Death of a Dissident ir-1

by Stuart M. Kaminsky

  Sonya Granovsky held her daughter and turned cold eyes on the pacing policeman.

  “You,” she said. “You killed him. One of you came in here and killed him, killed him for what he thought, what he said, what he wanted.”

  Grief had made the woman speak out in a way she would never have spoken in a natural state. It was refreshing and somewhat astonishing for Rostnikov to hear such outcries, and he secretly enjoyed moments of honesty, though he hid his pleasure behind a patient nod and sigh. In most cases, Russians had learned to control their outrage or kill it. Complaints were fruitless and could be dangerous.

  “I did not kill your husband,” he said softly.

  “Not you, one of you, K.G.B.,” she shouted. “They were following him, threatening him.”

  “No,” said Rostnikov, wondering if he could ask for a cup of tea, not to keep the woman busy but to have something to do with his hands that wanted to touch objects in the room, the small painting on the wall, or to reach out and engulf the two thin women, to comfort and quiet them.

  “No,” he repeated. “Listen, it is not beyond the power of the state to act, but like this? No point. It is not…”

  “Clean?” she finished, her body shaking.

  “Clean, a good word,” Rostnikov agreed.

  “You did it,” she repeated, turning her eyes back to the corpse. “That is what happened, what we will say, what I know. You can kill us, beat us, send us to the Vladimirka prison, but that is what we will say, what we know,”

  Rostnikov had seen this look before. He had lost for the moment. She had fixed on the idea, grasped it like a god, a cause, something to exist or be martyred for. She would, at least for now, cling to the belief that her husband had been killed by the state. The three, detective, woman, and girl, all looked at the body. A spot of blood had grown larger, seeping through the sheet. It spread in an uneven pattern, as if it had life, were groping. It cast a spell broken by a knock at the door.

  Officer Drabkova opened the door and stood back to let Karpo and Tkach in. Karpo the Tatar looked first at Rostnikov, whose look told him how to act. Tkach looked first at the corpse, then at the two women and finally at Rostnikov, who made a nod to draw the two men closer.

  “Officer Drubkova,” Rostnikov whispered loud enough for everyone to hear, “will you please take Mrs. Granovsky and her daughter…” and he was at a loss as to where they could go. They certainly couldn’t sit there watching the corpse. “Mrs. Granovsky, do you have someplace you can stay, someplace-”

  “Our place is here,” she spat back.

  “You can hate me just as well in another apartment,” he countered.

  “No,” she said between her teeth, “it is easier here.”

  “Perhaps you are right,” Rostnikov agreed, “but I can’t have it. We have work to do, a murderer to find. We can take you to a cell.”

  “Fine,” said Sonya Granovsky, straightening her back and indeed, it would be fine with her. Rostnikov knew he had made a mistake.

  “Why don’t I take them someplace and question them?” Karpo said, turning his eyes on the two women. Sonya Granovsky looked up at the gaunt, almost corpse-like figure and suppressed a shudder.

  “My brother, Kolya, he lives near,” she said, “he might…”

  “He will,” Rostnikov added emphatically. “Officer Drubkova will see that you get there.”

  Drubkova moved quickly to the two women and helped them up with more gentleness than Rostnikov had thought she possessed. The girl was still crying softly as Officer Drubkova helped her put her coat on. Sonya Granovsky dressed herself and turned to face Rostnikov once more at the door. Her hat was on an angle, a comic angle like Popov the Clown. Maybe with a wisp of hair in her eyes she would look like the dissheveled American actress whose name he couldn’t remember.

  “I meant what I said,” she said with a tremor.

  Rostnikov nodded and watched Drubkova lead the two figures out.

  “Drubkova,” he called when the door was almost shut and the woman hurried back into the room. “You, personally, are to remain with them all night. If they don’t let you stay in the apartment, remain outside as close as you can. Hear what you can hear and prepare a report. You will be relieved in the morning. Tkach, see to it.”

  Tkach nodded and Drubkova left, her brown uniform tight with pride.

