The nearest member of his gang stepped forward, arms outstretched. Leo allowed the man to grab hold of his neck, in reply pushing the shard into his stomach, through the man’s shirt, dragging it sideways. The man was gurgling but Leo kept on dragging the steel, cutting through skin and muscle. Releasing his grip on Leo’s neck, the wounded man stood, peering down at his bleeding stomach, as though puzzled by it, before slumping to his knees.
Leo turned to the remaining three men. They’d lost all interest in the struggle. Whatever deal they’d been offered wasn’t worth the fight. Maybe all they’d been promised was better rations or easier work at the camp. One of the men, perhaps identifying this as an opportunity for promotion within his gang, took charge.
— We have no quarrel with you.
Leo said nothing, his hands covered in blood, the steel shard jutting out of his hand. The men pulled back, leaving their dead and injured. Failure was quickly disowned.
Leo helped Raisa up, hugging her.
— I’m sorry.
They were interrupted by the injured man calling for help. The first man, the man with his neck cut open, had already died. But the man with the cut stomach was alive, conscious, clutching the injury. Leo looked down at him, assessing his injury. He would take a long time to die: it would be painful and slow. He deserved no mercy. But on balance it was better for the other prisoners that he should die quickly. No one wanted to listen to his screams. Leo crouched down, locking the man’s neck in a grip, choking him.
Leo returned to his wife. She whispered:
— Those men were ordered to kill us by the guards.
Considering this, Leo replied:
— Our only chance is to escape.
The train was slowing down. When it eventually stopped the guards would open the doors, expecting to find Leo and Raisa dead. When they discovered two of their assassins dead instead, they’d demand to know who’d killed them. Some prisoner would almost certainly speak up, out of fear of torture or desire for reward. It would be more than enough of a pretext for the guards to execute Leo and Raisa.
Leo turned to face the prisoners. There were pregnant mothers, elderly men too old to survive the Gulags, fathers, brothers, sisters — ordinary, unremarkable, the kind of people that he himself had arrested and taken to the Lubyanka. Now he was forced to ask for their help.
— My name is not important. Before I was arrested I was investigating the murder of over forty children, murders which stretched from the Ural Mountains down to the Black Sea. Boys and girls have been killed. I know that this crime is hard to believe, perhaps even impossible for some of you. But I have seen the bodies for myself and I’m sure they’re the work of one man. He doesn’t kill these children for money or sex or any reason that I can explain. He’ll murder any child, from any town. And he will not stop. My crime was to investigate him. My arrest means he is free to continue killing. No one else is looking for him. My wife and I must escape to stop him. We cannot escape without your help. If you call for the guards, we’re dead.
There was silence. The train was almost at a stop. At any second the doors would slide open, guards would enter, guns at the ready. Who could blame them when faced with the barrel of a gun not to tell the truth? A woman on one of the benches called out:
— I’m from Rostov. I’ve heard of such murders. Children with their stomachs cut out. They are blaming them on a group of Western spies who have infiltrated our country.
Leo replied:
— I believe the murderer lives and works in your city. But I doubt he’s a spy.
Another woman cried out:
— When you find him you’ll kill him?
— Yes.
The train stopped. The guards could be heard approaching. Leo added:
— I have no reason to expect your help. But I ask for it all the same.
Leo and Raisa crouched down among the prisoners. She wrapped her arms around Leo, covering up his bloodstained hands. The doors slid open, sunshine flooded the carriage.
Finding the two bodies, the guards called out for an explanation.
— Who killed them?
They were answered with silence. Leo looked over his wife’s shoulders at these guards. They were young, indifferent. They’d obey orders but they wouldn’t think for themselves. The fact that they hadn’t personally killed Leo and Raisa meant that they hadn’t been given instructions to do so. It had to be done on the sly, through a proxy. Without explicit authorization they wouldn’t act. These guards had no initiative. However, given some slight justification, they might seize the opportunity. Everything depended upon the strangers in this carriage. The guards were shouting, pushing guns into the faces of those nearest them. But the prisoners told them nothing. They selected an elderly couple. They were frail. They’d talk.
— Who killed these men? What happened here? Speak!
One of the guards raised his steel-capped boot above her head. She wept. Her husband pleaded. But neither of them replied to their questions. A second guard moved towards Leo. If he made him stand up he’d see the bloodied shirt.
One of the remaining gang, the man who’d told Leo there was no longer any quarrel between them, got down from his bench approaching the guards. No doubt he’d now claim the reward promised to them. The man called out:
— Leave them alone. I know what happened. I’ll tell you.
The guards stepped away from the elderly couple, stepped away from Leo.
— Tell us.
— They killed each other, because of a card game.
Leo understood that there was a perverse logic to the gang’s refusal to give them up. They were prepared to rape and murder for a small profit. But they were not prepared to snitch, to be a guard’s stool pigeon. It was a question of status. If the other urki, the members of their criminal fraternity, found out they were selling inmates for perks they would never be forgiven. They would probably be killed.
The guards looked at each other. Unsure of what to do, they decided to do nothing. They were in no rush. The journey to Vtoraya Rechka, on the Pacific coast, would take weeks. There would be plenty of opportunities. They would await further orders. They’d come up with another plan. One of the guards addressed the whole carriage.
— As a punishment we will not offload these bodies. Soon, in this heat, they will begin to rot and stink and you will all become ill. Perhaps then you will talk.
Proud of himself, the guard leapt off the carriage. The other guards followed. The door was shut.
After a while the train began to move again. A young man with broken spectacles, peering at Leo through a cracked lens, whispered:
— How will you escape?
He had a right to know. Their escape now belonged to everyone in the carriage. They were all in it together. In reply Leo raised the bloody steel shard. The guards had forgotten to take it back.
Two Hundred and Twenty Kilometres East of Moscow
13 July