In the Name of a Killer

Chapter Thirteen

Dimitri Danilov considered being in the reception area for the American’s arrival at Petrovka but decided against it. The FBI presence had been described to him that morning as supportive, a scientific assistance. To have been waiting in the foyer might have conveyed the impression of deference. Which would have been wrong. So after the required but brief encounter with the Director — a worried diatribe from Lapinsk about the press conference running over into Lapinsk’s now familiar injunction to avoid worsening the already existing ill-feeling — Danilov remained in his jumbled office, waiting. He did, however, warn the reception desk of Cowley’s appointment, to avoid the American being kept waiting, as visitors to any Russian government building or organization were invariably kept waiting.

A professionally trained investigator would quickly realize the cul-de-sac into which they were blocked, Danilov accepted. And William Cowley would most definitely be a professionally trained investigator as well as — if not more so — someone with scientific expertise: it would be a matter of pride, apart from anything else, for the Americans to assign the best-qualified man available. Danilov felt a stir of unease, which bothered him. There was no reason for him to feel uneasy about the forthcoming meeting. Every recognized police procedure had been correctly followed, nothing overlooked, nothing forgotten. The reassurance didn’t come. He would be under new and different scrutiny from now on, a Russian detective being critically judged by an American. Wouldn’t he be making the same examination of the American? Of course he would. And if he did it properly, looking for the additional benefit, not the possible criticism, then the presence of another expert mind was something to welcome, not to balk at. It was going to be important, always to keep that balance in mind.

Danilov was at the office door when Cowley approached along the corridor — a polite ten minutes before noon — so the American had a chance before any physical contact to examine the Russian with whom he would be working. About forty, assessed the American: forty-five tops. Yesterday’s suit — maybe yesteryear’s — and definitely yesterday’s shirt, looking more like it had been rolled on than properly laundered. A hint of a belly bulge, so he didn’t exercise: conscious of it, too, from the way he was holding himself. Typically square, Slavic face, which was pale-skinned, another indication of an indoor, non-exercising man. Fading brown hair, close-cropped to be more than a crew cut but growing again, needing attention. Good personal control. Here was a Russian policeman heading an investigation into the murder of an American girl with heavy-duty US clout. And knowing it. Yet he was giving no facial reaction of either too little or too much uncertainty, calmly standing there, waiting.

As Cowley, accompanied by an escorting officer, reached him the Russian thrust his hand forward and said: ‘Dimitri Ivanovich Danilov.’

The American answered the handshake and in English said: ‘William Cowley, although of course it’s Bill, not William …’ The smile grew, just slightly. In passably accented Russian he went on: ‘How we going to do this? In Russian? Or in English? Guess there’d better be some ground rules.’

Danilov nodded to the withdrawal of the escort, backing further into his office, gesturing Cowley in with him. In English he said: ‘Whatever you feel most comfortable with.’ Surely a friendly offer, from the start? Although maybe it showed a conceit about his English.

Confident of himself and his language ability, gauged Cowley: stroke with velvet gloves, he remembered. ‘Why don’t we just work our way along with a combination of both? Anything I don’t get, I’ll ask: anything you don’t get, you ask.’

Condescension? Or further politeness, like arriving ahead of time? Danilov said: ‘That sounds OK.’ He indicated the only visitor’s chair, which he’d cleared of file papers that morning. ‘Sit. Is there anything I can get you? Tea?’ He hoped Cowley didn’t accept: everything from the canteen was abysmal. The tea was like sewer water.

‘Not at the moment.’ The finger-touching courtesy was almost overdone. Cowley prevented himself making any examination of the cluttered office. Someone with little social contact since the break-up with Pauline, Cowley had spent a lot of the past three years watching television: this room reminded him of a natural history series he’d enjoyed, particularly the cut-away shots of underground nests of animals who’d dragged all sorts of crap into their holes and settled right in the middle of it.

