In the Name of a Killer (The Cowley and Danilov Thrillers)

by Brian Freemantle

  ‘Got the murderer yet?’ The interest in Olga’s voice was about the same as her intonation when she’d discussed the soup she’d leave on the stove for when he got home.

  ‘Not yet.’

  ‘The taxi was expensive last night: nearly six roubles.’

  ‘I’m still glad you took it.’

  ‘If you used some influence like you did in the district we’d have our own car. Look how easy things seem to be for Yevgennie and Larissa. I’ve arranged an evening with them, by the way.’

  ‘I …’ started Danilov, unthinking. ‘Fine,’ he concluded.

  ‘At their flat. Not here.’

  ‘If you don’t want to do it, say so!’

  ‘I want to do it.’

  ‘I probably will be asleep when you get home.’

  The pathology account first, he decided: the Americans held a copy, so it was the likeliest source of immediate discussion. He had to be prepared. Danilov’s instant impression was that Novikov had rewritten and redrawn the entire report, after the warning the previous day of the victim’s identity. The presentation was faultless, with none of the written-over mistypings with which Novikov was normally prepared to let his documents be distributed. There were margin sub-headings, too, another innovation.

  Danilov was particularly careful to check the details of the wound against Novikov’s verbal account, convinced the man would have checked every note and supposition after learning of the American involvement. The depth of the wound was now given as nineteen and a quarter centimetres and the thickness wad qualified as just under five millimetres at the back of the knife but with minimal evidence of sideways cutting at the other edge, indicating extreme, easily entering sharpness. So as well as being sharply pointed the blade had been honed, as well. There was an abrupt change of opinion, needing another reminder pad notation, about the direction of the entry wound. During their conversation, Novikov had said the knife had entered in a slightly upwards trajectory. Now he stated categorically that having entered between the eighth and ninth rib, the wound graduated upwards to be a whole centimetre higher at the point of contact with the heart from the place of entry into the body. Danilov broke away, scribbling on his pad, noting beside it that Ann Harris had been one point six five metres tall and writing ‘killer height?’ and encircling it.

  Danilov felt a jump of irritation, reading on, at something Novikov had not told him the previous day. Then just as quickly refused the annoyance: without the intriguing references in the correspondence that only he had read, the significance would not have been obvious to the pathologist. Novikov had found contusions to both breasts, the more severe to the right, near the nipple, where the skin had been broken. The man judged the bruise to the right breast consistent with a bite. There was further contusion, to the right hip, again with evidence of teeth marks. None of the marks showed post-mortem lividity but were recent, within hours. What were bite marks to the breast if not sexual assault? thought Danilov. As quickly as before he stopped the criticism. His question to the man, the previous day, had concerned sexual assault at the scene. If the bruising had occurred before death, then it probably happened in the apartment on Ulitza Pushkinskaya, during the lovemaking which had left the woman with a semen deposit in the vagina. Novikov had found additional contusions to both nostrils and to the central nose cartilage, extending for six millimetres on to the upper lip. There was also a small laceration inside the upper lip. Danilov added the new information to his pad, with the reminder to check the autopsy report on the first victim, wondering how much of the injury would have been visible if he had brought himself properly to look at Ann Harris’s body.

  Shortly before her death, Novikov estimated not more than four hours, Ann Harris had eaten a meal. The stomach contents disclosed undigested pork and some apple and grape skin. There was also the presence of acetic acid, consistent with the consumption of wine, in addition to the traces of stronger alcohol, which Danilov took to be the vodka which he knew the girl and her companion had drunk in her flat.

  The kitchen at Ulitza Pushkinskaya had been clean, with no indication of any food preparation or cleaning. So where had Ann Harris eaten? And drunk wine? And with whom?

