Rostnikov vacation

EIGHT

"And now?" yakov krivonos said as he watched the thin woman with stringy hair tear away Jerold's pants.

"Nothing changes," said Jerold, who was lying on his stomach in the position the stringy woman had guided him.

"Nothing changes," Yakov agreed, looking around the room.

The room smelled of medicine and tobacco, and the woman, in a baggy black dress with somber purple circles, did nothing to enliven it. She barely spoke and acted as if Yakov were not even in the room.

Yakov had driven more than twenty miles on the Kashira Highway to Gorki Leninskye and to the small house where the woman who now worked on Jerold's pants had opened the door and ushered them in without a word.

"I need my gun," said Yakov, walking around the small room that had been set up as a surgery. "I need my music. When are you getting me another Madonna?"

"Now you need me," said Jerold as the stringy woman cut away the leg of his pants. "Later, you will have Madonna."

Yakov paused in his wandering about the room to look at the bullet wound in Jerold's right side. He knew it would be worth seeing. The front seat of the car he had stolen was soaked with Jerold's blood, and though Jerold had neither moaned nor complained, his voice had dropped just a bit during the ride, and his breathing was definitely heavy. By the time they had reached this house, Jerold was definitely quite pale.

Jerold's wound was dark and round, big enough to put a finger in. Yakov wondered if Jerold would scream if he suddenly poked his finger into the wound. Would the doctor who displayed no emotion scream if Yakov then licked his bloody finger?

These were important questions. Questions that should be in a song, a song Yakov should, would, write. Carla had thought his idea of writing songs was ridiculous. She had never said so, but he knew what she thought. He had wonderful ideas for songs. Maybe he would get a group together quickly and perform at the Billy Joel after he killed Yuri Blin. No, he would be in Las Vegas. It was gone. The question he wanted to put into a song. It was gone.

Carla had suggested that he write his ideas in a little notebook. Perhaps he would. When Jerold gave him the money, he would write songs, learn to play the guitar, get the best teacher.

"The bone is not broken,'' the stringy woman doctor said. She had put on a pair of rubber gloves and probed the wound. Jerold had not uttered a sound.

' 'I can remove the bullet,'' "Remove it," said Jerold, turning on his side to look at her.

' 'You will need blood,'' the woman said, moving to a sink in the corner in which she dropped the bloody rubber gloves.

' 'Then get it," said Jerold.

The woman looked at him and nodded, and then she looked at Yakov.

"I'm going out in the woods to play music on Waltherand Blackhawk."

The woman looked at Yakov, who met her eyes. It was Yakov who turned away.

"Blackhawk is in the car," said Yakov, looking around the room for something to touch, something to play with.

Yakov considered the possibility of killing the doctor when she finished working on Jerold, but there were many reasons why he knew he would not. He didn't like the idea of touching this emotionless creature. He was afraid she wouldn't react, would just look at him with disapproval regardless of what he did to her, and maybe, as Carla had done, she would taunt him. That was it. Now he remembered why he had thrown Carla through the window. She had taunted him because he was unable to rouse himself, to keep himself erect. Carla had said it was the pills Jerold was giving him, and Carla had smiled. Carla no longer smiled.

"The one who shot you," said Yakov, looking at himself in a mirror over the sink and trying to recognize the Yakov he knew in that clerk's face he saw. "The one who tried to kill me. I can go back and kill him while she takes care of you."

"Stay here," said Jerold behind him.

"You'll take days, a week to-" Yakov said as the stringy woman left the room.

"I will be up in two hours. Nothing changes. And we do not have to kill the policeman. He is of no importance." ' 'He shot you,'' said Yakov, turning away from the mirror. There were sharp instruments here, scalpels. It would be fun to hold one, turn it over, let it catch the light. He had done that before, not so many years before.

"Revenge is meaningless," said Jerold, finding it difficult to hold his head up.

"Someone does something to me, it sits in my chest like clay," said Yakov, pointing to his chest. "I want it out."

"Stop thinking of immediate gratification. Think of living in Las Vegas."

Yakov grunted. He saw no scalpel.

Perhaps he would like to live in Hollywood instead of Las Vegas. That would be nice, too. To be rich anywhere in the United States would be nice. To meet Madonna would be nice, but there was a lump of clay forming in the chest of Yakov Krivonos, and it was slowly molding into the face of the policeman who looked like Death. He did not want to look down at it, but he knew he must.

Jerold's eyes were closed as he lay back on the table, but the doctor was looking at Yakov. He avoided her eyes.

"I'll give you something," she said flatly, moving to a cabinet in the corner and opening it.

"He must be able to function," Jerold said, eyes still closed.

The woman did not answer. She opened the cabinet and removed a bottle, which she opened. The capsules she poured into her palm were red and white. She handed them to Yakov, who gulped them down dry.

Before he could stop himself, Yakov said, "Thank you."

But his mother did not answer.

The call from Emil Karpo came in the afternoon, when Rostnikov and McQuinton, the American, were seated in the lobby of the Lermontov, reading. Rostnikov was reading his badly battered copy of Ed McBain's Ax for the seventh time, and the American. Lester McQuinton, was reading the copy of Lawrence Block's When the Sacred Ginmill Closes that Porfiry Petrovich had lent him.

