Murder on the Trans-Siberian Express ir-14

by Stuart M. Kaminsky

  She cocked her head to the side and made an almost imperceptible negative nod.

  “And what is your name?” she asked.

  “Roman Spesvnik,” he said.

  “And what do you do, Roman Spesvnik?” she asked.

  She was toying with him. He knew that. He knew she expected lies. Oh God, did she also sense his weakness for aggressive women?

  “I work in the government information office in Moscow,” he said. “Utilities division. Gas, electrical power.”

  He knew a little about the job. His mother had held such a position until her retirement.

  “Roman,” she said, looking out the window, showing a near-perfect profile, “this will be a long trip with beautiful scenery. But one can spend only so many hours a day looking out the window even at the most beautiful of mountains and forests and the most quaint of villages.”

  Sasha said nothing.

  “It is good to have company on a long trip, don’t you think?” she asked.

  There was provocation in her words. Sasha knew them. He recognized them. There was a magic thread with an invisible hook reaching out to him.

  “Yes,” he said.

  “You are traveling alone?” she asked.

  “I … yes.”

  “Good, then perhaps we can provide each other with company. Are you married, Roman?”

  “Yes.”

  “So am I,” she said. “But my husband is far away and, to tell the truth, not very good company recently.”

  And then it got even worse.

  “I understand that there is a single compartment open in the next car,” she said. “I’ve already inquired about moving into it. The conductor can arrange it.”

  She was older than Sasha. That he could tell, but there was a confident sophistication which was overwhelming.

  “Shall I do that, do you think?” she asked.

  “It is not up to me,” he said.

  “Oh, yes, it is,” she replied.

  This could not be happening. It must not happen. Not again. She had caught him unprepared. There was nothing gradual in her approach. She was giving him no time to think.

  Sasha took a deep breath and said, “Then I recommend that you save your money and remain in this compartment where you have people to talk to.”

  “Roman,” she said. “Don’t make a mistake. I’m not suggesting anything that need be shared with anyone else, not even with the plumber you barely met.”

  Oh Lord, this was a temptation that vibrated through his body and between his legs.

  “I am afraid Į will be very busy during this trip,” he said. “I have a full week of work, reports to prepare. If I fail …”

  “… to go through all the compartments and find what you are looking for,” she said, reaching over to touch his hand and lean within a foot of his face.

  He could smell her essence. “No, I cannot. And I do not know where you got the idea that I am looking-”

  “You examined the luggage,” she reminded him.

  “I was humoring you,” he said. “I did not want to be impolite to a woman.”

  “And would you have humored me had I been old and ugly?”

  “I must go now,” he said, getting up, his nose almost brushing hers.

  “Perhaps we can sit together at dinner tonight,” she said. “Perhaps we could discuss putting your work aside for a bit and pursuing our new friendship.”

  “I have already agreed to dine with a French couple,” he said, moving to the door.

  Her eyes met his and held. He closed his eyes and said, “I must go”

  When he was gone, the woman sat back down. Her smile disappeared. She had learned what was necessary and now she was prepared to act. There were risks involved, risks that might end her career, but the chance of success would be worth the risks.

  Tonight she would have a long talk with the plumber and the handsome young man who called himself Roman.

  The watcher had listened to Pavel Cherkasov tell his jokes at the breakfast table, had heard him give the name David Drovny, had watched him eat.

  Cherkasov was a remarkably capable courier. He did not hide. He played the role of glutton and near-buffoon to perfection because his persona was both true gluttony and buffoonery. That Pavel Cherkasov was well-armed there was no doubt. That Pavel Cherkasov would be cautious with his mission was equally certain. The watcher knew that the courier was a professional, an illusionist, a magician who could improvise brilliantly and execute his plans without error.

  The watcher had been informed that there were two policemen on the train. There had been no problem spotting them. They matched their descriptions. Rostnikov was a difficult man to hide.

  The important thing was that Rostnikov and his assistant not know that they were in a game, that they continue to believe and pursue their difficult task and not think there was another player. The presence of the two detectives gave the watcher an advantage, a backup plan.

  If the attempt to make the transfer was observed, even anticipated, the watcher could act swiftly, beat the policeman to the prize. It was what the watcher expected. But there could be mistakes. Chance could intervene. Rostnikov might make the interception, capture the prize.

  And then, unaware of the game, the prize could be taken from the policeman. It was really only a matter of who had to be killed. Pavel Cherkasov? The two policemen? The watcher would have preferred simply killing Pavel, but the difference was not great.

  The watcher had ample weaponry and could improvise. Sometimes improvisation proved to be the best procedure, especially if it resulted in the conclusion that the necessary death had been an accident.

  The watcher had pushed a woman in front of a bus in Rome, lifted a lean, surprised man over a low wall along a tower walkway of the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris, dropped a heavy steel loading-ramp door on an American in Budapest, and worked variations ranging from overdoses of drugs to quite accidental drownings.

  The watcher had not kept count. Numbers did not matter. If murder was a sin and there was a God to punish, than ten or twenty meant no more than the first. The same would be true if the watcher were eventually caught, which was always a possibility, a slight possibility but a possibility nonetheless.

