"Maybe God's pissing on us. Ready?"
"Thank you." Emma remembered her manners.
"You can call me Madame Furtseva, although Madame will do."
Madame Furtseva was the closest thing to a witch Emma had ever met. Also, she believed in rice. She made rice water for the baby and rice pudding for the girl. As Emma ate she gawked at the variety of photographs, artifacts and souvenirs from around the world. And Madame Furtseva did not ask questions, although she knew a great deal.
"I can't get to water holes in Africa anymore, so I photograph the water holes that are here. It's not so different. There are lions and buffalo and jackals, many jackals. I take pictures of them using an infrared filter. They can't see me but I can see them."
Madame Furtseva opened a portfolio and showed Emma a landscape of pink trees under a dark sky, a portrait of milky round-faced Yegor and a group of girls running with a dog. Motion swirled around them.
"Itsy and Tito and Milka and me."
She looked at that one a long time.
34
Arkady felt as though he were in a small boat on a large sea. Great struggles took place far below on the ocean bottom, creating waves on the surface and casting up myriad strange creatures. The how or why he didn't know. Everything powerful was hidden. Every order was silent. Why had he been given his gun back? Those who knew, knew.
Traffic on Mira usually crawled, but at this time of night, cars were bold and loud. A roar ran along the front of the Agricultural Ministry, not the whisper of a Mercedes but the wild tones of the Maserati and Ferrari.
Traffic police stood helplessly by their police-issue Ladas. Giving chase to a Porsche or BMW ended up as a sobering demonstration of how outclassed they were. Audis and hypertuned Mazdas came in waves like surfers. They had raced, illegally, around the Peripheral Road. Downtown Moscow was their victory lap.
When Arkady felt the nudge from behind, he took it as a cue to get out of the way. He was already at the speed limit and the Lada was beginning to sound like a biplane. He let a black Hummer go by and ventured out onto the Boulevard Ring. Upscale then, upscale now. A smooth ride by the House of Music. And then a nudge from behind again, this time harder. Another Hummer. Or the same one. Arkady couldn't see the driver because the windshield was tinted. The front end had high chrome bumpers. When Arkady tried to stop, the Hummer pushed the Lada along. He shifted to neutral before the gearbox broke.
Arkady felt around for his sacred blue roof light, his safe passage to the city. It was usually on the dash. Not now. The Lada's temporary door did not lock. Someone had just reached in and plucked the light like an apple on a low-hanging branch. The Hummer shoveled the Lada along, and a trickle of sweat moved down the back of his neck. If he could only see who was driving, he could get some grasp of what he was contending with. Before he knew it, they were in a tunnel, and the air imploded. As they emerged, a Hitachi sign greeted them. Illuminated panels extolled the beaches of Orlando, Florida, spearfishing in the Red Sea, swimming in the turquoise waters of Croatia, places he'd love to go to if he could get untangled from the car behind him. A straightaway along the Kremlin wall. Not a single guard. Wasn't anyone protecting our leaders? Finally, blessed centrifugal force. At the bottom of the Alexander Garden, the Lada made a tighter turn and slid off the Hummer's bumper. Arkady put the car into third gear as two hubcaps rolled freely alongside.
Traffic police in shiny slickers waved Arkady to a stop. For the first time in his life he was happy to see them.
"You don't deny you were racing?"
"I wasn't racing; I was running for my life."
"Racing or running, that's going to cost you five hundred rubles. And your car, we'll have to confiscate your car." The officer took a good look at it. "You have to take your car."
The second officer said, "We'll take five dollars."
"I was escaping from…" Arkady looked around. There was no sign of the Hummer.
Arkady's cell phone rang inside the Lada. Each move he made, the officers blocked his way.
"Oh no, pay up first."
"I need to answer the phone."
"Money first."
"I'm a senior investigator."
"Show me your papers."
Five dollars proved to be papers enough.
But the ringing had stopped. There was only a message from Victor.
