The Cleansing Flames (St Petersburg Mystery)

by R. N. Morris

  A priest intoned the day’s reading, John, Chapter 20, Verses 19 to 31. It was the story of Thomas, of course, for this was Thomas Sunday. Thomas, who needed not only to see the risen Christ but also to thrust his fingers into His wounds before he would declare: ‘My Lord and my God.’

  The point was, of course, not that Thomas had doubted. But that he had come to believe. Porfiry thought of Virginsky. He moved his lips in prayer for his junior colleague.

  11

  A sheepskin coat tied with string

  The following day, Lieutenant Ilya Petrovich Salytov stood before the poster that had just been pinned up in the receiving hall of the Haymarket District Police Bureau in Stolyarny Lane. Salytov had once been known as ‘Gunpowder,’ on account of his fiery temper. But ever since he had been disfigured in a bomb atrocity, about six years earlier, his colleagues had tactfully dropped the soubriquet.

  The face in the poster fascinated him, possibly because it was even more grotesque than his own. But, also, it seemed somehow familiar to him. It stirred the muddy depths of his memory.

  Salytov read the accompanying text, and, as directed, tried to discount the waxen patches on the cheeks. But he found that it was no simple matter to overlook something so startling, especially once it had been pointed out to him.

  He concentrated on the eyes. He could not shake off the feeling that he had once before stared into two eyes as tiny and loathsome as these. He felt an eddy of anger rise up from those murky depths where that particular half-memory was buried, the resurgence of an old rage. But that was all that he could summon, for the moment at least.

  Whether it was the strange transformation that had occurred in the face on the poster, or because the thought of his injury was never far from his mind, Salytov found himself thinking back to his hospitalisation after the bomb blast. He imagined the raw, shredded agony of his face once again wrapped in moist bandages. He pictured the nurse slowly easing and teasing the bandages away from his melded flesh. He saw again the involuntary look of horror that she could not suppress, and then the sad dip of her head as she avoided his eyes. At his insistence, she had held a mirror up to him.

  He relived that moment now. Curiously, when, in his imagination, he turned his gaze to the glass, it was the face on the poster that he saw, not his own.

  *

  ‘Do you know what day it is tomorrow, Pavel Pavlovich?’ said Porfiry. He too was studying the face of the unknown man recovered from the Winter Canal. He had pinned up a copy of the original poster, which bore the wording ‘Wanted’. Perhaps there was something perverse about his preference for this version, now that the corrected posters had been delivered; the possibility could not be discounted that he kept it as a rebuke to Virginsky. Next to it he had fixed a photographic enlargement of Kozodavlev’s face, taken from the Affair staff photograph.

  ‘I should hope so. Today is Monday, therefore tomorrow will be Tuesday,’ answered Virginsky.

  ‘Yes, but what is special about this particular Tuesday?’ It was almost as if Porfiry was addressing the face on the poster.

  ‘If you are referring to some obscure religious festival, or saint’s day, then I am afraid I cannot help you. I long ago gave up trying to retain the arcane intricacies of the Christian calendar in my mind.’

  ‘But this is a very important one, for us at least.’

  ‘For us?’

  ‘Yes. As magistrates engaged in a murder investigation. Tomorrow is the Tuesday of Thomas Week. The festival of Radonitsa, when we are duty bound to remember the dead.’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘You knew really, didn’t you? Your parents must have taken you to the cemetery on Radonitsa, to place painted eggs on the graves of your ancestors.’

  ‘Perhaps so.’

  ‘You feasted on funeral kutia, and all the other delicacies of the day.’

  ‘If you say so.’

  ‘I do. Tomorrow . . .’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Are you intending to visit a cemetery at all?’

  ‘I had not thought to do so.’

  ‘I would just like you to know that you have my permission.’

  ‘I thank you, but that will not be necessary.’

  ‘You should not cut yourself off from the rituals of your nation, Pavel Pavlovich. You might be surprised to discover a new sense of wholeness and well-being. The old rituals are there for a reason, you know.’

  ‘But I do not believe,’ said Virginsky flatly.

