Hot Siberian

by Gerald A. Browne

  It was also Sikma who, that Saturday night shortly after ten, got the telephone call from the killer. He understood the killer’s cryptic message. He’d been expecting the call all week. Each time the phone had rung he’d answered it before his wife could get to it. That was the only thing about it that bothered him, having to be so obligated to the phone. Last November he’d had to wait ten days for the call. The time before that, though, it had surprisingly been only one day. What could he expect—killings precisely scheduled? Oh well, now that he’d received the call he could relax and let the thing run its predictable course.

  He went into the kitchen for some slices of his favorite Cesnekovy salami, chunks of dark bread, and some sour pickles. He uncapped a cold bottle of strong Urguell Pilsner and poured it fast so it got a three-inch head. Urguell had been his beer for fifty years. Other beers didn’t even taste like beer to him. He took his Urguell and food into the living room and situated himself comfortably on the sofa. A replay of a Heinz football game was on the television. Simka wasn’t interested and the reception was worse than usual, but he watched anyway.

  The body of François Jean Doulard was found twice.

  First by a cello teacher on his way home from an excruciating lesson. While kneeling to feel for the beat of François’s heart, the teacher happened to feel François’s wallet. He would let someone else notify the police.

  Such as a restaurant hostess who lived in the building right there. The contorted sprawl of François blocked her way. She thought she was being inconvenienced by a drunk, and when she got no response from her demands that the son of a bitch move, she warily jabbed hard at him with the high heel of her shoe, then added some jabs too vicious for any living person to endure. She gingerly stepped over the dead man and went up to her apartment.

  The police, in excess number, arrived in a needless rush. They performed their measuring. They photographed. They took a statement from the hostess. They searched the area for the murder weapon and found the victim’s emptied wallet. An air of bustle and excitement prevailed for nearly two hours. Then, with the removal of the victim’s body, everyone departed, the narrow passageway was again dark, and, except for the considerable blood that had jelled in the concavities between the cobbles, it was as though nothing had occurred.

  Investigation of the Doulard murder was under the charge of Inspector Mikhal Vodácký. He personally would not be out trying to assemble some sense of it, but all information would come to him and he would make the conclusions.

  Vodácký’s conscientiousness was thickly crusted over. He no longer saw murder as a challenge or a professional insult. No matter how cold- or hot-blooded or gruesome, when it came to those whose breathing had been unlawfully stopped, Vodácký put them into one scurfy lot. His mental picture of them was an accumulated spherical shape, their identities lost in coagulation, just legs, arms, entrails, and sexual parts protruding. This sphere of his was often added to, as it was now by the Doulard case. However, it never seemed to get larger, just more dense. It was, Vodácký realized, a Kafkaesque concept, and he had never confided it to anyone. He was now in his mid-fifties and planned to retire from the police and Prague when he was exactly sixty, while he still had an adequate number of uncudgeled brain cells.

  Monday morning when Vodácký received a phone call from the French consul, inquiring about the Doulard murder, he was glad he was able to say what the consul wanted to hear—that this murder did not fit the pattern of the five other murders of French nationals that had occurred in Prague over the past two years. What set this murder apart from the others was its robbery motive, the victim’s emptied wallet found less than a block away. It made the thing as clichéd as the traditional demand “Your money or your life!” In this instance both were taken.

  Vodácký knew how convenient it was for him that there’d been a robbery involved. To emphasize that motive, he told himself, was his prerogative. That someone out there in Prague disliked the French enough to do away with five or six of them, so far, had understandably aroused concern from official France and the Czech Ministry of Tourism. The Sûreté had dug hard and deep in every thinkable direction, hoping to prove out its belief that the victims shared some denominator. Nationality, gender, and Prague were the only meaningful things in common. The Sûreté had pressed at a rather high level for permission to send some of its experts to Prague to assist in the investigation. Was the Sûreté questioning Czech competence? Permission was denied. The last thing Vodácký wanted was a pack of pompous Sûreté sleuths all over him. Truth be known, he’d experienced a number of obnoxious French sorts whom he, himself, wouldn’t have minded adding to his secret sphere.

