A Razor Wrapped in Silk

by R. N. Morris

  What emerged was the story of a love affair, or rather a story of desire, seduction, manipulation, disillusionment and rejection. It was hard to tell whether there was love involved, on either side. On the side of the party who had no voice in the narrative, Mizinchikov, his love could only be inferred, along with the pain he must have suffered, and his brief, rare, but surely intense, moments of joy. Was there ever a moment in the story when Yelena Filippovna had loved him? Certainly she seemed to profess it on occasion, though in a careless or even conflicted way.

  If I do not proclaim my love for you in every line that I write – as I know you would have me – it is not because I do not love you, but rather because I naturally baulk at such a tedious task. I am a grown woman. You must believe that I love you, as much as I am able to love any man.

  To the besotted Mizinchikov, ‘you must believe’ might have read as a passionate entreaty. To Porfiry’s objective eye, it had about it a little too much of a command. Similarly, the qualification ‘as much as I am able’ could be taken two ways: it could be joyously expansive, an indication that her love for Mizinchikov was bounded only by her capacity to love, which after all might be infinite; or, far more likely, it was an admission that she was incapable of loving any man, including him.

  In the earlier correspondence, she certainly held out the possibility of loving him, though her preferred tone, after the first few highly formal letters, was flirtatious. She was more comfortable promising physical intimacy than emotional equivalence. Porfiry identified the point at which their relationship was consummated. A letter dated the twenty-eighth of July spoke of the heights of ecstasy to which he had taken her. It also spoke of Mizinchikov’s ‘skilful swordplay’. She declared that she eagerly awaited being ‘sweetly stabbed’ by him again. No doubt such passages gratified his male pride. No doubt they were intended to.

  Soon after, her letters began to talk of their engagement and something approaching a sense of hope entered her tone. I look forward to the day when you and I will be one in law and before God, and this time of tribulations will be at an end. At times, however, a note of resignation could be detected. We deserve one another. There is no one else for each of us. And so we must learn to be content with one another. Perhaps the fire of passion does not burn as it once did. What of it? I cannot live my life in a conflagration.

  But later in the same letter, she reproached him for his want of feeling. You do not love me any more, admit it. Admit it so that we may be free of one another. Is that not what you want? And a few lines later: Forgive me. I am a foolish woman. I know you love me. I have never doubted that.

  Then came the final letter, in which she suddenly and irrevocably put the matter beyond either hope or doubt. I have never loved you, she had written, along with the barely mitigating proviso: any more than I have loved any man.

  Something had brought a new clarity to her understanding of her feelings. Something that Mizinchikov had done. You may also consider that you have brought this on yourself. How could I love you now?

  ‘What did he do?’ wondered Porfiry, as he laid the last letter down on his desk, his eyes fixed on her words. ‘What was this shameful act that sullied him and insulted her?’ After a moment’s silent reflection, he turned to Virginsky, who made no attempt to provide an answer.

  Porfiry lit a cigarette. ‘I begin now to understand the razor.’

  ‘You do?’

  ‘I do.’

  ‘Then could you explain it to me?’

  ‘As I have said, this razor is not the murder weapon. No, it is the tangible symbol of a possibility, perhaps of an intention. Or perhaps, by keeping this razor next to her letters, he was in fact, in some way, preventing himself from killing her. It was a kind of talisman to him. As long as he kept the razor in the drawer, she was safe. But if he took it out, he knew he would kill her.’

  ‘This is proof of premeditation.’

  ‘Go on,’ encouraged Porfiry.

  ‘He put the razor next to the letters at the precise moment when he decided to kill her,’ Virginsky ventured. ‘And of course, he had another razor with which he committed the actual crime.’

  ‘Why did he want her dead, though? Because she had jilted him?’

  ‘It would appear so.’

  ‘If he couldn’t have her, no one could. Let alone the absurd Naryskin.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘A crime of passion?’ Porfiry put the question with narrowed eyes.

