‘This is proof of premeditation.’
‘Go on,’ encouraged Porfiry.
‘He put the razor next to the letters at the precise moment when he decided to kill her,’ Virginsky ventured. ‘And of course, he had another razor with which he committed the actual crime.’
‘Why did he want her dead, though? Because she had jilted him?’
‘It would appear so.’
‘If he couldn’t have her, no one could. Let alone the absurd Naryskin.’
‘Yes.’
‘A crime of passion?’ Porfiry put the question with narrowed eyes.
‘I do not believe you can call it that. A crime of passion, as I understand it, is a crime committed in a sudden rage. The result of an intense and overwhelming emotional upheaval. There must be no opportunity for reconsidering or turning back. If the letters provoked Mizinchikov to murder, he had ample time to reflect as he travelled to the Naryskin Palace. This was not done in the heat of the moment. As we have discussed, the presence of the razor in the drawer, next to her letters, indicates a certain degree of premeditation. “This is what I will use against the woman who has rejected me” — that is what it says. We must assume that he went there armed with his second razor, fully intending to use it. And that he bided his time until he had the opportunity to put his plan into action.’
‘But is it not possible,’ countered Porfiry, ‘when an individual is overtaken by such a destructive passion, that “the moment” may last for some considerable time, its heat maintained for hours, days even? If we do not call it a crime of passion, we may talk of diminished responsibility. They act without reason, without planning, without strategy. They are compelled. A force more powerful than them takes them over. And while they are in the grip of this compulsive force, they can think of nothing else. It is hardly a question of thought. They become the act itself. All their will, emotion, energy — their very soul, in short, is channelled into one moment, one fatal transgression. Certainly they do not think beyond the execution of the act. And once they have crossed over from intent to execution, once they have made the transgression, and they find themselves standing in the aftermath of their crime, they are to a large extent baffled, lost — even bereft. For not only have they been deprived of the compulsion that gave shape and purpose to their existence, but also they have lost the person they once loved more than any other. Put simply, they have no reason to live any more. Can we wonder that such criminals often go on to take their own lives, or passively surrender to their fate? They have nothing else to live for.’
‘I do not dispute your construction of his mental state,’ conceded Virginsky. ‘Although it occurs to me that we are both forgetting Prince Sergei’s testimony, that Yelena Filippovna wanted to die and indeed solicited her own death.’
‘Then how are we to explain the mirror?’ asked Porfiry, suddenly dismayed.
‘The mirror?’
‘Someone cleaned the mirror.’ Once again, Porfiry drew the shape of a large M in the air. ‘Why did he go to such trouble to cover his tracks? What did it matter to him? Indeed, how could he have mustered the required presence of mind?’
‘Yes, I see.’ Virginsky nodded thoughtfully. ‘By your account, he should have simply waited for the police — or killed himself on the spot.’
‘What if Captain Mizinchikov is in fact innocent? Then perhaps his flight can be adequately explained by panic. He was fleeing the prospect of a false accusation. An unwise and regrettable decision on his part, but that I suppose is the nature of panic. Tell me, Pavel Pavlovich, did you notice any blood on the floor beneath the mirror?’
‘No.’
‘Neither did I. However, it is reasonable to assume that the liquid soaking her dress and the rug beneath her body was blood. Logic therefore suggests that she was killed where she lay. Which means that she cannot also have been killed in front of the mirror. Assuming the smears on the mirror are blood, how did they get there?’
Porfiry lapsed into silent thought, as though unable to answer the question he himself had posed.
Virginsky seemed hesitant to break the silence. He offered his explanation tentatively: ‘The murderer placed a bloody hand on the mirror … and then, noticing the mark it left, attempted to wipe it clean — perhaps with the sleeve of his tunic? That would explain why we were not able to find a blood-soaked cloth, and why no one was seen carrying one away from the room.’
Porfiry seemed enlivened by the suggestion. He nodded in excited approval. ‘Having committed this terrible deed, he felt compelled to confront himself. Looking into his own eyes and seeing for the first time the eyes of a murderer, he is overcome by an unbearable horror. His legs buckle and he falls forward, reaching out a hand to hold himself up.’ Porfiry mimed the action he described, his eyes wide with vicarious horror. He suddenly frowned in dissatisfaction. ‘But why bother to wipe clean the relatively small amount of blood on the mirror, when there is copious blood on the rug, about which he can do nothing?’
‘Because the blood on the mirror appears to him as a sign of his guilt. It is his hand that has left the mark.’
‘And if the murderer is indeed Mizinchikov, he subconsciously signals his guilt …’ Porfiry described the letter M with one hand. ‘Whilst his conscious mind attempts to eradicate all trace of it. Yes, I find your theory very interesting, Pavel Pavlovich. It is at least psychologically coherent.’
‘Thank you.’
‘It is vital that we find Captain Mizinchikov. Vital for him, I mean. If our reconstruction of events is correct, his soul must be burdened by this terrible crime. More than burdened — tortured. His soul is in conflict with itself. We must give him the opportunity to confess. We must arrest him for his own salvation. I fear what he may be driven to, left alone with his guilt.’
‘He must know that we are looking for him,’ observed Virginsky.
‘Yes, and a man in a blood-spattered dress uniform will be conspicuous. The first thing he will try to do is change his clothes. He had an opportunity to do so at the Naryskin Palace. You noticed the clothes in the wardrobe?’
‘Yes, but he may not have realised they were there.’
‘Indeed. Perhaps, however, we should postpone further speculations until we have a clearer idea what the substance on the mirror is. Has Dr Pervoyedov been alerted?’
‘I understand that he wished to visit the scene of the crime. There is every chance that he is there now.’
‘Then let us join him,’ said Porfiry, slapping both palms decisively on his desk as he rose. ‘While we are at it, we shall pay a visit on the invalid, Aglaia Filippovna, thus killing two hares with one shot.’ He gave Virginsky a challenging look, as if to say, Does your Oblomov kill two hares with one shot?
13 Sanguinary expectations
A fine white mist rose off the Yekaterininsky Canal, as if it were generating obscurity. The vague silhouette of some vehicle, rattling over Kokushkin Bridge without lights, came towards them at speed. It turned out to be an empty drozhki, which Virginsky hailed at the last moment, almost as it was upon them. The driver stood swearing as he reined in his horse. Porfiry Petrovich almost threw himself into the frail cab, which shook under his weight. As always in a drozhki, it was a tight squeeze for the two men, and they sat with Porfiry’s arm around Virginsky back.
‘Will you wish to interview the Tsarevich?’ asked Virginsky, once the horse had settled into its stride.
‘Why should I?’
‘Because he was at the Naryskin Palace last night.’