by R. N. Morris
The two actors stood frozen to the spot. No one knew what to do next or how to interpret what had happened.
Maria could not get out of her mind the image of Aglaia’s eyes at the moment before her collapse. There was something so raw, so intimate, something almost obscene in that exposure, that she knew it could not be an act.
‘Help her! Somebody help her!’ She was on her feet again. Her words released the two actors from their suspended state. They rushed to Aglaia Filippovna. Unable to rouse her, one called for a doctor while the other communicated urgently with stagehands. The curtains came together and the painted screen descended.
The audience broke into uproar.
6
White camellias, a red thread, and seven rings
Porfiry Petrovich looked down at the body of the young woman. She was frozen in an angular pose. Her arms retained the tension with which they had been lashing out at the last moment, acutely bent at the elbows and wrists, fingers splayed to grasp life as it leeched from her. Her head was sharply skewed to one side, as if in the throes of angry denial. She lay half on her side, her body cork-screwed. It seemed she had died writhing to lift herself out of the swamp of blood that encircled her.
As always in these circumstances, Porfiry’s gaze was drawn to the wound. Of course, his interest was professional, but it occurred to him that his choice of profession might have been influenced by a need to confront such sights. Or perhaps it was a profoundly human compulsion, little more than the vulgar urge to gawp at the scene of an overturned carriage. He had merely elevated morbid curiosity into a calling. The morose cast of his musings could be excused by the fact that he had been wrenched from uneasy dreams of his father by the frantic hammering of police officers sent to rouse him. Usually when he dreamt of his parents, the mood of the dream was joyful. These were dreams of reunion that he did not want to end. The simpler familial relationships of childhood were restored and there was only love between them. Whatever complications there had been in life were blissfully forgotten. But this night’s dreams were shot through with an obscure sense of guilt that he couldn’t shake off, but was reluctant to probe.
Undoubtedly, Zakhar’s death had something to do with it.
It was almost as if he took solace in the wound.
It was a deep, neat incision across the full breadth of her throat. The pumping force of life had burst through it, pushing the severed flesh apart. The front of her dress was sodden, the black silk heavily darkened in a sweeping arc that extended below her midriff. Her blood drenched the Turkish rug on which she lay, obscuring the rich reds with its muddy cast. Porfiry saw the wound as a second mouth, its inert lips slightly parted as if it were trying to tell him something. But it spoke only blood.
The body was in a small, windowless room in the basement of Naryskin Palace, close enough to the tiny theatre to serve as a dressing room. Three narrow, elaborately moulded doors on one wall gave onto a wardrobe, which Porfiry had already discovered to be hung with dusty clothes. As far as he could tell from a cursory examination, they were male clothes. The room was furnished with a dressing table, which was cluttered with the accoutrements of stage make-up. Next to it was a small table bearing a wash basin and jug. The water appeared fresh and unused. There were a number of burning candles on both surfaces, adding to the light provided by a hissing gas lamp mounted on one wall. There were two mirrors: one over the dressing table, and another, full length and gilt framed, mounted on the wall opposite the wardrobe. An embroidered screen closed off one corner of the room, with a small sofa placed in front of it. All this was enough to give the room a cramped air.
A bouquet of white camellias, still in the florist’s wrapping, lay on the sofa. The card read: ‘I will always love you, M.’
His gaze still fixed on the wound, Porfiry breathed in deeply. The air was perfumed, though the flowers of course gave off no scent. But Porfiry could discern the smell of the butcher’s slab, the dark odour unstoppered by violence.
The door opened but he did not look round. He knew by the other’s patience that it was Virginsky.
‘It is a long time since those were fashionable,’ said Porfiry, at last looking up from the dead girl. In answer to Virginsky’s quizzically gathered brows, he gestured vaguely at the flowers. ‘Who is M, I wonder?’