Rostnikov had spent almost two hours getting to the weight room at the hospital, working out and making his way back. McQuinton had been standing in the lobby, waiting for lunch to be served, when he returned.

"I can't get used to eating lunch at two," he said. "Women aren't back. Want to join me?"

Rostnikov had accepted, and they had eaten the communal mound of an unidentified rice creation with pieces of meat that was heaped upon their plates and served with a vegetable on the side that looked something like okra.

They spoke English at lunch, and Rostnikov had suggested an afternoon of reading while they waited for their wives to return. McQuinton had readily agreed.

"Andy thinks we should be doing, seeing something all the time," he said. "She wants to cram everything in. She thinks it's a waste to relax here when we can relax at home. You know your friend from last night is watching you again?''

Rostnikov had nodded and sat in a chair near the window. Though he was not the least bit chilled, Rostnikov had also brought a sweater from the room, which he wore buttoned to the neck. He had handed McQuinton the Block book he had brought down from his room after noting that his room had been gently, professionally, searched. Misha Ivanov was seated across the lobby, a newspaper in hand, making no effort to conceal the fact that he was performing his duty. He was watching Rostnikov. Rostnikov had been right. Ivanov had not been relieved of his assignment in spite of his direct contact with Rostnikov.

For Rostnikov, it was an afternoon of waiting. There was nothing to be done until Ivanov approached him. Nothing to be done until Karpo called. Nothing to be done till Sarah and the American woman returned. And, as always, doing nothing was the most difficult job of all for a policeman. It was the task that took the greatest toll, that started the policeman thinking about the pettiness of his superiors, the unfairness of his lot, the boredom that often resulted in failure and waste and guilt for having wasted time. Doing nothing, though it was essential, was the greatest threat to a policeman's stability and sanity.

When the call came from Karpo, Rostnikov excused himself to McQuinton, coaxed his left leg into near cooperation, and moved across the lobby to the booth, knowing Misha Ivanov was watching him across the room.

"Emil Karpo," he said when Karpo identified himself. "Have you had a busy day?"

Karpo recounted his encounter with Jerold and paused while Rostnikov digested the tale.

"Politics and ideology," said Rostnikov. "Passionate murder, drugs, even madness, are so much easier. In America, the police hardly ever deal with politics and ideology."

"The people in America shoot each other for nothing," said Karpo. "For stepping on gymnasium shoes." ' 'I didn't say it was better, just easier,'' Rostnikov replied.

"I have seen the list of investigative officers from all branches who are now on vacation. It was far too long to print out without being questioned, and it is not an unusual number for this time of year. There is an upward-percentage variation of only two percent. I have also noted those who are on vacation in the Yalta region. That, too, is not an unusual number, an upward variation over the past six years of five percent. What is unusual is the rank and profile of those on vacation."

"Enlighten me, Emil Karpo," he said, looking through the little round glass door of the phone booth at Misha Ivanov, who was looking directly back at him.

"An unusually high number of senior investigators in all branches are now on vacation," he said. "Normally, the vacations of senior investigators are staggered. The statistical variation is off by more than eighty percent.'' "Do you like computers, Emil Karpo?"

"I find them useful," he said.

"You speak to them well," said Rostnikov.

"I do not speak to them," corrected Karpo. "They provide data based upon programs properly established to retrieve information. The computers at Petrovka, if the individual has proper access coding, are capable of retrieving a great deal of interest."

"It has been said," Rostnikov replied, "that Lenin loved telephones, loved them so much that he covered the desks of his apartment with them and actually had the central Moscow switchboard operator located right outside the office in his apartment."

"Lenin did not love telephones as objects," said Karpo.

"He wished to control communication during the postrevolutionary period. It was essential." ' 'And he could listen to any call in Moscow if he wished,'' said Rostnikov.

"He could," said Karpo.

"I think we shall speak no more on the telephone," said Rostnikov.

"As you think best, Inspector."

"Be cautious, Emil Karpo."

They hung up, and Rostnikov emerged from the booth, picked up two cups of hot tea, and went back to the chair where the American sat reading, a pair of half glasses perched on his nose.

"I'm going to take a walk," said Rostnikov, handing McQuinton one cup of tea and placing the other on the table near the chair in which Rostnikov had left his book. He took off his sweater and placed it next to the book.

"I'll go with you," said McQuinton, closing the book.

"No, please," countered Rostnikov. "The wives should be returning soon. You can greet them. I won't be long."

"Okay with me," McQuinton said, settling back again.

Rostnikov did not enjoy walking. The stress on his leg was great, and though he had a distance he felt it essential to walk each day for his health, he had passed that mark hours ago.

He began his journey by going to the men's room just off the lobby. Misha Ivanov watched him but did not leave his chair. Rostnikov had intentionally taken the cup of tea for himself and left both his sweater and his open book on the chair next to the American. He wished to give the impression that he was going to the rest room and would be right back.