  ‘It is not always necessary to believe. Sometimes it is enough to embrace. There is a rhythm and a pattern to the old ways that is deeply consonant with the rhythms and patterns of life. Tomorrow we feast in memory and celebration of the dead. If you are not going to the cemetery, then I will bring in some funeral kutia to eat here in chambers.’

  ‘Please, there is no need.’

  ‘It is no trouble.’ Porfiry turned from the poster and crossed to his desk. ‘During Bright Week, we celebrate the resurrection of our Lord and God. And then in Thomas Week, we look forward to the resurrection of all the dead, at least of all those who have died believing.’ Porfiry gave Virginsky a warning look. ‘In the meantime, we witness all around us the resurrection of nature, the rebirth and resurgence of life as spring bursts out from beneath the thawing snow. It is no coincidence that the marriage season begins in Thomas Week. After we have given due remembrance to the dead, we turn our hearts to the living and the continuance of life. It makes perfect sense, Pavel Pavlovich. You must see that. You must feel it.’

  There was a knock at the door. Porfiry looked up to see Nikodim Fomich enter.

  ‘Good day, Porfiry Petrovich.’ The chief superintendent held out a brown envelope.

  ‘What have you there?’

  ‘The police report on the fire in Bolshaya Morskaya Street.’

  Porfiry sprang to his feet and hurried over to Nikodim Fomich. He took the envelope eagerly. ‘Ah . . . and so it is not as we feared? It did not go to the Third Section!’

  ‘In point of fact, it did. The official file has disappeared into that department, in all likelihood never to be seen again. However, a diligent clerk – to whom we have cause to be grateful – made a copy of the police report and retained it in a separate file at the Admiralty District Police Department. I was able, through my contacts there, to arrange for the loan of that duplicate file.’

  ‘You have read it?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Does it shed any light on the disappearance of Kozodavlev?’ Porfiry took out the report, a single sheet, filled with a clerk’s neat copperplate, and scanned it.

  ‘It seems most likely that your Kozodavlev fellow did indeed perish in that fire. We may reasonably conjecture that the fire had its beginnings in his apartment. The reasons for that conclusion you will no doubt read for yourself. I should warn you, Porfiry Petrovich, that if you do go raking over these particular coals you will stir up an unholy cloud of smoke. You will undoubtedly attract the attention of certain interested parties.’

  Porfiry took Nikodim Fomich’s hint. ‘And what if I willingly make my chambers available to the officers of the Third Section, and offer my services to aid them in their investigations?’

  ‘Perhaps they will accept your invitation. And perhaps you will wish that they had not.’

  ‘Thank you for this,’ said Porfiry. He held Nikodim Fomich for a moment with his gaze. There was a beseeching quality to Nikodim Fomich’s expression. He seemed to be asking if he had been forgiven. Porfiry’s nod seemed to answer that he had.

