The Relic (10 page)

‘I keep them,' she said. ‘Are you hungry?'

‘No. Are you?'

‘Ravenous. Stay there and I'll make something for us.'

‘You're always hungry! You wanted breakfast the first time we met.'

‘I didn't. I only ordered it to keep you talking to me. Do you want a drink? I've got some wine.'

He lay back against the pillows, watching her. She put on a dressing gown. She switched the light on and drew the curtains.

‘I might get drunk,' he said. ‘I'm always drunk by now.'

She paused by the door. She said, ‘You'll never get drunk again. You're not alone any more. We'll have a glass of wine together!' She sat on the bed and they touched their glasses in a silent toast.

She made sandwiches and they ate them crosslegged on the bed, finishing the wine together.

‘Why aren't you married?' he asked her.

‘I never met anyone I wanted to marry,' she said.

‘But you've had lovers?'

‘Only two. There was a student at the college in London where I was studying interior design. It lasted about a year. It wasn't serious; we were both very young. Then there was a man in Jersey. I decorated his house and we became involved, but that didn't work out either.'

He said slowly, ‘I don't want to hurt you, Lucy. I don't want to disappoint you. But I must go home before my wife gets back.' He sat forward, not touching her.

‘Tell me about your wife,' Lucy said. ‘Talk to me about her. You said she loved you.'

‘She calls it love,' he answered. ‘She's tried in bed with me for a long time. I can't bear to touch her. She says we could start again. The other night she said we could be happy. There have been nights when I lie there, listening to her breathing beside me and I think of killing her.'

‘Why? Whatever did she do to you?'

He lay back and she moved close to him, taking his hand in hers.

‘When I came here first I had TB. I caught it in prison. I was ill, I couldn't concentrate, I couldn't see people or face interviews. I didn't know what was the matter with me. Then I had an accident. I hadn't left the flat for so long. I remember it was sunny outside. I wanted to go out, to walk on the street alone. The flat was like a prison. I didn't get far. I fell and knocked myself out. Someone called an ambulance and I woke up in hospital. They found the pills I was taking twice a day. I believed they were for my lungs. My wife, Irina, prescribed them. They were drugs, mind-numbing sedatives. The dosage was so strong the doctor at the hospital said it was no wonder I fell down.

‘They kept me in overnight. I wouldn't let them send for Irina. I wouldn't see her. By the time I went home I'd thought it out. My wife had been controlling me, just like they do with the poor devils in the special wards. Keeping me quiet, doping me so I didn't talk to journalists, give interviews … turning me into a sleepwalker who'd never cause Moscow any trouble. I threw the bottle of pills at her.

‘She tried to lie. But the hospital had X-rayed my lungs and they were clear. She's not the sort of woman who cries, but she did. She begged me to forgive her, to understand that she'd had to promise to do it before they'd let me out of prison.'

‘She kept saying, “You'd have been dead of TB if I hadn't agreed to what they wanted.”'

‘You couldn't forgive her,' Lucy said at last.

‘I could have forgiven her for what she did to me,' he said. ‘I'd escaped total addiction; that was lucky. I wouldn't let her even give me an aspirin for a headache, so I had a drink when I got withdrawal symptoms. I could have let her persuade me, I suppose. She'd given up so much to follow me. She had a brilliant career; she was dedicated. Her father was a powerful Party man with friends in the Politburo. She'd worked hard to get me released. In the end, I could have come to terms with the way she'd betrayed me.

‘I would have forgiven her. Until I found out why she was really in Geneva.

‘I thought of killing myself many times. But I didn't. I gave up on life and went on living. Drinking! Making Irina suffer.'

‘What exactly is she doing?' Lucy asked him. ‘Can you tell me?'

‘She works for the KGB,' he said. ‘She has special patients at the clinic. She tortures them with drugs; she breaks them into little pieces so they can be blackmailed into doing whatever Moscow wants. It was part of the deal she made when they let me go.

‘I said I'd denounce her. She just looked at me and said, “I got you out of prison. I'm doing it for you. Go on, have me arrested. I'll get twenty years under Swiss law.”