‘An officer of the Preobrazhensky Regiment, by the name of Mizinchikov, was seen to have an argument with the dead woman – Yelena Filippovna Polenova. She slapped his face. Several witnesses saw him running away from this room shortly after the dead woman’s sister, Aglaia Filippovna Polenova, raised the alarm. All the witnesses testified independently to the fact that Mizinchikov’s uniform was spattered with blood.’
‘Spattered?’
‘Yes.’
‘That is the word they all used? Independently?’
‘Not necessarily. I am providing you with a digest. You may read the witness statements in full, of course.’
‘And what does … this officer Mizinchikov have to say for himself?’
‘Captain Mizinchikov is not available to be interviewed.’
At this unsurprising information, Porfiry raised his eyebrows showily and blinked his consternation. ‘I understood that the owner of the house – Prince Naryskin, is it not? – had the doors of the palace secured to prevent anyone from leaving before the police arrived.’
‘It seems that Captain Mizinchikov had already effected his escape.’
Porfiry sighed. ‘That is very tiresome of him and will not help his cause when finally we catch up with him. I trust we have put out a description of him. Exceptionally tall, dark-haired, bearded, not particularly good-looking …’
‘How did you know?’ Virginsky’s tone was suspicious rather than amazed.
‘You did say he was an officer of the Preobrazhensky Regiment?’
‘Yes.’
‘Have you not observed the practice amongst Russian Guards regiments of selecting recruits according to certain physical attributes? The Semyenovsky Regiment, for example, is known for fair hair and good looks. Whilst the men and officers of the Preobrazhensky tend to be exceptionally tall and dark-haired individuals with beards. I believe they are generally held to be the least handsome of the regiments, by those who notice such things.’
‘I see. I had never noticed. I am not much interested in military affairs.’
‘You should be, Pavel Pavlovich. There are sixty thousand soldiers garrisoned in St Petersburg, making every tenth inhabitant a soldier. If one takes an interest in St Petersburg – as our work demands we must – one must therefore take an interest in military affairs. A passing knowledge of the city’s regiments will aid you considerably in your duties. I presume you have dispatched some men to Kirochnaya, 35. That is his address, is it not?’
‘So I have been informed.’ There was a flinch of annoyance from Virginsky.
‘Naturally. It is the address of the Officers’ House of the Preobrazhensky. Of course, he won’t be there. Even so, I imagine we will at least find some of his fellow officers, who may or may not be able to shed light on his whereabouts.’
Porfiry was peering into the large mirror with his head angled back, evidently to allow himself the best possible view of the interior of his nostrils. ‘I wonder who else the prince has allowed to absent themselves.’ Porfiry was now tentatively fingering a row of transparent whiskers growing out of the top of one ear. ‘When a man reaches a certain age he finds himself faced with an abundance of hair in places he had not expected it.’ He angled his head down to examine the pale stubble that covered his bulbous skull, and pursed his lips in satisfaction. ‘And a dearth of hair in those places he might reasonably hope for it.’
‘I did not take you for a man too much concerned with his own appearance, Porfiry Petrovich,’ remarked Virginsky with a sly smile.
‘Oh, it is not on my own account, you understand,’ threw out Porfiry casually, bending forward to scrutinise something on the surface of the mirror.
> ‘Not on your own account? Do you mean to say—?’
‘I wonder what that is,’ murmured Porfiry absently, before turning his back on his own reflection. Virginsky took his superior’s place before the mirror and frowned as he scanned its surface, looking for whatever had caught Porfiry’s eye.
‘What do you think he meant by it?’ said Porfiry, opening one of the wardrobe doors. The sight of the discarded clothes, still exactly as before, reminded him that he had already looked inside. He sniffed the air in the wardrobe suspiciously, then closed the door and prowled the room like a caged animal.
‘Who? By what?’ Virginsky reluctantly gave up his examination of the mirror to keep a watchful eye on Porfiry.
‘M. By giving her camellias. White camellias.’
‘Some ladies like white, others prefer red.’
