The Sin Collector (Masha Karavai Detective Series)

by Daria Desombre

  All she wanted, desperately, was to sleep. When Kenty left her in the study and quietly pulled the door shut behind him, she wasted no time in tossing off her clothes and slipping into a cool forgetfulness there between the crisply ironed sheets. She was asleep in an instant.

  ANDREY

  Andrey regarded his boss’s blood-red face. Usually when the tyrant was angry, Andrey worried. But today he definitely did not care. No boss man could possibly make him feel any worse than he already did. There was a monster after Masha—his Masha. And he did not know a single way to chase the killer back into the foul, dark pit from which he had emerged. Andrey’s shame was propelling him forward, nagging him onward every time he stopped for half a minute to toss back a sandwich to fuel himself. But the whole race had been pointless. He was running on a treadmill. Every clue led to nothing, and all the suspects were dropping off the track. The police officer resting in his grave. The Old Believers. The military officers, interviewed just yesterday by the guys from his team about whether they had ever worked with Yelnik. There were too many murders, and he had to dig in dozens of different directions, like a mole, hoping to sniff out the slightest lead in this vast field of data. Any clue would be a miracle.

  “Of all the fucking things!” Anyutin slammed his enormous fist on the desk. “Did you see this?” He tossed a newspaper down in front of Andrey with the headline “NEW CHIKATILO IN DOWNTOWN MOSCOW!”

  Andrey dispassionately ran his eyes over the page, then went back to his own thoughts. If he couldn’t catch the killer, then maybe he’d be able to hide Masha from him? No, he told himself. Hiding her wouldn’t work. The only thing to do would be to keep her by his side, twenty-four hours a day, and maybe, just maybe, he’d be able to protect her. Not that she’d go for that.

  The colonel was raging, “Can you imagine what kind of shitstorm is going to come down on me? How long can I feed them stories from the Old Testament?”

  “It’s the New Testament,” Andrey corrected him without thinking.

  “What the hell is going on?” Anyutin went on menacingly. “Everyone at Petrovka’s a Bible scholar now? Do you think we’re playing pick-up sticks here? Or are you just waiting for him to get through all of his, what are they, tollhouses, and disappear back to hell?” He slammed his fist down on the desk again, and paper flew in all directions. Somebody knocked at the door. “Yes!” Anyutin barked, while he and his subordinate collected the documents strewn across the floor.

  “May I come in?” The voice at the door was a calm baritone.

  In walked Katyshev. Anyutin’s face went even redder, and he stood up and shook the prosecutor’s hand. Katyshev nodded in Andrey’s direction.

  “I was just thinking about you. I was wondering how your investigation is getting along.”

  Andrey shook his head tiredly.

  “It’s not,” Anyutin answered for him. “The guy’s a ghost.”

  “Well,” said Katyshev, settling into a chair with a cold chuckle, “that happens with serial killers, you know. Remember how many people the original Chikatilo got to.” He nodded toward the open newspaper. “And how many of the wrong people were arrested for what he did.”

  “Don’t try to make excuses for these so-called detectives,” said Anyutin with a scowl, not even deigning to glance in Andrey’s direction. “The clock is ticking, the bodies are rolling in, and these idiots haven’t gotten one iota closer to solving the case.”

  Katyshev crossed his legs and calmly swung one foot back and forth. Andrey noticed how worn out his shoes looked.

  “At least your men have figured out the rules of the game, which was no simple feat.” He smiled sadly. “You know, I walk around Moscow myself, sometimes, without even recognizing it. I always wonder what happened to the city of my childhood. All these new nightclubs and strip shows, the abject poverty alongside the Bentleys and the champagne fountains . . . This suspect of yours doesn’t have to operate under any of our rules or limitations. He slices up, or, I suppose, quarters, people we in law enforcement can’t seem to get our hands on. Like that governor’s wife.”

  Katyshev rose to his feet and sighed.

  “Sometimes you have to wonder. Maybe we should give the guy the chance to finish what he started.”

