A Razor Wrapped in Silk

43 Three hundred foxes

The air was crystalline. A piercing winter clarity assailed their eyes and sharp particles of frozen moisture stung their faces. Sensing their urgency, the driver stood and whipped his horse mercilessly. The drozhki swung precariously from side to side, as fragile as an empty acorn shell tossed on the wind. At times it seemed to leave the ground.

Porfiry shouted to be heard over the roar of conveyance. ‘News of Aglaia Filippovna’s miraculous recovery no doubt reached him. He must have realised that once she was up and out of his control, it was only a question of time before we came after him. And so, perhaps, he wishes to make one final grand gesture.’

‘What?’ The word came out sharply and was whipped away by the wind.

‘His plan was to incriminate the Tsarist regime — to make the public believe that a member of the Romanov family was capable of child murder, or at the very least to prove that the Tsar was incapable of protecting the empire’s most vulnerable children, thereby propagating revolutionary sentiments to the wider populace. Aglaia Filippovna’s motives may well have been different. Her action was driven by her monstrous jealousy of her sister. She wished to harm all who loved Yelena. That is why she attacked the pupils of Maria Petrovna’s school. To attack Maria Petrovna, whose love for her sister was the most unconditional and unquestioning of all. And of course, Aglaia Filippovna’s jealous rage culminated in her actually destroying her hated sibling. This no doubt created difficulties for Perkhotin. He was forced to help her cover up an essentially personal murder, which he attempted to pass off as political. The two-headed eagle again.’

‘And so? Where does that leave us?’

‘He is no fool. I imagine that he realises the game is up. He must know that his deception has been uncovered. There is little point continuing the pretence. He is exposed as a greater monster than the regime he seeks to overthrow.’

‘Go on.’

‘He has nothing to lose any more. He is not a man to run and hide. He is a man to go out in a blaze of glory.’

‘But why would he take Maria Petrovna with him?’

‘He has shown throughout his career the need to impress young women with his cleverness. There is nothing that flatters his vanity so much as his idolisation in the eyes of young ladies. Perhaps he wishes to persuade Maria Petrovna of the correctness of his actions, to justify himself to her.’

‘You do not think she was involved in this all along?’

‘Only unwittingly. Were she to know the truth, she cannot but be appalled at Perkhotin’s part in Aglaia’s crimes. Her former idol will be transformed into a monster. The effect will be devastating. Everything she has based her life on has stemmed from his teachings.’

‘Why would she go with him?’

‘She may have been acting under duress, though nothing Father Anfim said hinted at that. More likely, she does not yet know the full truth. Perhaps he has revealed Aglaia Filippovna’s guilt, without disclosing his own role in it. She may believe that she is rushing to a meeting with Aglaia Filippovna, and wishes to persuade her to give herself up before any more innocents die. Or perhaps she does know the truth. And Apollon Mikhailovich himself is the friend whose life — or soul — she hopes to save.’

‘What do you think he intends to do?’

‘The story of Samson is instructive, I think. In chapter fifteen of the Book of Judges, we are told that Samson attached burning firebrands to the tails of three hundred foxes, tethering them in pairs, two to a firebrand. I always thought that rather cruel. He released the foxes into the fields of the Philistines, burning their crops in a great conflagration. I wonder if Perkhotin has something similar in mind. The Nobel brothers manufacture a diverse range of engineering products. Including armaments for the Russian state. I have read accounts of their experiments into the development of a new and highly destructive explosive material. They have successfully blown up sections of the Neva, I believe. A crude incendiary device planted in the right part of the factory would result in a far more destructive conflagration than could be achieved by three hundred blindly panicking foxes.’

Virginsky stood in the rocking drozhki and screamed at the driver. ‘Faster! Make the beast go faster!’

*

The Nobel Metalworking Factory was a modern, and in some ways model, factory. It had been in existence for a mere eight years, and so the semi-derelict dilapidation that characterised so many Petersburg factories had not yet taken hold. The Nobel family itself, or rather the members of it who remained in St Petersburg, resided in a mansion that was inside the factory precincts. In fact, their home was attached to the factory and seemed to grow out of it, as if the comfort and leisure of these few individuals was just another product manufactured there. But by choosing to live so close to the source of their wealth, they showed that they were not ashamed of it. On the contrary, it suggested that the pride they might naturally feel towards their home extended to the factory too. It could also be taken as a gesture of solidarity with their employees, or those of them who lived on site in the purpose-built workers’ quarters.

