When Shatalov was no longer visible outside the door, Rostnikov said thank you to Peto, who took down the “closed” sign, hurried to the table, and asked no questions about what had just happened in his restaurant, though he was pulsing with curiosity.
“Another tomato sandwich?” asked Cashierovsky.
“Why not? Another roll and tea for you, Emil Karpo?”
Karpo shook his head.
“I’ll wrap the food you didn’t eat to take home,” said the restaurant owner.
“That would be very nice,” said Rostnikov.
The pudgy restaurant owner hurried off to make another sandwich for Rostnikov.
“Were you genuinely angry when you struck the table, Porfiry Petrovich?” asked Karpo. “It was very unlike you, but most effective.”
“I was genuinely angry, Emil,” said Rostnikov. “I have a family crisis. Elena Timofeyeva has been injured and I am wearing a jacket and pants that would befit a clown across the street. I have a bad feeling. I was angry, but perhaps not as angry as I appeared.”
A bag containing the uneaten food and a second tomato sandwich appeared in front of Rostnikov. On the plate next to it was a firm peach.
“You remembered,” said Rostnikov.
“I remembered your love of peaches,” Cashierovsky said.
“Enjoy.”
“He’s back,” Ivan Pleshkov said to Iosef over the phone.
“Does your father know you are calling me?” asked Iosef, sitting at the desk in his cubicle. He had been about to go out the door and head for the home and office of Leon the doctor. Porfiry Petrovich had left a message for his son telling him where Elena was, that she had been injured but that she was fine.
Iosef had wanted to see for himself, to be with her, but the phone had rung and Yevgeny Pleshkov’s son was on the line.
“Is he planning to leave?”
“I don’t think so,” said the son. “He looks tired. He looks like cat vomit.”
“Has he said anything to you or your mother about where he has been, what he has done?”
“He doesn’t have to,” said Ivan. “He’s been whoring, drinking, gambling, behaving like a fool. The great potential leader of the people is a buffoon, but what is new about that?”
“Can you keep him there?” asked Iosef.
“I can’t keep him anywhere,” said Ivan. “He goes where he wishes, does what he pleases, helps the masses and abuses individuals. But from the look of him he is at least content to be home for the immediate future. My mother has asked no questions. She will, though, and he will give her stupid lies. She will pretend to believe them. It is over. He is back till next time. Good-bye.”
Ivan hung up the phone and so did Iosef.
The proper thing to do at this point was to tell everything to the chief inspector, his father, but Porfiry Petrovich was out somewhere with Karpo and it was possible that Yevgeny Pleshkov might run off again. He either had to act on his own or talk to Director Yaklovev, which he preferred not to do. But he had little choice.
Instead of calling, he walked to the director’s office and asked if the Yak was in. The dwarfish Pankov began to sweat almost immediately. He had been given a specific list by Director Yaklovev. Except in an emergency, no one else was to be admitted to his office.
Porfiry Petrovich was on the list. No other member of the Office of Special Investigation was.
“Is this an emergency?” asked Pankov, looking at the director’s office door.
“It is,” said Iosef. “And we are wasting time.”
“What is the emergency?”
“Something for the ears of the director only.”
“I can ask him,” Pankov almost pleaded. “But I must have some idea. .”
“Tell him it is about Yevgeny Pleshkov,” said Iosef. “Tell him it is urgent. Tell him. .”
The director’s door opened and Yaklovev, spire-straight, said,
“Come in, Rostnikov.”
Oh, by my mother’s saints, thought Pankov, he can hear everything that is said out here. He has wired my space.
This was terrifying news to the little man, who now searched his memory, frantically wondering, fearing, that he had said something in the last months, something that would eventually mean his ruin.
I should have known, Pankov thought. I should have suspected.
Oh, god. He doesn’t care if I know. He is planning to replace me, to drive me into a breakdown and replace me.
The door closed behind the two men.
Porfiry Petrovich Rostnikov had many things on his mind when he returned to his office. He wanted the day to be over so he could talk to and be with Sarah. He wanted to bring in the killer of the Chechins and Tatars. He wanted quite a few things, but he did not want to find Lydia Tkach sitting in front of his desk with her arms folded when he returned from his meeting with Shatalov and Chenko.
He sat behind his desk, put his hands flat in front of him, and looked at the thin woman attentively. That she was furious was obvious. Sasha’s mother did not hide her opinions or feelings. And her primary feelings were reserved for her only son.
“Elena Timofeyeva was attacked by a wild tiger,” she said.
