“None,” Korolev said. “So he wasn’t well-liked?”
“Not at all,” Chestnova said. “Not by his colleagues and certainly not by the students. Feared, perhaps.”
“Feared? Well that’s useful to know.”
Korolev examined the dead man’s face. It was difficult to deduce a corpse’s personality just from looking at it. Death rubbed away much of a person’s character-and left only a misleading impression at best. But Chestnova was someone whose opinion he could attach some weight to. If she said Azarov wasn’t a pleasant man, then he believed it. Especially since his maid had given a hint or two along the same lines.
“Well, he must have trusted whoever shot him,” Korolev said. “Why else would a man sit at his desk calmly while his killer stood behind him?”
“Just because he wasn’t afraid of the killer, doesn’t mean he didn’t know they despised him,” Slivka said, with a shrug of her shoulders.
“Perhaps. Ushakov, I’d like to have a look at what he was working on at the time of the murder. Can you clean the blood off these?”
Korolev pointed to the blood-caked papers.
“We’ll do our best-I’ll let you know how we get on. In the meantime, I’ve extracted your bullet from the desk.” He held up a small brown paper bag. “It looks like a.45 caliber-big, in other words. It must have been fired from close range but it barely made a dent, really-for its size.”
There was something in Ushakov’s tone that suggested he had some thoughts on this.
“Go on.”
“It’s just a hunch, but I’m thinking a very small pistol. One of those waistcoat weapons, you know the kind. We’ve asked the local Militia station to pull all the firearms certificates for the building. The bullet’s a bit battered but we should have enough to match it to a weapon. If we locate the weapon, that is.”
Korolev glanced toward Slivka.
“We’ll go through the place atom by atom.”
“Well, I’d better go and meet the late professor’s colleagues.”
Korolev said his farewells. On his way out, he wasn’t surprised to find Priudski the doorman still loitering on the landing, barely visible in the gloomy light.
“Comrade Priudski?” Korolev asked.
“Yes?”
“I need to call Petrovka. Can I use your phone?”
“Of course, Comrade Korolev. Of course.”
Priudski led him down the staircase and, when they reached the bottom, ushered Korolev into his small office. The doorman picked up the receiver, tapping three times for the operator.
“I need to call Moscow CID,” Priudski said. “Petrovka.”
“Thank you,” Korolev said, taking the receiver from the smaller man and holding the door open for him.
The doorman left the room with an expression that reminded Korolev of a scolded schoolboy-but if Korolev was going to make a report to Popov on a case like this, he’d rather it wasn’t overheard by a fellow like Priudski.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Korolev had never heard of the Azarov Institute before but he often traveled along Bolshaya Yakimanka and knew the building well enough from the outside. At one time, long before the Revolution, it must have been the residence of someone who’d had money to burn-and had decided to burn a good portion of it on a large and ornate mansion. Since then a revolution, the Moscow winter, and the passage of time had worked on it, turning once bright-red bricks to brown, and white marble to gray. And what time and weather hadn’t managed to alter, man had. Bars and barbed wire guarded each window and ledge-and the high wall that surrounded the grounds was topped with spikes.
Korolev parked the car and got out, first walking to the heavy oak front door, conscious that large raindrops were beginning to spatter the pavement around him, and then, following the directions on a handwritten sign, around the corner and down a narrow laneway, his mood darkening with each step. Two men in black hooded rain cloaks stood waiting for him in front of a small sentry box that guarded the side entrance. They watched him approach with apparent indifference.
“I’m from Petrovka,” he said, showing his identification card to the nearest of the two-a heavyset man with blank blue eyes and a hard face. “I’m-”
“From Moscow CID. Korolev.” The guard said this without bothering to look at his papers. He sounded bored.
“You’re expected, Comrade Captain,” the second guard said.
“You knew I was coming?”
“Please come with me, Comrade Captain.” The second guard spoke as if he were persuading a temperamental child to perform an unpleasant task. “The deputy director will answer your questions.”
He stepped aside so that Korolev could pass and, after a brief pause, Korolev did just that. After all, the rain was beginning to come down fatter and faster-pittering and pattering around him on the laneway’s cobbles.
It was unsettling, of course, that they’d been expecting him, but perhaps Popov had thought it wise to call ahead. Or Priudski. Anyway, he was a senior detective from Petrovka-it wasn’t likely that entering the place on his own would be dangerous. These were just ordinary guards, doing their duty-same as he was.
But as he followed the guard along the gravel path, he caught sight of two concrete buildings. They were invisible from the street because of the institute’s high perimeter walls-they were only two stories and set well back-and, at first glance they looked like ordinary office buildings or some such. A second glance, however, revealed the heavy metal doors and the shuttered windows, the thick walls and the regular lampposts that surrounded them. And it occurred to him that these were buildings designed not to keep people out-but to keep them in.
* * *
The man behind the large desk stood as he entered, giving him a smile that seemed genuine enough.
“Captain Korolev, I’m pleased to meet you.”
The deputy director was young, not yet forty, broad-shouldered and in good shape. In fact he had the sort of rude health that suggested he’d be more comfortable working in a field than sitting in an office.
“Thank you for seeing me at such short notice,” Korolev began, before a roll of thunder seemed to rattle the very building itself. A simultaneous gust of wind sent splashes of rain through an open window onto the wooden floor. The deputy director stood up and, with an incongruous half-bow, moved quickly to close it.
“The storm has come at last,” he said. “Let’s hope it means the air will be cleaner-cooler too, with luck. I’m Shtange. The deputy director.”
“Korolev,” he said, still feeling the strength of Shtange’s grip, “but you know that.”
Korolev was surprised at how rough Shtange’s hands were-they didn’t feel like a doctor’s hands, far from it.
“Yes, they told us you’d be coming. I’ve been instructed to be as cooperative as possible.”
“Thank you.”
“We’re all shocked by the news, of course.”
For an instant Shtange was silhouetted against the window by lightning, which was followed almost immediately by a deafening blast of thunder-even closer now, it seemed. A real summer tempest, Korolev thought, not without some satisfaction.
“Professor Azarov was a tireless striver for Socialism, a Stakhanovite worker of the highest productivity. With more like him, the State would be completing Five Year Plans in two years not four.”
Shtange had to shout to be heard over the wind and rain lashing at the windows, but even so, his words sounded formulaic, almost as if he were embarrassed by what he was saying.
“We’ll investigate his death with every resource available to us, of course.”
“I don’t doubt it, Comrade Korolev, I don’t doubt it. Such an important figure in Soviet science-well, the State will expect nothing less.”
Shtange extracted a metal cigarette case from the pocket of his dark jacket, took one out and tapped it on the table. Korolev noticed with interest the engraved propeller design on the case’s lid-wondering to himself what Shtange’s connection with airplanes might be. Shtange caught the glance and, misreading his interest, offered Korolev a cigarette.