  It had been a long career, a highly successful career, and there was no reason to stop. Assassination was the watcher’s life. There were no hobbies or interests beyond a professional interest in the tools of destruction and the game, which included planning, tracking, and execution.

  Money meant little. In the beginning it had seemed important, but it no longer was, though the fees for such services were high.

  The train rattled on. A stop in twelve minutes. Shar’ya. It was time to move, find the courier, stay with him, not be spotted.

  The watcher did not have a sense of humor, but there was something that approached amusement in the fact that four people were now looking forward to the inevitable transaction.

  There was a good chance that Rostnikov did not yet know who the courier was. The fact that his assistant was still going from compartment to compartment in search of the suitcase supported that conclusion, but it was sometimes dangerous to make assumptions even though they seemed obvious. It was far better to act solely on the facts and be prepared for the human factor, the variants that could neither be controlled nor anticipated.

  Chapter Four

  Through the train the four winds blow

  The arctic and the sirocco

  Stalactite and stalagmite

  Stalag camp and satellite

  Pass the captives on death row

  The gulag archipelago

  The skulls of reindeer in the snow

  The longboat drifts, the dead sea floats

  “K her s nim, I don’t give a damn,” Misha Lovski tried to shout, but it came out as a faint dry croak.

  He no longer had any sense of how much time had passed. Was it a day? A week? A month? The lights had remained on except when they came in to tak
e his bowls, empty of food and water, and his bowl filled with excrement.

  The music was ceaseless. His own voice. His own band. The words lost their meaning. He could not see the speaker. They were watching him. He knew it, felt it. And so he sat on his mattress folded over to cover his legs. He was feeling a definite chill. He was coming down with something. Maybe they had been putting something in his food. What the hell did they want? He wanted to dat’pisdy, kick ass, bash a head in with his guitar.

  “I will not die,” he croaked. “I will not cry. I am a cossack, a free man, an adventurer, a kazak. I live at war. I am the cossack Illya of Murom of the bylina, the heroic poem, the best.”

  I am a cossack, he told himself, a warrior of the Dnieper and the Don.

  “We are a community of Russians, Tartars, Germans, Serbs, Georgians, Greeks, and Turks. Warriors. I know what you are doing. You are testing me to see if I am a real cossack, if I am worthy to meet the challenge, be a worthy warrior.”

  He received no answer but the sound of his own voice and the shock of metal vibrations from the music.

  “I am going to go to a cossack camp,” he said. “I am going to learn to fight with my fists, with the shasqua, saber, and the kinjal, lance.”

  The music seemed to get louder.

  “I will ride bareback, learn to fire guns, cross rushing rivers, sing cossack songs, embrace Christianity, and wear a true cossack uniform. You know why I am the Naked Cossack?”

  The music grew even louder. Misha was talking to himself.

  “Because I am not yet worthy of the uniform,” he said so softly that even he could not hear himself.

  He tore at the corner of the mattress. Frenzy. Another idea. There was padding inside. Some material. Cotton, wool. He rolled two balls of the material and stuffed them in his ears. He did it openly, not trying to hide. He wanted whoever was watching to see this as an act of ingenuity and not as an indication that their torture was working. He folded his arms, crossed his legs, and stared at the door.

  The sound was muted but not stilled. The music continued. He dozed in exhaustion and then awoke. His plan had to take place soon or it would be too late. He would be too tired or too crazy.

  He had to be ready to move quickly, silently.

  Misha had noticed something. Not for the first ten or fifteen times, but after that, when the lights suddenly went off and the music stopped while his bowls were taken and relatively clean ones placed in front of his bars. Whoever made the exchange always reached over and checked the door to his cell with a quick pull to be certain that it was still firmly locked.

  Misha had tried it. The cell door was surely locked and he had no tools to work on it. It could not be long now. Someone would come. The ritual would be repeated. He would be ready. He had actually practiced walking barefoot, silent, learning the exact number of steps from the wall to the bars of the cell so that he could move across the floor in total darkness.

  While he was going over his plan again, the lights went out. The music stopped. He had placed his bowls very close to the bars. Whoever came would have to move close. He could hear the door beyond his cell open, hear the footsteps, sense when the person was about to reach down. Misha got to his feet, moved quickly, feeling his testicles beating against his thighs.

  Hand through the bar, ready. The sound of his jailer reaching for the door.

  Misha struck, reached through the bar, grabbed the wrist. The wrist was not thick, but he could not hold it as the jailer pulled away with a grunt and gasp, dropping metal bowls that clattered to the floor.

  The jailer said something through clenched teeth. “Propezdoloch, clever bastard.”

  Misha thought he recognized the voice. He croaked defiantly, “I am going to get out.”

  And the voice of his jailer came back, “Ni khuya, no way.”

  The jailer moved quickly to the door at the end of the room, not stopping to pick up what had been dropped, not wanting to put a hand into or touch the toilet bowl.

  The outer door opened and closed and Misha was alone again, but this time he had something to work with. He had recognized the voice of his jailer. He would not utter the name. He would pretend that he did not know. The darkness of the visits was still his protection.

