The Sin Collector

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.”