  When the door closed, Rostnikov went to the sofa and sat heavily in it. Karpo knelt by the body and pulled back the sheet.

  “Tkach, go out in the hall and tell the man out there to have the evidence people get up here now.” Tkach did as he was told and Rostnikov watched Karpo examine the body.

  “You frightened that poor grieving widow,” Rostnikov said with a smile.

  “A talent developed over the years,” Karpo answered, looking into the eyes of the corpse.

  “And what does my corpse tell you?” Rostnikov asked.

  “Secrets,” said Karpo softly. “He whispers to me. The dead and I get along quite well.”

  “Better than the living?” said Rostnikov, watching the Tatar’s fingers explore the area around the wound.

  “Yes,” said Karpo evenly. “Whoever did this had strength. This sickle is old and rusty, yet the penetration is deep and through a bone. A strong man.”

  “Or a madman or woman given the strength of purpose or anger,” Rostnikov said, looking at the dead man’s face. It was an angry face even in death. He would be forever angry.

  Karpo rose.

  “Assuming he was not lying down when he was struck,” Karpo began.

  “He was not,” said Rostnikov. “The trail of blood is from the front door.”

  “Of course,” Karpo continued. “The killer was not tall, the wound indicates someone no bigger than…”

  “…me,” Rostnikov finished.

  Karpo shrugged and Tkach reentered the room. “And what are you working on?” Rostnikov asked the young man. “Just the most important cases.”

  “State liquor store thefts,” he answered quickly. “Someone is breaking into state liquor stores at night. Huge amounts have been taken. It is a very large, very bold black market operation. I have-”

  “No details,” Rostnikov said holding up a hand and looking back at the corpse. “That will wait. You get two, maybe three hours sleep and then start following up on Granovsky’s friends. Be nice, be kind, be sympathetic. Find out if he had enemies, what they think. Be discreet, but find out.”

  “Shall I take a uniformed man with me?” Tkach asked.

  “What you think best,” responded Rostnikov, without turning around. “Would you see if there is any tea here?”

  “Yes,” said Tkach moving past the corpse and to the kitchen area. “You think the tea…”

  “I’d like some tea,” Rostnikov closed. “Don’t worry about fingerprints. The killer didn’t come in and make tea. He or she did it and ran. There was a K.G.B. man watching the place when Granovsky was murdered.”

  “That is Granovsky, the…” Tkach said turning from his search to take another look at the corpse.

  “It is,” said Rostnikov looking at Karpo, whose face betrayed nothing. “And you Emil, your cases?”

  “Apartment robberies, assault, and someone masquerading as a police officer has been preying on African students at Moscow University, pretending to suspect them of crimes, taking their money. Complaints…”

  “Ah,” sighed Rostnikov, listening for the sound of boiling water, “political.”

  “Everything is political,” Karpo added, wandering to the window to examine the hole.

  “I sit corrected,” Rostnikov.

  “I was not correcting you,” said Karpo. “I was observing.”

  “Yes,” sighed Rostnikov, rising with effort to the sound of a knock at the door. “Well this is more political. When the evidence people finish, I want you to take that sickle and find what you can find.”

  The door opened and three dark figures entered slowly. One held a suitcase, another, wearing t
hick, tinted glasses, carried a camera.

  “Tkach, we are leaving,” said Rostnikov. “Gentlemen, there will be hot water in a few minutes for tea.”

  The third dark figure, who wore no glasses and carried nothing, spoke in a rumbling voice that sounded like a Metro train.

  “You had a message from Procurator Timofeyeva,” he said. “A taxi driver was killed a little while ago, two witnesses. Before he died, the taxi driver said, ‘Granovsky!”

  “Karpo,” Rostnikov said pulling his coat on, “you take that. I will pay a visit to the K.G.B. in the morning and we will meet at Petrovka…when we can meet at Petrovka.”

  The trio of dark figures moved past Rostnikov, who turned for a last look at Granovsky-an angry man and look what his anger got him. There was perhaps a lesson in this room, on that face. Rostnikov absorbed the lesson without thinking about it.