  They would keep it dark when they entered for only two reasons: to help drive him mad or to protect themselves from Misha identifying them when he was free. Which meant that Misha had a chance of being free. It was slim hope, but he clung to it, and the knowledge that he knew who his captors were.

  The lights came on. The music did not. Misha looked at the mess outside his cell. One bowl, the one which had held water, was on its side against the far wall. The food bowl was overturned within his reach. Miraculously, his toilet bowl had not been moved.

  In addition, there were three fresh bowls within reach just beyond the bars. Misha reached through the bars and worked the food and drink inside.

  He was hungry now, thirsty too. There was much to think about. He could fashion new earplugs while he considered his plight.

  He was not being tested by cossacks, but he would behave as if he were a cossack. He would imagine himself in full blue uniform and long blue coat, leather boots, and a fur hat.

  Misha felt a chill. He coughed once, took a drink of water, and retreated to the wall and mattress. He had much to do.

  “Your name is Anatoly Zagrenov,” said Karpo, looking down at the sheet on the badly scarred wooden table.

  “People call me Bottle Kaps,” the young man said. “I call myself Bottle Kaps.”

  They were in a small room in a local precinct police station. There was nothing in the room but a table and two chairs. A single window, quite small and quite dirty, about seven feet up on one wall let in a little light. The walls were a thin brown with spots and smears of dirt. The floor was rough, cracked gray concrete. There was no two-way mirror. There was but one door and any police officer passing the room ignored whatever sounds, pain, anguish, pleading, or cries seeped into the dark corridor.

  The young man who wanted to be called Bottle Kaps had moved to the chair to sit. Karpo motioned to him to remain on his feet. The detective also remained standing on the opposite side of the table with the sheet of paper before him.

  “You are nineteen years old,” Karpo went on. “Your mother is dead. Your father lost his job two years ago as a janitor in a plastic factory.”

  “He is a drunk,” the young man said. “A parasite.”

  “In contrast to you,” said Karpo.

  “I work.”

  “At what?”

  “Things,” the young man said. “I know cars. I can fix things. But only for the right people.”

  The young man rubbed the top of his head. He hadn’t shaved in about a day. Prickly small hairs were starting to grow.

  “You are going back in the obyezannik, the monkey cage with the drunks and thieves,” said Karpo. “With Sergei.”

  “Sergei?”

  “Sergei Topoy, Heinrich,” said Karpo.

  “Sergei Topoy,” the young man repeated with a smile.

  “You will remain in the cage until you answer my questions and I believe your answers, Anatoly,” said Karpo.

  Anatoly cocked his head to one side, spread his legs slightly, and clasped his wrist behind his back, a posture meant to show that he had no intention of cooperating.

  “What happened to Misha Lovski?”

  “I told you. We went out into the street. He just went his way.”

  “You are lying,” Karpo said calmly.

  “You may think what you like,” said Anatoly.

  “A boy was murdered near the Mahezh Shopping Center yesterday, a rapper,” said Karoo.

  The Mahezh was an underground mall off of Red Square where Russian rappers in loose-fitting parkas and baggy pants gathered.

  “So?”

  “You killed him,” said Karpo.

  “I … I was nowhere near there yesterday. I have never killed anyone. I was with Hein
rich and friends all day. We …”

  “But you killed the boy,” said Karpo.

  “No.”

  “I have a policeman who will testify that he saw you do it,” said Karpo.

  “I did not kill anyone,” Anatoly said. “Ask Heinrich. Ask …”

  Karpo moved to the door and opened it. A young uniformed policeman stepped inside. Karpo nodded toward Bottle Kaps and said, “Is that him?”

  The young policeman looked at Anatoly and said, “Yes.”

  “You are certain?” asked Karpo.

  “Certain,” said the policeman, who turned to leave.

  “Wait,” cried Anatoly. “You … it must have been someone else. We look alike.”

  The policeman was gone. Karpo had asked him to step in and identify the young man Karpo had brought into the precinct two hours earlier. Karpo had said nothing about a murder and, as far as Karpo knew, there had been no murder.

  “I did not kill anyone,” Anatoly insisted, his arms now in front of him. “That cop is … I understand.”

  Karpo said nothing.

  “You are bluffing just to get me to tell you what happened to the Naked Cossack.”

  “One minute,” said Karpo. “I give you one minute. Tell me what happened or you go back in the cage and I give Sergei the opportunity to tell me and walk out the door while you remain to be tried for murder.”

  “You are bluffing,” said Anatoly with mock confidence.

  “You are running out of seconds,” said Karpo.

  The young man looked at the pale unsmiling figure in black. He knew the police had taken others off the streets, put them in jail for crimes they had not committed, found witnesses, usually the police themselves, to testify to their guilt. Anatoly had heard such stories. Such arrests accomplished two things. They officially solved a crime and they put someone in jail the police wanted off the streets.

  “Your time is up,” Karpo said, gathering his papers.

  “No, wait.”

  “Your time is up,” Karpo repeated, turning toward the door.

  “I will tell you, but you do not let Sergei or anyone else know I told you,” the young man said in near panic.