Darcy jumped up as if swept outside his consciousness, the fact of what lay there, half-alive or dying, the fact of a gun in his own hand, and, bathed in steam and the drum of the pouring water, Aurelio’s coat behind him, a black lake on the floor, the brass button that had been listening all along, floating like a tiny crucible. Darcy found himself out in the dark abandoned corridor. The gun in a hand that didn’t feel like his hand, his blood-smudged fingers turning the key in the door, locking the general in. Darcy stood there in a hallway silent but for the whippet skulking in the shadows as if sent down to check, the dull thrum of the shower. As Darcy pocketed the key he began to shake, a trembling rippling through him, and he knew only violent people should be violent. Darcy knew he had to keep moving, that if he’d stabbed a man in the eye, he could use a gun. The echo in his head of the general’s hollow contact with the bath, skull on iron, the stolen car keys and knife now stuffed in the pocket of his denim jacket, his vision seemed altered as he searched for a servant’s entrance out into the cold black coatless nothing, but the corridor ended so he moved towards the entry hall, rubbing the blood on his pants, the dog by his side licking up playfully as he walked.
In the entry hall stood the widow by the Laika picture, not hiding but standing, pale and stricken, the old man by her side. They were expecting the general. Darcy held the gun in the air like a quivering grenade but the old man had no weapon, and Darcy saw his face in the light for the first time. Nikolai Chuprakov, older, the same mournful dark eyes, Nikolai Chuprakov’s father. I’m so sorry, said Darcy, he slipped the general’s dress coat from the hallstand, soft as mink, and he was crying as the old man opened the door for him as if he somehow understood.
Darcy stumbled down through the narrow poplars, shouted no at the following dog and heard the widow call its name. He pushed its felt snout from the car door, set the gun on the passenger seat. He slammed the door and closed his eyes for an elevated second as he turned the cold ignition and it started, the rattle of the engine, the crunch of tyres reversing. He glanced back and saw the maid standing under the eaves like a shadow and prayed she’d not called for help, that they somehow believed he was Nikolai Chuprakov’s lover, and forgave him.
The snow fell in a sudden sheet as he drove through the columned entrance, from a place with a climate of its own, and the last thing he saw in the rear-view mirror was the whippet, perched like a statue in the lantern light behind him, the old man and widow gone. Now he felt engulfed in darkness, the taste in his mouth almost sulfuric; perhaps they’d have helped him, hidden him, but why? He couldn’t trust a look in an old man’s eyes.
He’d sneaked cars down driveways since he was nine, but then he’d felt an exhilaration, now he gripped the wheel to stop his own shaking, jumped through a gear and switched on the lights to blind the sentry who raised his hand. Through the snow and the thrash of the wipers, Darcy was the general with the general’s gun, leaving for the night, but then he saw the guard in the mirror, outside his box in the blanketed street, and Darcy accelerated.
Darcy started ripping buttons from the general’s coat, throwing them out into the snow, with no horrid exhilaration, just disgust; and Darcy couldn’t know if he’d ever forgive himself but the shaking wasn’t stopping and he didn’t turn back to search for Aurelio, or for evidence of Fin. He drove on towards the city.
A siren, but it was a train, the gates of a level crossing lowered quickly before him. He looked back at a van behind him, prayed it wasn’t police, imprisoning him, he gazed ahead into the hoot and rattle, the blur of endless hammers and sickles emblazoned on carriages, symbols of cutting and bludgeoning, in rhythm. He touched the burn on his neck, scabbed now, and he tore at it, the pain like a tranquiliser, ripping the crusted edge as a whoosh of windswept snow blasted the car from the last carriage passing and he stared at oncoming cars at the crossing—two green sedans in tandem, militiamen, and as he jolted the Lada over the tracks, Svetlana turned from the second car and caught him there, and as they passed they watched each other but Svetlana’s eyes said nothing to him but go. And he wished he could tell her to look for Aurelio but the city was somewhere ahead, the river to his left, and he wove through the night, his vision blurred with fear and vodka.