  “Do any of you remember the name of the American movie actress with the yellow hair that kept falling in her face?” Rostnikov asked. “She had to keep blowing it out of her eyes.”

  “Veronska Lake,” said the man with the bag, moving to the corpse.

  “No,” sighed Rostnikov scratching his ear, “the hair wasn’t designed to be over the eyes. It was always by accident.”

  “I see,” said the man with the thick dark glasses, groping his way to the kitchen in search of the tea.

  “Maybe it was Deanna Durbin?” said the man with the camera.

  “No,” said Rostnikov, “thanks.” It was one of those annoying things of no consequence that would drive you mad if you couldn’t remember. There was a chance, not much of a chance perhaps, but a chance that Rostnikov’s career might be in danger, but this nearly forgotten American movie star had cropped up and had to be named to set his mind at rest. It would come, it would come.

  An hour later Emil Karpo entered the M.V.D. building on Petrovka Street. The armed duty guard looked at him with no sign of recognition but made no move to stop him. The older officer at the desk, fully uniformed, white-haired, involuntarily nodded in greeting at the striding Karpo, though he knew Karpo was not one to respond to social gestures.

  A dark suited man named Klishkov passed Karpo on the way down. Klishkov who bore an ugly red scar across his face and nose from an attack by a drunk, glanced at Karpo, who let his eyes respond in unblinking acknowledgement.

  The door to Room 312 was closed but a light was on behind it. It was one of many “discussion” rooms in Petrovka. Such rooms could be used for meetings, conspiracies, or interviews with suspects or witnesses. Because of the uneven heating of the building, some of the interview rooms were painfully cold in the winter while others were oppressively hot. This was a cold one. Karpo opened the door and faced two men across the small table in the center of the room. The Roshkovs, father and son, were startled and started to rise. Karpo ignored them and turned to the uniformed officer who stood in the corner. The officer, well aware of Karpo’s reputation, moved smartly forward and handed him a clipboard with a report attached. Karpo took it and read it ignoring the sudden babbling of Vladimir, the elder Roshkov.

  “We’ve done nothing,” pleaded the old man, “nothing.” His eyes, yellow and soft, were moist with self-pity.

  Karpo handed the report back to the officer and faced the old man. The sudden attention caught the old man in mid-sentence, stopping him. There was something about this corpse-like policeman that made such rambling pathetic even to Vladimir Roshkov, who had spent an eighty-year lifetime perfecting it, but the pause was only that. Vladimir Roshkov could no more hold his tongue than he could join the Bolshoi Ballet.

  “Officer, sir,” he pleaded, actually bringing his hands together, “we did nothing. We were on our way to work, to work. There is no crime in going to work, is there sir, comrade, officer?”

  Karpo said nothing but turned his eyes on Pytor Roshkov who sat sullen, a coarse brown police blanket wrapped around his legs.

  “Are you ill?” Karpo asked.

  “No,” said Pytor, “I have no pants. That cab tore off my pants, and the police wouldn’t let me go home for another pair. Mind you, I’m not complaining. I understand, but…I understand.”

  “My son is not complaining at all,” shouted the old man, rapping his son on the head. “He’s happy to help any way he can. We both are, but we had nothing to do…”

  “Sit,” commanded Karpo, and the old man sat next to his son, his voice momentarily stilled but his mouth was open and ready, his teeth poor and jagged.

  “You saw the man get out of the cab?” Karpo said, standing with his hands behind his back over the two men.

  “Yes,” said the old man, “he was all in black, a madman. I thought he was going to kill us. His clothes were good, not new. My first thought was, ‘Here is some capitalist tourist drunk and up to no good.’ ”

  “He was a foreigner?” tried Karpo.

  “Yes,” went on the old man, “definitely a foreigner, English or American, he…”

  “Did he speak?” tried Karpo.

  “I…I…,” stammered the old man, anxious to please.