  ‘I do not believe you can call it that. A crime of passion, as I understand it, is a crime committed in a sudden rage. The result of an intense and overwhelming emotional upheaval. There must be no opportunity for reconsidering or turning back. If the letters provoked Mizinchikov to murder, he had ample time to reflect as he travelled to the Naryskin Palace. This was not done in the heat of the moment. As we have discussed, the presence of the razor in the drawer, next to her letters, indicates a certain degree of premeditation. “This is what I will use against the woman who has rejected me” – that is what it says. We must assume that he went there armed with his second razor, fully intending to use it. And that he bided his time until he had the opportunity to put his plan into action.’

  ‘But is it not possible,’ countered Porfiry, ‘when an individual is overtaken by such a destructive passion, that “the moment” may last for some considerable time, its heat maintained for hours, days even? If we do not call it a crime of passion, we may talk of diminished responsibility. They act without reason, without planning, without strategy. They are compelled. A force more powerful than them takes them over. And while they are in the grip of this compulsive force, they can think of nothing else. It is hardly a question of thought. They become the act itself. All their will, emotion, energy – their very soul, in short, is channelled into one moment, one fatal transgression. Certainly they do not think beyond the execution of the act. And once they have crossed over from intent to execution, once they have made the transgression, and they find themselves standing in the aftermath of their crime, they are to a large extent baffled, lost – even bereft. For not only have they been deprived of the compulsion that gave shape and purpose to their existence, but also they have lost the person they once loved more than any other. Put simply, they have no reason to live any more. Can we wonder that such criminals often go on to take their own lives, or passively surrender to their fate? They have nothing else to live for.’

  ‘I do not dispute your construction of his mental state,’ conceded Virginsky. ‘Although it occurs to me that we are both forgetting Prince Sergei’s testimony, that Yelena Filippovna wanted to die and indeed solicited her own death.’

  ‘Then how are we to explain the mirror?’ asked Porfiry, suddenly dismayed.

  ‘The mirror?’

  ‘Someone cleaned the mirror.’ Once again, Porfiry drew the shape of a large M in the air. ‘Why did he go to such trouble to cover his tracks? What did it matter to him? Indeed, how could he have mustered the required presence of mind?’

  ‘Yes, I see.’ Virginsky nodded thoughtfully. ‘By your account, he should have simply waited for the police – or killed himself on the spot.’

  ‘What if Captain Mizinchikov is in fact innocent? Then perhaps his flight can be adequately explained by panic. He was fleeing the prospect of a false accusation. An unwise and regrettable decision on his part, but that I suppose is the nature of panic. Tell me, Pavel Pavlovich, did you notice any blood on the floor beneath the mirror?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Neither did I. However, it is reasonable to assume that the liquid soaking her dress and the rug beneath her body was blood. Logic therefore suggests that she was killed where she lay. Which means that she cannot also have been killed in front of the mirror. Assuming the smears on the mirror are blood, how did they get there?’

  Porfiry lapsed into silent thought, as though unable to answer the question he himself had posed.

  Virginsky seemed hesitant to break the silence. He offered his expla
nation tentatively: ‘The murderer placed a bloody hand on the mirror … and then, noticing the mark it left, attempted to wipe it clean – perhaps with the sleeve of his tunic? That would explain why we were not able to find a blood-soaked cloth, and why no one was seen carrying one away from the room.’

  Porfiry seemed enlivened by the suggestion. He nodded in excited approval. ‘Having committed this terrible deed, he felt compelled to confront himself. Looking into his own eyes and seeing for the first time the eyes of a murderer, he is overcome by an unbearable horror. His legs buckle and he falls forward, reaching out a hand to hold himself up.’ Porfiry mimed the action he described, his eyes wide with vicarious horror. He suddenly frowned in dissatisfaction. ‘But why bother to wipe clean the relatively small amount of blood on the mirror, when there is copious blood on the rug, about which he can do nothing?’

  ‘Because the blood on the mirror appears to him as a sign of his guilt. It is his hand that has left the mark.’

  ‘And if the murderer is indeed Mizinchikov, he subconsciously signals his guilt …’ Porfiry described the letter M with one hand. ‘Whilst his conscious mind attempts to eradicate all trace of it. Yes, I find your theory very interesting, Pavel Pavlovich. It is at least psychologically coherent.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘It is vital that we find Captain Mizinchikov. Vital for him, I mean. If our reconstruction of events is correct, his soul must be burdened by this terrible crime. More than burdened – tortured. His soul is in conflict with itself. We must give him the opportunity to confess. We must arrest him for his own salvation. I fear what he may be driven to, left alone with his guilt.’