He dabbed his neck with the collar of the coat with fingers already tainted with blood, and thought of axes pounding through the bathroom door, searching for spare keys, the widow calling her father, the head of Special Forces. He thought he saw the beacons of the Siminov Monastery above him, lights that hit the pistol on the seat, his fingerprints all over it, his eyes that stung like nettles, straining as far as they could; he twitched and slowed at a claxon sound, an ambulance blaring, coming towards him, but he pressed the Lada forward, passing cars that pulled over, a snow plough, a military truck, if he could just keep the river to his left, but he felt as if the road was veering away. The outlines of buildings clustering, closing in, he wondered if he could find the metro station at Taganskaya, abandon the car, but he knew how to get to Kropotkinskaya by road—follow the river to the Chayka Pool—the weather so thick, his head aching, he dabbed his neck and pressed his elbow against the velvet coat and sensed the slide of plastic, the sacred telegram, how the Turk had almost reached him, crouched and then been felled. Darcy pictured KGB men, done with the Armenians, waiting for him at the embassy gates.
He looked over at the gun, uncertain how to shoot it, then up at a stoplight that burned red and the gun flew from the seat to the floor as he braked and his heart rose up, the car was sliding, bunting a black metal barrier. He swung into the skid so the Lada caught traction and Darcy turned left; then he saw what he knew was the lustreless sweep of the river. Out behind him everything refracted, camouflaged in snow, but there was the embankment approaching, the high sloping stones, and his hopes high with it. He couldn’t yet see the lit panorama of the Kremlin, but he knew where he was, the unyielding stone towers, the Armoury Palace and the endless facade of the walls and cathedrals, all of them above him, places with names he remembered. The Ivan the Great belltower and the Presidium.
In the wake of a bus he looked up at the school-age eyes peering scattershot out a back window, children in a winter like this, and he didn’t feel Russian, crushed by loss and steeled by it, he felt desperately alone. He reached down for the gun but grasped cigarettes. Aurelio’s. But there would be no Aurelio. There would be stray dogs in winter, a general congealing in steam. There would be shaven-headed boys being raped in the gulags or cast out into snow.
He turned at the swimming pool onto Kropotkinskaya Prospekt, but a car turned behind him, and all he could do was stare in the rear-view mirror as he slowed for number thirteen. The other car crept past and no obvious convoy of KGB vehicles waited, yet the quiet felt suspicious, the guard hut lonely as an outhouse in the guttering light. He reached down for the pistol and rested it in his lap, under his new coat, pulling in beside the sentry box, and he felt how easy it would be to use a gun, after cutting at eyes with a knife—you could turn a gun on yourself if you had to.
No one inside the gates, in the snow-blurred shadows, the pitch-dark mansion. A torch shining in the window and Darcy held the roll of notes from his pocket and closed his eyes as he wound the window down into the light on his face and the sleet that spat on his cheeks—the blunt, oval face and same spare chin that denied him the last time. Darcy handed over what remained of the roll of money and looked straight ahead.
Ulli Breffny, he said, clasping the wheel so his hands didn’t tremble, willing himself through, letting go and holding on. Another car passing, the guard picking up a receiver concealed under the counter and phoning, mumbling in Russian, a call he hadn’t made last time, and Darcy felt the gun in his lap, about to point it up, to be sure it was the right call and then, ahead of him, the iron-barred entrance began its drag through the slush, and a pair of rusted arms lifted like they were about to embrace; Darcy drove in almost convulsively, more wary still than elated, faint, as he held for the sound o
f the creaking gates to lock him in, the hinges like a child screaming.
Australian Embassy, Kropotkinskaya Prospekt 13, Sunday, 10.25 pm
Darcy looked up in disbelief, craned his head to see if anyone waited, if a striding figure would emerge to welcome him, but the butter-coloured mansion sat in an unnatural dark. Then he saw a woman at the top of a low-lit set of stairs, coiffed like an air hostess, her head covered in a plastic rain scarf. She walked down the slick narrow steps and Darcy watched her, hardly dared breathe or swallow. As she approached, he pocketed the pistol and opened his window, quelling his instinct to rush.