"You're not going to believe this. That bastard, your former boss Prosecutor Zurin, says that since you were dismissed, nothing on the tape is admissible as evidence. That includes confessions gained by 'cheap theatrics.' He says it is nothing but the rant of a sick individual."
Arkady tried to call back but Victor's phone was already engaged. And he tried to reach Anya's cell phone because if the Borodins were loose they would have a chance to kill her a second time, which seemed unfair. There was no answer.
What was the story about an appointment in Samarra? Arkady thought. Trying to avoid death, we run into its arms. It was unavoidable, at this traffic light or the next.
And there it was, pulling in snug behind Arkady, a black Hummer with a blue light-most likely Arkady's-riding on its roof. On the first blink of the traffic light, Arkady made a U-turn into oncoming traffic. The Hummer followed but was too large to thread the needle cleanly. It clipped fenders as it forced its way but followed in Arkady's tracks. What had his father said? "In the field, an officer should run only as a last resort." This wasn't retreat, this was panic. Arkady took a full turn at the roundabout at Lubyanka Square heading for narrow streets with sidewalk cafes. He leaned on the horn and got a feeble bleat. Cafes were shutting down. A tower of stacked chairs tottered and fell. Somewhere along the line, the Lada's wing mirrors had disappeared, and he had to look in the rearview mirror. The Hummer had a police beam, and in its glare, Arkady could barely see. It didn't matter, they were in his neighborhood now.
Arkady floored the knob that was all that remained of Victor's accelerator. The Lada started to shake apart. The exhaust pipe dragged, playing a tune on the surface of the road. The Hummer tried to pass. Arkady kept the Lada's nose in front. With one block to go, the Hummer pulled alongside. The driver rolled his window down. Sergei was at the wheel. His mother sat beside him. Mother and son, a family portrait, Arkady thought. He steered a little closer and Sergei corrected, allowing the Lada to keep its nose ahead. White smoke spewed from under the hood.
Sergei pointed a gun at Arkady. Arkady aimed his pistol, the gift of the Russian people, in return. Madame Borodina was shouting, although Arkady could not make out the words. He cut the wheel and leaned into the Hummer, toward an orange pylon lying on its side.
"I am God!" Sergei shouted.
The Hummer hit the pothole at 150 kph.
Neither Borodin was belted. Both burst through the windshield as the Hummer stood on its head and made a pirouette in midair before it landed.
35
He followed Arkady onto a little green commuter train, the sort that minds its own business and noses its way from big city stations to the bare platforms of villages. Seats were wooden and made for discomfort. It was hard enough for him to move. He accepted the pain as punishment for having botched the job.
Tajiks! Why hadn't anyone informed them that the shed was a Tajik heroin depot? They would have made arrangements. Instead, his brother is mauled by the fucking hound from hell. Abandoning Ilya had been the hardest decision of his life, but it wasn't as though he had a choice, not with a bullet through his shoulder and some Asiatic rifleman aching to put him in the crosshairs again. Took him three hours to crawl to the door. The episode was shameful and only fueled his determination to make things right.
It had taken two weeks to heal up but the time had not been wasted. He took the commuter train that Renko used morning and evening now that he was reinstated at the prosecutor's office. At first he sat at the far end of the car just to test the water and make himself familiar. He took note of what book Renko was reading and bought a copy of another book by the same autho
r. The book was pure bullshit but he understood the themes. A day later, he was already discussing the books with him.
Renko was such a fraud. Security at the prosecutor's office was a fraud too. He had shown up in the uniform of a deliveryman with a package that absolutely, positively had to reach Arkady Renko. He got the city and country address. He had the goods on Renko, who had everyone fooled. A choirboy, except real choirboys didn't shoot people.
He took precautions. Cut and dyed his hair gray, inserted steel caps on his front teeth. Those were the two features that people noticed most. Hair and teeth.
They walked part of the way to the village together. He had taken a room at a local farmhouse for a pittance in cash. His story was that he had high blood pressure and his doctor had advised him to go somewhere with fresh air and springwater. A rest in the country was the best medicine. Renko pointed out a pond just large enough to justify a rowboat and a plastic kayak that lazed upside down at a dock. He almost overstepped when he told Renko the pond was little bigger than a piss hole, then began dropping hints that a dip in it would be a capper to his vacation. He didn't push too hard or too soon because the girl might recognize him.
