The Man Who Walked Like a Bear

FOURTEEN

Simeon Propkin, the young MVD officer guiding late-afternoon traffic crossing the bridge just below the Lenin Hills, was surprised to see the bus moving slowly in the stream of traffic. He was surprised for several reasons. First, according to the sign above the window, the bus was far off route. Though Peotor Kotsis had told him to change the route sign, Boris Trush had simply in his ongoing fear forgotten to do so. The second and perhaps more important reason Simeon Propkin, the traffic officer, was surprised was that he recognized the number of the bus as the one that had been reported missing three days earlier.

Propkin had been an active member of the MVD for only three weeks, which turned out to be fortunate, since, from the moment he saw the bus, he never considered doing anything but that which he had been told to do. Propkin let the bus pass, left his post, and hurried to the phone in his car parked in the restricted area just beyond the bridge.

“Don’t speed,” Vasily said as they moved away from the bridge. He punctuated his order with a sharp jab of his gun into Boris Trush’s ribs.

Boris, who had been unaware that he was going too fast, slowed down.

“When we get to the square, go past the old church. If no one tries to stop you, drive slowly to the front of the tomb,” Vasily said. “If someone tries to stop you, get to the tomb as fast as you can. Roll over anyone and anything in your way. You understand?”

“I understand,” Boris said.

“And then,” Vasily said, “we will all do our job and meet for a toast in hell.”

They were less than a block from the entrance to the square when a series of events took place. The first was that a barrier had been placed across the road to the square. Boris was the first to see it. It was a yellow-and-white gate. In front of it stood two uniformed MVD men with weapons held ready across their chests. Behind the barrier stood three men, one heavyset, one young with his hair falling over his forehead, and the third tall and pale, as pale and serious as death.

Vasily saw the barrier and the men only an instant after Boris.

“Go through it,” Vasily said, putting the gun to Boris’s head.

“I can’t,” Boris said.

“You will,” Vasily said, hitting Boris on the top of his head with the barrel of the gun. “You will or this bus will be painted with what little brains you have. You will because I will not fail my father and my sister. You will because this is the best moment of my life and I’ll not have it screwed up by a sweating fool.”

The bus was moving slowly forward. Boris could clearly see the faces of each man at the barrier. Their guns were now leveled at the window of the bus, at Boris Trush.

From somewhere behind them, within the bus, a woman’s voice, Lia’s, called: “Give it up, Vasily! We can’t get through!”

“Shut up!” Vasily shouted, looking out the front window as the bus moved to within fifty yards of the barrier.

“We can’t get through!” came another voice. Vasily let out a terrible shout, a howl of madness. He turned and fired a burst from his machine pistol into the rear of the bus. Windows exploded. Someone screamed. Boris lost control, and the bus careened to the right, hit a light pole, and came to a stop as it tilted over. Vasily tumbled toward the door, losing his grip on the gun. His head hit a window and went through it. Boris, who clung to the steering wheel in fear, reached over to open the front door with the vague thought of getting out. Behind him the terrorists screamed and shouted, and those who were uninjured and alive went through windows.

Boris let go of the steering wheel and rolled toward the door in total panic. As he went through, Vasily, his face a mask of blood, grabbed him. Boris yelped like a dog and dragged Vasily with him into the street. Boris struck at the hands that clung to him, at the face that bubbled something angry and unintelligible.

Over Vasily’s shoulder as they rolled on the ground Boris could see the MVD officers and the three men behind the barrier running toward them. He struggled madly to get free of the creature who clung to him. And then Boris Trush found himself on top of Vasily Kotsis and a rush of something animallike and liberating came over him. Boris punched at the creature beneath him, the creature who was trying to strangle him with crimson, sticky fingers. Boris struck and shouted something not even he understood. He was punching furiously when the officers pulled him off the subdued man beneath him.

“Enough,” said the young man with the hair in his eyes, the one who had been behind the barrier.

“Enough,” Boris Trush agreed as he was led away.