“A tiger?” asked Rostnikov. “Contrary to rumors you may have heard, I can assure you, Lydia, that there are no packs of wild tigers roaming the streets of Moscow. There are animals far more dangerous, but not tigers. It was a dog.”
“Anna Timofeyeva said it was a tiger.”
Rostnikov seriously doubted this, since Lydia was shouting and not wearing her hearing aid. Actually, she almost never wore the hearing aid, which made conversation with her very public.
“A dog,” said Rostnikov.
“Then a dog,” Lydia conceded with exasperation. “Anna Timofeyeva says she will probably die.”
“Elena Timofeyeva is probably home by now,” said Rostnikov, trying hard to keep from looking at his watch. “She has some injuries but she is fine.”
“We shall see,” said Lydia with suspicion. “She was working with my Sasha, wasn’t she?”
“Yes.”
“Then he may be attacked by some animal, may be killed,” she said, challenging the chief inspector.
Sasha was certainly in danger from animals with guns, but a second dog attack was unlikely.
“I think he is in relatively little danger,” Rostnikov said, reaching under the desk to try to adjust his leg through the trousers of Leon’s dead father-in-law.
“Relatively?” Lydia shouted. “Relatively? There shouldn’t be any relatively for Sasha. There should be no danger.”
“He is a police officer,” said Rostnikov patiently. “There is always some danger when one is a police officer.”
“Not if one sits behind a desk,” Lydia said, leaning forward with a cunning smile.
“He does not want to sit behind a desk. I don’t know if I could get him moved behind a desk even if he wanted to. We have had this conversation many times, Lydia Tkach.”
“And we will have it many more times till you do something to protect my Sasha.”
There was a knock at the door of his office. Rostnikov called,
“Come in.”
Pankov entered with a very false smile and a steaming mug.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I thought you might like some tea.”
“That would be nice,” said Rostnikov.
“Can I bring some for the lady?” Pankov asked, placing the tea before Rostnikov.
“What?” said Lydia, looking at the little man as if he was an intrusive insect.
“Tea,” Rostnikov said loudly.
“No.”
“This is Sasha Tkach’s mother. This is Pankov, the director’s secretary,” said Rostnikov.
The tea was hot and sweet, a strong tea. It was clear that Pankov wanted something. This was the first time the little man had been in his office, and Porfiry Petrovich was confident that Pankov had never been in the room across the hall with its cubicles for the other inspectors.
“I would like to speak to you, Chief Inspector,” Pankov said, trying to smile apologetically.
“I’ll come down to your office when we are finished.”
“No,” Pankov shouted loud enough for Lydia to hear him clearly and look up at him. “No. I will come back. Don’t come to my office.”
Pankov left quickly.
“Strange man,” said Lydia, looking at the door. “He could have offered me some tea.”
“He did,” said Rostnikov, but her back was turned and she clearly did not hear him.
Then she turned.
“I cannot tell Sasha Tkach what to do,” said Rostnikov, wrapping his thick fingers around the hot mug. Thunder grumbled somewhere far away. “He is a grown man.”
“He has a wife, two children, a mother,” said Lydia.
“I do not have time for this conversation which, as we have agreed, we have had many times before,” said Rostnikov.
“And you always sit there like a. . a. . Buddha, a sphinx, a clerk at the postal office.”
“I have an only son, too,” said Rostnikov. “He is a policeman. It was his choice.”
“And you were happy with his choice?” Lydia said with most un-subtle sarcasm.
“Yes,” said Rostnikov. “And no.”
“If Sasha is hurt, I will hold you responsible,” she said, pointing a thin finger across the desk.
“I will probably do the same, Lydia Tkach,” he said. “But that does not alter the fact that I cannot force Sasha to take a job in the office.”
“You mean you will not,” she said.
“Perhaps.”
Lydia rose suddenly, lifting her Saks Fifth Avenue shopping bag filled with vegetables, a few pieces of fruit, some cans of Hungarian soup, and two new pairs of socks.
“Sasha has not been himself,” she said, changing her tone from aggression to a deep, solemn concern.
“I have noticed, Lydia.”
“He has been sullen, depressed. I think, and I don’t want this to go beyond this room, that he has. . that he has been with women other than Maya. He is his father’s son.”
“So are we all, Lydia.”
“I think Maya is planning to take the children and leave my Sasha,” she said. “Take them back to the Ukraine. I know she is. I won’t see them. If Sasha. .”
“You want me to talk to Maya?” he asked.
“Could it hurt?”
“I don’t think so,” he said.