The mansion presented a neo-classical frontage which, together with a stand of trees planted beside it, almost hid the grimier blocks behind. The screen was only partially successful because the trees were now seasonally denuded. There was an ornamental garden in front of it, bounded by a wrought iron fence, with a semi-circular recess reminiscent of the entrance to a park. The productive factory buildings appeared plain and functional, though well-maintained and orderly, laid out at right angles to one another. As an indication of the factory’s rational design, there was only one smoking chimney tower, which peeped over the roof of the palatial facade. Perspective suggested that it was at the rear of the factory precinct, at the furthest possible distance from the Nobel family home.

It was here that Porfiry and Virginsky called, identifying themselves as magistrates and insisting that Ludwig Nobel himself be made aware of a most serious threat to his factory. All this was very hard for the maid to take in. Somewhat panic-stricken, she informed them that Ludwig Immanuelevich was currently at work in the office.

‘Then take us to him, miss! There is not a moment to lose!’ demanded Virginsky. ‘Do you wish to be blown to atoms?’

The question galvanised the timorous girl into action. She led them at a bustling lick through a beech-panelled hall, which had a fresh but sober countenance. There was no real decline in the standard of decor as they passed into the servants’ quarters. In the kitchen, it was not just the hanging pots and pans that gleamed, but every surface, even the freshly-waxed floor.

The kitchen door gave directly on to the factory yard. Now, suddenly, as that door was thrown open, the harsh world of industry clamoured to make itself felt. The day’s activity was in full flow. Haulage carts drawn by teams of colossal drays rattled across the cobbles. Creaking gantries unloaded and loaded the raw materials and finished products that represented the mighty respiration of the plant. In came palettes of coke, ore, sand, limestone and paint. Out went machine parts, pipes, gates, chains, sheet metal, not to mention mysterious unmarked crates, the contents of which could only be guessed at. But this was only a fraction of the goods processed. On the other side of the main factory building was the River Neva, where barges were loaded and unloaded, ferrying goods to and from every corner of the empire. It was here that several years ago Ludwig Nobel’s brother Alfred had discharged a canister containing a chemical formulation of his devising, which had resulted in the displacement of several tons of icy water and the deaths of countless fish.

To Porfiry, there was something vital and energising about all this teeming activity, something also profoundly human.

At the entrance to the office block, the maid left them in the hands of a middle-aged clerk in a black frock coat. His face was unpromisingly lean and officious-looking, and his neck raw from the abrasion of his stiff winged collar; nonetheless, he had the intelligence to grasp the urgency of the situation immediately and hurried off to fetch Ludwig Nobel himself.

‘We are wasting time,’ hissed Virginsky, as they waited for the arrival of that gentleman.

‘You have seen the scale of the factory, Pavel Pavlovich,’ said Porfiry calmly. ‘We cannot possibly guess where Perkhotin might be without help from someone who knows the place well. And who knows it better than the man who built it? Furthermore, if we attempt to search the premises without the owner’s co-operation we will be challenged at every turn. A few words to Ludwig Nobel will save us vital time in the long run, I am confident.’

The clerk returned, accompanied by a man of about forty years of age, with dark hair parted low on one side and full mutton-chop sideburns. His expression was careworn around his eyes, but one eyebrow was kinked wryly. The line of his mouth was grim, though not without an angle of scepticism or reservation.

‘What is all this about?’

‘You are Ludwig Nobel?’

‘I am. And you?’

‘I am Porfiry Petrovich, investigating magistrate. This is my colleague, Pavel Pavlovich. We are here because we believe your factory may be in imminent danger. Tell me, if one wanted to wreak the maximum damage through an incendiary attack, where would one launch it?’

Nobel’s features contracted into a frown. He did not seem alarmed, rather he was an engineer engaged in calculating an interesting but essentially abstract problem. ‘I would suggest the munitions storeroom. We store a quantity of gunpowder there, amongst other combustible and highly volatile materials. However, it is practically impregnable.’

‘But if someone were to find a way to ignite it, the damage would be widespread?’

‘It is built to reduce the impact of any unfortunate accident. However, the sheer quantity of material stored there would be sufficient to inflict damage on adjoining sectors of the factory.’

‘I would be very grateful if you could take us there immediately.’

Nobel nodded decisively. ‘This way, gentlemen.’

They crossed a vast warehouse which led to a locomotive and rolling stock workshop. They witnessed the slow rotation of a skeletal engine on a massive turntable in the centre of the floor.

‘I must say, I am impressed by the diversity of your factory’s output,’ said Porfiry as he hurried to keep up with Nobel.

‘It is the way we have always done business. The world is so rapidly changing that one cannot afford to tether one’s self to any one technology or endeavour, in case it is supplanted. We are always looking for new channels of diversification. It is the way to the future.’