  The Doulard murder could not be just offhandedly dismissed, of course. Doulard’s room at the Intercontinental was thoroughly searched, all his personal possessions gone through. Found among them were thirty-four color photographs graphically depicting various male homosexual sadomasochistic, anal, and oral acts, which added another facet to the possible murder motive. Some of Doulard’s movements in Prague were determined, including, most importantly, his visit to the Café de l’Europa. Questioning revealed that he’d left the café with another man around nine-thirty. Waiters and bartenders, when asked to describe the other man, said he had wavy red hair, straight gray hair, a mustache, no mustache. He was wearing a brown suit. He had on a black suit. He was in his twenties, in his forties, slim, heavyset, fair-skinned, swarthy. One waiter said he was certain the man was carrying a cane and he definitely remembered a black hat.

  Thus Vodácký had no evidence and only contradictions to go on, and the robbery motive actually did seem most plausible. On Monday afternoon as Vodácký was passing by the office of Medical Examiner Sikma, he felt like going in and imploring Sikma not to find anything that would entangle this neat, explicable French murder. Ironically, what Sikma could have given Vodácký was absolute assurance that he wouldn’t.

  Sikma himself would perform the autopsy that night. He had told his first assistant, Zelený, just to get everything ready for him and then go home. This wasn’t unusual, and besides, Sikma was thought to be somewhat eccentric.

  At seven o’clock Sikma called his wife and told her not to concern herself with either him or his supper. He left his office in the main police building on Konvitska Street and walked the usual two blocks to his usual restaurant on Borsov, where, at his usual table, he had his usual roast goose and potato dumplings. When he returned to his office that section of the building was deserted. He took up his thirty-five-year-old fat brown briefcase and went down to the subterranean level to the morgue.

  That lifeless room with its floor of tight little gray tiles and wall of stainless-steel individual refrigerator compartments was very clean; it was scrubbed and wiped daily. It had a distinct smell which was only complicated by disinfectants. Sikma entered the adjacent, smaller procedure room and bolted the door from the inside. He covered the single glass pane that was built into the door by taping up a paper towel upon which he printed AUTOPSY IN PROGRESS, along with his scrawly signature. He changed from his regular clothes, put on baggy blue surgeon’s trousers and smock and cap and canvas sneakers. From a white metal cabinet that was known as his personal cabinet he got his combination cassette player/radio. He plugged it in and placed it on the chair next to his briefcase. Also from the cabinet he got an atomizer of Princess Dior eau de toilette. He spritzed a cotton face mask with it, then tied the mask over his mouth and nose. He put on a pair of surgical gloves and punched in the play button of his radio. He was inhaling Dior and hearing Dvořák’s Symphony No. 3 in F Major performed by the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Vaclay Talich as he started to work.

  As instructed, Zelený had prepared everything so that Sikma would be able to do the autopsy unassisted. The stainless-steel table upon which the corpse lay had been adjusted to accommodate Sikma’s shorter-than-average height, and the table was tilted just enough so the corpse would remain in place while any body fluids wo
uld run down and flow out through the opening in its raised edge. Surgical instruments were arranged neatly on a tray stand. Sikma briefly contemplated the rigored Frenchman. He didn’t think “Unfortunate fellow,” didn’t question justice. It wasn’t that he lacked natural compassion. The inert, ready-to-rot substance stretched before him had never been a personality as far as he was concerned. Besides, he thought, people had given their lives to much lesser causes. He examined the stab wound but did not have to bother with measuring it or noting its exact location. That had already been done. He was mildly amused at how hirsute the Frenchman was. An overabundance of black, wiry hair on his shoulders and chest and legs. Such a thick bush at his crotch that his penis was barely visible and his testicles were entirely hidden. The Frenchman’s skin had an abnormal pallor, the color of the scum of spoiled cream.