Danilov’s strongest impression was of the American’s size. The man filled the already overfilled room, the chair inadequate and lost beneath him. The suit, which wasn’t travel-creased, would have had to be specially made for him. Possibly the shirt, as well. Cowley’s hair was dark and tightly crinkled, beyond being wavy, combed straight back from a heavily lined forehead. The man had a direct, almost unblinking manner of looking at another person through eyes quite a light, almost unnatural, blue. As Cowley casually crossed one hand over the other, Danilov saw the heavy ring, with a large red stone, that Cowley wore on the little finger of his left hand: Danilov believed it had something to do with American college societies but wasn’t sure. The other American who had confronted him first at the embassy and then outside the girl’s apartment had worn a similar decoration. Cowley appeared quite at ease and relaxed in unfamiliar surroundings, showing no outward disquiet. In English Danilov said: ‘I suppose it is important for us to establish ground rules.’

‘Your choice,’ insisted Cowley. ‘I know all the exchanges between our two governments: my function is advisory …’ Cowley stopped, unhappy with the choice of words. ‘Help, where possible … to suggest technical or scientific ideas, maybe,’ he finished, badly. He hadn’t thought sufficiently before he spoke. And he really had been trying to appear friendly, conciliatory even to someone who would naturally regard his being in Moscow as an invasion of territory.

People advised and offered help from superior positions or ability. Danilov guessed the American hadn’t meant to say that, not quite so bluntly. So what could have appeared the acceptance of a secondary role could equally be a patronizing one. Danilov moved consciously to stop the drifting analysis. Wasn’t there a danger, in constantly seeking several meanings from every word and phrase? He’d already decided, so many times that he’d lost count, that he was confronting an investigation more difficult than any he’d encountered before. And accepted he was getting nowhere. So he needed all the help he could find. He looked intently at the other man and thought once more, a professionally trained investigator. And then called to mind another previous reflection: the best-qualified man available. Wasn’t there more sense, more practical personal benefit, in putting to one side the suspicion and resentment, none of which had been caused by this man, to take advantage of the fresh mind and the fresh approach? ‘I don’t imagine it’s going to be easy, for us to adjust to working together. But if it is to work, we’ve got to be totally open with each other. Which I’m prepared to be.’ Danilov was sure the offer had sounded completely right, without any of the cynical opportunism that was there.

Where was the sneaky, smart-assed son-of-a-bitch motherfucker? wondered Cowley. Respond in kind, he concluded, this time thinking ahead of what he was about to say. He smiled again, taking any criticism from the remark, and said: ‘It didn’t get off to a very good start at the embassy, did it?’

Danilov smiled back, briefly. ‘Misunderstandings on both sides.’

Cowley nodded, accepting the inference of a new start. So why not let it run that way, completely to ease his way in? All he had to do was to remain alert; careful against any advantage being taken from him. ‘Those ground rules suit me fine. Which means I’m missing the forensic examination of her apartment. Whatever the importance might have been from what you took from it. And if there was anything of importance in what’s simply listed as “correspondence” which you also removed.’

Cowley had itemized everything a trained detective would need to see, in addition to whatever had already been made available. Testingly, Danilov said: ‘My assessment? Or the material?’

He would probably have posed the same question himself, Cowley acknowledged. ‘Both. But the material first: I don’t want to assume any preconceptions you might express, in advance of my seeing what evidence is available.’

Danilov again recognized the correct professional reaction. ‘Everything’s along the corridor.’

There was certainly no room for it in this nest, thought Cowley: he hoped he hadn’t let his attention wander. ‘I’d better start getting up to date.’

Cowley thought the Russian exhibit room pitiful: three baizetopped, collapsible tables (one containing a map, the other completely barren), two obviously new filing cabinets (presumably unfilled), two long-corded telephones, brown Formica everywhere (Formica wall strips and Formica panelling and Formica wall platforms), and heightening the whole scene into farce a new, multi-horned pedestal coat-rack upon which no coats hung. And with no office personnel whatsoever. In America, had the murder victim been a Russian diplomat with the sort of political connections of Ann Harris, there would have additionally been a computer bank, staffed by operators, possibly a mini-telephone exchange, an exhibit and evidence controller in charge of an assembly group and at least three more display boards, one clearly indicating hour-by-hour and day-by-day progress. Cowley said: ‘Seems pretty well organized to me.’

Danilov looked at the American curiously, pointing towards the one occupied exhibit table. ‘That’s what you want. I’ll be back in my office. Take your time.’