‘And armaments are an important part of your business?’

‘The Russian army is a good customer of ours. Which leads me to wonder why there is no military presence here with you, to safeguard this important source of supply.’

‘There has been no time for that.’

‘Are you confident that the two of you alone will be sufficient to frustrate this attack?’

Virginsky’s frown echoed the uncertainty of Nobel’s question. Porfiry answered both with a wince. They continued in silence.

Eventually, they entered a room in which the temperature noticeably increased. It was soon clear why: all around flames licked up from the floor. The air was thick with noxious fumes, each breath a chemical punch into the lungs. It seemed to Porfiry that they had entered someone’s vision of hell. He remembered Perkhotin’s words to Father Anfim.

Porfiry saw that the flames, which never exceeded knee-height, only emerged from certain points. Covered channels ran across the floor; fissures in the coverings released the flames. The heat now was oppressive.

Workmen in heavy protective clothing wielded long rods to handle a massive vat suspended on a chain. An incandescent stream of molten iron was released from a chute and flowed sluggishly into the vat. The workmen jabbed at it as if they were goading a bear. The men swung the laden vat along a gantry and then tipped it, so that the blinding surface spilled out into a heavily encrusted receptacle.

‘They are skimming off the impurities,’ said Nobel. ‘They will use what remains to cast cannonballs.’

‘Cannonballs,’ repeated Porfiry, vacuously.

The engineer’s frown betrayed something of the contempt a practical man feels for a theorist.

Nobel opened a door and led them outside once more. The cold wind was a relief after the heat and poisonous air of the workshop. Across a narrow passageway was a low, brick-built outhouse, entirely lacking in windows, and sealed with a single door of steel.

‘As you can see, we keep the munitions storeroom heavily secured, and, for obvious reasons, at some distance from the foundry. There is no way in or out, other than through that door, which is kept locked at all times. Do you wish to go in?’

‘Who has a key?’ asked Porfiry.

‘Myself, of course. And the director and several of the foremen of the munitions section.’

‘Are they all trustworthy individuals?’

‘I believe so.’

Porfiry looked anxiously over his shoulder. ‘If we open the door, we may provide him with the opportunity for launching his attack. My only fear is that he is inside already.’

‘Impossible,’ asserted Nobel.

‘You would like to think so but we are dealing with a ruthless and resourceful individual here. We have every reason to believe that he has been planning this attack for some time. He may already have gained the confidence of one of the keyholders. Apollon Mikhailovich Perkhotin can be a very persuasive man.’

‘Apollon Mikhailovich?’

‘Do you know him?’

‘I have engaged the services of one Apollon Mikhailovich Perkhotin to teach a series of evening classes here. I met him through my philanthropic activities. I have always encouraged my workers in their efforts at self-improvement.’

‘That is commendable. But now we see how it all begins to fit together. To your knowledge, did any of the munitions foremen attend his classes?’

Nobel nodded hopelessly. Suddenly the careworn slackness around his eyes spread to the rest of his face. ‘Fedya Vasilevich.’

‘What do we do?’ The question, strained to the point of panic, came from Virginsky.

‘I am consoled by the fact that he has not yet blown up the storeroom,’ said Porfiry. ‘However, I fear that if we go in now we may precipitate the very event we are anxious to prevent. At the same time, we must ask ourselves for what is he waiting? For an audience, no doubt.’

Porfiry put his ear to the steel door but heard nothing. He nodded to Nobel to open up.

‘Porfiry Petrovich, are you sure this is wise?’

‘Don’t be afraid, Pavel Pavlovich. We must find a way to talk to him. We will achieve nothing, if not.’

The door slid open heavily on its runners. The smell of gunpowder rushed out as if in flight.

‘Tell me, Ludwig Immanuelevich, just so that I might be prepared … I have heard of your brother Alfred’s experiments. Are there any of the substances he has invented stored in here?’

Ludwig Nobel shrugged his shoulders. ‘Alfred has returned to Stockholm. It is eight years since he successfully tested the explosive potential of nitroglycerine in the Neva. However, I cannot say for certain that he took all his toys with him.’

A glimmer of light was visible at the rear of the storeroom, shining up from behind dim shapes.

‘He has taken a light in there!’ Nobel’s face rippled with incredulity. ‘One spark from that could take the whole building up.’

‘Apollon Mikhailovich!’ called Porfiry through the open doorway. ‘Come out. You are placing yourself and others in grave danger.’

There was a scuffle of movement, footsteps scraping. Tense hissed whispers echoed between the looming racks of massed ammunitions.