  MASHA

  Masha woke up when the front door slammed. She stayed in bed for a minute, listening. Not a sound. Kenty must have left for a meeting with a client, or maybe he’d gone to buy more groceries to cook for her, try to make amends. Masha wasn’t mad at him anymore. And she realized now that she hadn’t been convinced, not really, that the killer was as religious as all that. It was more likely, she thought as she got dressed, that he was just using religion as a cover. The idea of Heavenly Jerusalem, coupled with the list of Torments, gave him a precise pattern to work with. A path he could follow while doing just what his heart desired. And speaking of hearts . . .

  Masha called her mother’s cell phone, but landed in her voice mail. She was probably still sleeping.

  Masha walked to the kitchen and poured herself some juice. She really was feeling better, here in Kenty’s apartment. She decided she would not think about her stepfather. She would not think about the Sin Collector. She would think about those things tomorrow, and she was sure she’d have to keep thinking about them for a good long while. But today? Today she would try to read a book, maybe one from Kenty’s collection. Nothing too serious, though, just something from when they were kids. Maybe a book from that Adventure Stories series. She had seen some of those in the study. Or Sir Walter Scott, or Thomas Mayne Reid. Masha leaned over the couch, one hand holding her glass of juice, the other hand running over the familiar book spines. Aha! Jules Verne, The Mysterious Island. Perfect! Masha hooked the little volume with one fingernail, and it slid off the shelf and into her waiting hand.

  In the gap where The Mysterious Island had been, she could see the dark wood of the book case, and also something white. An envelope? Masha frowned. Was Kenty hiding money in his bookshelf? That didn’t seem like the kind of thing he would do. So what was it? Masha wavered. She downed the rest of her juice and tossed the book onto the sofa. Still frowning, she reached for the envelope, and carefully slid it out from between the books. For a second, Masha stopped, ashamed of herself. The envelope was obviously supposed to be hidden away from prying eyes. But her curiosity won out. Kenty had already let her in on one huge secret, so, Masha reasoned, it made sense to check, just to make sure he wasn’t hiding some other nasty surprise, right? She’d just take a quick look, she told herself, that was all. The envelope was not sealed.

  Inside, there were photographs. But these weren’t photos of both of them together, from the days Kenty and Masha made the rounds of youth festivals and parties. These pictures—black-and-white, glossy—were of Masha alone. Every single one of them.

  After seeing the first one, she gasped and dumped out the rest. There was one shot of Masha leaving home in the morning, walking, laughing carelessly, with one of the boys from college who used to have a crush on her. There she was drinking champagne with her mother at a premiere at the Bolshoi. There was Katya, and other friends of hers, too. What was this? You could track her whole life through these pictures! School, her family, her friends, different events . . . Innokenty had been following her! For a long time, too. Masha remembered very clearly that outing to the Bolshoi five years ago, because her mother had forced her to wear a low-cut, floor-length dress. Innokenty had not been there with them. Or apparently he had been, but she hadn’t seen him. Was he hiding behind a column or something, focusing on her through the lens of his camera? Masha looked with horror at all these snapshots from her life, spread all around her. Why had he done this? Why had he spied on her?

  Masha swallowed nervously and stood up, brushing the pictures off her like poisonous insects crawling up her legs. She needed to get out of here, and now. She dashed into the hallway, where the cow-eyed faces of the old icons watched her from the white walls. Shaking all over, she
struggled to put on her shoes. For God’s sake, how could she have ever felt safe here? There was nowhere in this city where she could feel safe anymore! And she didn’t think there was a single person she could trust, either. One thought nearly made her physically ill. She would have to go back to the empty apartment she had deserted, just a few hours before, where everything reminded her of her father and stepfather, and where—she knew for sure now—the killer had certainly set foot. Masha pushed open the heavy front door with clammy hands, and ran out into the echoing stairwell.

  Suddenly Masha heard movement on the stairs below. The measured, confident step of a tall man, taking two stairs at a time. Innokenty. She scurried in the other direction and walked one flight up, and stood concealed behind the grating of the elevator shaft, watching him unlock the door.

  “Masha?” he called, his voice worried.

  The door closed behind him, and Masha flew like a bird down the stairs, rushing headlong to confront her own solitude.