His last glimpse of the scene was of the terrorists kneeling on the ground with guns trained on them and more uniformed officers rushing from doorways.

“Enough,” Boris Trush repeated one more time before he passed out.

When he awakened hours later in the hospital, Boris Trush would be informed that he was a hero. And he would believe it.

Immediately after Rostnikov received the report from Karpo that the terrorists had been caught, the bus recovered, and the driver released, the inspectors left for the hospital. He could return to his office later to complete the reports. A trip to the hospital would also give him time to consider how he would deal with the fact that he had interfered with a terrorism-and-hostage case that had officially been turned over to the KGB. In anticipation of an affirmative outcome to the situation, Rostnikov had already prepared a rough statement, with the Wolfhound’s approval, to the effect that the colonel had simply responded to an informant who indicated that an unnamed criminal was expected to attempt a robbery not far from the Kremlin.

It was weak, but Rostnikov knew he could fill in the holes. The fact that the policeman at the bridge had called in the approach of the bus gave Rostnikov a fortunate option. Word of the approaching bus had been called in to the KGB, but since Rostnikov’s people were already in the vicinity, they responded and, fortunately, were present.

It was easier to take an elektrika train than to try to get an automobile and a driver. Besides, the train ride gave him ample time to think.

Sarah was sitting up in bed and eating when he arrived. She was still wearing a bandage, but it was much smaller than the turban he had last seen. Her red hair was beginning to grow back.

The two other beds in the room were empty. The girl and the old woman were capable of walking and were down in the patients’ dining room.

“Don’t look at me,” Sarah said when he came through the doorway. “I have no hair.”

“It will come back,” said Rostnikov, moving to her side to kiss her cheek. “What are you eating?”

“I don’t know,” she said, looking down at the tray on her lap. “It’s wet, white and has lumps of something in it. Would you like some?”

“No, thank you,” he said, resting on the side of her bed. “What does the doctor say today?”

“Three, four more days and I can go home,” she said. She handed him the tray, and he put it on the table nearby. “Porfiry, why have we not heard from Iosef?”

“He’s all right,” he said, taking her hand. “I’ll find out tonight or tomorrow. I’ll talk to him.”

“It’s not a good experience, the army,” she said, looking at him.

“One can learn from it,” said Rostnikov. “There is no war now. It’s just boredom, routine, and stupidity.”

“Yes,” she said, making it evident that she did not believe him. “Ivan Bulgarin, have you found him? How is he?”

“No,” said Rostnikov, remembering the man who walked like a bear. “But I think we need have no fear about his well-being.”

“I’m not so certain,” she said. “You know, I thought I was going to die in here.”

“I know,” he said.

“I didn’t want to think about the future,” she went on, holding tightly to his rough hand. “Now we should think about the future again.”

“And what shall we think?” he asked.

She said nothing and he understood. She was dreaming of leaving the Soviet Union.

“I’m tired again, Porfiry,” she said. “Those pills they give me.”

“Sleep,” he said, getting up from the bed. “I’ll be back tomorrow.”

“Don’t forget to eat, Porfiry,” she said dreamily.

“I won’t,” he promised.

And instantly she was asleep or pretending to be.

It was raining gently when Rostnikov stepped out of the hospital. There was a chance, if he moved quickly, that he could catch the ten o’clock train back to Moscow. He was not at all sure he could move quickly, but as it turned out, he did not have to hurry, nor did he have to take the train.

When Sasha Tkach reached home that evening, he was greeted at the door by Maya and Pulcharia. Maya kissed him, closed the door, and handed him the baby, who leaned over quickly to give his nose a toothless, moist, and gentle bite.

“Is Lydia home?” he asked.

“Yes,” Maya said. “And she is in a good mood. She says she is looking forward now to the move. And she is going out tonight. I think Lydia has a date.”

“Lydia has …” Sasha said.

Pulcharia tried to poke a finger in his eye, but Sasha turned his head and moved to the chair in the corner of the room.

“Yes,” Maya said. “She … What’s wrong?”