I’m Ulli de Breffny, she said through the snow. A de before the Breffny, a strawberry-blondeness to her hair, eyebrows carefully pencilled, and Darcy felt his spirit returning. Darcy Bright, he said. He fumbled his collar up over the bloodied sore and tried to get out but his legs seemed weak beneath him like he’d been crippled. He wanted to drape himself over her for safety, but she was formal, touching his shoulder as if she understood. She shepherded him to the stairway with a certain urgency. Darcy looked over at her. Thank you, he said. Is this still Soviet soil?
Yes and no, she said, as they entered a faint spray of light from the canopied doorway. Technically no. And Darcy staved off tears of exhaustion, his fingers shaky as flames.
Ulli de Breffny slipped the rain scarf from her head. In from the cold, she said, aware of her joke, but Darcy couldn’t see it as funny. He glanced through the glistening snow behind him, the night that had let him go; these people who’d given him passage, the old man like an angel out of nowhere, Svetlana. And now he was inside, in a small austere reception room. A place that no longer seemed possible. An Australian flag on the wall, metal desk and office chairs, a plain teak table with a silver tea service. A holding pen perhaps, for quarantine, debriefing. The gun shoved deep in his coat as this woman double-bolted the iron-clad door and they both looked down at Darcy’s wet Blundstone boots on the dry taupe carpet.
He stared up at her beseechingly. Can I speak to the ambassador? he asked.
She draped her scarf on the back of a chair and motioned him to sit. I’m his envoy tonight, she said, pouring tea into a gold-lipped cup, her English impeccable but not Australian. She passed Darcy the cup on a saucer, a plate of homemade lemon squares and lamingtons. She smiled reassuringly. She hadn’t patted him down.
But who are you really? he asked.
I am originally Finnish, she said, pouring her own tea. The dull pink of her lipstick, a woman who still traded on her looks. She leaned back on the desk. I liaise with the Soviets, she added with a quiet authority, as if that might suffice. Also, she said, I’m the wife of the Australian cultural attaché. And Darcy knew she was a spook.
Darcy watched as she leaned against the desk, assessing his scraped-up face, the way he shook, as if trying to judge what he’d been through. As he drank tea, the cup quivered at his lips, and the liquid burned down inside him. He noticed the Southern Cross on the flag, listened for activity but the building seemed oddly silent; he’d still not seen an actual Australian. He cleared his throat. You know Fin? he asked.
Ulli de Breffny made a slight face as if she might not run in quite the same circles. I met her only once. My husband was responsible for her grant to come here and paint. He was very taken with her portfolio.
They were mine, he said.
She nodded. We know that now, she said. Then we got a message from her. About you.
Darcy looked down at the tea leaves in his cup. What did she say?
Ulli de Breffny sipped her own tea but still didn’t sit. That you were in over your head; that you were an innocent.
Darcy felt the shape of the pistol against his ribs. Can you find out if she’s alive? he asked.
We can try, she said. We know there’s been an incident.
Darcy felt a rush of anger. An incident? He clasped his hands around the tea cup to retain his composure. He needed to be practical. He remembered his map inside his denim jacket, his body layered with damp pockets. He unfolded the map and held it up, pointed to where he’d seen her last, down the river past the Danilov Monastery and the Church of the Ascension, but he suddenly wasn’t sure of directions. He couldn’t find the Southern River Terminal, only the weight of what he’d witnessed, what he’d just done, unravelling within him. You don’t know what I’ve seen, he said, but she told him they were doing what they could, that it was difficult here. Darcy looked up at Ulli de Breffny sensing his bewilderment, and he wasn’t sure if anyone would ever understand.
You know what she was doing here, said Ulli de Breffny, don’t you?
Darcy nodded. I learned, he said, I learned in Lubyanka. He thought it might make an impression but she merely inclined her head.
Essentially, she said, she’s a fugitive. She spoke as if Darcy might need reminding.
She’s my sister, he said, and Ulli de Breffny stared down at the map, at Darcy’s clenched hands. Then she acknowledged a green folder on the desk behind her. A string around it, a row of numbers printed.