  There was another apparent omission when Danilov turned the page, and this time he allowed the anger. He distinctly remembered Novikov saying there was no sign of Ann Harris having fought her killer. Death was practically instantaneous, the man had said. Yet here he had recorded that two nails – on the index and middle finger of her left hand – had been broken. Danilov searched hurriedly but unsuccessfully through the next five or six lines, seeking a measure of how long the woman’s nails had been, and then sat back reflectively. Had she fought after all, despite Novikov’s insistence to the contrary? If she had, sufficiently strongly to break two nails, the possibility was that the killer would be marked, scratched on the face or hands or possibly both. The inconsistency registered immediately. If she had scratched her killer there would have been scrapings of skin or blood or hair from beneath her nails. And he’d specifically asked about that. Nothing, Novikov had said.

  Danilov scribbled another reminder to himself before thrusting the report to one side, turning to the forensic account.

  There had been two obviously different sets of fingerprints and a small number of indeterminate smudges which were older, from the evidence of surface particle cover. The ridges of Harris’s fingerprints had been whorled. The second set had registered lateral pocket loops. Danilov at once isolated a peculiarity about the second, unidentified prints. Around the empty vodka glass in the living-room there had been a complete set of a right hand and two further full markings of both left and right, one on top of the dressing-table in the bedroom and the third on the sink surround in the bathroom, as if the person had leaned forward on outstretched, supporting hands. Yet they were not complete. Recorded against each was the fact that the index finger on the right only half registered. On what would have been the little finger of the same hand the print was marred by a tiny triangular patch, clean of any loops, which was labelled as scar tissue. Nowhere else in the apartment, where single prints had been located, had the index finger been found complete. The only prints on the vodka bottle belonged to Ann Harris.

  Comparative analysis had matched some head and pubic hair recovered from the bedsheet as that of the girl herself but there were also samples from someone else. There had been minimal semen staining, from which a B Rhesus Negative blood grouping had been identified. There was separate staining by spermicidal chemicals forming part of the formula of the contraceptive pessaries recovered from the bedside drawer. Microscopic examination of the bottom sheet, near where a pillow would have been, had revealed a small patch of blood. It was B Positive, the same group as the dead woman. The pillow on the left of the bed was marked, again so minimally that it only showed under a microscope, with traces of anhydrous lanolin and white paraffin. Both were common in skin-care cream or skin cleansers.

  Samples of wool, rayon, polyester and silk fibres had been collected throughout the apartment. All the dyes were American. No fibres identifiably Russian had been recovered at all.

  Initially disappointed, Danilov put the forensic report alongside that of the pathologist. He’d hoped for something more, without knowing precisely what it might or could have been. So what did he have? Largely confirmation of things he already knew, apart from the oddness of the unidentified fingerprint. It was the only item from the report he’d singled out for separate notation.

  He sat quite alone in the empty, mostly darkened building, immersed in thought for several moments. And then, suddenly, he isolated what was possibly the most important disclosure in what he’d read: important for what it did not say.

  Sometime during the evening of her death Ann Harris had entertained a lover at Ulitza Pushkinskaya. They had sat together in the living-room, drinking. He had moved about the flat, into the bathroom and the bedroom. In the bedroom he had undressed, taken her to bed and made love t
o her. From past experience, Danilov knew it would have been practically impossible for something – a thread or a fibre – not to have come from the man’s clothing during that degree of activity. Yet the conclusion of the report was quite emphatic: nowhere in the apartment was there anything forensically identifiable as Russian. Danilov smiled, no longer disappointed. He had a pathway to follow. He wondered where it would lead and thought at once that the last document he had to read might show him.

  The telephone monitoring covered the immediately preceding month. The list of outgoing calls was comparatively short and from his earlier study of Ann Harris’s address book Danilov was able to identify most of them. There was one number she had called more than any other.

  Definitely a pathway, Danilov decided. There was possibly a very practical benefit from the impending arrival of an FBI officer. Were they referred to as officers or agents? He wasn’t sure.