The tired smile on Sasha’s face had disappeared. His eyes had fallen on the table, set for dinner and containing a small glass in which were nestled the flowers he had given to Lydia so long ago that morning, the flowers of Sonia Kotsis, who had shot off the top of her head in front of Sasha Tkach.

Sasha clutched the baby close to him, closed his eyes, and felt Maya’s hand on his head. In the next room, Lydia Tkach burst into a loud and off-key version of something that may have been “Waltzing Matilda.”

Sasha wept.

Emil Karpo ate a dinner of bread and herring while working at the desk in his room. He drank mineral water and carefully completed his notes on both the Morchov case and his part in the apprehension of Vasily Kotsis and the rescue of the bus driver. He had written official reports at Petrovka and checked the pending investigations file. On the way to his apartment he had made a slight detour to confront the meat dealer whose name he had been given. The man, standing alone in a small room behind his small shop inches from the pale policeman, had been most cooperative. Karpo was certain that by the next morning he would have in his custody the men who had been kidnapping pets.

He finished his food, cleared away each crumb carefully, packed his small garbage, and walked it down to the trash room on the first floor.

It was still early when Karpo returned to his room, took off his jacket and shoes, and sat on the floor to meditate. For a moment he thought he felt the aura of a migraine headache, but it did not come, and he felt a pang of disappointment, for in spite of the pain, the headaches were old acquaintances.

Porfiry Petrovich had recently suggested to Karpo that the headaches may have been his body’s way of forcing Karpo to relax, to pay attention to his bodily needs. Yes, Karpo thought, remembering his recent conversation with Rostnikov. The machine is not a human body, and the human body is not a machine.

Emil sat on the floor and crossed his legs, focused on a whorl in the wood of his chair, and found himself imagining Yuri and Jalna alone in the dacha, huddled together with new hope and the specter of murder lifted from them. Karpo refocused, trying to turn the image to white, but the image of the two young people alone, laughing in bed, would not go away.

Karpo rose from the floor. It was a week early. He had never violated his schedule, had never given in to the animal needs of his body, though he never denied them. But this need he felt was without words and beyond his understanding.

He would explore it, control it, but first he had to give it what it demanded. Karpo put on his jacket and shoes and left his room. He ignored the light rain and found a phone. He placed his call and waited.

“Mathilde Verson,” he said to the man who answered the phone. Behind the man he could hear soft jazz music. And then he heard her voice.

“Yes?” she said.

“It’s me,” said Karpo.

“What can I do for you, Emil?” she asked. “You need some information?”

“No,” he said. “I would like to see you. Are you … available?”

“It’s not Thursday,” she said. “Are you all right?”

“Yes.”

“I’m available,” she said.

“I’ll be there in fifteen minutes,” he said and hung up the phone.

It was done. He had no idea what he would tell her. All he knew was that for the first time in his life he did not want to be alone.

The car that pulled up beside Rostnikov on the rain-deserted street near the hospital was large, dark, and not Very old. The rear door opened. Rostnikov could see no one inside, but he recognized the invitation and it was not completely unexpected. The rain had begun to fall harder. Rostnikov moved to the car and slid in next to Schroeder, the hospital administrator. Schroeder glanced at Rostnikov, who closed the door as the driver moved quickly away from the curb.

“You made a mistake, Comrade Inspector,” Schroeder said without looking at Rostnikov. “You should have been looking for me in the hospital. You should have asked more questions about Ivan Bulgarin. You are in trouble.”

Rostnikov grunted. He had made no mistake.

“Why did you stop looking for Bulgarin?” Schroeder asked conversationally.

And Rostnikov understood. It was Schroeder who had made the mistake, Schroeder who had failed to keep Rostnikov looking for Ivan Bulgarin. It was Schroeder who was in trouble.

“Ivan Bulgarin did not need my help,” Rostnikov said.

Neither man spoke again for the remainder of the ride. Schroeder looked out of his window and Rostnikov out of his as the rain quickened and the sound of the windshield wiper lulled.