  ‘He must know that we are looking for him,’ observed Virginsky.

  ‘Yes, and a man in a blood-spattered dress uniform will be conspicuous. The first thing he will try to do is change his clothes. He had an opportunity to do so at the Naryskin Palace. You noticed the clothes in the wardrobe?’

  ‘Yes, but he may not have realised they were there.’

  ‘Indeed. Perhaps, however, we should postpone further speculations until we have a clearer idea what the substance on the mirror is. Has Dr Pervoyedov been alerted?’

  ‘I understand that he wished to visit the scene of the crime. There is every chance that he is there now.’

  ‘Then let us join him,’ said Porfiry, slapping both palms decisively on his desk as he rose. ‘While we are at it, we shall pay a visit on the invalid, Aglaia Filippovna, thus killing two hares with one shot.’ He gave Virginsky a challenging look, as if to say, Does your Oblomov kill two hares with one shot?

  13

  Sanguinary expectations

  A fine white mist rose off the Yekaterininsky Canal, as if it were generating obscurity. The vague silhouette of some vehicle, rattling over Kokushkin Bridge without lights, came towards them at speed. It turned out to be an empty drozhki, which Virginsky hailed at the last moment, almost as it was upon them. The driver stood swearing as he reined in his horse. Porfiry Petrovich almost threw himself into the frail cab, which shook under his weight. As always in a drozhki, it was a tight squeeze for the two men, and they sat with Porfiry’s arm around Virginsky back.

  ‘Will you wish to interview the Tsarevich?’ asked Virginsky, once the horse had settled into its stride.

  ‘Why should I?’

  ‘Because he was at the Naryskin Palace last night.’

  ‘Was he? I thought Prince Naryskin said otherwise.’

  ‘You did not believe him?’

  ‘The powerful create their own truth, which they are able to impose on the rest of us. It is left to us to adapt our truth to theirs.’

  ‘You cannot be serious, Porfiry Petrovich!’

  ‘I would expect that the Tsarevich has by now left Petersburg. Whilst I am perfectly at liberty to request his return, only the Tsar may command it. Before I petition the Tsar, let us first find Mizinchikov. Let us also speak to Aglaia Filippovna, if we are able.If those enquiries prove fruitless, then we reserve the right to extend our investigation to include ministers of state and, indeed, heirs to the imperial throne.’

  ‘Are you not concerned that you are shaping your investigation around the rank of your witnesses?’

  ‘No, though thank you for voicing that concern. I feel confident that if the Tsarevich had any information to impart concerning the death of Yelena Filippovna, he would have wasted no time in coming forward to volunteer it.’

  Virginsky gave a half smile. ‘And yet last night you rebuked Prince Naryskin for allowing him and Count Tolstoy to leave.’

  ‘Did I? I don’t remember.’ Porfiry let his head loll back and closed his eyes. ‘There is nothing quite like riding through the mist in an open drozhki, do you not think?’

  But Virginsky did not answer.

  *

  At the Naryskin Palace, Dr Pervoyedov stared into the dressing room mirror with a fixed frown, as though dismayed by his own reflection. And well he might be: his hair stood up in untameable clumps and his plaid overcoat had clearly seen better days. No doubt it was the overcoat of a busy man, but that consideration did not mitigate the obscure horror it inspired in all decent people. His face was bland and unprepossessing, distinguished only by the flush of high colour that often occupied it, the result of Dr Pervoyedov’s unfortunate propensity for tardiness, which he sought to rectify by constantly rushing between appointments. It might be said against him that he had two great faults. The first was that of taking on too many duties; the second, that of fulfilling them too conscientiously. Narcissism, however, was clearly not one of Dr Pervoyedov’s faults, and so Porfiry Petrovich thought it was reasonable to assume that something other than his mirror image had caught his eye.

  ‘So, you have found the smears, Dr Pervoyedov!’