  *

  Some time before midnight of Monday, 17 April, fire engines of the St Petersburg Fire Co. attended a fire at the Koshmarov Apartment Building, Bolshaya Morskaya Street, 12. Police Officers of the Admiralty District were also in attendance. This report is entered on behalf of the attending officers, and is countersigned by them. The fire was concentrated on the fifth storey, although the storeys immediately below and above also sustained damage. All fatalities occurred on the fi
fth storey. The alarm being raised, a number of residents were safely evacuated, including many of those on the fifth floor, who had already come out of their apartments at the first whiff of fire. However, the ferocity of the flames on the fifth floor, coupled with the thick black smoke resulting, hampered attempts to save a small number of occupants living closest to the centre of the blaze. When the flames were finally dampened, approximately one hour after the first engine arrived on the scene, the bodies of six dead were discovered, including those of five juveniles. These latter were the children of the Prokharchin family, who had been left alone by their parents while they entertained themselves in a nearby tavern. The children are thought to have been sleeping, and to have died from smoke suffocation. The fire is believed to have originated in the apartment of the Prokharchins’ neighbour, one Demyan Antonovich Kozodavlev, as the devastation and scorching is greatest there, particularly in the bedroom. It was here where the one adult body, that of a male, was found. This body is assumed to be that of Demyan Antonovich Kozodavlev himself, although a positive identification is impossible due to the severe disfigurement of the deceased’s face through burns. Interviews with neighbours on his floor who survived the conflagration indicate that Kozodavlev was visited shortly before the fire by a disreputable-looking individual in a grubby sheepskin coat belted with string and a worker’s cap. His appearance was variously described thus: ‘He looked like a convict’; ‘He had the eyes of a murderer’; ‘A nihilist if I ever saw one.’ Furthermore, it was noticed that this individual was carrying a large ceramic vessel, assumed to be a flagon of vodka. A violent altercation, in which voices were raised and oaths uttered, was heard to occur between the two men. The smell of burning was subsequently noted and various neighbours came out onto the stairwell, at which point the individual in the sheepskin coat and worker’s hat was seen fleeing precipitously from Kozodavlev’s apartment. Shortly afterwards, the fire took hold in earnest and the alarm was raised. Fortunately, the fire engines of the St Petersburg Fire Company were in the close vicinity, returning from a false alarm nearby. That the fire was not more widespread, giving rise to even greater devastation and casualties, is in large part due to the prompt arrival and brave action of the fire crews, who entered the building without thought of their own safety. A human chain was formed up the stairs, with fire buckets passing both ways along it. The parents of the deceased children arrived at approximately ten minutes past midnight on Tuesday, 18 April. The mother being in a highly inebriated state, and in addition distraught over the fate of her children, who were at that time unaccounted for, had to be forcibly restrained from entering the burning building. The father’s inebriation was such that he failed to comprehend the gravity of the situation. He apologised for his wife’s ‘intemperance,’ as he called it, and seemed to find the presence of the firemen and police amusing. When it was explained to him that his children were in danger, he answered with a smile, ‘The little ones? No, they are tucked up safely in bed.’ He then expressed the opinion that it was time they were home too. It was pointed out to him by a neighbour that this was his home, in answer to which he replied, ‘I’m sure it can’t be.’ At first he laughed at the suggestion, but becoming gradually serious, he fell at last silent. Soon after it was confirmed that all five children had perished. A large ceramic vessel, of the kind described by witnesses as belonging to the man in the sheepskin, was found empty in the hallway just outside Kozodavlev’s apartment.

  12

  Paying respects

  That afternoon, Porfiry took a drozhki to the Koshmarov Apartment Building in Bolshaya Morskaya Street. He was accompanied by Virginsky, who could not help but notice the unusually sombre and taciturn mood of his superior.

  ‘What do you hope to find, Porfiry Petrovich?’

  Porfiry stirred from his morose self-absorption only to shrug his shoulders. In the tight confines of the rocking drozhki, Virginsky felt himself squeezed upwards by the gesture.

  ‘Do you not think that the gendarmes of the Third Section will have removed any evidence from the scene?’ pressed Virginsky. ‘That is if there was any meaningful evidence left after the fire.’

  Porfiry’s eyelids descended in synchrony with a slow, grave nod of agreement.

  ‘Then why go?’

  Porfiry opened his eyes and turned the ice-grey irises to Virginsky. ‘I wish to pay my respects to the dead.’

  ‘I thought tomorrow was the day for that?’

  ‘Tomorrow, today. It makes little difference.’

  Virginsky raised an eyebrow. ‘To the dead, it makes no difference.’

  ‘Perhaps we do not do it for them. We do it for ourselves.’

  ‘You betray yourself, Porfiry Petrovich. That suggests that you do not believe in the survival of the soul after death. It is the kind of thing an atheist would say. Or at the very least, a rationalist.’

  ‘This week is Thomas Week. St Thomas doubted, before he came to believe.’

  ‘And you doubt?’

  ‘Sometimes. When five innocents perish in a fire that may have been started deliberately . . . One struggles to see God’s purpose in that.’

  ‘And Kozodavlev? Was he not innocent?’

  ‘Very well, six innocents.’