Cowley lowered himself to the table as the Russian left the room but did not move at once to the document files, trying instead to assess the encounter. It barely qualified as preliminary. But was useful nevertheless. Certainly very different from what he might have expected from the warnings from Barry Andrews. So Barry had mishandled it, at the beginning. He wouldn’t completely ignore the warnings, though. He would simply wait, as he’d always intended to wait, to reach his own judgement on the Russian investigator. What was that judgement so far? Ill-dressed and uncomfortable with it, from the frequent shrugging together of his jacket and the fingering of his tie, against his crumpled shirt. But reasonably sure of himself, which was an advantage. In Cowley’s operational past, personal uncertainty of any sort in a partner — and he had to think of the Russian as a partner — had always been a hindrance as well as sometimes a danger in the field. He thought Danilov was clever, too. If there was one conclusion — premature maybe, wrong possibly — that Cowley had reached about Dimitri Danilov it was that the man was definitely not a fool. Which was another advantage. Enough, so early in the acquaintanceship: perhaps more than enough. He leaned forward for the first of the correspondence bundles.

Back along the corridor, Danilov reached the Director at the first attempt on the internal telephone, anxious to cancel the pointless afternoon briefing. The meeting with the American had seemed to go reasonably well, he assured Lapinsk. Cowley was now studying the outstanding documentation. After which they were to talk again. Beyond that, there was nothing to report apart from forensic proof that the notes referring to pain which had been retained by Ann Harris had been written on American paper in American-manufactured ink: the report had been waiting when he’d returned from the morning briefing, which was why he hadn’t mentioned it then.

‘It’s amicable, then?’ demanded the Director, an elderly man needing to be reassured more than once.

‘It seems to be, so far,’ said Danilov.

‘How much does he know?’

‘We’ve only talked about the woman at the moment.’

There was a burst of coughing. ‘Call me at once if any problems arise later. I want to be warned in advance.’

Pavin entered the office as Danilov replaced the receiver. The Major said: ‘How’s it gone?’

‘We’ve agreed on complete openness. He’s looking at the correspondence and the forensic report on the flat. It’s really too early to decide what sort of man he is.’

‘Do you think he’ll keep his word about sharing everything?’

‘I don’t know,’ Danilov admitted. ‘We’ll have to see.’ Did he intend sharing everything? And how could he check on the other man’s honesty? He was going to have to remain very alert.

‘He’s certainly big enough,’ said Pavin, another big man. ‘I was downstairs when he arrived. He came by ordinary taxi. I thought there would have been an embassy car but there wasn’t. Just an ordinary street taxi.’ Pavin appeared surprised.

‘We’re talking again, when he’s completely filled himself in. You’d better be here, to meet him.’

‘How good is his Russian?’

‘Seems all right.’ The two men looked at each other, nothing left to say and with nothing positive left to do. An absolute cul-de-sac, Danilov thought again. He was genuinely anxious now to expand the conversation with the American, to see if a fresh mind would come up with anything new. Only four more days before the next Tuesday, he remembered. ‘What about the case history search of psychiatric clinics?’

‘We’re still assembling lists. It isn’t easy,’ Pavin apologized. ‘I’m having the house-to-house done again, around both scenes. And I’ve got a street map, from the bookstall at the Intourist Hotel: I’ve already pinned it up. It’s not as detailed as I would have liked — misses out a lot of the alleys and sideroads, although the street where she was killed is there — but it’s the best I could do: at least we can section off the area where they both happened. Stationery here say they’ve had maps on order for six months. If they get some they’ve promised to let me know.’

‘How many Militia posts cover that area?’ demanded Danilov, suddenly.

‘I’m not sure,’ admitted the Major, doubtfully. ‘Eleven and 122, certainly. Depends how wide you really want to extend the area.’

‘Mark out a radius maybe two or three kilometres beyond where both bodies were found and see if that takes in any other Militia districts,’ ordered Danilov. ‘And have the street patrols from all of them checked. I want every report of prowlers, stalkers, Peeping Toms, any violence that can’t be explained as an ordinary street brawl, where everyone involved has been identified. Go back …’ He paused, seeking a manageable period. ‘… a month before Vladimir Suzlev was killed.’ Guessing the cause of the scepticism on Pavin’s face, Danilov said: ‘We can demand any facility we want. I know it’ll take time but assign extra men.’