‘I couldn't betray her, Lucy, and I couldn't speak out on the old issues unless I did. So I opted for the Russian alternative. I got drunk.'

After a time he said, ‘You despise me, don't you?
You
wouldn't have compromised.'

‘I would have done the same as you,' Lucy said. ‘She saved your life; you couldn't have denounced her. You're not that kind of man.'

She put her arms around him. He saw how pale she was. The blue eyes blazed.

‘I hate her for what she's done to you. But you're free of her now, Volkov. You won't feel guilty and you won't drink. And very soon the world will hear your voice again. Don't go back tonight. Stay with me.'

‘I want to,' he said slowly. ‘But it wouldn't be wise. She mustn't know about you. She'd find some way to hurt you.'

‘Where do you live?' she asked him.

He told her. ‘You mustn't try to contact me,' he said. ‘You must be careful.'

‘I'll wait for you outside, tomorrow,' she said quietly. ‘If you don't show up I'll know there's something wrong. I'll come up and get you.'

He held her tightly, kissed her hard and hungrily. ‘She leaves for the clinic before nine,' he said. ‘There's a flower shop on the corner. I'll be there at ten o'clock.'

He let himself out of the apartment. Lucy watched him from the window. He turned, looked up and waved. Then he disappeared from view.

‘I won't take any calls this afternoon. I'm having a long session with Monsieur Brückner.'

‘Yes, Doctor,' the nurse said.

At the door of Brückner's room, Irina Volkov paused.

He'd been given a light sedative after the morning; she'd watched him drift off to sleep. He'd laid his bloody ghost to rest. Or so he thought.

While she wrote up her notes and locked the first of the tapes in her desk, she thought of the woman, violated and degraded and the child who had tried to save her. She opened the door and went in. He was still drowsy. She prepared another injection, pinched up a vein and shot the drug in to him. Then, after checking her watch to let it take effect, she slapped him hard across the face.

‘Wake up! Wake up!'

She had hit him so hard there was a red mark on his cheek. Her own hand stung. She lit a cigarette and took her seat. He was awake and muttering in confusion. She reached over and switched on the powerful light above his head.

‘Look at the light! Look at it, or I'll have to slap you again. Good. Now, Boris had killed the woman. The boy was dead and you'd stolen the desk set. Tell me, Adolph. Tell me what you did then.'

‘Boris was gloating over the cross,' the voice was low and slurred. ‘He kept rubbing the red stones and holding it up to the light. “Gold and jewels,” he said over and over. “It's worth a fortune. Boris, you're in luck, you clever fucker! You'll be rich when this war's over.”

‘I was wrapping the clock and the calendar in a skirt I'd found in the bedroom. He'd thrown everything on the floor, emptied the drawers. I wanted to get out, take the stuff and get the hell away from the place. I remember I was so scared I was peeing myself, thinking what would happen if a Red Army patrol caught us coming out of that house. Then I heard a moaning noise.

‘I shouted at Boris. He heard the moaning, too, and he shoved the cross in to his jacket. He picked up his gun. “Watch outside,” he told me and he went back in to the bedroom. I thought we'd killed her, but she was still alive. I stood by the window looking out again. The sun was shining in. Then I heard a noise. It was coming from a big cupboard by the door. I got ready to open fire and then I opened it.'

Irinia noticed that the monitor attached to his wrist showed a violent rise in his pulse rate.

‘Tell me,' she said. ‘What was in the cupboard?'

‘Two kids. A boy, holding a baby. He had his hand over its mouth to stop it crying. He just stared up at me.'

‘Did you kill them, too?'

‘No. I heard shots in the bedroom. I knew Boris had finished off the woman. I made a sign to the boy to stay quiet and I shut the door. I didn't say anything about them to Boris. I knew what he'd do. I used to dream of that kid's face and the eyes, staring up at me. I had nightmares about it for a long time.'

‘Didn't you have nightmares about the woman and the boy being murdered? Didn't that worry you?'

‘Not so much. I'd seen a lot of corpses by then. We always looked for women when we took a village. Everybody did it. She wasn't the first one I'd had. But the boy in the cupboard, holding the baby. I couldn't get it out of my mind. The way he looked at me.'