  It was difficult, to control the shaking, the fear vibrating through him, almost causing a physical ache. So close: so incredibly, near-disastrously close. It was a miracle they hadn’t seen the knife, the knife that had actually been moving towards her back, almost touching the thick brown material. It would have slid in so easily: just like silk. That’s how it had to go in, just like silk. Her hair had been wonderful, long and blonde. It would have been good, to have collected blonde hair. And the buttons, of course. There would have been a lot of buttons. So close: close enough to hear her say how sorry she was to be late and see the smile of forgiveness as the man came forward from the shadowed alley off Ulitza Kislovskii to kiss her. Shouldn’t have hurried, wanting too much to do it again. Should have taken more care, to be sure she was alone, not meeting anyone. Not a bad failure: no cause to shake like this. Hadn’t been caught. Do it right next time. Just like silk. More hair. More buttons.

  He’d taken her before she was properly awake, hugely aroused, and it had been difficult in her surprise for Pauline to respond fully to his excitement. She hadn’t matched him at the end but she didn’t think he had realized: she knew he was pleased, at how it had been. Afterwards Pauline made breakfast in her housecoat. Andrews was fully and immaculately dressed when he emerged from their bedroom.

  ‘I’m going out to Sheremet’yevo to meet him tonight,’ Andrews announced.

  Pauline poured the coffee as her husband sat down. ‘That’s considerate.’

  ‘Want me to pass on any message?’

  She frowned down at him. ‘Hello, I guess. What else?’

  ‘How do you feel about seeing him again?’

  Pauline replaced the coffee-pot, aware she had to be careful with the answer. ‘I don’t think I feel anything.’

  ‘We’ll have him here for dinner. You’d like that, wouldn’t you? Having him to dinner?’

  ‘If you want to.’

  ‘Do you want to?’

  ‘It’s your decision, Barry. You know that.’

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘My decision.’

  Chapter Eleven

  Andrews positioned himself close to the doors beyond the Customs area and hurried forward the moment Cowley emerged, but then didn’t seem to know what to do with his hands, holding both before him initially and then clasping them behind his back. The smile was hesitant. ‘Hi!… Hi Bill … Good to see you.’

  ‘I hardly expected you to meet me in.’ Could it ever be good to see the man who had taken his wife? Not taken, Cowley corrected at once: he’d lost Pauline’s love long before Andrews had appeared on the scene.

  ‘How you doing?’ The smile lasted slightly longer this time.

  ‘OK.’

  There was an uneasy silence between them in an airport full of noise. Then Andrews said: ‘Thought it best to get it out of the way. You and me.’

  ‘You get a briefing, from the Director?’

  ‘A long one.’

  ‘It was a headquarters decision. Political.’

  ‘That’s what the briefing said.’

  ‘I hope we can work together.’

  ‘Why shouldn’t we?’ The smile came on again.

  There was a jostle of people around them and Cowley felt two men very close, whispering in English the offer of taxis.

  ‘Let’s get the hell out of here!’ said Andrews. He half reached for Cowley’s bag but then drew back. The embassy car was directly in front of the terminal. The road surface of the main highway into the city was pockmarked with holes, jarring the vehicle. ‘Just like New York!’ said Andrews.

  ‘How’s Pauline?’ It would have been ridiculous for Cowley not to have asked.

  ‘Good … very well … says to say hello.’

  ‘Say hello back.’ It was going far better between them than he had expected.

  ‘Ambassador wants to see you first thing tomorrow,’ announced Andrews. ‘Political lecture, I guess.’

  ‘I already had one in Washington.’ Cowley didn’t remember the man speaking like this, firing rather than saying the words. Cowley detected a cigar odour in the car: he couldn’t remember Andrews being a smoker, either. Cowley stared out, not able to see very much in the darkness apart from faraway lights, to the right. ‘There doesn’t seem much information available.’

  ‘Being made available,’ qualified Andrews. ‘The investigator is an asshole. Name’s Danilov, Dimitri Danilov. Sneaky son-of-a-bitch.’

  ‘I understood there was to be cooperation?’

