Dead Meat

Yes, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to sound defensive.'

Gidaspov unlocked a filing-cabinet and pulled out a drawer. He sorted through the contents and then took out a file that he handed to Grushko.

You'll find everything in there,' he said. Address, passport number, medical report, employment records, everything right back to when he was in the Young Pioneers.'

Thank you, sir. Grushko handed Gidaspov his card. 'When the convoy does return, I'd be grateful if you could give me a ring.

Nikolai followed Grushko to the door.

One more thing, Mr Gidaspov,' said Grushko. Are you at all familiar with a Dr Sobchak?'

No, I don't think I've heard of him.'

Grushko nodded. He did not bother to correct Gidaspov's assumption that Sobchak was a man. It seemed only to confirm that his answer had been an honest one. Instead he thanked him for his time, once again complimented Gidaspov on the excellence of the facilities at ASA and then left.

He and Nikolai then spent the remainder of a hot and sticky afternoon fruitlessly inquiring into the particulars of Tolya Boldyrev's life.

18

I came out of Leningrad Railway Station (Muscovites continued to call the station that served travellers to St Petersburg by its old name) and caught a trolley bus going south. It was good to be back in Moscow and, even at that early hour of the morning, the place felt more affluent, more like a big city than Petersburg. People moved with more of a spring in their step. The traffic moved faster. There were already more of the gold-coloured aluminium kiosks housing privately owned shops than I remembered from before; and it seemed that there was more food about than in St Petersburg. But the prices were hard to believe. How could people afford to buy things?

I got off the bus and walked west along the Boulevard Ring to the Militia Headquarters that was located just north of the Ring, at Number 38 Petrovka, close to the old Hermitage Gardens. From the outside the Moscow Big House was very different from its St Petersburg counterpart: the neoclassical frontage looked on to an attractive garden with flower beds, herbaceous borders and a marble monument of the militia insignia's sword. But inside the place was more or less identical.

I went through the security turnstile, walked through the garden to the front door and rode the lift up to the second floor. Shaverdova's secretary, Irina, was making tea. She did not look surprised to see me.

Is he free?' I asked her.

Yes,' she said.

I knocked at the door and went in. Vladimir Shaverdova, the Chief of Moscow's Organised Crime Department, was on the telephone. He waved me towards him and started writing something on a piece of paper. I sat down and lit a cigarette while I waited for him to finish his call. The only pictures in his office were the ones of his wife and family that lay under the sheet of glass on his desk.

Shaverdova was a tall, dark man, with one of those heads that looked as if it had grown through his hair, and a rather sulky, childish sort of mouth. He wore a claret-coloured three-piece suit, a light-grey shirt and a black tie.

Irina came through the door with his tea. Shaverdova replaced the receiver and collected the cup and saucer from her.

You want some tea?' he asked me.

Thanks, I could use one.'

Irina nodded and went out again.

Shaverdova nodded at the telephone.

Guess what?' he said. That was Khasbulatov.

Khasbulatov was the Moscow State Prosecutor.

We just charged Batsunov with accepting bribes.'

You're joking.'

Arkady Batsunov was the Assistant State Prosecutor who had been responsible for the majority of the prosecutions involving the Organised Crime Division. Most of my investigative life in Moscow had been spent in preparing cases for him. Arkady Batsunov had also been my friend.

It's true,' said Shaverdova. He's admitted it. Well he could hardly do anything else. We caught him red-handed, taking a twenty-thousand-rouble bribe from a Dazhakstani. We found over a hundred thousand roubles at his apartment.'

Irina returned with my tea and I sipped it thoughtfully while Shaverdova took another call. Arkady Batsunov, corrupt. It seemed incredible. I wondered if they imagined that I might also be corrupt. Guilt by association.

Shaverdova finished the call and lit a cigarette.

I'd never have believed it,' I said.

Shaverdova shrugged silently. So how are things going in St Petersburg?' he asked. What have you found?'

Nothing,' I said. Not a damn thing. Well if they are bent, I can't spot it.'

You've looked in all the usual places?'

Of course. You know me. I'm nothing if not thorough. Shit, I've even looked under Grushko's mattress. If you ask me they're clean. Most honest bunch of cops I've seen in a long time. I can't imagine why Kornilov ordered this investigation.'

Shaverdova shrugged.

It's up to him. It's his department.'

Besides, I'm pretty sure Grushko knows what I'm up to. He wasn't much impressed by all that crap about intercity liaison, and finding out about the way they handle things in St Petersburg.'

Grushko's not stupid.' He flicked some ash towards the ashtray. So what's he doing with you? Is he playing things close to his chest? Or what?'

He couldn't be more open. I've even been to his home.'

So I gathered. Well, that's good. If he were bent he wouldn't have let you through the door. So what's the story?'

They need a new carpet, and the colour TV's on the blink. The wife was planning to trade some English soaps in order to get hold of a piece of beef. If there's any extra money around it isn't coming from Grushko. The daughter's a doctor. She's seeing a yuppie who makes plenty of money on the local exchange. Could be he's some kind of a crook, but you can hardly hold that against Grushko. Besides, he hates the boy's guts.'

What about the others?'

Like I say, they seem clean enough.'

Well, seema__ isn't isa__. After all, we all thought Batsunov was on the side of the angels, didn't we? And look what happened to him. So just keep at it for a while longer, will you? I know it's a lousy job but it has to be done. Well, I don't have to tell you that. You've done this sort of thing before. If they're straight then they've got nothing to worry about. Besides, it's not like you're not trying to catch them out; you're just trying to prove that they're on the level, right?'

I nodded gloomily.

Right.'

Emerging from the Big House I walked south down Petrovka and into the large square that was the downhill end of the shopping street of Kuznetsky Most, which still retained a faded echo of its grander, pre-Revolutionary days. To the left of the Bolshoy Theatre was a modern glass building called TSUM, the Central Universal Store, and it was there that I found a hard-currency music shop that sold Andrei's Michael Jackson tape. It was depressing to see just how many shops now had signs in their windows declaring themselves Hard Currency Only'. It would soon be impossible to buy anything with the rouble.

I went down into the underground passageway that led to the Metro. It was full of beggars: gypsy women with children, an old woman who was busking with an accordion to pay for an operation, a teenage war-veteran both of whose legs had been blown off just above the knee, and yet more drunks. There were people selling pornographic newspapers, and others offering to trade whatever small surplus they had: a bottle of vodka, a packet of American cigarettes, a pair of boots, chocolate, a set of bed-sheets.

I bought a couple of tokens and boarded a northbound Metro. Even the price of a token had quadrupled in price.

My apartment was just off Mira Prospekt, in Duboyava Roshcha. From the bedroom window you could just see the soaring obelisk that marked the Memorial Museum of Cosmonautics, a pompous and wholly unrealistic celebration of Soviet scientific and technological achievement. I rode the lift up to the sixth floor and knocked at the front door. When after a minute or two there was no reply, I found my keys and let myself in. I was surprised to see there was nobody at home, although it was not quite nine o'clock. I was not sorry that my wife and her lover were out of the apartment. But I almost missed seeing my daughter. Then I found a note that explained that they had gone away for a few days to our dacha in the country. I had been planning to go there myself on my journey back to St Petersburg to pick up a few of my books. But now I was more inclined to give the place a wide berth. Still, I wasn't about to let my wife acquire the dacha as well as our apartment, and I told myself that she would have to ask permission to use it in future. My father had built that dacha and I intended to keep it.