The car stopped before the door to Lubyanka, KGB headquarters. The rain had slowed a bit. Rostnikov stepped out and looked back across the square at the statue of Felix Dzerzinsky, father of the Soviet secret police. Schroeder joined him, and the car pulled away.

The policeman and the KGB man walked to the door and entered. On either side of the dank entryway stood a uniformed and armed guard, who watched as the two men approached the desk in front of them. The woman behind the desk looked at Schroeder, who displayed an identification card, and then at Rostnikov, who removed his identification card and handed it to the woman. She placed the card on a thin metal plate on the corner of the desk and pressed a white button next to the plate. There was a slight hum, and the woman returned Rostnikov’s card without a word.

The rest of the journey was a familiar one to Porfiry Petrovich. Schroeder moved slowly, allowing Rostnikov to keep pace with him. Rostnikov was sure, however, that Schroeder was not slowing his pace out of concern for the policeman. Schroeder was in no hurry to get where they were going. Up one stairway, down the corridor, and then what he had suspected was confirmed. They stopped in front of a dark, heavy wooden door. Schroeder hesitated and then knocked.

The door opened and a powerful-looking giant of a man in his late thirties stepped back to let them in. The powerful man wore a dark blue suit. He was clean-shaven with hair blond and cut short, and he looked very like the last man who had opened this door for Rostnikov.

The powerful man moved across the small carpeted room furnished with three chairs against the wall, a desk with a chair, and a single photograph of Lenin on the wall. The man knocked gently at the far door, and a voice Rostnikov recognized called, “Send him in, Vadim.”

The powerful man opened the door, and Rostnikov stepped forward. Vadim Schroeder hesitated, considered entering with him, and thought better of it. The door was closed gently behind him by the powerful man when Rostnikov entered the room and found himself facing the KGB officer, Colonel Zhenya.

Zhenya was no more than forty-five, very young for one of such rank. He had moved up when his predecessor, who was not a young man, died after a long and painful illness. Zhenya, immaculate, thin, balding, and dark, wore his uniform, a uniform devoid of decoration. For an instant Rostnikov looked at the man seated behind the desk with folded hands, the barred window, the uniform, and the sparseness of the room and wondered if Zhenya had created a prison for himself.

“Sit, Rostnikov,” Zhenya said.

Rostnikov sat. The rain brushed against the window loudly and then went back to its steady drum.

Whatever Zhenya wanted, Rostnikov was sure, would not come directly or quickly. It was a game both men had played throughout their lives. Zhenya had started the game. Now he would have to make the first move.

“You interfered with a KGB operation this morning,” Zhenya said, unclasping his hands and putting a finger on a dark, thick file folder on the desk. “The Turkistani business could have had disastrous consequences as a result of your ego.”

“I will submit a complete report by morning, Comrade Colonel,” Rostnikov said. “The presence of my colleagues at the square was coincidental.”

“A fortunate coincidence,” said Zhenya with a smile that was not a smile.

“Full credit belongs to Colonel Snitkonoy,” said Rostnikov.

“Yes, I understand he will be properly rewarded for his quick thinking and the efficiency of his staff,” said Zhenya. “He had a very busy, a very productive day.”

The pause was long. The two men listened to the rain.

“Do you know why you are here, Rostnikov?” Zhenya said.

“Nahatchavanski,” said Rostnikov.

“Yes,” said Zhenya. “Nahatchavanski. That will get your colonel a promotion, more responsibility. And with that come enemies. Your colonel has long been considered a harmless buffoon. Since you have joined his staff, he has become more formidable. I doubt you have done him a service, Rostnikov.”

“I do my duty,” Rostnikov said.

“Why did you stop looking for Ivan Bulgarin?” said Zhenya.

It was time. Rostnikov’s move.

“There is no Ivan Bulgarin,” said Rostnikov.

“When did you know this?” asked Zhenya.

“I suspected from the start,” said Rostnikov. “The naked giant who entered my wife’s room and whispered a cryptic clue to corruption was well staged but a bit coincidental. The mental ward of the hospital is in a far wing. He had to wander a long distance and randomly select the room in which a policeman happened to be visiting.”

