What next took place I didn't get from Grushko but from Nikolai a few days afterwards as I reconstructed the chain of events that had such tragic consequences. Now I can excuse Grushko's actions. Not only was he under a great deal of pressure from General Kornilov to make an arrest, but things were not very easy for him at home either.
Grushko's daughter Tanya had reaffirmed her intention to apply for emigration papers and this had caused another bitter argument between them. He had been especially surprised to discover that emigrating to America had not been Boris's idea, as Grushko had suspected, but Tanya's, although Boris was happy to go along with it. Grushko had a low opinion of anyone who was prepared, as he saw it, to desert his or her country in its hour of greatest need. Especially someone who was a doctor. And despite what Tanya had said about going to America being her idea, Grushko held Boris responsible. Grushko's wife was rather more sanguine about the prospect of her only daughter leaving Russia. She just wanted her to be happy and, as Tanya had argued, and indeed was almost irrefutable, there was little chance of that happening in Russia. Lena's immediate concern was the dinner party she had planned to celebrate Tanya's engagement, and it must have been around this time that she managed to buy a joint of beef at the Kutznechny cooperative food market. What this would have cost I am not sure, but probably a couple of hundred roubles and, even if she had managed to sell some fine soaps to help pay for it, I did not think that Grushko would have approved of the extravagance any more than he approved of shopping on the black market.
20
A detective is obliged to work at all hours of the day. I tend to work fairly set hours, and this might have been thought an advantage except that people like Luzhin, the advocate acting for the Georgians who we were still holding in the police cells, worked to the same sort of schedule.
On the morning of the Georgians' third day in custody, the day after Pyotr Mogilnikov decided to spill the corn about the Ukrainians, I had yet another telephone call from Luzhin regarding his clients. He reminded me that without a charge we would be obliged to release them that same afternoon. I told him to be patient and that I would call him back before lunch to let him know what was happening. But even a cursory glance at the papers in the case would have told me what I already knew: that it would not have been possible to have charged them with much more than a few minor currency violations.
The case of Ilya Chavchavadze was different. He had already been charged with the attempted murder of Pyotr Mogilnikov, and, thanks to the hard work of the ballistics department, the murder of Sultan Khadziyev. All attempts to connect the rest of the gang with these murders had so far come to nothing. Chavchavadze was adamant that these had been personal scores that he had been obliged to settle and were nothing to do with anyone else. It went without saying that he had no knowledge of a Georgian Mafia gang.
I rang Vladimir Voznosensky at the State Prosecutor's Office and explained that we needed more time to gather evidence.
We've got a witness for the arson attack,' I said, albeit a reluctant one.' That was understating it by a long way. The man who owns the restaurant. Only he's a bit scared to give evidence.'
What about this Chavchavadze character? Can't you prove he's part of the gang?'
He was photographed at the Georgian funeral,' I said. And Nikolai and Sasha saw him at a gym with other members of the gang.'
I see. It's not enough to charge the rest of them with complicity in Sultan's murder,' he said. The best I can do is get you another twenty-four hours' custody. To do that I'll have to go before the Kallinin District Court. You'll need to get Sasha and Nicolai to make statements that they believe Chavchavadze was acting in consort with the rest of them.'
Thanks, Volodya, I said. 'I'd best call Luzhin and give him the news. He'll want to argue it with the judge.
Voznosensky laughed. He can certainly try.'
While I was busy organising this extended period of custody for the Georgians, Grushko had gone to the apartment building on Griboyedev. But not to see Nina Milyukin again. This time he wanted to speak to her flatmate, Mrs Poliakov.
He met her as she was on her way out to the baker's shop on Nevsky. Mrs Poliakov had wanted to invite him inside but Grushko said that he could ask his questions while they walked.
I'm not sure that I can tell you anything,' she said meekly. As my husband explained, we don't notice very much. You know, the other day it was on the TV news that someone abandoned a baby on the corner here and I think I must have walked straight past it. Can you imagine doing such a dreadful thing? Abandoning a baby. What is the country coming to? And I didn't notice.'
Well,' said Grushko patiently, mothers were abandoning babies in Russia before you and I were born. That's how Rome got started.'
Yes, and look what happened to them.'
They came around the corner on to Nevsky Prospekt and joined the early-morning queue for bread. As usual the talk among the people waiting patiently in line, most of them women, was of rising food prices. A loaf of bread, Grushko was shocked to discover for he rarely queued for anything except vodkacost five roubles.
Do you remember when I told you that Mikhail Milyukin had been murdered?' he said, avoiding the fact that the Poliakovs had eavesdropped on his conversation with Nina Milyukin. You mentioned something about him stealing food from your fridge'
Mrs Poliakov looked embarrassed.
Please,' she said, colouring a little under her blue satin headscarf, can we forget all about that? I was upset. He wasn't a bad man at all. I was just being silly.'
No, I don't think so. Can you remember what was taken?'
Remember it?' She nodded. I haven't stopped thinking about it. That bit of beef just a small piece you understand it cost over a hundred roubles.'
Beef?' said Grushko.
You're surprised that we can afford it, eh? Well, let me tell you, we saved up for that little bit of meat. To help us celebrate our fortieth wedding anniversary.'
Grushko shook his head with puzzlement.
No, it's just that I expected something else. Something more important.'
What's more important than that?'
I see what you mean.' He smiled ruefully. But you see I thought you might have mentioned something else. A packet. A carton. Something that could have been used as a container for something else. Was anything else taken perhaps?'
Just the beef,' she sighed. Noticing Grushko's disappointment, she added, I'm sorry I can't be more help.'
Well, thanks anyway.'
He nodded politely and tried to extricate himself from the quickly growing line of people.
What's the matter?' snarled one old woman behind him as he pushed his way past her. Can't you make up your mind?'
No,' cackled another. He's like most men. No idea of what his wife buys. He's going to fetch his wife to buy their bread.'
She'll be lucky,' added a third woman. Haven't you heard? The bread's run out.'
Grushko walked quickly away.
It was generally held that we were in for a heatwave. Even through the dust on the windows the sun felt like a coal fire and I wondered whether the radiator-hose on my car could take it.
When Grushko arrived at the Big House wearing his usual dark worsted suit he looked as if he had stepped out of an oven.
Christ, it's hot,' he gasped, picking the shirt off his chest and then swatting a mosquito away from his sweat-covered face. It's a real churki's summer, this.'
I explained about the Georgians and the State Prosecutor's Office.
Maybe something'll turn up,' he said optimistically. I sure hope it does. I don't fancy having to tell the general that we had to let those bastards just walk out of here. How would that look on Zverkov's television programme?'