  Virginsky paused a moment before resuming: ‘Do we have . . . how may I put this? Do we have jurisdiction to enter the scene? We are not, after all, assigned to the case of Kozodavlev.’

  ‘Kozodavlev was a witness in the case we are investigating.’

  ‘With all respect, Porfiry Petrovich, we do not know that for certain yet, and will not do so until we have confirmation back from Helsingfors that Kozodavlev was the man watching the sailors. And even then . . .’ Virginsky broke off. It seemed that Porfiry felt every word he uttered as a personal wound.

  ‘There will be no jurisdictional aspect to our visit. As I said, we are simply paying our respects.’

  Virginsky’s mouth twisted up on one side, into a bemused smile. ‘And if the Third Section find out? I cannot believe they will not have someone watching.’

  ‘We have nothing to hide from the Third Section,’ said Porfiry. After a moment, he added, ‘Yet.’ For the first time on the drozhki ride, something like his old liveliness came back into Porfiry Petrovich’s eye. His eyelids oscillated frantically in celebration.

  *

  They had to step over the remnants of the door, which had been smashed through and lay scattered on the floor.

  The pungent smell of charred wood and plasterwork mingled with a cloying dampness. The result was a peculiarly chill and despondent atmosphere. Black streaks marked where the flames had touched the walls and ceiling. The bedroom was so fire-blacked that it looked as though it had been painted that funereal colour, along with every strange, distorted object in it. The walls were gutted, deep black scars where the combusted laths had burnt through the plaster. Only the metal frame of the bed remained intact, though the mattress on it had almost completely disappeared; clumps of black matter hung together around the edges of the bed. The skeleton of a burnt-out armchair lay exposed beside a heat-contorted metal bookcase, its contents vanished. They were puzzling stumps of furniture, barely holding their form, weakened beyond all possibility of function.

  Porfiry paced the empty apartment breathing the fumes of the extinguished flames. He quickly realised that he had to tread with caution. In places, where the fire had really taken hold, the boards had been burnt away, and elsewhere, those that remained were too fragile to support his weight.

  A middle-aged man, all grizzled beard and velveteen coat, poked his head suspiciously through the empty door frame as they were making their survey. ‘And who might you be?’ he asked unceremoniously, pointing the stem of his smoking pipe at Porfiry, as if it were a rifle he was intending to discharge.

  ‘Friends of the deceased,’ said Porfiry. ‘Come to pay our respects.’

  ‘Strange I never saw your face when he was alive.’

  ‘Do you see every visitor who
comes to every one of the residents in this building?’

  ‘I like to keep my eyes open.’ His eyes, in fact, narrowed warily.

  ‘You are the yardkeeper?’

  ‘That’s right.’ The yardkeeper shifted impatiently. ‘You’ll have to go. This place is unsafe.’

  ‘I should inform you that we are magistrates. We are here also in an official capacity.’

  ‘Make your mind up. Magistrates or friends. Which is it to be?’

  ‘Cannot we be both?’

  ‘Demyan Antonovich was not the sort to make friends with magistrates.’

  ‘Are you suggesting he engaged in illegal activities?’

  ‘Just that he did not much care for the authorities.’

  ‘Did you see the man who visited him shortly before the outbreak of the fire?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Who was he?’

  ‘He did not show me his passport.’

  ‘Was he the sort of person you are wont to admit to the building? A respectable gentleman?’

  ‘If I admitted only respectable folk, the place’d be empty.’

  ‘Had you seen him around here before?’

  ‘Mebbe. Mebbe not. Hard to say.’

  ‘Did you hear their argument?’

  ‘I did not eavesdrop if that’s what you’re suggesting.’

  ‘Of course not. It’s just that I assume you keep your ears as well as your eyes open.’

  The yardkeeper thought for a moment. ‘I couldn’t tell you what it was about.’ His expression became closed off. ‘You’ll have to go now.’

  ‘Who is your contact at the Third Section?’ asked Porfiry, abruptly.

  ‘What’s this?’

  ‘Ours is Major Verkhotsev. You will have heard of Major Verkhotsev, of course?’

  ‘No one told me any magistrates were coming.’