  ANDREY

  From the moment he left Anyutin’s office, where the colonel and Katyshev were still bemoaning the morals of the day, Andrey knew there was no way he would be capable of thinking, or engaging in any investigative activities whatsoever, until he saw Masha. He needed to embrace Masha Karavay, press her body to his and never let her go, until either they found the killer or he stopped killing. He would hold her that long, or maybe even forever. Eternity in Masha’s embrace didn’t seem like such a bad deal. Andrey didn’t really trust Innokenty, but still, he felt better knowing she was with him rather than all alone. When he called and heard her expressionless voice on the line, pronouncing just two words—“I’m home”—Andrey did not stop to ask questions.

  I just need to remember to stop at the store, he thought as he parked in front of Masha’s building. His fridge was empty again. But that would be later, with her by his side.

  As Andrey climbed the stairs, he heard voices. One male, speaking quietly, and the other female, slightly hysterical, which sounded as if it were coming from behind a closed door. He couldn’t make out the words at first. But the higher he climbed, the more distinct the dialogue became. He recognized Innokenty’s voice. And the first words he understood stopped Andrey in his tracks.

  “Masha, please!” Innokenty was saying. “Please forgive me! I feel like all I’m doing is apologizing, admitting things I’ve done wrong. What do you think? That I’m insane and I’ve been stalking you for years? Don’t you think that might not be it at all? Isn’t there—” Innokenty paused for a second. “Don’t you see any other reasons, aside from me being some sort of bloodthirsty maniac, that I might have—Masha, why can’t you see? I—”

  “You lied to me!” Masha interrupted him, the panic sounding in a long, high note in her voice.

  Andrey couldn’t wait any longer, and he sprang forward.

  “You hid so much from me!” Masha yelled. “I don’t trust you now. I don’t trust anyone!”

  Andrey reached the landing and saw Innokenty standing with his forehead pressed to Masha’s apartment door. He turned to Andrey, his eyes lost and unseeing.

  “Masha!” Andrey called. “It’s me. Open the door.”

  Andrey stepped forward, and Innokenty stepped aside, his shoulders shaking. “Please, Masha,” said Andrey.

  The door cracked open and there she stood, tears in her eyes.

  “Where have you been?” She took a step toward Andrey. “Why did it take you so long to get here?”

  Andrey hugged her then, the way he had dreamed of doing all day long, and he felt her hot, damp cheek pressed against his neck. He held her head to his shoulder, and moved his lips over the silky hair covering the back of her neck. He whispered, as soothingly as he could, “Hush, now. Shhhhh. Hush. Everything will be okay. Let’s go to my place. We’ll feed Marilyn. We’ll eat, too. We’ll go to bed and get a good rest, okay?”

  And Masha only squeezed him harder and sobbed for a while before her breathing gradually returned to normal. Then he turned her to face him, and when Andrey looked into her sad, moist eyes, he thought he had never seen them look so piercingly green.

  “Anything you want to bring with you?”

  “That would be the third bag I’ve packed this weekend,” she said. “No. I don’t want anything. Just let me grab my purse.”

  Without letting go of his hand, Masha rummaged in the coat rack for her purse, turned off the light, and pulled the door shut behind them. This time she didn’t bother to lock it.

  Only then did either one of them remember Innokenty. They looked around, worried, but he was nowhere to be seen.

  “Come on,” said Masha, pulling Andrey by the hand. “Let’s go. Marilyn Monroe must be starving.”

  THE SIN COLLECTOR

  Moving with an easy, athletic stride, the man vaulted over the fence around the park and walked quickly toward the playground. The car was there, in place, black in the early-autumn twilight. He opened the door, sank down onto the worn seat, and sighed. He cranked the window down and lit a cigarette, then took a long, appreciative drag. The spicy smell of the leaves outside mixed with the cigarette smoke in his lungs. Now the trees are covered with colorful leaves, he thought, but soon all that will remain of these trees is their black branches, like a cryptic script written on the pale sky. In the mornings, those benches will be covered with frost. And then the first snow will fall, and finally it will seem that everything has become lighter. But that is an illusion, a trick of the eye. Winter will come. Catharsis. Death, with no hope of clemency. This year, too, would die. And he would die with it. No reason for regret.