  Sikma took up a scalpel and made a continuous, deep incision down the middle, from breastbone to pelvis. The skin and fatty tissue rolled open like a split cushion. He then incised the muscles, the superficial ones such as the obliquus and transversalis. He made two other similar deep cuts, one across the lower abdomen and another from just above the navel to above the rib cage. These allowed the skin and fascia to be flapped open.

  The Czech Philharmonic was giving Dvořák the excited strings he had asked for, and palpitations from the percussion.

  The Miss Dior sweetly scalded the membranes of Sikma’s nostrils. He’d overdone it again.

  Sikma gutted the corpse almost as he would a fish. Merely as a matter of form he took several fecal samples and samples of stomach and intestinal content. He wasn’t nearly as methodical or thorough as he would have been with an authentic autopsy. He carelessly yanked the viscera out of the corpse, scooped out its various substances, ripped out its arteries and veins and nerves as though they were just so much useless circuitry. When he’d disposed of the entire mess he used a pressure-nozzled hose to lavage the gaping cavity with a disinfectant.

  He rinsed off his gloves and went to the chair. From his briefcase he removed a package about six inches square by an inch thick. It was tightly wrapped with brilliant blue plastic that had been heat-sealed. The package had been delivered to his office a week ago.

  Sikma believed he knew what this blue package and all the previous blue packages contained. Not specifically what was in them, but for him they contained meaning, personal meaning. Never in his life had he been a patriot beyond incorrectly singing the words to the Czech national anthem at public events and mindlessly waving a tiny flag when it was called for. When the Soviet tanks rumbled into Prague in 1968 he hadn’t shed a tear or gotten angry for Czechoslovakia. He’d only griped about the diesel fumes they caused and exaggerated a cough and was glad to see them roll out of the city for that reason. The year before last when he’d been approached to do this important patriotic thing he’d surprised himself by the way he jumped at the chance. Perhaps it was his age and his knowledge of how bad his general health was—perhaps it was knowing he didn’t have much to lose. Any night after goose and dumplings he could clog up and be done. No matter—doing his part with these blue packages of Soviet secrets was a tonic for him. He always felt better afterward. He wished there were a blue package every week, which, of course, wasn’t feasible; it would require too many French corpses.

  Naturally, Sikma was curious about what kind of secrets were in the blue packages. He imagined diagrams of various nuclear weapons, maps indicating well-hidden missile sites, military and political strategies. Everyone enjoys knowing a secret, but he told himself to be satisfied with just imagining, and to do what he’d been told. What a privilege it was to be a conspirator, or, in fact, a spy. That self-designation was valuable to him and he didn’t want to spoil it.

  He inserted the blue plastic-wrapped package well up into the vacant chest cavity of the corpse and sutured the chest and stomach closed with large, loose stitches. Tomorrow afternoon the corpse would be on Czech State Airlines Flight 37 bound for Paris. Sikma correctly presumed that someone there in France, someone in the CSA cargo division, would be on the lookout for the corpse. That someone, with easy access, would remove the package and then see that the stitches were tightened and tied off properly.

  What Sikma did not know, would never know, was that the blue packages contained diamonds. Russian diamonds skimmed from Aikhal.

  This time, eighteen hundred D-flawless one-carat stones. Investment-quality.

  At eighteen thousand dollars a carat, this batch was worth thirty-two million, four hundred thousand.

  CHAPTER

  6

  NIKOLAI’S EYES OPENED SUNDAY MORNING ON THE ABSENCE of Vivian. There, deserted and lumped out of shape by all her usual nightly hugging and burrowing, were her goose-down pillows. And beyond on the fabric-covered nightstand on her side of the bed was her little silver Art Deco clock. The clock had only one hand, its smaller hand. Vivian refused to have it repaired. She rather liked having a handicapped clock to sleep by, she said. Not being able to know the exact hour to the minute suited being in the country.

