We set off that same night, skirting round the walls of the Kremlin and crossing the river on the Krymsky Bridge. I thought I would be nervous. This was my first real crime – very different from the antics that Leo and I had got up to during the summer, setting off schoolboy bombs outside the police station or pinching cigarettes. Even stealing from the back of parked cars wasn’t in the same league. But the strange thing was that I was completely calm. It struck me that I might have found my destiny. If I could learn to survive in Moscow by being a thief, that was the way it would have to be.
Gorky Park is a huge area on the edge of the Moscow River. With a fairground, boating lakes and even an open-air theatre, it’s always been a favourite place for the people in the city. Anyone who had a flat here would have to be rich. The air was cleaner and if you were high enough you’d get views across the trees and over to the river, where barges and pleasure boats cruised slowly past, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, another Stalin skyscraper, in the far distance. The flat that Fagin had identified was right next to the park in a quiet street that hardly seemed to belong to the city at all. It was too elegant. Too expensive.
We got there just before midnight but all the street lamps were lit and I was able to make out a very attractive building, made of cream-coloured stone, with arched doorways and windows and lots of decoration over the walls. It was smaller and neater than our apartment block, just four storeys high, with a slanting orange-tiled roof.
“That’s the window – up there.”
Dima pointed. The flat was on the top floor, just as Fagin had said, and sure enough I could make out the fortochka, which was actually slightly ajar. The woman who lived there might have thought she was safe, being so high up, but I saw at once that it would be possible to climb in, using the building’s adornments as footholds. There were ledges, windowsills, carved pillars and even a drainpipe that would act as one side of a ladder. It wouldn’t be easy for me but once I was inside I would go back down and open the front door. I’d let the others in and the whole place would be ours.
There were no lights on inside the building. The other residents must have been asleep. Nor was there anyone in the street. We crossed as quickly as we could and grouped ourselves in the shadows, right up against the wall.
“What do you think, Yasha?” Dima asked.
I looked up and nodded. “I can do it.” But still I hesitated. “Are you sure she’s away?”
“Everyone says Fagin is reliable.”
“OK.”
“We’ll be waiting for you at the door. Make sure you don’t make any noise coming down the stairs.”
“Right. Good luck.”
Dima cupped his hands to help me climb up to the first level and as I raised my foot, our eyes met and he smiled at me. But at that moment I suddenly felt troubled. This might be my destiny but what would my parents have said if they could have seen me now? They were honest people. That was the way I’d been brought up. I was amazed at how quickly I’d become a burglar, a thief. And if I stayed in Moscow much longer? I wondered what I might become next.
I began the climb. The three boys scattered. We’d agreed that if a policeman happened to come along on patrol, Grigory would warn me by hooting like an owl. But right now we were alone and at first it was easy. I had the drainpipe on one side and there were plenty of bricks and swirling plasterwork to give me a foothold. The architect or the artist who had built this place might have had plenty of ideas about style and elegance but he had been less brilliant when it came to security.
Even so, the higher I went, the more dangerous it became. The pipe was quite loose. If I put too much weight onto it, I risked tearing it out of the wall. Some of the decorations were damp and had begun to rot. I rested my foot briefly on a diamond-shaped brick, part of a running pattern, and to my horror it crumbled away. First, there was the sound of loose plaster hitting the pavement. Then I found myself scrabbling against the face of the building, desperately trying to stop myself plunging down. If I’d fallen from the first floor, I’d have broken an ankle. From this height it was more likely to be my neck. Somehow I managed to steady myself. I looked down and saw Dima standing underneath one of the street lamps. He had seen what had happened and waved a hand – either spurring me on or warning me to be more careful.
I took a deep breath to steady my nerves, then continued up – past the third floor and up to the fourth. At one stage I was right next to a window and, peeping in, I saw the vague shape of two people lying in bed under a fur cover. I was lucky they were heavy sleepers. I pulled myself up as quickly as possible and finally reached the ledge that ran along the whole building just below the top floor. It was no more than fifteen centimetres wide and I had to squeeze flat against the wall, shuffling along with my toes touching the brickwork and my heels hanging in the air. If I had leaned back even slightly I would have lost my balance and fallen. But I had come this far without killing myself. I was determined to see it through.
I got to the window with the smaller window set inside it and now I saw that I had two more problems. It was going to be an even tighter fit than I had imagined. And it was going to be awkward too. Somehow I had to lever myself up and in, but that would mean putting all my weight on the main sheet of glass. The windows were only separated by a narrow frame and unless I was careful there was a real chance they would shatter beneath me and I would end up being cut in half. Once again I looked for Dima but this time there was no sign of him.
I reached out and held onto the edge with one hand. The fortochka was definitely unlocked. The room on the other side was dark but seemed to be a lounge with a dining area and a kitchen attached. I grabbed the glass with my other hand. I saw now that I was going to have to go in head first. It just wasn’t possible to lever up my leg. Using my forehead, I pushed the little window open. I leant forward, pushing my head inside. Now the glass was resting against the back of my neck, making me think of a prisoner in the old days, about to be decapitated by guillotine. Trying to keep as much of my weight off the glass as I could, I arched forward and in. The fit was very tight. The opening was barely more than forty centimetres square… a cat flap indeed. My shoulders only just passed through and I felt the loose end of the glass scraping against my back. I pushed harder and found myself wedged with the lower rim of the fortochka pressing into my back just above my buttocks. Suddenly I was trapped! I couldn’t move in either direction and I had a nightmare vision of being stuck there all night, waiting for someone to discover me and call the police in the morning. The glass was creaking underneath me. I was sure it was going to break. I pushed again. It was like giving birth to myself. The edge cut into me but then, somehow, gravity took over. I plunged forward into the darkness and hit the floor. I was in!
If it hadn’t been for the carpet, I would have definitely broken my nose and ended up looking like Dima. If there was anyone in the flat, they would certainly have heard me and I lay there for a moment, waiting for the door to open and the lights to go on. It didn’t happen. I remembered the people I had seen beneath their fur cover in the flat below. Surely they would have heard the thump and wondered what it was. But there was no sound from below either. I waited another minute. My arm was sticking out at a strange angle and I was worried that I had dislocated my shoulder, but when I shifted my weight and got back into a sensible position, it seemed all right. Dima and the others would have seen me go in. They would be waiting for me to come down and open the front door. It was time to move.