  ‘We should have taken complete charge, not shared it. That’s what I expected. There’ll need to be a lot of arm twisting, to get what we want. There’s an autopsy report you won’t have seen.’ Andrews patted a dossier beside him. ‘Got it here.’

  Buildings began to form ahead, high-rise apartment blocks, and the darkness began to lift, with street light. ‘Tell me about Danilov.’

  ‘Typical jerk, small-time policeman, out of his depth and trying to hide it. Got into her apartment before we could get to it: sealed it. We’re burning ass over that. They’ve given us a list of what they say they took, but we’ve no way of knowing if it’s accurate. We’re demanding a return of the body, too.’

  ‘Anything special in the autopsy?’

  Andrews smiled across the car. ‘She’d been screwed. How about that! Senator Walter Burden’s virgin niece had been screwed.’

  ‘I thought there was no evidence of rape.’

  ‘Screwed before she went out into the street.’

  ‘Boyfriend?’

  ‘She didn’t have one, as far as I know. The original Frigid Bridget.’

  ‘You know her?’

  ‘In her company a few times, at dinners, stuff like that.’

  ‘What sort of a girl was she?’

  ‘Attractive. Good body: nice tits. Sure of herself: knew she had uncle’s pull, back home. Didn’t bother much with the hired help, like me. Saw herself at ambassador and First Secretary level.’

  The car turned on to Ulitza Chaykovskaya and Cowley saw the embassy ahead. ‘So you didn’t like her?’

  The other man shrugged. ‘Didn’t like or dislike. As I said, I didn’t know her that well.’ He turned down the sideroad by the old embassy towards the new legation and accommodation compound at the rear. ‘We’re using the living quarters but the bastards insisted on local labour and bugged every fucking thing in the new embassy. We’ve got to pull it down and rebuild.’

  The suite allocated to Cowley consisted of a sitting-room, with an alcove kitchen to one side, a bedroom and a separate bathroom equipped with a shower. The living-room had American furnishings, a couch and two easy chairs covered in rough-weave, oatmeal-coloured material on a white shag carpet, and a dark wood dining set of table and four chairs. The bookcase held mostly National Geographic publications. The majority of the books displayed were guides or explanations of the new Russian confederation and Russian life. There was a video player beneath the television set.

  Andrews nodded towards it and said: ‘Television here is crap, apart from CNN, by satellite. There’s a video library, though. And the marine ser
geant can get stag movies.’

  ‘I don’t anticipate much time for television,’ said Cowley. ‘Your cable said the investigator …’ He paused, for the name. ‘… Danilov … it said he speaks English?’

  ‘Motherfucker tricked us with that,’ admitted Andrews. ‘Sat there gabbling Russian and listening to everything we said, among ourselves. Asshole! Mind if I smoke?’

  Yes, thought Cowley. ‘Go ahead,’ he said. Cowley wondered just how much he would need the language he’d begun to learn in military intelligence, which had been his original career choice before joining the FBI, where he’d brought it up to near fluency at the Bureau language centre at Monterey. For the Russian to have feigned ignorance of English to hear everything that was said seemed hardly typical jerk, small-time policeman. ‘I guess I’m going to have to work out how to operate as I go along.’

  Andrews crossed towards the kitchen to go unerringly to a cupboard containing a selection of bottles, kindling a cigar as he went. ‘Stocked up for you!’ It was an anticipation rather than an announcement. ‘What do you want?’

  ‘I don’t drink, not any more.’

  Andrews regarded him with a look verging on disbelief. ‘You’ve got to be joking!’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Jesus! Who would have thought it?’ Andrews poured himself scotch, over ice.

  Cowley refused any annoyance at the open condescension. He had been a drunk, so someone who’d known him as well as Andrews was entitled to disbelief. And if he showed any reaction, Andrews might imagine the reason deeper than simple annoyance, at being patronized. He said: ‘What sort of steer can you give me?’

  ‘Don’t take any of Danilov’s shit. Keep the asshole jumping. Let him know who’s going to be calling the shots from now on.’