  The man carefully put out his cigarette in the ashtray, closed the window, and drove away. For some time, the road was completely empty. But suddenly, with a wailing of sirens, a fire truck flew into view from around a corner, and another one after it.

  That was quick! The man laughed disdainfully. Everyone’s afraid of fire. They even say if you’re being attacked, you should cry, ‘Fire!’ instead of shouting for help. Who would ever respond to a call for help?

  The man swallowed back a familiar bitterness in his mouth. He knew that bitterness would not pass, no matter how often he tried to gulp it down or how much alcohol he used to wash it away. He had driven as far as Kutuzovsky Avenue when the rotund silhouette of a traffic cop, waving his striped baton, emerged from the darkness on the side of the road to pull him over. The man frowned. He knew he had not broken any rules, simply because he never broke any. But he did not wish to be delayed here. Instead of his driver’s license, he handed the traffic cop his badge, and he watched as the officer’s gelatinous face quickly transformed into something like the formal grimace of a man in a military parade. “Have a good day, sir!”

  The man could smell something burning. The wind must be blowing from that direction. His hands smelled like it, too. And a little bit like gasoline. He would have to remember to wash them with antiseptic. That would never fool the crime lab, but by the morning, at least, the smell would have to be gone, so that more inquisitive noses at work wouldn’t sniff anything out. He had work yet to do. Masha Karavay would suspect there was one more left when she heard the news tomorrow. But she would be wrong. There would be two more. And he smiled again, the honest smile of a hard worker who had just a short way left to go before a well-deserved rest.

  But back where he had come from, farther and higher up Poklonnaya Hill, deep in Victory Park, the enormous bonfire raged, leaping with joyful, bright flashes of flame against the blue-black night.

  MASHA

  Masha woke up because she was cold. They hadn’t bothered to light the stove last night and settled instead for the space heater, which had been a mistake. She huddled against Andrey as best she could, warming one icy foot against his side, then a frozen hand under his arm. They had slept all night, interlaced like a strange kind of jigsaw puzzle. But at about two in the morning, Andrey had gotten up to turn off the heater, not wanting to risk a fire, and by morning, the small bubble of w
armth generated by their combined bodies had drifted away. Masha finally gave up that blissful state of forgetfulness she had forged out of Andrey’s sleepy breath on her cheek. It was time to get up and do some thinking.

  Carefully, so she wouldn’t wake him, Masha stretched out her legs and swung her feet onto the cold floor, then jerked them back again, shivering. But the thought of turning on the heater in the kitchen and of the old fleece Andrey had lent her last night gave her courage. Masha got out of bed, grabbed a small pile of clothing, and hustled into the kitchen, where Marilyn Monroe was already sitting at the ready. The mutt watched absentmindedly as his master’s girlfriend slipped into a T-shirt and jeans in record time, then added a sweater, his master’s fleece coat, and then, with a satisfied hum, his master’s wool socks, which had been drying near the stove since last ski season.

  Then Marilyn’s new mistress disappeared again into the bedroom and returned with the heater. She put on the tea kettle . . . and she opened the refrigerator! Marilyn Monroe couldn’t wait any longer. He stood up and went to press his flank against his mistress’s legs, just in case she might have forgotten the poor hungry dog in the house. And the mistress, who was a kind soul, not yet spoiled by a strict master, offered Marilyn a pair of sausage links right away. She watched thoughtfully as Marilyn gulped them down as noisily as ever, and then gave him another one. Marilyn tried to handle that one with a little more sophistication, out of respect for the lady, and then he went to wait meekly at the front door. And the mistress understood him. She unhooked the latch and let him out to run around.

  As Masha watched the dog forge a new path through the frosty yard, she wasn’t thinking about anything. She simply let her eyes absorb the fog outside the window, the dark mass of the hedges that separated their little cottage from the next one, and the absolute silence. All she could hear was Marilyn’s muffled tread over the freshly fallen, damp leaves, and the sound of his curious canine snout snuffling through the grass, crunchy with frost.