Pavin shrugged acceptance. ‘The criticism has already started at the amount of resources we’re utilizing. This will make it worse.’

‘What sort of criticism?’

Pavin shifted, uncomfortably: the smile was apologetic. ‘That the power … the possibility of becoming known internationally … has gone to your head. Affected you.’

Danilov laughed, genuinely amused. ‘What about the risk of failure? Where will the glory be then?’ Lapinsk had warned there would be no glory, he remembered.

‘A lot are expecting you to fail. Making bets.’

‘Any complaints about resources can go direct to General Lapinsk,’ dismissed Danilov, confidently.

‘I don’t imagine any are going to be made officially. Our demands provide a good excuse for failed investigations elsewhere, don’t they? Can actually be useful.’

To add to all the other excuses to shield those receptively open hands, thought Danilov. He said: ‘Keep me in touch, about what’s being said. And by whom.’ It was always useful to know one’s enemies. Was that overly paranoid? No. Just properly selfprotective. He’d need a lot of protection, if he did fail.

Pavin turned first, at the sound at the doorway, ahead of Danilov realizing the presence of William Cowley. The American was big, conceded Danilov, at once: standing as the man was, at the very threshold, he virtually blocked the entrance. Cowley remained where he was, as if waiting for an invitation to re-enter. Danilov provided it by introducing Pavin and identifying the Major as the exhibit officer. Cowley offered his hand first and went through the meeting ritual in Russian, thinking as he did so that if the Major was the exhibit officer he hadn’t really been over-extended assembling what had been set out in the room he’d just left. To Danilov, the American said briskly: ‘Now we can talk.’ He perched himself delicately upon the inadequate chair. ‘How do you want to run it? My impressions to you? Or yours to me?’

Deferring here, too, acknowledged Danilov: providing a way to build bridges between them. ‘No point in lectures, one to the other. Let’s just talk it through, compare points that stick in my mind to those that might have come into yours.’

The Russian had not taken the offer of command. Intentional avoidance, to put them level? Or hadn’t he realized the offer was there in the first place? ‘I’ll follow you.’

‘Why was she out on the street at all?’ began Danilov, rhetorically. ‘You’ll have seen it’s difficult to establish a reliable time of death, precisely because of the cold. Between eleven and one o’clock on the night Ann Harris was killed, the Moscow temperature fluctuated between four and six degrees below zero. She wasn’t dressed for that degree of cold — her topcoat was comparatively thin — so why did she leave a warm bed in a warm apartment to get where she was found?’

‘Assignation?’ suggested Cowley.

‘She’d just had one in her apartment.’

‘Called out, from one lover to another? I don’t know what guidance I’m going to get from the embassy, but from the correspondence and from the paraphernalia you found in the bedside cabinet she was a pretty busy girl, sexually. Possibly experimental, too.’

‘Which could throw up a number of possibilities,’ Danilov chimed in. ‘There could have been jealousy, from the lover she left at Pushkinskaya. Or from the one she was going to.’

‘Or neither,’ Cowley completed. ‘The on-the-scene forensic report made a point of the minimal blood leakage. Could she have been killed elsewhere and then dumped, where she was found?’

‘I think the blood loss was absorbed by the coat. She definitely wasn’t killed in her apartment.’

‘I’ve read the forensic findings at Pushkinskaya,’ agreed Cowley. ‘I just think the possibility of another murder scene should not be overlooked.’

Which up until now it had been, Danilov accepted. ‘The pathologist says the knife was very sharp: minimal bruising around the entry wound. So the wound could have sealed itself, upon withdrawal.’

‘There’s no medical evidence of that, in the report.’

With no intention of further criticism of the inefficient pathologist, Danilov said: ‘He claims no evidence of nail scrapings, where she might have fought. But the written account lists broken fingernails. We have to go back on that.’

Cowley nodded. ‘I was told by our ambassador this morning that the body is being returned to us. I’ve asked for another autopsy in Washington.’ He was possibly coming to the first moment of positive difficulty: it had been inevitable, although he hadn’t wanted it to arise quite so soon. Consciously trying to soften the statement — certainly not to appear condescending — the American said: ‘There’s an analysis procedure we use in America, to confirm death-at-the-scene: blood volume calculated by a victim’s height, weight and body size.’