  ‘Yes indeed, Porfiry Petrovich,’ said Dr Pervoyedov, addressing himself to the magistrate’s reflection. ‘Yes indeed.’

  ‘And what do you think they are?’

  ‘Goodness, Porfiry Petrovich! What can you mean by such a question? Are you asking me to hazard a guess?’

  ‘I would not dream of it.’

  ‘I am glad to hear it. Ve-ery glad to hear it.’

  ‘We – that is to say, Pavel Pavlovich and I – wondered if it might not be blood.’

  ‘That does not surprise me, Porfiry Petrovich. The nature of your work must encourage such sanguinary expectations.’

  ‘And your work does not?’

  A good humoured smile kinked Dr Pervoyedov’s face in the mirror. ‘I make a point of suppressing expectations of any kind. Expectations are not consistent with a scientific outlook.’

  ‘A scientist is as capable of entertaining expectations as the next man. He merely calls them by different names.’

  ‘Is that so?’

  ‘Theories. Hypotheses. What are they if not expectations?’

  ‘But we always put them to the test.’

  ‘Good. That is what I want you to do with our … what was it you called them?’

  ‘Sanguinary expectations.’

  ‘Are you able to confirm whether the substance smeared on the mirror is blood or not?’

  ‘Not simply by looking at it, Porfiry Petrovich. There is, as far as I know, only one reliable test for the presence of blood – spectral analysis, as described by Sorby. You may know that it was used successfully in the Briggs murder case in London some years ago.’

  ‘I had read about it in one of my journals. I would not have asked you to do it, if I did not think it possible.’

  ‘Really? That is very considerate of you, I must say. Very considerate indeed. I will need to collect a sample and take it back to my laboratory.’

  ‘Are you able to do that now?’

  ‘If you wish.’ Dr Pervoyedov retrieved a scalpel and a circle of filter paper from his bag. He folded the paper to form a cone, which he held close to the mirror, beneath a section of one of the smears. ‘The substance, whatever it is, has dried.’

  ‘That is co
nsistent with the behaviour of blood upon oxidisation, is it not?’ asked Porfiry.

  Dr Pervoyedov gave no more than an ambiguous smile in answer to this.

  ‘So tell me, Dr Pervoyedov, what do you make of our cadaver?’

  Dr Pervoyedov turned from the mirror to consider Yelena Filippovna. ‘She is a beauty. Or rather, was.’

  ‘Is such an opinion consistent with the scientific outlook?’

  ‘I dare say not. Will I be required to conduct an autopsy?’

  ‘I have yet to discuss the case with the prokuror. As you know, it will be his decision. In the meantime, I suggest we arrange for the body to be removed to the Obukhovsky Hospital morgue. Would that suit you?’

  ‘Very much so.’

  ‘I would also ask you to conduct your spectral test on a substance I detected on one of her rings. The large ruby ring on her right hand, the one turned inward. I have sanguinary expectations regarding it.’

  ‘It would be my pleasure.’

  ‘Now, Pavel Pavlovich, shall we visit the invalid? Perhaps it would interest you to accompany us, Dr Pervoyedov?’

  ‘What is this?’

  ‘Aglaia Filippovna, the dead woman’s sister,’ supplied Virginsky. ‘She succumbed to a nervous attack last night, which has rendered her unconscious. She revived briefly this morning, but according to the physician attending her, she has sunk into a coma. She is here at the palace.’

  ‘And how do you expect to interview a patient in a coma, Porfiry Petrovich?’

  ‘She may come round. In the meantime, I have some questions I would like to ask her doctor. Your presence would be invaluable.’

  *

  Aglaia Filippovna’s hair lay in a loose black halo over the pillow. There was an eggshell fragility to her head. Her skin seemed as thin as rice paper. Apart from where it veiled her eyes with purple shadows, it was pallid to the point of transparency. Her lips were slightly parted, which gave her face an ugly, unguarded expression. Her body lay as neat and unmoving as a pencil beneath the covers, arms pressed close to her sides, legs together.

  The room was in semi-darkness; the drapes were partially drawn, allowing a torpid grey light to intrude without conviction. A fire had been lit in the grate, and its reflected glow filled and enlarged the bedroom, dancing in restless shifts across the ceiling.