He started walking south. His new boots served him well on the slippery surface. He felt them grip but also sensed within his step the heart-lurching point at which they would fail him, and he measured his gait to stay the right side of it. Then, as a closed carriage passed him heading in the opposite direction, he turned sharply back on himself and ran in its lee. He was exhilarated by his ability to stay upright. He surprised himself by the maneuver but was comforted by it all the same, not merely because the carriage sheltered him from the weather. If the tramp was still on the other side of the street, the moving vehicle would act as a further blind, in addition to the nascent blizzard. As he came to the first corner, he turned right into Morskaya Street. The carriage continued straight on. Virginsky ran a few more paces and then abandoned himself to a slide that took him, arms windmilling, a couple of sazheni along the pavement. His arms came up, and he ducked into a quick walk, casting a single glance over his shoulder.
With the same impulsiveness that had prompted him to turn on his heels in Gorokhovaya Street, he suddenly lurched toward the door of a shop. He did not look at the name of it and had formed no clear impression of what it sold.
There was a smell of new felt and cologne, which had to it an elusive familiarity. He had been here before, once, a long time ago. In fact, his last visit to the German hat shop on Morskaya Street had been soon after his arrival in St. Petersburg. In those days his own apparel was equal to the expensive hats on display. It had seemed the most natural thing in the world to hold his head high as a shop assistant measured its circumference. Then he had inspected the shop’s wares as if they already belonged to him, and he had not been afraid to look himself in the eye in one of the many looking glasses. His face beneath a German topper had not struck him as preposterous. Far from it. He had bought the hat, though it was long since hocked, the pledge surrendered.
Now the mirrors crowded in on him oppressively. He flinched away from them as if from a public shaming. And to try on one of the hats would have been as impossible as to dance on the ceiling.
Virginsky moved far enough into the interior to be partially hidden from the street, but not so far that he could no longer look out through the window of the door. He was anxious also to avoid the attention of the shop walker. Fortunately, the staff all seemed to be busy with other customers.
He didn’t have long to wait before the tramp shuffled into sight. In fact, the man’s sudden appearance on the pavement outside the shop took him by surprise. He had not had time to prepare himself for what now confronted him: an unimpeded view of the other’s profile. The greatest shock was that he did not recognize the face. It was certainly not his own. This was so unexpected that he stared blankly at the man, scarcely believing that it was the same tramp. He looked down at the stranger’s feet for confirmation. He was still wearing the old felt boots. But Virginsky noticed he now had a pair of good rubber galoshes over them.
The man hesitated briefly on the pavement almost directly in front of Virginsky, casting searching looks up and down Morskaya Street. It seemed it did not occur to him to look inside the German hat shop. It was clearly inconceivable to connect the object of his search with the interior of such an establishment. The man moved on. Once again his speed and purpose impressed Virginsky.
“Can I help you?”
Virginsky turned. A sleek, elegantly dressed man of around thirty stood before him. He tilted his head back so that he could look down at Virginsky more effectively.
Virginsky thought of all the things he could say to the fellow as he took in the details of his appearance, the long oiled hair that curled solidly at his collar, the crisp black frock coat, beneath it the taut waistcoat, as glistening and bright as a polished mineral, and the finely tapered, beetle-black shoes. Everything was sharp and unassailable, a hostile elegance, even the needle-scent of his perfume.
“I bought a hat here once,” said Virginsky, putting as much defiance as he could into the claim.
The shopman disdained to comment but pivoted backward at the waist, as though reeling from the words.
“My father is a landowner,” blurted Virginsky. He bowed his head and left the shop, burning with a hotter, deeper shame than he had ever known.
Dmitri led them down the dingy corridor. It was so narrow, they were forced to proceed in single file. Uninvited, the ragged porter brought up the rear. There was a watchful stupidity to his expression. His heavy-lipped mouth hung open. He evidently didn’t want to miss anything.
It was hardly a room at all, just an odd bit of space left over after the construction of the rest of the hotel, an airless cell crammed into the last corner beneath the stairs. The door had a corner cut out of it to accommodate the sloping ceiling. Dmitri’s candle showed up the grime that lay over everything. The wallpaper was yellowish, though it seemed more likely that it owed its color to age than to any printing process. There seemed to have once been a pattern to it. The single bed almost filled the floor space. Next to it a wooden stool doubled up as a bedside table. There were more candles on a dark, oversize chest. Dmitri lit them from his own candle.
“Who’ll pay for those?” demanded the porter.
“You may present me with a bill. I will pass it on to the chief of police for approval,” answered Porfiry.
“The chief of police!” scoffed the porter excitedly. But seeing the seriousness of the others, including the boy, he became discouraged and sullen.
Porfiry handed a candlestick to Salytov and took one himself. The two of them examined the room closely. Porfiry looked under the bed, where, unsurprisingly, he found a thick drift of dust. In places, it seemed, the dust had adhered into heavy clumps. Porfiry removed one glove and tested one of these clumps with a fingertip. It was not dust after all.
Porfiry rose to his feet stiffly, with a pinch of the substance between his thumb and forefinger.
“What is it?” asked Salytov.
Porfiry sniffed it. “I can’t say for certain, but I think it’s horsehair.”
“Horsehair?”
“Yes.”
Salytov sank down onto his knees to take a look beneath the bed himself. Porfiry turned to Dmitri. “Is there anything you can remember, any detail at all, that struck you as odd, from the time that Govorov was staying in this room? Did you hear any cries, for instance?”
Dmitri shook his head.
“Did Govorov ask for anything? Did he eat? Did you bring food to his room?”
“Yes, he ate. Of course he ate.”
“What did he eat? Can you remember?”
“Veal. Hors d’oeuvres. Tea.”
“Did he ask for anything else?”
Dmitri thought for a while. “He didn’t want vodka. I asked him if he wanted vodka, and he said no.”
“That’s interesting,” said Porfiry. He gave Salytov, who was now back on his feet, an inquiring glance.
Salytov nodded pensively. “Yes, I would not have had our Govorov down as an abstemious gentleman,” he confirmed.
“Perhaps he brought his own vodka?” suggested Porfiry. “Let’s see,” he began to recap. “He declined the vodka but accepted the veal-even though this would have been within the Christmas fast, would it not?”
Dmitri nodded.
Porfiry continued: “Obviously not a strict observer of the Faith.”
“Who is these days?” said Salytov. “Besides, I am surprised you expect a murderer to observe the fasts.”
“We don’t know he is a murderer,” said Porfiry with a provocative smile.
“It’s all we have,” said Dmitri abruptly. “If you don’t eat veal, you don’t eat here.”
“We’ve never had any complaints,” said the porter aggressively.
“And there was nothing else?” pressed Porfiry.
“Only veal and hors d’oeuvres,” said Dmitri.
“I meant anything else at all out of the usual.”