‘I’ll keep that in mind.’ It would be wrong to let the chill growing between them develop. With a briskness matching that of the other man, earlier, Danilov hurried on: ‘Like you said, sexually she appears to have been a busy woman. But from the correspondence she puts herself in different lights to different people.’

‘Yes?’ said Cowley, curiously.

‘She was particularly confessional to the college friend, Judy Billington. If there’d been any personal contact between them — telephone calls or vacation visits — she might have said even more than she did in the letters: hinted the identity of the lover.’

‘The Billington girl certainly needs to be interviewed.’ He was enjoying himself, Cowley abruptly realized. He was back where he felt he belonged, in the middle of a complicated and at the moment insoluble investigation, the sort of environment he didn’t know any more from an administrative desk in Pennsylvania Avenue. And he wasn’t finding any personal difficulty, with Andrews. The self-criticism was immediate. He’d barely spent two hours in the other FBI agent’s company, so how could he decide there wasn’t any personal difficulty? And there was still the meeting with Pauline. Three years, he thought again. How much would she have changed, in three years? How much had he changed in three years? Virtually completely, he supposed. He wondered how she’d like the transition. Cowley recalled the Director’s remark about distraction, determinedly stopping the way his mind was drifting. He smiled across at the Russian. ‘Anything else?’

It was right to have come this far discussing only the girl, whose murder was the sole interest of the other man, but they couldn’t go any further. Danilov said: ‘Possibly quite a lot, but I don’t think we should consider it by itself.’

Cowley frowned. ‘I don’t understand.’

‘Ann Harris wasn’t the first murder victim,’ said Danilov, simply. ‘She was the second.’

Senator Burden had demanded the meeting but it took place at Henry Hartz’s urging, insisting upon the FBI Director’s attendance and further insisting it was not possible so obviously to disdain the politician, which had been an irritated Leonard Ross’s initial intention. Richard Holmes also regarded it as a nuisance having to come into the city from the CIA headquarters at Langley, but not with the same obvious ill-will as his Bureau counterpart. They assembled in the Secretary of State’s suite at Foggy Bottom, again ahead of Burden’s arrival.

‘The more we tolerate his nonsense, the worse it’s going to get,’ complained Ross.

‘We don’t have a choice,’ said Hartz, flatly.

‘Why not?’ demanded Holmes.

‘Burden is playing with a marked deck,’ said Hartz. ‘The President needs Burden’s constant support, up on the Hill. And he’s going to need it through the term. The damned man — and his party — controls Congress. The moment Burden pulls the plug, we get a lame-duck President whom Burden can defeat for a second term, which every incumbent President starts campaigning for from the moment of his inauguration. All of which makes Burden as powerful as hell. And he knows it: every little bit and particle of it.’

‘He’s made open threats?’ anticipated Ross, with weary resignation.

‘Last night. During a fifteen-minute private meeting at the White House,’ confirmed the Secretary of State, just as wearily. ‘What Walter Burden wants Walter Burden gets. And that’s the word of God. It might not be officially recorded as such, but you’d better believe that it is.’

‘Shit!’ said Ross, viciously.

‘Shit’s the stuff that fuels politics,’ reminded Hartz, with unaccustomed cynicism.

‘The President might need the arrogant bastard’s influence,’ said Ross. ‘I’m not at all sure I do. Or that I’m officially supposed to.’

‘The feed from the White House is that he’s got to be handled with care,’ insisted Hartz. ‘Let’s keep our personal feelings to ourselves, OK?’

The Secretary of State didn’t try to greet Burden at the door on this occasion and probably wouldn’t have reached it in time anyway, so quickly did the politician enter from the outer office.

‘I’m not satisfied,’ announced Burden, once again before he was properly seated. ‘I’m getting a run-around and I don’t get treated that way.’ The clipped-voice warning was delivered quietly, ominously without any outward emotion.

‘What exactly is it that you want?’ said Hartz, accepting his role as convenor.

‘To be told everything that’s happened. What progress has the FBI agent …’ Burden paused, directly addressing Ross. ‘… The FBI agent I was specifically prevented from speaking with, before his departure … made in the investigation? Are there any definite leads? The likelihood of an arrest …?’