“Then talk to her, Porfiry Petrovich. Talk to her soon.”
“I will,” he said.
Lydia pulled herself together, stood tall, and said, “I have money, Porfiry Petrovich. I could buy my son a shop or help him get started in a business.”
“I know,” said Rostnikov. “You want me to talk to Sasha too?”
“Yes,” she said.
He nodded to indicate that he would do so. Lydia left.
Rostnikov raised the mug of still-very-hot tea to his lips. A knock at the door and Pankov entered before Rostnikov could tell him to come in.
Pankov closed the door, smiled at Rostnikov, and quickly sat in the chair that Lydia had just vacated.
“Director Yaklovev had to go to a meeting at the ministry,”
Pankov said.
“That’s nice,” said Rostnikov. “That is what you wanted to discuss?”
“No,” Pankov said nervously. “We have known each other for many years.”
“About eight,” said Rostnikov. “The tea is good.”
“Thank you,” said Pankov with a smile that suggested a man in desperate need of root-canal surgery.
The little man shifted in the chair uncomfortably and looked at the closed door as if he feared the sudden entrance of uniformed, helmeted, and armed men.
“Pankov, can I help you with something?”
The little man turned back to face Porfiry Petrovich. The office was warm but not warm enough to account for Pankov’s perspira-tion. Then again, Pankov perspired very easily.
“Can you recall ever having said anything in my office or, more important, my saying anything to you in my office that would, might be considered. . indiscreet?”
“Knowing you from our many pleasant exchanges,” said Rostnikov, drinking more tea, “I would doubt if you ever spoke indiscreetly. I, on the other hand, am on occasion given to utterances that might well be considered indiscreet, though I can recall no specific instances. Would you care to tell me what we are talking about?”
“I have reason to believe,” said Pankov softly as he now leaned toward Rostnikov, “that there is a microphone in my office and that the director can hear everything that goes on, everything that is said.”
“Yes,” said Rostnikov.
“Yes? All you have to say is yes? You knew this?” asked Pankov, removing his glasses.
“Yes,” Rostnikov repeated, putting the mug aside, pulling his pad of paper toward him, and writing something in pencil.
Pankov assumed Porfiry Petrovich was simply making one of his cryptic drawings. After meetings in the director’s office, Pankov had many times examined the pads left behind on the table. There were seldom any words on Rostnikov’s pad, and the words that were rarely there made little sense and seemed to have no relevance to anything that had gone on at the meeting. Pankov had saved all the notes and drawings left behind by all the inspectors. He remembered one of Rostnikov’s notes in particular. It contained two drawings of birds in three-dimensional squares. One bird was black. The other white. And the words “monks, monks, monks”
were neatly printed below the birds.
“Porfiry Petrovich. .” Pankov had begun when Rostnikov tore off the sheet on which he had written and held it up for the little man to read. The letters were large but Pankov’s eyesight left much to be desired. He leaned closer, adjusted his glasses, and silently read: “ALL OF OUR OFFICES ARE WIRED.”
Pankov sat back in his chair. Actually, he fell back and began to look around the room.
“Pankov, you may well be wrong.”
“Yes, yes, yes. I may be wrong. Probably am. I’ve been working hard.” Pankov rose in confusion and turned toward the door.
“Wait,” said Rostnikov.
“What?”
He held up the now-empty mug and handed it to the little man.
“It was very good. Thank you.”
Pankov nodded and headed in dazed confusion out of the office. He had trouble closing the door behind him and came very close to dropping the mug. But he managed to juggle and catch it before it fell to the floor.
Yaklovev was many things. Corrupt, self-serving, ambitious. He was also loyal to those under him upon whom he depended for his success. Yaklovev was smart, very smart. He was not a man to un-derestimate, and Rostnikov did not intend to do so. Porfiry Petrovich had known his office was monitored two days after the Yak had become director, given Rostnikov a promotion, and assigned him this private office. The microphone was well hidden behind a panel in the ceiling almost directly over the desk. It had taken Rostnikov almost half an hour to locate it. He could have done so faster, but climbing atop the desk with one good leg was an invitation to disaster.
Since Rostnikov respected the director’s intelligence, he doubted if the conversation he just had with Pankov would fool him for an instant. The director would know, when he listened to the tapes, which must now be rolling to record silence, that Rostnikov knew about the microphone.
“Like the old days,” Rostnikov said aloud for the ears of the Yak.
Fifteen minutes later, after he had spoken with Sarah on the phone, Rostnikov and Emil Karpo were on their way to pick up a murderer.