‘There is a special significance to the red ones, I believe.’
‘Yes, but that is a signal for the ladies to give to their admirers.’
Virginsky’s remark drew Porfiry up sharply. He looked down at the card. ‘Brilliant, Pavel Pavlovich. Quite brilliant.’
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘Could not the card equally be read as being addressed to M, as from him? Could it not be her protestation of undying love to him?’
‘Possibly.’
‘As well as an advertisement of her sexual availability. Ironic, is it not? She announced herself free from menstrual blood, only to be drenched in fatal blood.’ Porfiry caught a knot of uncertainty tightening Virginsky’s brows. ‘You’re not convinced? But it was your idea.’
‘I cannot honestly take credit for it.’
‘The original dame aux camelias was a prostitute, was she not?’
‘A courtesan.’
‘A high-class prostitute. But a prostitute nonetheless. Perhaps that was the significance of the flowers, if they were as we originally thought, a gift from M to her: you are a whore but I will always love you.’
‘You think the flowers are important?’
‘I think the flowers are here. In the same room as a dead girl. What was she? Some kind of actress?’
‘No, not really. This was an amateur affair.’ Virginsky paused a moment before going on with uncharacteristic diffidence: ‘Porfiry Petrovich … Maria Petrovna is here.’
‘Maria Petrovna? The charming young lady whom I met yesterday?’
‘Yes.’
‘What a remarkable coincidence.’
‘I do not like to hear you say that, Porfiry Petrovich. I know you do not believe in coincidence.’
Porfiry said nothing.
‘However, it is not so strange,’ Virginsky went on. ‘This evening was organised as a benefit gala for her school.’
‘I see.’
‘Prince Naryskin – the Naryskin family – is one of those connections she has made through her father.’
‘And what of Yelena Filippovna?’
‘What of her?’
‘Did Maria Petrovna know her?’
‘Yes. I believe so. They were at school together. At the Sm—’
‘Smolny Institute,’ finished Porfiry. ‘How very interesting.’
‘You do not think Maria Petrovna had anything to do with this?’
‘Do I not?’ Porfiry Petrovich met Virginsky’s anxious expression with a bland face and much blinking.
‘Will you wish to speak to her?’
‘I hope that I will have that pleasure before too long.’
‘She is very tired. She has already given a full statement to me.’
Porfiry Petrovich gave no answer to this, or none that Virginsky could understand. He merely rubbed the tops of both ears now with the tips of his index fingers while staring blankly into his junior colleague’s face.
*
Pavel Pavlovich Virginsky knew better than to press the point. He had been working with Porfiry Petrovich for a little over two years now and had become as skilled at divining his superior’s moods as at executing any of his more formal duties as a junior investigating magistrate. He knew that Porfiry Petrovich’s famous capriciousness was an essential part of the mysterious process by which he solved his cases. To attempt to curtail his eccentricity would be futile; as inconceivable as forbidding Porfiry his cigarettes. Certainly it was infuriating, as a colleague, to be on the receiving end of the old man’s puckish behaviour. He really ought to be able to confine such tricks to his dealings with suspects and, at a pinch, witnesses; regrettably he was not. At first it had amazed Virginsky how willing others in the department, including otherwise hardline police officers, were to tolerate Porfiry’s individualism, which, he had noticed, had become more extreme over time. Perhaps there were those who were only waiting for the celebrated investigator to fail. And then all the resentments that had built up over the years, the procedural irregularities, the wounded dignities, the nurtured humiliations, not to mention the ill-judged pranks – all this would be remembered and used against him. His downfall would be swift and irrevocable, Virginsky feared. Everything was permitted, or certainly a lot was overlooked, so long as Porfiry’s record as an investigator remained impeccable. Virginsky wondered how many failures it would take before the tide turned against him and the chorus of his enemies was heard to cry: ‘You have gone too far this time, Porfiry Petrovich.’