There were four in Renko's party. He would have to get them all in one fell swoop. But he liked this kind of problem. He liked the puzzle about a goat, a chicken and a fox crossing a river in a boat. There were things to take into consideration, like time of day and greatest surprise. He would have to eliminate Renko first, then the boy and women. That would mean getting Renko alone.
The village had a shop that sold used farm tools on consignment. He bought a spade, a scythe and a whetstone. Just swinging the scythe and listening to its whistle made him feel more grounded. He grew to hate the long conversations on the train, the forced bonhomie. His face hurt from grinning.
There was a deadline. Renko had confided that they would be going back to the city at the week's end. He scouted Renko's dacha. There were hazards in that. He was almost spotted by a suspicious neighbor. And there was a party at Renko's that he was invited to. He begged off in case it was a trap, but watched through binoculars. Renko said he shouldn't be so shy. Arkady spotted him the minute he was on the train. He was a jackal trying to hide among lapdogs. He had blunt, half-finished features with a heavy brow and large, capable hands. The newcomer said his name was Yakov Lozovsky, an engineer from Moscow vacationing on his own. Arkady ran "Yakov Lozovsky" through the files and found that, indeed, there was an engineer by that name and he was on vacation. Nevertheless, Arkady began carrying his pistol, and Victor came to add an extra body.
Arkady was on paid leave. There had been no formal ceremony of reinstatement, only a summons to the office of Assistant Deputy Gendler. Ever since he had been reinstated, Zurin had treated his investigator with great consideration, as if they were both struggling toward the "Truth," each in his own way. Zurin got most of the credit for outwitting and stopping a serial killer, which was only his due as a senior officer.
The issue was whether to stay at the dacha or return to the city. To break routine might be more dangerous than retreat. Maya called him the Catcher and said he would never stop. She would always live in fear. Anya said she had already been dead, she had nothing to lose. Zhenya was eager to be a protector in Maya's eyes. Arkady warned that they would have to do without cell phones because there was no coverage at the dacha, no landline and help too far away in any case.
They could feel the Catcher prowling in the dark. In any siege, success was a matter of patience. Yakov Lozovsky had a clean record and was not breaking any laws, yet fear set in, evidenced by contrary bouts of claustrophobia and a reluctance to leave the house. Anya was sharp with Arkady during the day. At night, in bed, she pressed herself against his back and clung for reassurance.
Only Maya and Zhenya were home when Yakov showed up with an ax at the back door of the dacha. He had the broad physique of someone who had done manual labor all his life. He had taken off his shirt to chop wood and the bullet scar on his shoulder was a raw welt. Maya shrank into a corner out of sight.
"Who's home?"
"People are around," Zhenya said. He couldn't control his trembling. He remembered Yakov riding a battered station wagon and waving a reward poster for Maya.
"Around what?"
"They're around."
"Now, here's the question. Do you need any firewood?"
"No, thanks," said Zhenya.
"It's no problem." Yakov pointed to the logs stacked outside the back door. He picked up the largest piece of wood, set it on a stump, and split it with the ax. Like a man snapping a toothpick. "It won't take a second. No one will know I was even here. No? You're sure?"
"I'm sure," Zhenya said.
"Well, only trying to help. It's going to rain tonight. Good for the farmers."
As soon as Yakov got back to the farmhouse, he sketched an outline of the dacha, all the access points, the windows and doors and chimney, driveway, dock, fields of vision. Then he sat back and waited for rain.
The rain was perfect, a steady downpour with no lightning. A friend of Renko's watched from a Lada at the front door. It didn't matter. The man who called himself Yakov Lozovsky swam across the pond to the least defended side of the dacha. In his wet suit, he was virtually invisible. All he carried was a waterproof sack containing two smoke grenades and a ballistic gas mask with huge eyes and a silicone seal. In a leg sheath was a SAS fighting knife, good for slashing as well as sticking. He watched from the vantage point between the rowboat and the kayak as lamps went out in the dacha one by one. As the last lamp was doused and Yakov slowly rose from the water, the rowboat flipped and he was slit open from his sternum to his balls.