  “No,” said the son, hugging the blanket over his vulnerable legs. “He said nothing. He just ran down Petro Street.” Pytor Roshkov had decided to fix his eyes on the fascinating painting on the wall of the first meeting of the Presidium.

  “Then you don’t know if he was a foreigner,” Karpo continued.

  “No,” said the son.

  “Yes,” said the father.

  “If you would try less hard to please me and harder to simply tell the truth, you will get out of here much faster and back to your home or work,” Karpo said. “However, if you continue like this, it may take hours before we feel we can let you go. Now, can you describe the man you saw running from the cab on Petro Street?”

  “I…,” began old Roshkov and stopped, clamping his jaw tight with an audible click.

  “No,” said the son. “He was a regular man in a black coat and hat and he was young, at least he was fast like a young man.”

  “And you heard Ivan Sharikov say ‘Granovsky’?” asked Karpo.

  “We don’t know any Ivan Sharikov,” wept the old man. “We are just shopkeepers. We aren’t political, just poor peasants who…”

  “Sharikov was the taxi driver who was murdered,” Karpo said evenly.

  “Granovsky,” said Pytor, moving his eyes from the painting to look at Karpo, but unable to hold the look.

  “So,” babbled the old man, “it’s simple. You find this man Granovsky who killed the cab driver, and everything is fine. So simple. How many Granovsky’s can there be in Moscow? Our police can find him like that.”

  “Old man, you are babbling with guilt,” Karpo said softly, wanting to shake the trembling creature into simple responses. “I don’t care what you have done. I want information.”

  “Done?” said the old man, rising and pointing a thick finger at his chest. “Done? We have done nothing, nothing. If you mean those shoes, well, those shoes. How were we to know the soles were cardboard. We bought them from…”

  “Father, shut up,” shouted the suddenly frantic son rising to quiet the old man and letting the blanket drop to the floor.

  “But…” continued the old man, prepared to confess to seven decades of crime. The naked son clasped a hand over the old man’s mouth and Karpo glanced at the uniformed officer who was trying to control a grin.

  “Get them out,” said Karpo.

  “We want to help,” said the old man, leaning forward on the table as his son retrieved his blanket.

  Karpo left the room, feeling the aura of a coming headache. He would retrieve the sickle from the evidence men and work on that. The sickle would be tangible and might say much without speaking. A pinpoint of irritation vibrated somewhere in Karpo’s brain, and he thought of Rostnikov’s question about the American actress. A voice wanted to ask Karpo how anything could be accomplished in such emotionalism, irrelevance, and chaos, but he stilled the voice before it could spea
k and remembered Rostnikov’s past successes and reminded himself that the Roshkovs were a step in the movement toward an ideal Soviet state, a movement which he knew would not he an easy one.

  Perhaps the room was not getting larger. It was a thought he had never considered and the voice of his father had never suggested. This thought came in something like the voice of the cab driver he had killed, the cab driver with the bloody face, the gross pig of a cab driver to whom he owed so much. The smashing of the vodka bottle. The moisture of the vodka in his face. The feeling of solidity when he plunged the bottle into the fat surprised face. The two men in the snow. It had been a warning to stay alert.

  He sat on the floor of the apartment, his coat still on, the darkness surrounding him. As the minutes passed, the light from the single window illuminated the familiar room, but it looked unfamiliar, new to him. The world had changed. And then the room had threatened to grow. He had scrambled from the floor to the old chest of drawers, his parent’s old chest and had pulled out the heavy hammer. The handle had been made on the farm by his father and the heavy iron head purchased before he was born. It felt solid, good, and cool. He let the metal head cool his burning cheek and forehead, but the room threatened to grow and he thought again that the room might not be getting larger. What if he were growing smaller? The thought made him shriek and shiver. There should be someone to help. He should turn the lights on, but he couldn’t move. He wanted to put the idea away but it was fascinating. Maybe he would just keep getting smaller and smaller and when she came in in the morning after work, she would step on him, squash him like a bug. There would be a small spot of blood on the floor and she would make a sandwich and go to bed, not knowing what she had done.