‘Somebody was looking for something specific, I think,’ Tanya said. ‘I was at work when the police telephoned to tell me a neighbour had reported a disturbance in my apartment. Mrs Gaskiene was worried I had gone mad in my grief. She came to knock on the door, only to find it gaping open and this mess in the front room.’
As I bent to pick up an amber necklace that lay on the carpet by my feet, I sensed immediately that this had been the work of Kirov.
‘What do you think they were looking for?’ I asked Tanya, not voicing my fear. I recalled the comment he had made in the workshop. I know where Tanya lives. She’s all on her own now. Was this a warning? I wondered. Or was he looking for the bracelet, or evidence of Kolya’s whereabouts?
‘No jewellery seems to be missing,’ Tanya said, bending down beside me, taking the necklace from my fingers. ‘Vassily made this for me,’ she added. ‘You remember?’
‘Yes,’ I said, the memory of that moment flooding back as I fingered the beads of the necklace. ‘Just before you left the village to come to Vilnius.’
We were in the kitchen, in her grandparents’ home, around the large old table. It was late evening and the room was dark and warm, the door of the tiled stove open in the corner, providing us with light and heat. Tanya had told us she would have to return to the capital to continue with her studies. Vassily attempted to convince her to stay, but, though she seemed genuinely sad to be leaving, she was determined to go back to university.
‘I will bribe you to stay,’ he said.
‘There is nothing you could offer,’ Tanya shot back.
Vassily laughed. From his pocket he pulled out a necklace. Each of the amber beads on the silk string was a different shade. Translucent yellow, the shade of sunshine, to currant black. He held it up. ‘Women are not able to turn from the power of finely made jewellery. When they see a piece of jewellery they love, there is nothing they will not do to get hold of it. It has always been so, since the beginning of time. You know the story of Freyja?’
Tanya laughed. ‘No,’ she mocked, ‘but I’m sure you will tell us.’
‘She was the goddess of love,’ he said with relish, smacking his lips. ‘She was beautiful, the most beautiful woman in the ancient world. Not only was she the goddess of love, she was the goddess of the sexual act; she loved beauty and sensuality. But she was also goddess of the dead and was mistress of a secret magical science that could read the fates of men and brought fecundity and birth. She was married to Od, god of fury, and was happy.
‘One day, while she was wandering along the border of her kingdom, her eyes fell upon the most beautiful necklace she had ever seen.
‘Her kingdom bordered that of the Black Dwarfs. As she peered through the trees and the thick undergrowth she caught sight of the gleam of gorgeous stones. Four dwarfs were crafting a beautiful necklace, which caught the sun whenever they held it up. Entranced, Freyja could not stop herself from slipping into the glade where the dwarfs were working and going to admire the necklace.
“‘How much does it cost?” she asked them. “Tell me, I will pay whatever sum you ask for.”
‘The dwarfs shook their heads. “This,” they told her, “is the Brisingamen. There is no price you could pay.” But Freyja begged them. It was the most beautiful jewel she had ever seen and she could not imagine living without it.
‘You see,’ he said, ‘you have to know the power a piece of jewellery can have on you. You have to know the pull some stones have.’ He paused a moment longer. ‘Freyja would have paid anything to have that necklace. The four dwarfs huddled together and discussed the price for which they would be willing to sell the Brisingamen. Finally they decided. “We will sell you the necklace,” they said to her, “but there is only one price we will accept.”
“‘What is it? Just name it,” said Freyja.
“‘You must make love with each one of us,” the dwarfs said. And such was the power the beautiful necklace had on her, Freyja agreed to the price instantly and with joy. Betraying her husband, she slept with each dwarf for a day and a night, pleasuring them with whatever sensual delights they wished for. And on the fourth day she left with the necklace strung around her neck, radiating beauty.
‘But she had betrayed her husband,’ Vassily said, quietly emphatic. ‘And when you betray somebody you are sure to be found out sooner or later.
‘Freyja had been seen,’ he continued. ‘The odious Loki had seen everything. He went to her husband and told him all he knew. Od would not believe that snivelling spirit of evil. He demanded Loki prove his tale to be true.
‘But how could Loki prove his tale?’ Vassily drained his glass of vodka and poured a new one. ‘Freyja had hidden the jewel.’ He paused again for effect, looking around at each one of us sitting around the table. ‘Loki turned himself into a mosquito. He flew into Freyja’s chambers and bit her as she slept. The bite irritated her and she scratched and tossed and turned in her sleep. Loki grabbed the necklace from beneath her pillow and took it straight to Od.
‘Od flew into a rage. He threw the necklace aside and the next day he disappeared. When Freyja woke the next morning, she discovered that both her necklace and her husband had gone. Ever since that day she has wandered the earth looking for her husband, weeping continously. The tears that fall upon the rocks, seeping into the seams, turn into gold. Those tears that fall upon the sea turn into beads of amber.’
‘Seven years ago,’ Tanya said. ‘It seems a lifetime.’
She put the necklace on the low table and picked up some more of the scattered fragments of jewellery and amber pieces.
‘There wasn’t much money here,’ she continued. ‘You know what Vassily was like◦– as soon as it came in it went out, he had no desire to hoard it beneath the mattress and anybody who knew him would have known that.’ She paused, surveying the mess of papers and books. ‘It seems,’ she said, ‘that they were after some of his papers or his books. It doesn’t make any sense to me.’
‘I think it could have been Kirov,’ I said quietly.
‘Kirov? Why?’
I shrugged. ‘He may have thought there would be something here that would reveal where Kolya is. Where the bracelet is.’
Tanya shivered.
‘What scares me,’ she said, ‘is that I have no idea what is going on. It is like standing on the edge of an abyss in the darkness. This great hole has opened up before me and I don’t know how to deal with it. Vassily and I told each other everything. We had no secrets, we would never lie to each other, that was what we said again and again.’
She stood up and kicked out at an upturned book.
‘Fuck him!’ she cried. ‘How could he die and leave this mess? Why did he not let me know what was going on, Antanas? Why did he lie to me?’
She kicked another volume, sending it ricocheting across the small room. I stood up and took hold of her arms.
‘How could he have done this to me, Antanas?’ she said bitterly.
‘Calm down,’ I said. ‘I know as little as you.’
‘I’m sorry,’ she said, red eyed.
I tried to draw her down on to the sofa, to calm her.
‘You must find Kolya,’ she said. ‘He is the only one who can explain what this is all about.’
‘I’m worried,’ I said. ‘The more we get involved in this, the more dangerous it is for you.’
‘Why should it be dangerous for me?’
I shrugged. ‘Who knows what Kirov will do.’
‘I’m becoming more frightened of the shadows,’ Tanya said, ‘the empty spaces, the not knowing.’
She went into the kitchen to make some coffee, and I turned my attention to the mess. I gathered the books and replaced them on their shelves, collected the scattered sheets of paper, stacking them on the sofa to sort later into their appropriate files. Tanya reappeared with coffee, put it down and began to sweep up the splinters of glass and broken fragments of vase and cups. We had more or less finished when I noticed, behind us, the shadow of a figure standing in the doorway.