Arkady pitched himself backward as an effusion of warmth spread through the water. A hand clutched his ankle. He kicked free but lost his knife and backpedaled to deeper water, where standing upright on the spongy bottom of the pond was a balancing act. Holding his skin together like a vest, Yakov got a handhold on Arkady's belt and embraced him from behind. There was a little jiggle; that would be Yakov drawing a knife, Arkady thought. The man unraveled, yet here he was, a professional, carrying on. Arkady heard Victor shout from the front of the house, too far away to help. Zhenya jumped in from the dock but he could barely swim.
What distracted the man was the sight of Maya in the glow of a lantern at the edge of the pond. Here was the child whore he had been chasing almost in his grasp. Her lantern shined and laid a golden path across the surface of the water. All he had to do was follow the reflection.
Arkady ducked out of the man's grip and dove. From the bottom of the pond, he looked up at a silhouette of Yakov turning left and right in a cloud of blood.
Arkady surfaced long enough to say, "Are you the last one?" He dove before Yakov could strike.
"Will they send anyone else?" Arkady surfaced in a different direction.
"Who are you?"
But the man who called himself Yakov Lozovsky died like a scorpion, spinning and stabbing the water.
36
A stage was set up where the trailer had been. The acts were simple: marionettes, trained dogs, a sword swallower, a juggler and a monkey who collected money in a cap. Although the cap was shabby and the monkey had the mange, an outdoor circus on a sunny day drew young families that usually avoided Three Stations.
To add to the holiday air, the piano from the Yaroslavl Station waiting room had been brought outside. For all the times Arkady had come in and out of the station, he had never heard the piano being played. Someone was playing it now, despite the fact that the piano had not been tuned in years. Unexpected sharps and flats abounded, and some keys were totally dead.
In short, Arkady thought, Russia set to music.
Some men chase butterflies; others let butterflies come to them. Arkady stayed by the circus while Maya and Anya ran after every stroller and Zhenya and Victor patrolled the sidewalk. Maya's hair was growing back but she was frail and drawn from weeks of search.
&nb
sp; Arkady noticed that a little girl with a baby in her arms was taking in more money than the monkey. It bared its teeth at her and she shrieked.
"Does he bite?" she asked no one in particular.
"Well, he's sulking at the moment. He's embarrassed about his cap."
"Is he really? How can you tell?"
"Look at him, downcast eyes, runny nose. He's in a state."
"I like dogs. I had a friend who had a dog. Tito."
"Good dog?"
"The best." She started to tear and caught herself. "I'm with Madame now but she can't come out because of the sun."
"That's a pretty blue blanket. What's the baby's name?" Arkady asked.
She hesitated in her snuffling.
He asked, "Is it Katya?"
"I'm just taking care of the baby until her mother comes."
"I can see what a good job you're doing. It's a big responsibility."
"Who are you? Are you a magician?"
Arkady said, "Kind of. I can't make rabbits pop out of hats. That's not useful anyway; people don't have room for rabbits. First you have two, then you have twenty. I'm more useful. I know things."
"Like what?"
"I know that the baby's blanket has a pattern of ducklings."
"That doesn't prove anything. You could have peeked."
"And if you lift the hair on the back of her head, there's a birthmark in the shape of a question mark."
"Is not."
"Look and see."
She shifted the baby to examine the back of her neck. When she saw the mark, her jaw fell open.
"How did you know?"
"First, I'm a magician and second, I know Katya's mommy. She's been looking for Katya for weeks."
"I didn't steal her."
"I know that."
Emma teared up again. "What do I do?"
"Very simple. Take Katya over to her mommy and say, 'I found your baby.' There she is." Arkady pointed out Maya at the circus entrance. With her short hair she wasn't difficult to spot.
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