Red Templar

16

After ten minutes in the outfall vent, Holliday and the others reached a side passage. From the smell of it the narrower, brick-lined tunnel led to the sewers. Holliday stopped, turned and listened. So far there were no sounds of pursuit, but he knew it wouldn’t last. It was more than likely that the OMON squad would have at least one or two Spetsnaz special forces types on board, and those guys were relentless. They’d eventually spot the broken hasp on the vent in the boiler room and they’d come after them like baying hounds after a fox.

There was a rusted grille over the tunnel just like the one at the outfall opening, but Holliday used the monkey wrench and levered it off, tearing the old hasp off completely. It didn’t matter; if the OMON squad got this far, trying to fake them out was a waste of time.

“This way,” said Holliday.

“It smells of. . excrement,” said Genrikhovich, balking and wrinkling his nose. Holliday was suddenly very tired of the Russian. He sighed.

“The outfall almost certainly empties into the river, and they’ll be waiting for you. Personally I couldn’t care less whether you come with us or not. It’s up to you: knee-deep in shit or a bullet in the brain.”

Eddie handed Holliday the battery-powered lamp and the two men climbed up into the sewer tunnel. For a few seconds there was silence from behind them, but alone in the dark, reality set in, and Genrikhovich came after them. The deeper they went into the tunnel, the worse the smell became until it was almost overwhelming.

“?Querido Dios!” said Eddie, gagging. “?Mierda Ruso huele mucho peor que la Cubana, creo que!”

Holliday didn’t need a translation. “No kidding,” he said with a grunt. They pressed on, the walls and arched ceiling of the tunnel growing damp and mildewed as they continued deeper down the passageway. The bricks of the floor were crumbling with dampness, and every now and again there was a flash of dark shadow that skittered away, chittering sounds of irritation fleeing from the bright beam of light cast by the searching beam of the lamp.

“Ratas,” grumbled Eddie. “Odio las ratas de mierda.”

“We know,” said Holliday. Ten minutes after entering the side tunnel they reached what appeared to be a main channel. There was a raised concrete step on either side of a broad, sluggishly flowing stream of brown muck, the thick stew of effluent scattered with floating islands of things more solid that defied description.

The concrete construction was old and crumbling, patched here and there with varying grades of cement. The raised sides of the trough were about three feet above the lavalike flow of the waste, which was flowing right to left. The sides were about two and a half feet wide, covered in sludge and treacherous-looking, the danger made worse by the fact that the walls curved upward, forcing anyone foolish enough to be here in the first place to walk in a half crouch.

Genrikhovich stared, horrified. “Reka diaryei,” he said.

“Reki Rossii diaryei,” corrected Eddie. A river of Russian diarrhea.

Holliday grimaced at the revolting image and swallowed hard. “I’m lost,” he said. “Which way do we go, left or right?”

Eddie spoke up immediately. “The flow of the mierda is from west to east, if that is any help. Perhaps un poco mas al nordeste as well.”

“You’re sure?” Holliday asked.

“Yes.” Eddie nodded firmly. “I have a thing. . una brujula, in my head,” explained the Cuban. Holliday frowned. Eddie turned to Genrikhovich. “Kompas?” he asked in Russian.

“A compass?” Holliday said.

“Si, companero, a compass. It never fails me.”

“If this is true we should go east,” Genrikhovich suggested. “West is the Neva. East is the center of the city. Perhaps we could find a way to the metro.”

“All right.” Holliday nodded. “Stay close and watch your step.” He ducked down and headed upstream along the slime-covered bank of the swirling river of sludge.

Within minutes of entering the sewer tunnel all three men were filthy as they were forced to reach out and steady themselves against the walls, their clothing scraping the slime-covered bricks and their shoes caking with ancient excrement. As they continued down the passage, each at various times would slip and tumble into the stream of sewage. Finally, covered in filth, they gave up all attempts to keep themselves even partially free of the stinking, oozing effluent and walked along knee-deep in the stream, the footing more solid under them and with far more clearance for their heads. More than once Holliday had felt some strange sort of abnormal movement within the flow they pushed against, and he could have sworn something unthinkable had brushed against his sodden pants legs. Something swimming.

After what seemed to be an eternity they reached some sort of two-story hub with sewers on the upper levels sending putrid waterfalls of effluent slopping down into a large pool, the pool itself having several even larger outlets.

Holliday shook his head in amazement and disgust. Catwalks encrusted with filth and mold stretched over the pool-obviously people were actually meant to come to this horrible cathedral, complete with a cathedral organ of accreted matter that ran down the curved brick wall in pipelike stalactites.

On the far side of the pool, reached by one of the catwalks, they found a small concrete chamber that was probably used as a rest stop by sewer workers. Eddie found it excruciatingly funny that the room came with its own toilet cubicle, and for a time he couldn’t stop laughing and muttering under his breath in Spanish. There was also a set of lockers in the room, which held complete sets of protective clothing, along with hard hats, oxygen tanks and masks.

“We change,” said Holliday. “We can’t go back to the real world covered in crap. At least these will make us look official.”

“We are above the metro station at Pushkinskaya,” said Genrikhovich.

“How do you know that?” Holliday asked.

Genrikhovich pointed to a metal sign half-obscured with old sludge.

“We’re above the station?”

“St. Petersburg metro lines had to be dug very deep to reach bedrock. The whole city is built on the Neva and the Fontanka estuaries.”

“And if we go up?”

“It is the Vitebsky railway station.”

“Where do trains go from there?”

“Mostly to Western Europe. Also to Kaliningrad and Smolensk, if I remember correctly.”

Eddie shook his head. “They will have eyes at the train stations, even if they are only electronic.”

“How far are we from the Hermitage?”

“A mile. Perhaps a little more than that.”

Eddie frowned. “It is not far enough, mis compadres. They will have a security cordon at least that far out by now.”

Genrikhovich spoke up. “My sister Marina and I have a dacha in Novoye Devyatkino. It is the last stop on the number one metro line.”

“I very much doubt your sister would appreciate a couple of fugitives as houseguests,” said Holliday.

“Marina is rarely there. She works at the United Nations in New York. I am there more than she is.”

“We need to get as far as we can, mi coronel.” Eddie shrugged. “I would like to have a wash of my body, too, I think.”

“All right.” Holliday nodded. “The end of the line it is.”