  Judging from the position of that one hand, Nikolai estimated the time as something to eight rather than something after seven. Where was she? Using the bathroom? No light on in there. Perhaps, he thought, she was down in the kitchen fixing a huge surprise breakfast, an inspiration that came to her every couple of months. Nikolai swung his legs over the side of the bed. His slippers were on the floor awaiting his feet. He pictured her thoughtfully placing them there. A show of affection for all the pleasure of the night before.

  Nikolai blinked vigorously, clenched and stretched his eyelids. Then he opened his mouth as wide as possible and twisted it to the left and right, and his nose. Vivian had taught him that this was a good way to wake up. Get the face going first thing—that was her theory. It seemed to work. Anyway, Nikolai had gotten into the habit of doing it every morning. Most mornings he and Vivian did it together and laughed at each other’s facial contortions. At the very least who could refute the merit of starting the day with a laugh?

  Nikolai sniffed, rather hoping for the smell of bacon being cooked. What he smelled was something fruity and sweet. He used the bathroom and put on a floor-length white terry robe that Vivian claimed had been not exactly stolen from the Paris Ritz considering the price charged for the suite it had come from. He went downstairs. Vivian wasn’t in the kitchen, nor was any part of a breakfast, not even coffee. Simmering on the stove was a copper saucepan containing water and a sachet of herbs. Hand printing on the paper bag on the counter said the sachet was a mixture called brandied peach. Vivian’s doing. On other occasions it had been a stew of lavender or stock or hyacinth, and once honeysuckle had permeated the air with such a cloying odor that even Vivian was caused to gag and they’d had to throw open every door and window in the house. She had a thing for dead flowers. To Nikolai a flower that was faded and all shriveled up was through. She felt otherwise. If at all possible she’d save any kind of petal from making its drop to the ground. Huge Waterford crystal bowls of potpourri were in every room, sprigs of dried heather and tiny roses and baby’s breath were bunched and tied by silk ribbons and hung on doorjambs, incorporated into wreaths, arranged in old baskets. Nikolai’s unstated opinion was that she’d carried a nice thing too far. She would never admit she overdid it.

  Also on the counter was what appeared at first sight to be a gathering of a dozen or so large brown gnats. Trout flies. Nikolai realized where she was. How early had she gotten up to go fishing? Why hadn’t she instead remained in bed, fitted against him, and slept late? Where did she get all the stamina? Considering the amount of loving they’d done it would seem this morning she’d be unable to move or at least limited to slow motion. Women, Nikolai thought, and went out the back door to the garden terrace.

  The day was what Vivian called a sometimes sunny day. Blue-as-possible sky with formidable puffs of white clouds scattered about. Nikolai walked along the wide brick terrace. At the far end he turned and gazed ba
ck at the house.

  Her beloved house.

  It was Queen Anne, not in period but surely in style. Two and a half brick stories. Six ample rooms on the ground floor, six more on the second, and in the upper half-story beneath a steep-pitched hipped roof, four smaller rooms and attic space. Built in 1875, it was the work of the architect George Gilbert Scott, Jr., which in itself added value to it. Like most well-done Queen Anne houses it had a sense of feminine balance and repose. The primness of its brick exterior and crisp white trim was offset just enough by the curves of its Dutch-flavored gables and the patterns formed by its nine-over-nine sash windows. The easy impression was that of a confident beauty of an age past at rest on a lawn. The informal gardens were her various-colored petticoats flounced and scalloped about her, and for her parasol there was the high spread of a huge sycamore.

  Nikolai understood why Vivian cared so much for this house. He almost believed her when she claimed she could spend the rest of this life comfortably satisfied in it.

  Several purple finches animated a nearby linden. A small, fat cloud momentarily got in the sun’s way. Ninja the cat played the oriental thug, sprang out from behind a purple azalea. Up on his hind legs with his front paws poised in karate fashion, he went for any part of Nikolai. And missed. He landed on his side in an awkward twist, recovered quickly, and shot Nikolai a defiant glare to save face before darting away.