‘That must have been his mother then, and his brother,' Irina remarked. ‘She tried to save them by hiding them in the cupboard. She didn't have time to save herself.'

Brückner's mouth trembled, and tears spilled out and ran down his cheeks.

‘It was the war! It was the same everywhere. I wasn't the only one! I could have shot them. Boris would have done it! I just couldn't. That boy staring up at me. I couldn't. Oh Jesus, my head hurts.' He began to sob.

Irina stood up. She looked down on him. Remember, remember your training. You are not involved. You are objective, unemotional. It means no more to you than a test-tube experiment. You struck him because you had to wake him up. You had to demonstrate your power over him. You are a scientist, a rationalist. You are superior to feelings of hatred and rage.

She switched off the tape recorder, put the tape in her pocket, shut down the harsh overhead light and rang for the nurse. Brückner was moaning, holding his head and tossing to and fro.

The nurse came in and Irina said, ‘We've had a very good session. Very productive. But he's experiencing some distress.'

‘Yes, I can see. What medication shall I give him, Doctor?'

Irina paused on her way out. She said coolly, ‘None. He'll just have to suffer through it. It's part of his therapy. If necessary, restrain him. I'll be in early tomorrow morning.'

She closed the door.

Volkov saw her car draw up and turn into the garage space reserved for residents in the apartment block. She was late; another special patient. He hurried in ahead of her.
I must be careful
, he kept saying to himself.
She's clever, she's trained to observe people. She mustn't notice any difference in me
. He wondered if it showed—wasn't a man who's found his sexual powers after five years of flaccid impotence, visibly changed? Isn't it obvious when a dead man comes to life? Won't she see at a single glance that something has happened? Part of him wanted to flaunt it. Part of him wanted to taunt her.

What did you do with yourself today?
She always asked that question, never expecting an answer, only the same sullen negative.
Nothing. I walked, I had a few drinks
. But not this time.

How much he hated her, he realized, waiting for Irina to let herself in.
Perhaps it's because I loved her so much in the beginning. I wanted to change her, to open her heart and mind to the goodness and the truth in human beings. I failed. I couldn't change her
. The only thing that touched her soul was love for him. And that's why he tried to kill it. That's why, if it weren't for Lucy Warren, he'd cut her heart out tonight.
So long as she loves me, I'm not free of her, he thought. I'm tainted with her cruelty, her heartless commitment to the Soviet ideal
.

‘Hello,' she said. ‘Sorry I'm late, darling. How was your day?' She wasn't really listening. She was making herself a drink, frowning, absorbed in something far from her surroundings.

He shrugged. He didn't answer. She didn't notice.

‘Oh!' she exclaimed impatiently. ‘I forgot. I said we'd have dinner with the Schmidts tonight. I'd better hurry up or we'll be late.'

The Schmidts were her friends. He was a lawyer, his wife a research chemist. They tolerated Dimitri, ignoring his drinking. They were sorry for Irina, with such a burden to carry.

She had a circle of acquaintances. They all treated him as if he were some kind of mental defective who had to be humoured. Poor Volkov. Just a shell. Put him in a corner with a bottle and forget about him.

‘I don't feel like going,' he said. ‘You go. They won't mind.'

Irina didn't mean to lose her temper. She didn't realize how the sessions with Brückner had frayed her nerves. She wanted to relax, regain her professional composure. She liked the Schmidts. Dimitri didn't like anyone. He had no friends. He lived in a limbo of his own making.

She swung round on him.

‘They're expecting you. Frieda's cooking dinner. What am I supposed to say at the last minute?'

‘I'm drunk,' he suggested.

Irina glared at him. She was trembling.

‘You're not,' she countered. ‘You're just being swinish. I've had a long day and I'm not going to play games with you. We're going out to dinner and that's the end of it. Get drunk if you like. They won't be surprised! Now I'm going to change.'

He said, ‘I don't like them. He's a bore and she talks about animal experiments. She makes me sick. I'm not going, Irina. I'm not going out with your friends any more.'