‘… Our agent has only just arrived,’ interrupted Ross, impatiently, immediately disregarding the earlier instruction because he was damned if he was going to be threatened by this man. ‘I’ve already told you I will pass on anything you should know. These meetings achieve nothing.’

Colour flooded Burden’s face and momentarily he appeared unable to speak. Before he did so, Hartz hurriedly intervened. ‘We have been officially informed that the body is being returned. Will you inform the parents? Or would you have us do it? There’s a procedure for this sort of unfortunate affair, where there’s been a sudden death.’

Burden initially seemed unwilling to withdraw from the dispute with the FBI Director, his open-and-close eyes moving in anger. But then he said, tightly: ‘I’ll do it.’ He turned quickly to the CIA Director. ‘Well?’ he demanded.

Holmes stared back, nonplussed. ‘I’m sorry?’

‘What about the idea of assassination?’

‘None whatsoever,’ said Holmes, smoothly. He hadn’t made any inquiry of the Moscow station, just reiterated his hands-off-at-all-costs order.

‘No doubt whatsoever?’ persisted Burden.

‘None. It was a street crime.’

‘Keep your people on it: I still think it’s sinister.’

Holmes nodded, not deigning to reply.

Burden looked to each of the three other men, addressing them all. ‘What about when the bastard’s caught? We got the extradition warrants under way? I want him back here, a proper trial for everyone to see. And a proper sentence …’

‘Execution, you mean?’ Ross, the former judge, cut in.

‘That’s exactly what I mean!’

‘You know something we don’t, Senator?’

Burden concentrated again upon the overweight FBI Director. ‘What’s that mean?’

‘You know who did it?’ demanded Ross. ‘That he’s an American? That’s the only chance in hell I could ever see of us being able to demand jurisdiction and extradition, and even then I’m doubtful of the legality. But let’s carry the hypothesis on, to see where it gets us. How do you want him executed? You favour the electric chair? Or lethal injection? Gas chamber, maybe? How do you imagine it’s going to work: some sort of lottery in reverse, getting all the States that still have the death penalty to put in bids for the right to try and pronounce judgement on him? We going to afford this guy a lawyer or have we decided to dispense with that: might slow the process up and I’m not sure you want that, do you?’

Burden was utterly exposed and he knew it, like everyone else in the room. His face was an even deeper red now, the prominent vein that had reacted before to anger jumping again in his forehead, eyes bulging, his hands twitching in frustration. When he spoke it was with difficulty, the words jerky and uneven. ‘I had a very important meeting last night … a meeting at which I received certain undertakings. I don’t believe those undertakings are being fulfilled by people here this morning.’

‘I’m sorry you should feel that way,’ said Hartz, anxiously. ‘I’m not sure what more any of us could have done, at this early stage.’

Burden made an obvious effort at recovery. ‘It seems to me the only way I am going to find out what I want is to go to Moscow myself.’

Pauline Andrews decided that despite there having been nothing in the Christmas cards or the yearly digests Cowley must have remarried. To somebody whom he clearly loved much more deeply than he’d ever cared for her: it still hurt that he hadn’t loved her as much as she’d loved him, which had been absolutely, able for so long to forgive all his mistakes and all his thoughtless disregard. Having remarried was the only explanation she could find for Barry’s insistence that Cowley had stopped drinking. He’d certainly not been able — or not wanted — to stop during all the years when she’d begged and pleaded. She hoped he was happy, with whoever it was. It was going to be strange, seeing him again. She felt ambivalent about it. Sometimes, since learning of his coming to Moscow, she’d wanted to meet him, meaning it when she’d told Barry she was looking forward to the encounter. But other times not, frightened it would all be too hard. But why should it be? The other times hadn’t been difficult, not really. Frosty, maybe: very much arm’s-length. But what else could she expect? She’d once loved him so much. Always felt so secure, so protected. Which was before she’d discovered he was screwing around, practically boring his way through every female in every embassy to which they’d ever been assigned. And before the drinking. Which had come first? She couldn’t decide. Her recollection was that it had seemed to happen at the same time. It would have been good, to feel secure and protected again. Too late, like so much else.

Pauline determined to try particularly hard with the dinner. Boeuf-en-Croute. That had always been his favourite.

She wondered if he would bring a photograph of the new wife. She’d like to see a picture: find out what his new wife looked like. Or would she?