulsing in his neck. Kirov thought about Pekkala; how the man never seemed nervous at moments like this. Of all the skills he had learned from the Inspector, the suppression of fear was not one of them.
The hall on the top floor was poorly lit, with two sets of doors on either side. All of the doors were closed. The one at the end of the hall showed signs of having been kicked in at some point in the past, and the dent of a footprint in the wood hastily painted over.
Knowing that it would be impossible to get to the end of the hall without making a noise, Kirov decided instead to move quickly. He strode down to the door, turned the handle and pushed.
Inside, the room was lit by a single light bulb hanging from a dusty shade in the centre of the ceiling. An iron-framed bed filled most of the room and a small window looked out over the moonlit rooftops of nearby houses.
Standing between the bed and the window was Serge Bakhturin. Clutched against his chest he held a girl about sixteen years old, one arm across her stomach and the other one gripping her throat.
The girl wore a white night dress with lace around the collar and buttons halfway down the front, which were unfastened. Her eyes were filled with dread.
Kirov raised the Tokarev‚ but there was no clear shot with the girl standing between them.
‘I heard you coming,’ said Serge. ‘I remember your face from the trial. And I know why you’re here‚ Major Kirov.’
‘Let her go. Then we can talk.’ Behind him, Kirov heard doors opening and the sound of people running barefoot down the stairs.
Serge tightened his grip upon the woman’s throat.
She tried to swallow. Her face turned red. She kept her eyes fastened on the barrel of the gun.
Kirov knew he couldn’t put down Serge without hitting the girl as well.
The girl seemed to know it too. A look of profound resignation appeared on her face, as if a shadow had passed through her mind. He had seen this look once before, in the eyes of an old, lame horse his family had owned on the day his father took it out behind the barn and put it down. The animal had known what was about to happen. There was no doubt in Kirov’s mind about that. He had been a child when this took place, but the moment had remained brutally clear in his mind.
‘I’m not going to deny it,’ muttered Serge. ‘I’m the one who killed Pekkala.’
‘Pekkala is alive,’ replied Kirov, his voice barely above a whisper.
‘Liar!’ Serge howled. ‘I saw him go down. I’d have killed his friend, too, if that damned revolver hadn’t jammed.’
Now Kirov understood why only one of the rounds had been fired. ‘Who put you in contact with Gustav Engel?’ he asked.
‘Nobody!’ barked Serge. ‘But if I see him again, I’ll kill him too.’
‘It was your brother, wasn’t it? It was Viktor.’
‘You’ve got it all wrong, Commissar. I don’t need any help, least of all from him. He’s been propping me up since I was a kid, and until I ended up in prison‚ I never stopped to wonder if I might have been better off handling things on my own. And that’s exactly what I did this time. I took care of things by myself.’
‘Yes,’ said Kirov. ‘Yes, you did. Now you can let the lady go. I’m not going to tell you again.’
‘I’ll let her go. Just let me slip out this window. Nobody has to get hurt.’
‘There’s no way down from there.’
‘Then I’ll have to walk right past you, won’t I?’
Kirov shook his head. He had the gun aimed at the girl’s throat, knowing that if he was forced to pull the trigger at this range, the round would pass through her neck and strike the man standing behind her.
‘You don’t look like a killer to me,’ Serge taunted him.
‘I’m not‚’ agreed Kirov‚ ‘but for you, I would make an exception.’
‘And for her?’ He tilted back the girl’s head until the tendons stood out on her neck.
This time, Kirov did not reply.
‘I didn’t think so,’ said Serge. ‘It’s me or nothing, and I don’t think you have the kind of luck to make that shot. You would need luck like mine‚ and you don’t have that kind of luck.’
‘You’re right,’ said Kirov. ‘I don’t have luck like yours.’
‘I knew you would come to your senses.’ Serge took one step towards the door, still holding the girl in front of him.
As Serge’s right leg moved forward, Kirov lowered the Tokarev and shot him through the knee cap. Serge cried out, releasing his grip upon the girl. He tumbled to the floor, like a marionette whose strings had been cut. Before Serge had even hit the ground, Kirov sent another bullet through the bridge of his nose, killing him instantly.
The sound of the shots was deafening in the confined space of the room.
Bakhturin lay on his back, one leg twisted under him. Smoke slithered from his wounds, rising to the ceiling where they mushroomed out across the stuccoed paint.
The girl hadn’t moved.
For a moment, she and Kir
ov just stared at each other.
Then, with trembling fingers, she began to fasten the buttons on her blood-spattered night dress.
Under the jaundiced eye
Under the jaundiced eye of a harvest moon, Pekkala, Stefanov and Churikova made their way through fields of uncut wheat and orchards where the fruit lay rotting on the ground.
Stefanov took the lead, retracing his route as well as he could remember. One path, in particular, which was nothing more than a cart track running between the fields, he remembered as having been empty when he walked it. He kept them on this trail, which proved to be just as deserted now as it had been before.
Although they heard the rumble of vehicles in the distance, they encountered neither trucks nor soldiers. The fighting had moved like a tornado across the countryside, leaving some places in ruins and the rest of the landscape untouched.
In the middle of the night‚ they arrived at the burnt remains of a house. Smoke slithered through the maze of fallen beams and clumps of charred thatch wheezed and crackled. Behind the house, they found the bodies of an old man and an old woman, hanging from the branches of a tree, their feet almost touching the ground.
Churikova reached out and set her hand against the dead man’s chest, as if to feel the beating of his heart. When she drew her hand away, the corpse rocked gently on the hemp rope noose, like a pendulum spent of its energy.
From a scabbard tucked into his boot, Stefanov pulled a knife and slashed through the ropes with one cut. The bodies fell heavily, one on top of the other, broken necks lolling grotesquely.
Pekkala and the others returned to the road and kept on marching. Not a word had passed between them since they came upon the house.