“You were not sure,” said Zhenya.

“No,” said Rostnikov. “Not then.”

“You are a suspicious man, Rostnikov.”

“One has to be to survive,” Rostnikov said with a shrug. “May I rise?”

“If you must,” said Zhenya.

Rostnikov rose slowly, bent his left leg, and rubbed the knee.

“Are you in pain, Rostnikov?”

“One learns to live with discomfort, Colonel, even pain.”

“What confirmed your suspicion?”

“Not the car you had following me,” said Rostnikov, sitting again. “That could have been for a variety of reasons, but it was on the heels of the Bulgarin incident. You made it too easy, Colonel.”

Zhenya could not keep his back from going straight at the insult, but he let nothing show on his face.

“Easy,” Zhenya repeated.

“Lukov, the Lentaka Shoe Factory manager, was too nervous,” Rostnikov went on. “But that could well have been a natural fear of the police. And then he gave up the name of Nahatchavanski too quickly, too easily. Yet that, too, could have been. The papers were too easy to find. It is difficult to believe that a man with the experience of General Nahatchavanski would allow papers that would incriminate him to be left in the files of a shoe factory.”

“Yes,” Zhenya agreed. “It was too easy, but I had no time for great subtlety. The longer you took, the more likely Nahatchavanski would discover your investigation and, possibly, trace it back to me. What other errors did my staff make? I would like to profit from this experience.”

“It was not difficult to notice the car that followed us the night we broke into the factory,” said Rostnikov. “Whoever was in that car should have made a pretense at least of searching my apartment, my office, that of my men in case they were seen.”

“Then, Inspector, why did you let us lead you along?”

“Because,” Rostnikov answered, “General Nahatchavanski is guilty.”

There were things that now were better left unsaid. Clearly, Zhenya had used Rostnikov to further his own career and rid himself of an enemy without risking an attack on a fellow KGB officer, an officer who, Rostnikov assumed, he wished to replace. And it was now clear that Rostnikov had used Zhenya to catch a high-ranking criminal within the ranks of the KGB.

“Have you considered the possibility that you may not leave this building?” asked Zhenya.

“Yes, Colonel,” Rostnikov said, looking at the window. The rain had stopped, and there was only darkness. “When I turned over to Colonel Snitkonoy the copy of the papers I had taken from the Lentaka Shoe Factory, I also gave him a report indicating the suspicions I have just related to you. The report also suggested that the apprehension of the general would not have been possible without the aid of cooperative individuals with the KGB. I named no names, for I had none, but I think it would not be difficult to determine who those cooperative individuals are. And, I suspect, if I disappear, the colonel will swiftly pursue the possibilities for my disappearance suggested by my report.”

Zhenya stood, walked to the window, and looked out, though there was nothing he could possibly have seen in the darkness. He put his hands behind his back and turned to Rostnikov.

“This is a dangerous game, Rostnikov,” Zhenya warned.

“For both of us, Colonel. You can rely upon my silence. There is nothing for me in attempting to implicate you.”

“You want something more, Rostnikov. I want your silence. You want your safety, but you want more,” said Zhenya, moving back to this desk.

“My wife and I would like to leave the Soviet Union,” Rostnikov said.

“Impossible,” replied Zhenya.

“I know,” said Rostnikov. “But I will settle for the release of my son from the army. He has served his time.”

Iosef Rostnikov’s military service had twice been extended, including an extension during the Afghanistan campaign. The reason given was the need for Iosef’s special skills, skills that had never been utilized by the military. The real reason Iosef Rostnikov was kept in the army was to keep his safety as a sword over the head of his troublesome father.

“I will inquire,” said Zhenya.

“I would be grateful for any assistance you can give, Colonel,” said Rostnikov.

“I don’t like you, Rostnikov,” Zhenya said. “That, I am sure, comes as no surprise to you. You are hampered by a sense of justice at odds with the goals of the State. You interfere, Rostnikov, and you believe that because you are good at what you do you will survive. You will not survive, Rostnikov.”

