St. Petersburg Noir

by Julia Goumen

  Coming out of the dive, Farid the Muslim sinned against the Koran yet again. Instead of extending charity as he was supposed to according to the one of the five pillars of Islam, he chased off the beggar. He called it “checking his license.”

  Our multicultural duo sped over to a nine-story building that rose up just behind the shopping center. A few minutes later the G-Wagen screeched to a halt by the entrance, next to an ambulance with a sleeping driver in it. Farid turned off the engine; leaving an empty cop car with the engine running wasn’t advisable. There were always people willing to take it for a spin. This wasn’t Beverly Hills, after all. Better to let the inspector spin the hand crank one more time.

  I noticed a large warning sign on the moldy wall of the building:

  DON’T STAND UNDER THE BALCONY

  DUE TO THE DANGER OF IT COLLAPSING!

  Thanks to the residential supervisor for his concern. Next year the word “balcony” would have to be replaced with the word “wall.”

  We ducked into the entrance hall. It was so leaky and damp it seemed to be raining inside the building. I went up in the ramshackle elevator. Farid walked up to the fifth floor. They say that after a certain incident he had become “elevator shy.” Once, some big bosses decided to check on how one of the then-inspectors was dealing with a routine domestic violence call. The bosses were big in the literal sense too—two of them two-hundred-pounders at the very least. The inspector was also not given to shunning God’s bounty, judging by his amplitude. Plus Farid himself. The higher-ups didn’t want to walk all the way up to the last floor, so they all squeezed into the elevator together. The elevator up and ground to a halt halfway; it couldn’t cope with the load. To add insult to injury, not one of them was carrying a cell phone or a walkie-talkie. They called out to the residents for help. Like, “We’re police, we’re responding to a call, we’re stuck! Call the repair service!” “Ah, the pigs? Well, you got just what you deserve!” It’s no secret how ordinary citizens view us, in spite of the heroes on TV. Some of them even started jeering. “We’re going to rip off your car while you’re in there sweating!” Farid nearly had a stroke. They stood there in complete darkness between the fifth and sixth floors for nearly two hours, praying that the cable wouldn’t snap. Since then Farid refuses to set foot in an elevator, even in his own building. He takes the stairs, and only the stairs. Besides, it’s good for the heart.

  The apartment where the drama was being played out was a completely ordinary, no-frills, working-class affair. Two small rooms, a kitchenette, and a narrow hallway. The deceased was lying on a bed in the room closest to the entryway, where his wife and son had carried him. His wife—his widow, rather—wasn’t sobbing, as I would have expected. She sat silent at the head of the bed and stared at her husband. She was in shock.

  A paramedic filled us in. The wife and son had been watching TV, while the head of the family was in the kitchen eating. He was a construction worker and was grabbing a quick meal; the construction site was next door, and it was cheaper to eat at home. He was running late, and swallowed a dumpling whole, it seemed, without chewing it. When he was choking, trying to cough it up, he fell and broke a plate. When the wife and son ran into the kitchen, he was writhing on the floor, clutching at his throat. The son rushed to the telephone, the wife tried to extract the dumpling, but it was lodged there and wouldn’t budge. Asphyxiation. The paramedic had no doubts about the cause of death. An accident. He had removed the dumpling from the dead man himself.

  After leaving us their number, the paramedics rushed off on another call. I went into the kitchen. A broken plate on the floor, a few stray dumplings in the corners—those were the only traces of the incident. I would probably agree with the paramedic that it seemed impossible to contrive an accident like that, to “make it happen” on its own. And there was no reason to, either. I was young and inexperienced, of course, but just by looking at the wife I could state with certainty that homicide was out of the question.

  The son came into the kitchen: a kid, about sixteen, pale as a wall poster bleached by the sun. “I’ll clean it up now,” he said, nodding toward the shards.

  “Don’t do that. Go get the neighbors. We need two witnesses. And get your father’s ID too.”

  While he was trying to talk the neighbors into coming over, I called Evseyev and reported the situation.

  “Question the next of kin, and cough up a report for sending the body to the morgue,” the duty officer said. “And get back here on the double. More reports are about to start pouring in. I’ll send someone to pick up the body.”

  That was about what I had planned to do. Cough up a report and question the relatives, as they taught us in the training course.

  I went back into the hallway. Without entering the room, I asked the widow to help her son find the documents. The woman nodded and left. I stood in the doorway, unwilling to go in and be face-to-face with the dead man. Like I said, I wasn’t used to it. It’s one thing at a funeral, but another thing entirely in domestic circumstances. I wasn’t squeamish or suspicious, I didn’t believe in the living dead, but I couldn’t shake those zombie movies from my mind. Maybe I could just draw up the report right here in the doorway? I thought. It’s not a murder, after all. There’s no need to search for evidence or find fingerprints. Especially since they already moved the body from the kitchen into the room, disrupting the original circumstances of the incident. . .