‘What does this achieve?’ continued Porfiry. ‘Your self-destruction will not bring about a more just society. We need you alive, Apollon Mikhailovich, to help shape the future. Russia will be nothing without its great men!’

‘There can be no future,’ came an answering cry. ‘Until we have swept away the present.’

A stifled sob broke out.

‘Maria Petrovna? Let her go, Apollon Mikhailovich. I will come in in her place, and we can talk about how we can bring about the changes you desire.’

‘Destroy everything!’

Porfiry flashed alarm towards Virginsky. ‘I’m coming in,’ he called back to Perkhotin. ‘I only want to talk. I am alone. Unarmed. I wish to learn from you. To be your disciple.’

Porfiry held up a hand to deter Virginsky from following him. ‘Close the door behind me and see to it that the area is cleared.’ With a nod of resolve to Ludwig Nobel, he stepped inside.

The light expanded as Porfiry walked towards it, picking his way around blocks of darkness. As he progressed, the objects around him became more clearly discernible. He saw stacks of metallic canisters and towers of crates. As his hand groped about him, it strayed onto a bulging column of wooden barrels, which swayed slightly at his touch. A forest of similar columns receded into the darkness. These were the barrels of gunpowder he presumed. Alongside them were metal drums, racked on their sides. Beyond the drums, he saw a pyramid of cannonballs, smaller than he had expected, each one about the size of a clenched fist. Porfiry reached a hand out towards the apex of the pyramid and clasped the black sphere resting there. He hefted it swiftly behind his back in his right hand.

Rounding a corner of the maze of deadly goods, he saw the source of light directly ahead of him. Perkhotin held an oil lantern over the black circular abyss at the neck of an opened barrel of gunpowder.

Maria Petrovna was seated hunched on the floor, huddled into a large, heavy shawl with a plaid pattern. Next to her was a man in labourer’s clothes whom Porfiry took to be the foreman, Fedya Vasilevich.

‘You see how things are, magistrate.’

Maria looked up at Perkhotin’s words and met Porfiry’s gaze with a look of mute pleading.

‘Make any sudden movement and I will let go of the lantern.’

‘Teach me,’ said Porfiry. ‘Teach me what you would achieve by that. I have come to learn from you.’

‘How did you find me?’

‘You left a clue for me, did you not? Out of the eater, the eaten. I presumed you meant to be found, leaving such an easy clue.’

‘I congratulate you. The riddle was a test. You have passed. You will be rewarded. You will be here to witness the cataclysm.’

‘You will tear apart the lion of the imperial state.’

‘Yes.’

‘And bring forth the honey of a new social order.’

‘Yes.’

‘You will send out three hundred flaming foxes.’

‘Yes.’

‘Only one thing concerns me, Apollon Mikhailovich. How will the people be able to interpret these wonders? How will they know that the revolution has begun, that the time to rise up is here? I know this corrupt regime. I know how it works. They will merely say that there has been an accident at the Nobel Plant. They will deny your act its revolutionary aspect.’

In the lamp glow, Perkhotin’s great shovel-beard was a dark spread of negativity eating away half his face. Above it, his expression clouded as he took in what Porfiry had said.

‘You need a witness,’ went on Porfiry. ‘Someone who will be believed. Someone the Tsar dare not silence. Let her go. Her father is a senior officer in the Third Section. She is untouchable. And think what power her testimony would have.’

‘No. She must stay. You may go. They will believe you. But she must stay. She must be made to understand.’

‘At least let Fedya go. He has served his purpose by admitting you here. You do not need him any more.’

‘His death is necessary. All our deaths are necessary. I have no choice in this. Revolution is an inevitable process. A force of nature. The innocent will die. Blood will flow. The blood of martyrs as well as of our enemies. But the process will triumph. I must not shrink from this.’

‘But you have never killed anyone, Apollon Mikhailovich! You didn’t kill any of the children, did you? That is not the role you play in this. You are the leader. The great thinker, originator of the masterplan. It is for others to execute it. Your disciples. You must have your disciples. Like Aglaia Filippovna. She was your instrument, your weapon. You aimed, primed and fired her. But she was not perfect. She was too wild, uncontrollable. She reduced everything to a sordid personal drama. There was no understanding, no true sense of mission. She simply killed to appease her bloodlust. A useful tool, but not a sophisticated one. How did it work? You picked out the children for her to kill?’

