The Yak checked his pocket watch, a gift he had given himself to mark his fiftieth birthday which he had celebrated the previous evening by dining alone on shark tail soup, pickled herring, and beet salad.
The Yak had no doubt that Rostnikov would put together what he was now erasing from his board.
Porfiry Petrovich Rostnikov needed no whiteboard or notepad. He sat in the room he had been assigned in the Devochka main building. It was sufficiently comfortable, if a bit too warm, even for the lightweight pajamas he wore. Sarah had purchased the pajamas for no reason other than that she thought he needed them and she liked them. The bottoms and tops were oak brown and covered with the names of six Russian writers-Dostoevsky, Gogol, Chekov, Tolstoy, Pushkin, and Turgenev.
He had worked out with Viktor Panin, the bald, smiling giant, in a well-equipped weight room. This had been Panin’s third workout of the day and he had sweated through his gray long-sleeved sweatshirt till it was completely blackened, and his pink face looked as if he had just stepped from a shower.
Though Panin glanced down with approval as he spotted for Rostnikov, Porfiry Petrovich was well aware that, as good as he might be in park district tournaments, he was no match for this Olympic-caliber young man.
“You don’t take off your leg when you work out,” Panin had said while they showered.
“Nothing in it rusts or shrinks, unlike the real one next to it,” said Rostnikov. “Besides, I would fall down.”
“You want to know my secret?” Panin had whispered while they showered.
“I’m interested in all secrets,” said Rostnikov, rinsing off soap. “It is my passion.”
“I hate working out. I hate the weights.”
“Then why do you do it?” asked Rostnikov.
Panin shrugged, turned off the water, and draped a large yellow towel over his shoulder.
“There is nothing else to do. I don’t read. I don’t watch much television. I have no close friends.”
He gave Rostnikov a big, toothy smile.
“Then. .?”
“It’s the one thing I do well. Besides, something happens when I’m lifting weights. I don’t know what it is, but I get lost. It’s even a little frightening.”
“Does it feel good?” Rostnikov said, balancing himself carefully as he dried.
“I don’t know how to say it,” said Panin, thinking deeply. “Not good. Not bad, but when I finish, I feel light, happy, like now.”
“Meditation,” said Rostnikov.
“Meditation?”
“It’s just a word for what you feel. I feel it too.”
“I knew it,” said Panin, loudly slapping his side with a huge open palm. “That’s why I told you.”
“What do you want from life, Viktor?”
“More weights.”
“I’m sure that can be achieved. Are you married?”
“My wife died three years ago.”
“Children?”
“Two. I would like you to meet them.”
“I would like to meet them.”
“My parents are accountants. They are in charge of all the bookkeeping at Devochka,” he said proudly.
They were both dry now and dressing.
“How did they come to be here?” asked Rostnikov.
“My father killed three people when he was a boy. They tried to take his lunch. He beat them to death with a chair. My father got very angry.”
“It would seem so,” said Rostnikov.
“My father was sent here instead of to prison or execution. They needed an accountant.”
“And your mother?”
“He met her here. She was a bookkeeper. Her family has been here since the mine opened.”
“And you have no accounting skills?”
“Ask me the birthday of any famous Russian,” Panin said, popping his shaved head through the hole in his shirt.
“Maxim Gorky.”
“March 16, 1868,” Panin said.
“How do I know you are right?” asked Rostnikov, slowly working his way into his slacks.
The question puzzled Panin.
“Because I am. You can check.”
“I believe you.”
“Another one,” the giant said eagerly.
“Fyodor Dostoevsky.”
“October 30, 1821. You want to check?”
“No, I know that one. You are a savant, Viktor.”
They were both dressed then and shaking hands.
“Again tomorrow morning?” asked Panin.
“Tomorrow evening,” said Rostnikov.
Panin nodded solemnly.
That had been less than an hour ago, and now Rostnikov in his bookish pajamas waited for telephone reports from Iosef and Elena. He had the same questions Igor Yaklovev had written on his whiteboard.
He did not, however, get to think about them this night for there was a knock at the door. He uttered, “Come in” and the door opened for his brother who, if he noted Porfiry Petrovich’s pajamas, did not reveal it with his eyes.
“Anatoliy Lebedev has been murdered,” said Fyodor Rostnikov.
He was holding something in his right hand.
After his expected phone calls, Rostnikov had hoped to read the 87th Precinct novel he had brought with him, but it would have to wait until much later, if at any time.
“Where?”
“In the mines. His body, cut and sliced, was found by a night guard who heard a noise. The guard had trouble locating the sound, echoes in the mines.”
“When?”
“Not long, maybe half an hour ago. This was found next to the body.”
Fyodor held up a lamp, an old covered oil lamp with a wire handle.
“Let us get Emil Karpo and become one of the people who walk in darkness.”
Chapter Nine
“The restaurant. It was delivered to the restaurant an hour past.”
The speaker was thin, no more than thirty years old, a deep ebony color. He had been one of the men who had engaged Iosef and Zelach in a gun battle and had barely gotten away. In the middle of the table at which he sat were wadded and crumpled remains of pages from Pravda. Resting on the paper was a finger-the small, black finger of a left hand. The curled finger was a matter of debate between the speaker, whose name was Patrice, and the other two young men at the table. They, too, had been in the gun battle.
The other two men were looking at Patrice for guidance, orders. The problem was that the finger on the table appeared to belong to James Harumbaki, their leader. In addition, the note left with the finger had said that both Umbaway and Roger were dead. The hierarchy was clear. Patrice was in charge, a position to which he did not aspire.
“You think they have killed Harumbaki?” asked the tallest of the three men.
Of the three, Biko looked most like a leader. He was erect, decisive in his language, prepared for whatever was to be done. The problem was that he had only one solution for any problem that emerged. Kill. Biko was more than a little crazy, and Patrice well knew it. Patrice also knew that Biko had two wives and six children under the age of ten.
“I don’t think he is dead,” said Patrice, who had no idea if what he was saying was true.
“He is not dead.”
This came from the third man, short, bespectacled, and young, the youngest of the group, named Laurence. Laurence was seventeen. He looked fourteen. He was the most battle-experienced member of the group, having been a shirtless mercenary with a Kalashnikov when he was ten. Now he had an extended family of thirty people to support.
“That’s not the finger of a dead man,” said Laurence, adjusting his glasses. “I’ve removed fingers from the living.”
“You can’t be sure,” said Patrice.
“I can,” said Laurence.
“He is sure,” said Biko.
“If we don’t give them diamonds,” said Laurence, “they will send us a toe.”