  I peered at the dead man. He was clothed in the dark-green jacket that construction-site foremen usually wear. He must have really been in a hurry, since he didn’t bother to take it off while he was eating. Poor guy. The paramedic had wrapped a bandage around his head and jaw, like someone with a toothache. Suddenly I imagined that the fellow was about to sit up, take off the bandage, and smile, saying that it was all a joke and everyone was invited in to finish off the dumplings.

  “What’s holding you back?” Farid’s voice sounded somewhere behind me.

  “I’m just not used to it, that’s all.”

  “Aw, c’mon, he won’t bite.” He entered the room calmly and leaned over the builder’s face. “It’s as clear as day. He died all by himself. Nothing to be afraid of.”

  Sure. He won’t bite . . .

  The neighbors arrived: two old ladies. As you’d expect, both of them shaking their heads, “what-a-pity” and “woe-is-me.” I asked them to come into the room and observe the examination. I sat down on a stool by the head of the body and took out an official form. If this had been my hundredth case, I wouldn’t have been nervous. I could have filled the thing out with just my left hand in five minutes. But a debut is a debut, so the whole thing took about forty minutes. I didn’t want to show my inadequacy. Recalling the instructions they gave us during the course, I began describing the circumstances from the general to the specific, as clearly and legibly as possible, and without making any spelling errors. This wasn’t exactly easy. First, I’m no Leo Tolstoy, and second, a dead man lying right next to you doesn’t exactly inspire confidence. I couldn’t find the right words. I kept losing my train of thought, so I ended up describing the clothes the dead man was wearing twice. I had no time to do it over, and you weren’t allowed to cross things out, so I just left everything as it was. Farid checked in on me a few times and tried in annoyance to hurry me up. The old lady witnesses patiently carried out their duties as citizens, whispering about what a wonderful neighbor he had been, although sometimes he took a drop too much. I could have done with a little drink myself. Just a tad—for the confidence.

  When I was done with the report, I dismissed the neighbors and went into the other room to question the wife. That took another forty minutes. The woman was in a sort of stupor, understandably enough. She answered in monosyllables. After she signed the report without even reading it, new characters appeared on the scene.

  There were two of them. Both wore baseball caps and dark green canvas jackets that looked like firemen’s suits. The older one, who looked about f
orty, carried a roll of black plastic under his armpit. The second one, about ten years younger, was holding a folded stretcher like a spear. They looked like the Tin Man and the Scarecrow. A glitter in the eyes and a faint but familiar smell pointed to the presence of low levels of alcohol in their blood.

  “Hello, ma’am. We’re from the morgue,” the first one said. “We’re here for the deceased.”

  The widow nodded.

  “May we take it?” This question was addressed to me.

  “Yes, we’re all done here.”

  “Where is he?”

  “The next room.”

  The two turned around and disappeared into the hallway, where Farid’s voice could be heard.

  “You’re fast today.”

  “Yeah, it’s the third stiff since morning. They’re dropping like flies.”

  While they were attending to the body of the builder, I explained the formalities of ordering a funeral to the widow, although I didn’t actually know a thing about it. Then I drafted a cover letter for an autopsy and took it to the orderlies. They were already carrying the body out. They had tied an oilskin tag with a number on it to the wrist, and for some reason had removed the bandage around the jaw. It was a sorry sight. The widow stayed behind in the room, probably afraid she would break down. The son held the door.

  Farid asked them to tow-start our G-Wagen. They agreed. After they had carried the dead body out onto the landing, they returned to the apartment and called the widow.

  “Our condolences, ma’am,” the older one said, removing his baseball cap and smoothing down his unwashed hair. “Maybe we should drink to his memory? Just a shot or two? So that everything will go smoothly, like it should. So we’ll be able to deliver the body safely and all that... ”

  The widow nodded again in silence and went out to the kitchen. The orderlies followed behind. We stayed in the hallway.

  “Won’t you have some?” she said, poking her head out.

  “No,” Farid answered. “We’re on the job.”

  Then he whispered to me that I shouldn’t get drawn into such things, even though I wasn’t planning on it anyway. We said goodbye to the widow and her son, expressing our condolences again, and went downstairs. The weather had deteriorated even further and reminded me of someone in a critical stage of fever. The death throes were about to begin. We got into the jeep and waited for the Tin Man and Scarecrow. Their black van with a yellow stripe was a more reliable means of starting the engine than the elbow grease of a young police inspector. It was worth waiting for. Evseyev wouldn’t miss us.

  The orderlies didn’t waste much time at the spontaneous memorial service. Five minutes later they brought out the builder and loaded him in the corpse-mobile. The alcohol content in their blood had increased significantly, but the fellows weren’t in the least worried or ashamed about it. It wasn’t likely that the traffic police would stop their particular vehicle.

  While we were preparing the tow rope, the tall one informed his partner that they had one more client to pick up in the neighborhood, and they wouldn’t go to the morgue just yet. They would pick them all up and deliver them wholesale. This would be easier and more economical. Apparently, their gasoline supply was intermittent, like ours.