The rest room was in an alcove next to a door that led to the kitchens. The door was seldom used and probably kept locked, but it was a simple door designed to deter. Rostnikov opened it with his pocketknife and went through it, pushing it closed behind him. Misha Ivanov had no reason to think anything was out of the ordinary. It would take him at least three minutes to become professionally concerned enough to check on Rostnikov.

The kitchen was empty, at least there was no one Rostnikov could see, but a woman somewhere sang a folk song in a quite beautiful voice. It struck Rostnikov that the hotel would be better served having the woman with this voice singing in the dining room than the dreaded concertina lady.

In spite of his reluctant leg, Rostnikov was outside the Lermontov in less than a minute. He did not expect much from his excursion, but it was essential if he were to be able to go on to other things. There were times when he found a song playing in his head or saw the face of a minor movie actor or remembered a book and desperately needed to place the author. At these times he found it almost impossible to function efficiently unless that little piece of unnecessary information could be supplied, preferably by his own recollection.

He had carefully searched Georgi Vasilievich's belongings, his room, and had discovered that the dead GRU man had had no friends in the sanitarium and knew no one but Rostnikov in the town. Vasilievich's room had been searched by whoever killed him, and it did not seem that they had found what they were looking for. What was it? Where, if it existed, had Vasilievich put it?

Rostnikov knew the route Georgi had taken each night back to the sanitarium. If Vasilievich knew he was being followed, might he not hide the treasure? Probably not, but possibly so. Rostnikov followed the route.

The sky was clear, with a tangy breeze from the sea. The sweater he had left on the chair would have been welcome. He wended his way down the path from the hotel, across the road, and into the woods. There were trees, just trees, nothing but trees. If Vasilievich had hidden his treasure in a tree, there was little chance of it being found. He would, Rostnikov was sure, hide it someplace protected from the animals and weather, someplace he could retrieve it quickly.

Porfiry Petrovich's eyes scanned the path as he walked. Far ahead of him he heard the laughter of a man and woman, but he did not see them. From time to time, he paused at a promising tree, a formation of stones. Nothing.

The path turned to the sea, and he followed.

In front of him the sound of the man and woman moved farther away. He came to a clearing on his right, an outcrop of rocks and a rotunda offering a view of both the sea and the castlelike sanitarium in the distance. Rostnikov moved cautiously onto the rotunda platform and stood for a moment watching the waves and a quartet of distant birds hovering over the water. One of the birds suddenly plunged into a wave and disappeared. Rostnikov watched till the bird reappeared on the surface of the water, shook itself, and took off again to join the other three.

It was difficult for Rostnikov to kneel. His leg protested and made the process not only awkward but painful, but he did kneel at the edge of the platform and reach under it, his finger probing, exploring. He felt nothing and moved a bit farther along. Getting up would not be easy. His fingers touched something under the boards, something soft and alive that scuttled away. He had covered less than half the possible undersurface when his fingers caught the edge of something on the rocks. He had almost missed it. Vasilievich's arms and fingers had been longer than those of Rostnikov. It was something pliable. He strained and grasped the prize as well as he could with two fingers and then coaxed it toward him until he could get a more solid grip on it. And then it was out.

Porfiry Petrovich didn't get a good look at what he had found till he raised himself from the platform slowly, his leg paying the price, with the help of the handrail and fence that ringed the little platform. Only when he was standing did he fully understand that he held a clear plastic zippered pouch inside of which there rested a red plastic-covered notebook about the size of a wallet. He removed the notebook, put it in his back pocket, then folded the plastic pouch into a neat rectangle and plunged it into his front right pocket.

Now it was time to get back. He could examine the book later. Misha Ivanov would know that he had gone somewhere, but there was little he could do about it.

Besides, if the book contained what Rostnikov assumed it would contain, he would soon be sharing its contents with the KGB man.

Going back proved to be much more difficult than coming. The primary problems were two. First, there was a slight uphill incline out of the woods. Second, the strain on his leg had taken a great toll. Rostnikov was in need of a warm bath or shower. Most of all, he was in need of a chair in which he could sit.

He continued to move, though he was forced every minute or so to pause, apologize to his aching leg, and promise it better treatment in the future. His leg, old enemy that it was, was not listening.

The woods around him were not silent. Birds fluttered, and the sea waves echoed under the canopy of thickly leaved trees. It was a place he would, given rest, like to take Sarah.

That was the thought on his mind when he became quite suddenly aware that he was not alone on the path. He knew it even before he made the turn. It was not magic. Perhaps it was a flurry of leaves or a lessening of sound or a vibration on the path that he sensed and didn't turn into sensations, but he knew. There was no turning back and no possibility of running. It could be innocent, a stroller in the afternoon. It could be and might be, but Rostnikov doubted that it was.

He considered quickly hiding the notebook or even throwing it off the trail next to a tree or rock he might recognize later, but the chances of his being able to retrieve it would be slight. Instead, he moved forward slowly and made the turn in the path.

Standing about five yards in front of Porfiry Petrovich, blocking his way, were the two men he had seen in the lobby of the Lermontov, a little man with one eye that looked quite mad and another eye that was definitely made of glass. Behind the little man was the other man, an enormous young man with the body of a large refrigerator.