We never told them that, she said. We thought it might protect you.
What? he asked. Told them what?
That she’s your sister.
They knew, he said. Again he felt the gun, wished her’d thrown it out into the snow.
I know who you are, she said. I saw a copy of the photo they took of you in Prague. I don’t judge you, she added, touched her fine-edged hair, and as Darcy closed his eyes, he felt it seeding inside him, the fact that one of the hands in his lap had gouged a knife into a Soviet general’s eyes.
Ulli de Breffny placed her tea on the desk. Foreign Affairs got calls from your mother, she said.
The mention of his mother, the thought of her trying, had Darcy battling a new wave of tears.
Apparently, she was very upset, saying how you telephoned and told her you might disappear. She kept saying your name and then the name Sarfin.
Darcy looked up with a kind of glazed wonder. Do you know who Sarfin is? he asked.
An associate of Gorbachev, she said. He works inside the KGB, and outside. She knew all about him. She broke off the corner of a biscuit and held it out in the air.
Darcy closed his eyes tightly. His son, Aurelio, became my friend here, he said. He has disappeared. I think he might be dead. The general cut his face up, he said, as punishment.
Darcy could tell by the way she shifted against the desk that this was a thing she hadn’t known. We’re doing all we can, she said sincerely, but Darcy watched her, trying to gauge the scope of her authority—there was nothing she could do, not about Aurelio, not about Fin, and now the phone beside her was ringing. Ulli de Breffny glanced at her watch before she answered. She listened, not speaking, then she responded in measured Russian. The only word Darcy recognised was Sarfin. She replaced the receiver and went to a small window, looked down at the Lada. A man called Tugrul has been shot, she said. The Turkish Consul-General.
As she turned, Darcy peeled his collar to reveal the blood on his neck. I knew him, he said. I was there. He could feel himself rocking, wanting to confess before others arrived, but Ulli de Breffny didn’t pick up her tea. She was thinking.
Did you really not know you smuggled a stolen document? she asked. You travelled with a time bomb.
Darcy’s breath hung quietly in his lungs. No, he said. I didn’t. Not then.
Do you know where the document might be now?
Darcy was silent and the woman’s face softened. What do you want, Darcy Bright?
I want to go home, he said.
Then you should tell me, she said. And I will see what we can do.
Darcy found himself seeing, in a way he’d forgotten, a chasm of hope placed in the air like a next breath. He removed the damp plastic envelope from his pocket, watched Ulli de Breffny examine the telegram. She allowed an odd pursed mouth. One more thing, she said. Why is it you have the car? She waited, almost smiling, as if inviting him.
Darcy stared int
o his emptied cup. You said you could only help if I got myself here, he said, careful with each of the words. General Sarfin didn’t kill me. He wanted me. He tried in Lubyanka. To rape me. He would have been raping me now.
Ulli de Breffny shifted along the desk, flattening her skirt. But you were in the house of the General Secretary’s daughter.
He wanted me clean, said Darcy. That’s what he said. He told me he’d split me in two. Darcy nodded, afraid he was telling too much. He’s on the floor of Anyetta Chernenko’s bathroom. I put a knife in his eye. Darcy didn’t produce the gun but he pulled the stained knife from the velvety coat and placed it on the low table beside him. It’s his car, he said.
Ulli de Breffny was clearly unsettled. She stood and, taking the folder and the evidence bag, left the room. Darcy could hear her on another phone, but the words were just murmurs and he had a sudden desire to wash himself now, see if he could stop the shivering, the noises in his head. He took off the coat, cautiously, as if the general still lurked in its folds, and removed the gun, the shining silver, unsure who lived or who died. He laid the coat hurriedly over the gun in his hand as Ulli de Breffny returned. We will need to get you out of Moscow, she said.
Darcy looked over at her pale lipstick, the intent in her eyes. She was more official now, laying out a possibility. You will need a passport, she said. And we will need to change your name. But we have to get you out before this becomes a major incident. The Soviets may suppress this but they will want you silenced. She went back to her window, stared down at the general’s car. I don’t understand how you are alive, she said.
Stray Dog Winter Page 24