  On the way back I dreamed about the warm rec room, a cup of hot tea, and a game of backgammon with Farid. But I had to bury my dreams. That evil Evseyev, apparently frustrated in his attempts to construct the naked minor on the computer screen, was waiting at the door with another body for us. In the park a dead fellow with no signs of violent death was sitting on a bench, scaring the passersby. Probably a junkie. Probably OD’d. Onward, gentlemen—on with the inspection and the report. If anything looks suspicious, call the operative.

  Thank god Mister Driver hadn’t stopped the engine, so I didn’t have to expend my valuable muscle power. I shouldn’t have to waste it on things like that anyway. There was not a single line in my job description that said that a police inspector is required to start up the official vehicle manually. Then again, I wasn’t going to get very far in my brown shoes.

  There didn’t seem to be any foul play here, either. Nothing criminal anyway. The experienced Farid recognized the poor guy immediately. A local junkie with an unhappy personal life who had been shooting up for three years. The doctor confirmed it was an overdose. A dirty syringe was lying in the grass nearby. It was unlikely that someone had shot up his buddy. Not that sort of a guy. It was self-liquidation.

  While I was sitting in our G-Wagen kozel drawing up the second inspection protocol of the day (which went a lot more smoothly than the first), a familiar black van with a yellow stripe pulled up. Long time no see!

  “They’re sure prompt today,” Farid remarked. “Sometimes you wait for six hours, and the stiff just lies there on the ground getting soaked in the rain. Though it’s all the same to him at that point.”

  The Tin Man managed to stay on his feet without any help, but the Scarecrow had to support himself with the stretcher. I wasn’t judging the guys. Theirs was a unique profession, unpleasant; you needed a way to reduce the tension or you wouldn’t make it. And it had been a hard day. One memorial service after another. That’s probably why they didn’t recognize us right away. Once they did, they started griping.

  “They’re keeling over left and right! Dropping like flies. We didn’t even get a lunch break. What do you have for us now?”

  We pointed to the body. Scarecrow dropped the stretcher in front of the bench, sat down beside the junkie, and lit up a cigarette. The seat was uncomfortable, and while his partner was tying on the tag, he leaned over to rest on the shoulder of his dead companion on the bench. He was zonked. Picking up the dead was nothing like beating the odds to get to the Emerald City.

  When the tag had been fastened, the orderlies—cigarettes still hanging from their lips—loaded the junkie onto the stretcher and hauled it over to the van. We’re off to see the Wizard, the wonderful Wizard of Oz…Their movements were hardly light and agile, but they did manage to bundle the body into the back of the van, where it took its place among its brothers in misfortune.

  “Back to the Corpse Motel, Valek?” Scarecrow asked his older partner, who apparently carried the weight in their symbiosis.

  “Not yet. Palich will bust us. He’ll know we’re drunk and open his big mouth. By nine he’ll be outta there and we can go back. We can say the battery went dead. Jump in, we’ll go grab some dinner and call to find out if there are any more runs to make.”

  “Whatever you say.”

  Apparently, as supervisor of the morgue, Palich commanded the respect of the personnel.

  When I handed Valek a copy of the death-scene report and the cover letter, I tried peering into the back of the van. There was nothing to see, though. The front seat was screened off from the back by a thick black cloth. It was just as well. What’s the point of knowing what’s in store for you? I hoped it was a long time before I’d find out.

  Valek got behind the wheel, turned the ignition, and the van waddled slowly off down the narrow park road.

  “I have a feeling that’s not the last time we’ll be seeing them today,” Driver said, his eyes following the van.

  “Who knows? Today may be the thirteenth, but it’s not Friday. It’s Tuesday.”

  “All the same, it’s the thirteenth.”

  On the way back, we swung by the shopping center to pick up a drunk from the cop stationed there, at the request of Evseyev, who had called us on the walkie-talkie. The drunk turned out to be that same beggar as before. The breadwinning megaphone was fastened around his neck with a sturdy chain, so no one could take it from him. The beggar didn’t put up any resistance. It was all the same to him. Unlike ours, his shift was over.

  I don’t know whether Evseyev ever finished the game of erotic Tetris, but Farid and I didn’t get to battle it out over backgammon that night. Reports rained down on us thick and fast. There were family dramas, complaints about noisy neighbors, drunken br
awls with the use of sharp objects or cutting implements. There was even a runaway—or a crawlaway—of a six-foot-long boa constrictor, from the apartment of a rich eccentric. Naturally, we didn’t go after it; we sent the owner to EMERCOM.

  I just kept on trucking, and, in contrast to my experienced partner, didn’t whine, driven by my sense of duty and the dream of moving away from my parents and into my own apartment. The whole time I was counting the hours to midnight, when the thirteenth would give way to a more auspicious date on the monthly calendar.

  But the dark powers wouldn’t give up. They’re not called dark powers for nothing. They delivered their final blow just five minutes before the finish line. Evseyev, their trusty messenger, breezed into the rec room just when we were arranging the pieces on the board.

  “Quit loafing, you two—we’ve got another stiff.”

  “Aw, gimme a break! This day can go shove it!” Farid said. “Let us play at least one game!”