‘No. It was not like that. At first, I wanted just to show her how the poor live under this criminal regime. To open her eyes. Her sister Yelena had a carriage, provided by that banker. She refused to set foot in it, but she let Aglaia use it. We would go driving around the worst slums and I would show her everything. One day, I recognised one of the children from the school, Svetlana, and called her over. She climbed into the carriage and sat between us. Before I could stop her, Aglaia Filippovna had strangled the girl. She said she did it out of mercy. That it was an act of kindness to kill the girl. I dismissed the driver, gave him some money and deposited him near a tavern. He knew nothing of what had happened, so quickly and quietly had Aglaia Filippovna committed the crime. I drove the carriage myself across the city, looking for somewhere to deposit the body.’

‘Why did you not go to the police? I only ask because I wish to understand.’

‘The police?’ Perkhotin spat the word back dismissively. ‘One cannot undo what is done. Besides, I saw that a greater purpose could be served. I had noticed the ring around Aglaia’s thumb. She was in the habit of borrowing her sister’s jewellery as well as her carriage. I realised I could not prevent her from killing, so I decided to take a utilitarian approach to her murderous instincts. To use them for the benefit of society.’

‘And thereafter you took her out in the carriage yourself?’

‘Yes.’

‘But when she killed Yelena, she went too far. That was never part of the plan, was it, Apollon Mikhailovich?’

‘One must be prepared to adapt one’s plans.’

‘You adapted admirably. But Aglaia had ideas of her own, did she not? She wanted to incriminate Captain Mizinchikov, to punish him for loving Yelena, whereas you saw that it would be another opportunity — a tremendous opportunity — to terrorise the state.’

‘Aglaia knew that her sister had placed a razor wrapped in red silk in Mizinchikov’s apartment, goading him to kill her. That gave her the idea of laying a red thread on Yelena’s body. In fact, she laid two — she was excessive in everything she did. I was able to steal one without her noticing. I thought it would come in useful. I didn’t know how, exactly, at the time.’

‘It was just as well that Aglaia collapsed under the strain of her crimes when she did. She was no use to you any more. But now you can use me, Apollon Mikhailovich. I understand. I am almost your equal. Notice that I said almost. I would not dare to set myself up as your equal. But I am worthy of you, you must see that. I shall be your weapon now, your disciple. It is not enough for me to witness the beginning of the revolution. Let me initiate it. The Tsar sickens me. I have been in his company. I have listened to his nauseating self-justifications. I want only to destroy him. Let me ignite the torch that will destroy the lion. And you, you can escape. You must escape! Russia needs you!’

‘No. It is too late for escape.’ Perkhotin regarded Porfiry narrowly. ‘Do you really wish to do this? No …’ He shook his head dubiously. ‘How can I trust you? This is some trick of yours. Some magistrate’s trick. I must do this myself.’

Porfiry closed in on Perkhotin in three brisk steps, so that he was close enough to scream in his face: ‘Do it then! Do it now, Apollon Mikhailovich. Release the lantern.’

Perkhotin let go. Porfiry swung out his left hand and batted the lantern away from the barrel. It smashed on the ground. The oil spread and ignited. Porfiry was standing in a pool of soft orange flame that lapped at his ankles.

Maria Petrovna leapt to her feet and in one movement drew the shawl from around her shoulders. She spread the garment out and screamed at Porfiry: ‘Out of the way!’ He jumped out of the flames as if he had only just noticed them. Maria Petrovna swept the shawl down to cover the fire. Fedya Vasilevich took off his jacket and threw that down too, but the flames were already out. They were plunged into darkness.

‘You fool!’

Porfiry swung the hand holding the cannonball in the direction of the voice. His hand flailed uselessly through the unresisting air. The momentum of the iron weight was too much for him. The cannonball left his hand and fell, landing almost without a sound, with just a soft swallowing shift of grit. Something granular and pungent filled the darkness, a harder, denser darkness within, an acerbic, invisible mist that clawed at their eyes and caught in their throats.

It was hard to tell for certain but it seemed that Perkhotin had borne the brunt of the dust cloud sent up by the cannonball plummeting into the gunpowder barrel. He was hacking uncontrollably.

‘Fedya! Can you find your way out of here?’ Porfiry felt himself to be blinded. His corneas were stinging with pain. Tears streamed from his eyes. The foreman, however, had been furthest from the barrel, and besides knew the layout of the storeroom better than any of them.

‘I am here,’ came Fedya Vasilevich’s stolid voice. ‘Stick close by me.’

‘No. You go and bring them back for us. It will be quicker.’ The foreman’s footsteps could be heard shuffling slowly away. ‘Masha, are you there?’

‘I am here.’ Her voice was infinite in the darkness, and at the same time, a tremulous vibration so frail and fine that it barely existed at all.

‘Give me your hand.’

Fingers found fingers. A shock chased along the nerve endings of his skin. Their hands groped desperately, fiercely together, into an interlocking hold. He pulled her to him.