Field of Mars (19 page)

‘I
want
this,' Tuitchevsky said in a hushed voice, almost amazed at himself. ‘I want this for my
collection
. There ought to be a way to preserve it, don't you think?'

‘I . . . I really don't know. I suppose . . . but we need it first.'

‘Yes,' Tuitchevsky said reaching out and touching the hand for the first time, turning it over to examine the calloused palm, the shredded flesh at the wrist. ‘It's beautiful, in a way. I mean, it is beautiful, you can't deny that, eh?'

Ryzhkov shook his head. For a moment he thought he was going to faint. Dizzy, knocked out from lack of sleep, from an overdose of absurdity.

‘If you say so.'

‘I do,' Tuitchevsky said quietly. ‘I
do
say so.'

When they finally got in their carriage they passed the woman again. She was sitting on the kerb, rocking back and forth, clutching a blue cloth cap in her hand. Another child was standing beside her, too young to understand, one hand on her mother's shoulder. It only took a few moments to drive past her and neither of them said anything about it.

Ryzhkov dropped Hokhodiev off and continued on with Tuitchevsky's hand to the Military Hospital so that the ring could be removed and cleaned. It turned out to be a common silver band. An assistant took fingerprints from the hand so that Ryzhkov could take them back to the External branch's Records Division.

Bondarenko came in right at the end of it. The grisly nature of the project seemed to catch his interest. ‘Well . . . it's a wedding band, or perhaps an engagement present. Not of great quality, I'd say. There is a jeweller's mark beside the inscription. It's somewhat worn. You might be able to find something via the fingerprints, and at the Records Division there is an extensive library of jeweller's marks.' He used a pair of tweezers to put the ring back in its envelope.

‘Thank you, Doctor. Ah . . . Colonel Tuitchevsky wants, for some reason . . . well, he's asked me to enquire if the hand itself could be preserved somehow? Is that possible?' Bondarenko had suddenly lost his good humour. He frowned.

‘Preserved?'

‘Yes . . . I don't know . . .'

‘I'm not a taxidermist,' Bondarenko said, offended. ‘Tell him it's absolutely out of the question.' Bondarenko abruptly turned away and retreated into his labyrinth, shaking his head and muttering curses under his breath.

Upstairs in the lobby Ryzhkov borrowed a telephone to check in with 17 Pushkinskaya and got an excited Izachik on the line. ‘Monsieur Zezulin has found out about this morning's events and wishes everyone to come in, sir, and also for you there is a message from'— a pause—‘an Inspector Schliff.'

‘Oh?'

‘Yes, sir. He asks you to meet him at the front of the Haymarket, sir.'

‘Really?'

‘Yes sir. He seemed to think it was important.'

The boy sat across the room. It was a large dusty open space, where rows of seamstresses had once worked. The fine wood floor had holes drilled through it that had been puttied over when they removed the machines but never repaired.

‘He says he only wants to speak to you.'

‘How did he know about me?' Ryzhkov asked.

‘I've been passing the word around. He heard somehow, went out and telephoned in. He's scared that he's in trouble,' Schliff said quietly, not quite whispering.

‘I can't imagine he could get in worse trouble than in this place.'

‘He's not worried about trouble with us, just with the old man that owns him,' Schliff said. ‘See, if you go investigating in places like this, if you want to get anywhere, you have to stand between the pimp and the bird. I spent a little on him, just so you know.'

‘How much?'

‘A twenty.'

‘All right,' Ryzhkov said. He had no way to tell if Schliff was just lining his own pockets. It didn't matter. It was the price of doing business; he would put in a request when Zezulin was asleep.

They walked across the open room. The boy looked up at them. He was about twelve years of age—or maybe he was older and just looked younger. Schliff had already told him that the boys were forced to move on when they got older. Either sold to individuals, or the homosexual brothels, or, if they were very handsome, to more luxurious establishments that catered to wealthy female clients. Any one of those choices was considered lucky. If they failed to land a position in one of the bordellos a life on the street was the only other possibility. It was the great dividing line in the life of a prostitute. The boy looked at him steadily.