Virginsky watched as the subject of his thoughts with a loud groan lowered his rotund form into a squat beside the dead woman.
‘I’m getting too old for this, Pavel Pavlovich.’
Virginsky was startled by the pronouncement, which seemed uncannily in tune with what he had been thinking.
Porfiry grunted as he re-arranged his legs. The difficulty of the manoeuvre provoked a fit of giggles which, given the proximity of a corpse, struck Virginsky as shockingly inappropriate.
‘Yes, this is not the occupation for an old man.’
‘You are not old, Porfiry Petrovich.’
‘Nonsense. I am old. And getting older. I am staring retirement in the face. Perhaps I should get out sooner rather than later, while my reputation is still intact. Why, whatever is the matter, Pavel Pavlovich?’
‘It is nothing … I … I was only wondering … How do you do it, Porfiry Petrovich?’
‘How do I do what?’
‘It seems almost, sometimes, as though you are able to read minds.’
‘So you were thinking that I am over the hill?’
‘No, not exactly. I was thinking that you have had a long and singularly successful career as an investigator.’
‘Diplomatically put, but it amounts to the same thing. I am yesterday’s man. While you are tomorrow’s. Besides, I have had my share of failure, although I do not look upon it as such. Even failure serves a purpose. We learn from it.’ Porfiry Petrovich bent over the dead woman, almost pressing his face into the gash at her throat. ‘Damn these tired eyes. Look at me. I have to get so close to see in focus. Of course in so doing I block out the light.’
‘Perhaps you should consider spectacles.’
‘I am not a vain man, Pavel Pavlovich. However, I do not think that spectacles will create the right impression.’
‘But surely it is more a question of practicality than image?’
‘In this occupation, the two are more closely related than you imagine.’ Porfiry was now engaged in moving his head along the dead woman’s torso, rocking side to side from his pelvis in a mechanical linear motion.
‘What about a magnifying glass?’
‘I prefer to have nothing between my eye and the object I am observing. The curvature of a lens distorts reality. The surface distracts us with its glints and motes. Ah, now, when one is looking with the naked eye, however old and defective, one finds things like this!’ Porfiry pinched at the dead woman’s dress and lifted his hand away. Virginsky could see a fine trail of red drawn trembling through the air.
‘What is it?’
‘A thread, I believe. A red silk thread.’
‘How did it get t
here?’
‘You have an undoubted talent, Pavel Pavlovich, for asking the pertinent question.’ Porfiry sat upright and held the thread high. It was now completely detached from the body. ‘Tell me, did you discover anything interesting about the mirror?’
‘There are a number of smears on it.’
‘What number?’
‘Four.’
‘Thank you. Four smears. I appreciate your precision.’
After a moment’s thought, Virginsky added: ‘They are red. Most likely blood, I should imagine.’
‘Most likely?’
‘It seems a not unreasonable supposition.’
‘And what conclusion do you draw from this not unreasonable supposition?’
‘That someone has wiped the mirror …’
‘Go on.’
‘Clean of blood.’
‘Yes. It would appear so, if your not unreasonable supposition proves to be correct. Wiped clean. With what, I wonder?’
Virginsky looked around sharply.
‘Perhaps in the wardrobe?’ suggested Porfiry. ‘I thought I smelled something in there.’
Virginsky opened the first of the wardrobe doors. He thrust a hand into the hanging garments to part them, moving them along the rail one by one. Next he groped along the bottom of the wardrobe. He repeated the procedure through the other two doors. His movements were brisk and eager, as if he believed the energy of his search would be enough to produce what he was looking for.
In the base of the wardrobe were two large drawers. The first drawer was stiff and came out slowly. It appeared to be empty. When it was extended half way, Virginsky reached inside and ran his hand along every surface, probing the corners with his fingers.
‘Empty,’ he confirmed, pushing the drawer in with difficulty.
The second drawer had a smoother action, and came out without any resistance. It contained several items of pressed linen.
