‘Were you aware of any blood on your tunic before you saw Aglaia Filippovna?’
‘I don’t know. I don’t believe so.’
‘Thank you. You may sit down again.’
‘What about me?’ said Virginsky.
‘And thank you, Pavel Pavlovich. You played your part with distinction.’ Porfiry walked round to take his seat again, as Virginsky stood up and brushed himself down. ‘Tell me, Captain Mizinchikov, have you seen any newspapers while you have been a fugitive from the law?’
‘Yes. I looked for news all the time.’
‘Were you aware that Yelena Filippovna was at one time suspected of the murders of three children?’
‘I saw that. It was a lie, of course. I knew it was a lie to trick me into giving myself up. I am not so simple-minded that I would fall for such a ruse.’
‘Oh, it was not a ruse. A mistake, perhaps. So, Yelena Filippovna did not confess these killings to you?’
‘Of course not!’
‘You do not believe her capable of such crimes?’
‘You need not ask that question. She was not a murderer. And she would never have done anything to harm those children.’
‘Why do you say that?’
‘They were pupils at Maria Petrovna’s school, were they not?’
‘That is correct.’
‘Lena … loved Maria Petrovna. It was a special kind of love, pure, absolute, unsullied. She preserved that love as something precious in her soul, the better part of her soul, although she had not seen Maria Petrovna since they were at school together. She would never do anything to hurt her. That was why she prevailed upon all her friends to support the school.’
‘The flowers,’ said Virginsky suddenly. The two other men turned towards him quizzically. ‘I will always love you, M. Maria was M. She was to have been the recipient of the flowers.’
Porfiry’s face lit up with pleasure. He granted Virginsky a bow of acknowledgement. ‘It’s an interesting theory, Pavel Pavlovich.’ Porfiry turned to Captain Mizinchikov. ‘Or was the bouquet of white camellias a gift from you to Yelena Filippovna?’
‘I know nothing of any flowers.’
‘Then perhaps she meant them as a gift for you. Was she in the habit of giving you flowers?’
Captain Mizinchikov shook his head, bemused.
‘You expressed the opinion a moment ago that Prince Naryskin may have murdered Yelena. I take it that you mean Prince Naryskin the younger?’
‘The elder or the younger, what does it matter?’
‘It matters rather a lot, actually. They are in fact distinct legal entities and it would be quite improper to charge one with a crime the other had committed.’
‘The younger then.’
‘Do you have any particular reason for accusing him?’
‘He is the one I hate the most.’
‘I see. I’m afraid that’s not really enough for us to build a case around. Let me put it another way. What motive did he have for killing her, in your view?’
‘She insulted him. Humiliated him.’
‘And he struck her. Should that not have been an end to it? In striking her, he paid her back for the insult.’
‘You don’t understand. Yes, she goaded him into hitting her, but that blow — struck against a woman in full view of public censure — that was the insult. That dishonoured him. It was that for which he could not forgive her.’
‘Did Yelena Filippovna ask you to kill her?’
The grime on Captain Mizinchikov’s face darkened. ‘Why should she do that?’
‘Because she wished to end her life. And she naturally turned to a friend to help her achieve her desire.’
‘It’s true that she asked me. She was hysterical. She did not know what she was asking. One had to hope that it would pass.’
‘You refused?’
‘Of course.’
Porfiry considered for a moment. ‘This matter of her requesting her own murder intrigues me. You would think — if that were the case — that she would have welcomed death when it came. And yet, as Pavel Pavlovich just now reminded me when he took her part in our little re-enactment, the disposition of her body clamoured protest. The expression of her face too, which he did not attempt to render, was not one of acquiescence. The question is, was she protesting her fate or the person who dispensed it? What would make a woman who actively sought her own death recoil so violently at the last moment?’
‘That’s understandable enough, surely,’ said Virginsky. ‘Only when it was too late did the full enormity of what she had desired strike home.’
‘Perhaps.’ Porfiry turned abruptly on Mizinchikov. ‘We found a razor at your apartment. A razor wrapped in silk. Do you know anything about it?’
‘I have no need for a razor. I have my beard trimmed by my barber.’
‘Pavel Pavlovich, please ask Alexander Grigorevich to bring us the razor that was found in Captain Mizinchikov’s apartment.’
Virginsky nodded and crossed to the door to pass on the request to Zamyotov.
Porfiry smiled blandly to Captain Mizinchikov. ‘Perhaps it will help to jog your memory if you see the razor.’
‘It is not a question of jogging my memory. I have no razor, I tell you.’
‘And yet one was found in your study. Together with these letters.’ Porfiry unlocked his desk drawer and opened it, or rather attempted to open it. However, something inside obstructed the action of the drawer. Porfiry pushed it back into its housing and tried again. When the second attempt proved no more successful, he rattled the drawer in its casing, and tried to ease the drawer out. But whatever was causing the obstruction had not been dislodged. Every time, the hidden object snagged on the lip of the drawer’s aperture and prevented the drawer from opening.
Porfiry’s smile acquired a degree of tension. ‘Please,’ he said, though it was not clear whether he was pleading with the drawer or begging for Mizinchikov’s indulgence. He crouched down and peered into the narrow gap created by the partially open drawer.
‘Ah! I think I see what is causing it. The very letters we were talking about.’
Porfiry took the letter knife from his desk and poked it into the gap, easing the recalcitrant letters down. He beamed a smile of satisfaction to Mizinchikov as the drawer at last eased open. ‘There! Nothing to it.’
He held the bundle of letters aloft triumphantly. It was as if the ribbon was not simply binding together the sheets of paper, but also holding in the secrets written on them. Mizinchikov started at the appearance of the letters. His body tensed, suddenly alert. He watched closely, his face rippling with apprehension and even horror, as Porfiry slipped the bow.
‘You recognise the letters, of course?’
Mizinchikov said nothing. The muscles around his infected left eye went into spasm.
‘They are letters from Yelena Filippovna. To you. Would you like to look at them?’
The twitch of Mizinchikov’s head may have been an angry shake of negation, or an involuntary muscular contraction without significance. In any event, he made no move to take the letters Porfiry held out to him.
‘What did you do?’ asked Porfiry thoughtfully, almost seductively.
Mizinchikov’s brows contracted in confusion.
‘What was the shameful act that sullied you and insulted her?’
Mizinchikov’s eyes squeezed out a wince of remembrance. ‘I agreed to take Bakhmutov’s money. I … loved her. But I did not see what the harm could be … if Bakhmutov wanted to pay me to do the very thing I most wanted to do — to marry her.’ His voice became leaden. ‘She did not see it like that.’
‘She broke with you then?’
‘Yes.’
‘So you did not get the money, after all.’
‘I didn’t care about the money. The money was for her. But she would have nothing to do with it.’