‘This is Teodor,' said Schliff. ‘Teodor, this is Inspector Ryzhkov. He's investigating the murder of a
vertika
that happened recently. Tell him about your friend.'

‘First I tell you, then I have to tell him,' the boy complained.

‘Fine, stop whenever you want to.'

‘You're looking for an old man. White hair, big side-whiskers like that?' The boy put his hands up to show them.

‘Yes.'

‘He likes to squeeze girls?'

‘We think so, yes.'

‘He killed this other girl?'

‘That's right.'

The boy looked at both of them for a moment. Making up his mind. He was older than twelve, Ryzhkov decided. Or maybe just old before his time.

‘There was a guy that killed my wife,' Teodor said quietly.

‘Your wi—' Ryzhkov started but Schliff put his hand on his arm. ‘Keep going,' he told the boy.

‘She went to this place and was with a grandfather, an old one like you said. She came back, they brought her back, she was sick when she came back, and then she died that night. She had something break up here from when he squeezed her.'

‘Can you tell us where she was that night, who sent for her?' Ryzhkov asked quietly. The boy gave a tight smile, shook his head, then looked up at Schliff.

‘No, no. Fine, Teo. You can stop. We don't want you to get in any trouble.'

The boy looked back across to the door. ‘Don't worry,' he said.

‘Anything you can tell us, Teodor . . .'

‘Sure,' he said. ‘Go and look in that cupboard.' The boy pointed across to the end of the big garret room where cupboards and open shelving had been built-in to store bolts of fabric. ‘Not that one, the one over against the roof.'

Ryzhkov opened the little cupboard. There was a box of wooden bobbins, some scraps of paper. Everything was covered in dust and mouse shit.

‘Reach back in the corner up at the top and there's a nail that sticks out.'

‘All right.' He felt back into the cupboard where the shelving joined the rafters.

‘If you pulled on that nail you might find something. It wouldn't be my fault.'

Ryzhkov tugged on the little nail and the board that formed the back wall of the cupboard teetered out and pivoted so that he could slide it away. Inside there was a tin box, about the size of a tea-box, and a black velvet handbag of high quality.

‘Just take the bag, leave the other, and put it back, eh?' the boy said. Schliff had taken a few steps across the floor but the boy stopped him. ‘You stay and watch the door. Everything I've got is in there.'

In the purse was a cheap gold-plated bracelet, a man's tie clip with some sort of stone set in its centre, several postcards, a photograph of a woman in a rather ordinary dress, and a man's empty leather wallet.

‘That's all her things she left me.'

‘She had light fingers, your wife did?' Schliff was smiling at the boy.

‘We were saving up to go away,' the boy said flatly. Ryzhkov looked at him for a moment and then opened the wallet.

Schliff took the bag, walked over and examined it under the light from the window. Looked at the portrait of the woman. ‘That her mother?' he asked, but the boy didn't say anything.

Inside the wallet Ryzhkov saw a small pocket for business cards, a worn yellow slip that indicated a St Petersburg residency permit. It was one of the old permits, all the newer ones had photographs and were supposed to be stamped . . . a name written across the top line in steel-pointed cursive script:
Lavrik, Oleg Karlovich
. With an address on Liteiny Prospekt. Not big money, but enough, he thought.

The boy was watching him. ‘Got what you want?' ‘Yes, thank you.'

‘You can keep it. I only held on to it hoping that one day I might run into him, you know?' The boy's eyes were steady as a knife's edge.

‘You might be able to get something for the bracelet.' Schliff said, closing the catch on the bag.

‘I don't think so. It's something she found when she was little,' he said.

‘Do you want a smoke?' Schliff asked.

‘I'm not supposed to unless they offer,' he said flatly. ‘She had a box, with some clothes. I gave those to some of the girls. Eva wanted the combs and her ribbons. There is a letter inside from her mother maybe, but I don't know. It might be someone else's mother.'

Ryzhkov tucked the bag with its souvenirs back inside the rafters, fumbled in his pocket and came out with a ten-rouble note. A lot. ‘Here . . . this is something for your savings.' He held the note out for the boy. Schliff reached out first and took it away, dug in his pocket and came up with a five and some coins. ‘Your boss, the old man will ask you if we paid, won't he?' Schliff said, looking at Ryzhkov.