Zhenya’s words had been delivered, beginning to end, in an emotionless monotone. Rostnikov nodded when he was finished. The colonel pulled the files on his desk in front of him, adjusted his glasses, and began to read. Rostnikov was being dismissed and ignored.

Porfiry Petrovich Rostnikov got up and moved to the door. He opened it and stepped into the small office, where he found the giant standing with his arms folded. Vadim Schroeder was gone.

Rostnikov did not stare at the huge man who lumbered slowly like a bear to open the outer door, beyond which Schroeder stood waiting to lead Rostnikov through the labyrinth of Lubyanka. The giant’s blue eyes met those of Rostnikov, and it was clear that the policeman recognized the man he had known briefly as Ivan Bulgarin. The giant smiled slightly as he closed the door behind the inspector.

Schroeder led the way through the building without speaking. When they reached the front entrance, Schroeder opened the door and said, “The car will take you home.”

“Thank you,” said Rostnikov.

“Your discussion with the colonel went well?” Schroeder said as Rostnikov went down the stone steps and headed for the waiting, humming automobile.

“Yes,” said Rostnikov.

Schroeder stood on the step wanting to ask more, wanting a clue to his own future, but he dared not ask. Rostnikov climbed into the car and settled back. He was very tired.

Back in his apartment, Rostnikov ate some bread and drank the last of a jar of potato soup. Slowly he undressed, put on his sweatshirt, pulled his bench and weights out of the cabinet in the corner of the living room, and turned on the record player.

Then to the sound of Edith Piaf softly singing of a lost love, Rostnikov lost himself in the magic of two-handed curls.

Three nights and one day later, Porfiry Petrovich Rostnikov opened the door of Sarah’s room at the September 1947 Hospital. She was ready for him in the wheelchair. Her lips were touched with pink, and the bandages had been removed. Her freshly combed hair seemed to have lost just a shade of its redness, but it may simply, Rostnikov thought, be my memory. Sarah was wearing her pink-and-white robe and her matching pink slippers.

The other two beds in the room were occupied by new patients, one covered and asleep and with a tuft of white hair, the other a thin woman of perhaps forty who looked at Rostnikov over half glasses.

“Do I look …?” Sarah said.

“You look fine,” said Rostnikov, moving to kiss her forehead.

“You lie, Porfiry Petrovich,” she said with a sigh.

“When I must, but not to you,” he said. “Dr. Yegeneva says we can go to the roof.”

“It looks as if it might be a little cold,” said Sarah as Rostnikov got behind the chair and pushed her toward the door he had left open. “Winter’s coming.”

“Yes,” he said, wheeling her slowly down the hall, the wheels clicking in need of oil, Rostnikov’s leg struggling to keep the movement even.

“And that makes you happy,” she went on as they reached the elevator. Rostnikov pushed the button and stood before her.

“I like the winter,” he said.

“How much time can you spend with me today?” she asked, touching her hair with a pale hand.

“All day. Till you tire.”

The elevator opened. It was empty. Rostnikov pushed the wheelchair in and hit the button to close the door.

As the elevator moved up the two floors to the roof, Rostnikov asked, “I have a surprise. Are you able to take a surprise?”

Sarah looked up at her husband, saw the small smile, and knew there was no terror in the surprise. She looked at his hands, but they held nothing.

“Yes,” she said.

And men the elevator door opened. There was a double door to the roof in front of them. The door was open. The fall wind blew and hummed and Sarah savored it and felt her body under its touch and was glad to be alive. As Rostnikov wheeled her around a corner onto the open roof, she reached up to touch his hand.

It was at that moment that she saw the sturdy, smiling young man standing no more than ten paces in front of her. He wore dark trousers and a black knit turtleneck sweater she had bought him for his last birthday.

“He can stay, Sarah,” Rostnikov said, squeezing her hand gently. “He is no longer a soldier.”

Iosef moved forward to his mother, and Porfiry pretended not to hear the sob that came from the soul of his wife.