‘Yeah, I'll have to give him something. He'll want to know everything. I don't care about the money. If you can get him, that will be enough.' Steady eyes looking at him.

Ryzhkov nodded. ‘Take it anyway. If he gives you any trouble, get in touch with me through Inspector Schliff here, and I'll protect you,' Ryzhkov said. He took out his Okhrana disc and showed it to the boy. ‘Do you know what this means?' he asked.

The boy looked at the flat circle of metal, with its worn double-eagle and the engraved numerals, and then up to Ryzhkov.

‘It means you think you can protect me,' he said.

By midnight Ryzhkov was sitting in an
izvolchik
with the canopy raised so that he could watch the front of Baron Oleg Karlovich Lavrik's city house. The files had not come over from the General Staff building, that would have to wait for morning, but he had looked up the address in the Petersburg directory, and verified that he still lived there.

The Liteiny house was high and narrow. Probably six or seven bedrooms. No stables or courtyard. They must travel everywhere by hired carriage. No one had come or gone from the time he had arrived, just after six in the evening. Lights came on and went off. There was a tail of smoke from the chimneys. He moved around the building and watched from different angles, but no one raised the corner of a curtain. Lamps were on in the upper bedrooms until after ten and then one after the other were snapped off. Two people were living there, he thought. Two people in two different bedrooms; if there were servants they would have rooms at the back.

He watched the darkened house for a half-hour more. The street was quiet. An ordinary Thursday evening with the air getting colder and colder. A little sheen of ice in the wet gutters. A crispness to the air. He decided there was no point in spending the night watching. He would turn up a photograph of Baron Lavrik, take it to Vera and her friend and if they could put Lavrik in the Iron Room, then he'd request a protocol to formally investigate the man, find his accomplice, and hopefully send them both to jail.

He was suddenly tired. Tired, as if he had finished a great test or examination of some kind. His mind wandered, playing games. He would bring in Madame Hillé once he had the protocols. She'd give up Lavrik if it meant losing her residency permit and her yellow card or jail; he'd withhold her passport so she couldn't run, get a case together that could go before a court. Maybe he could make things right, or at least a little better.

It was cold now and he decided to go home. The air was thick with the moisture that had risen from the canals and the river.

The weather was changing.

There would be a chilly fog in the morning. A stinking yellow blanket that would greet Petersburg's citizens when they woke; a poisonous veil that would hover over the pavements, making it impossible to read the street signs, and concealing everything from view.

SIXTEEN

Andrianov sat in the ornate foyer of Mendrochovich and Lubensky, one of the empire's great financial houses; impressive offices, with splendid furnishings and arched windows above the Nevsky, spanning the front of the building and around the corner of the Fontanka embankment. It was a clear day and the sun burned through the windows, bringing out the smells of the woollen carpet, the wax on the furniture and walls, the rich leather of the furniture, the pungency of cigar smoke. Across the wide foyer were a handful of other men, heads together discussing their business, shuffling papers, waiting for appointments, some of them anonymous, some known to him by name. Clients who visited Mendrochovich and Lubensky were able to conduct business within a cocoon of complete discretion, indeed individuals, partnerships, companies or entire families could, if it was required, be identified only by secret number. Anonymity was guaranteed absolutely. Naturally there was the full panoply of investment services for ordinary clients, even simple banking accounts and safe boxes available within vaults on the top floor.

‘It's such a pleasure to meet you Monsieur Andrianov, a man of your reputation. We're most happy indeed, and I am certain that you will be satisfied with our services.'

‘My pleasure. You are Dr Rody?'

‘Yes, sir. And I must say that you have been quite highly recommended by one of our most distinguished clients, Monsieur Brogdanovitch. Everything appears to be in order. Shall we remove to my office?'

Andrianov followed the man down a hallway. There were frosted-glass windows to hide the business of each of the factors from his neighbour. Altogether he estimated that several dozen clerks, administrators and agents inhabited the offices. There were facilities for the transfer of monies, an international division, the ability to perform any transaction you could imagine. They settled for a moment in Rody's office.