The nurse frowned in response to the desolation he could not keep from his face. An intense blanket of loneliness enveloped him. “Who are you, may I ask?” she went on.
Ruzsky responded slowly, pulling the papers from his pocket. “Chief Investigator Alexander Ruzsky,” he said quietly, “Petrograd City Police Criminal Investigation Division.”
The nurse looked at his papers, examining the photograph and then checking his face. She handed them back. “You are a long way from home, Chief Investigator.” Her voice and expression were sympathetic, as though she sensed something of the scale of his anguish, if not its cause.
He did not respond. It was not possible, he told himself, that the emotion of those days at Petrovo was an illusion.
It still felt utterly real.
“What is it that you seek?”
Ruzsky felt suddenly, crushingly tired. He wondered if he should leave immediately; was this another trap? He scanned the lobby and looked over his shoulder toward the bank where Pavel was hiding. He could make out nothing amiss.
“What is it that you want?” the nurse repeated.
“We were looking for a woman called Maria Popova,” Ruzsky said. “But it is no matter.”
“Why do you seek her?”
Ruzsky saw that she was curious. “I’m conducting a murder investigation.”
“Is she a suspect?”
It was an odd question. “No.”
The nurse looked at him steadily. “I don’t know a Maria Popova,” she said. “Did you expect her to be a patient?”
“No.”
“A nurse, then?”
“No, not a nurse. She came down to Yalta from Petrograd to see her sister. She told me the girl was a patient here.”
Ruzsky saw a flicker of recognition and his pulse quickened.
The nurse shook her head carefully. “We have no one called Popova.”
“But the name is familiar to you?”
“No.”
Ruzsky waited.
“The woman I seek,” he said, “is tall, with long dark hair. She is strikingly beautiful. She-”
“We have a Catherine Bulyatina. She has a sister named Maria who came to visit her from Petrograd yesterday.”
Ruzsky’s spirits rose. “Bulyatina?”
“Yes.”
“Catherine Andreevna?” Ruzsky asked. Maria’s patronymic was also Andreevna. It was too much of a coincidence. They must share the same father. One or other had changed her surname. “The girl here is Catherine Andreevna?”
“That is correct, yes. Kitty.”
“Is she here now? Might I see her?”
“No. I’m afraid that will not be possible.”
The woman’s eyes were steely. Despite his fatigue, Ruzsky tried to summon up the energy to be charming. “We have come a long way…” He sought her name.
“Eugenia Sergeevna.”
“Eugenia Sergeevna,” he repeated, smiling. “It is a sad case. A young woman and her lover stabbed on the frozen river Neva.”
“I’m sorry for it.”
“It would help-”
“You said the woman is not a suspect.”
“No.” He inclined his head. “No, no, she is not. But she may be at risk.”
Eugenia Sergeevna hesitated, her eyes narrowing. “You would not come all this way for such a reason.”
“She has information that may place her at risk.”
“Information that you want?”
Ruzsky did not know what answer to give. His relief that Maria had been telling the truth was clouding his mind. “Yes.”
She seemed satisfied that he had conceded. “It is a long journey,” she said to herself. “Difficult in these times.” What she meant was that the reason for such a trip must be compelling. “Why could she be at risk?”
“The victims were colleagues of hers… friends.”
“Friends?”
“Yes.”
She hesitated for a moment more, then shook her head. “Maria Bulyatina returned to Petrograd last night.”
“Are you sure?” Ruzsky tried to keep the disappointment from his voice. But it did not matter, he assured himself. She had come here to see her sister, just as she had told him.
“I’m certain.”
“Would it really not be possible to speak to Kitty? Under your supervision, of course.”
“No, I’m afraid not. Her health is… fragile.”
“Miss Bulyatina must love her sister a great deal,” Ruzsky said quietly, “to come such a long way for only one day.”
The nurse appraised him carefully. “The war has changed many things, Detective, but not love.”
“Perhaps especially not that.”
“Perhaps. To make such a journey… yes, it is a mark of love. Sadly, it was not-” She checked herself. “I must be getting back to my work. I’m sorry we cannot be of more assistance.”
Ruzsky was taken aback by the sudden change in her mood. “Would you ask Kitty if she would speak to me?”
“No.” She shook her head. “I’m afraid that would not be appropriate.”
“Have you known the family long?”
“No,” she said.
Eugenia Sergeevna had half turned away, but something was causing her to hesitate. “Maria Bulyatina is truly at risk?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Ruzsky thought carefully before responding. This was not a woman to be fobbed off with half-truths. “A group of people she was once involved with… some time ago, here in Yalta, has become the target of a killer. Three have been murdered already, in Petrograd. So far as we can tell, the group had only three other members. Maria was one of them.”
“What kind of group?”
“A… political group.”
“Revolutionaries?”
He hesitated once more. “Yes.”
“Bolsheviks?”
“It is not clear.”
Eugenia considered this and then shook her head. “She did not strike me as that type of girl.”
“No.”
“You know her?”
“A little.”
Eugenia shook her head. “It’s not possible.”
Ruzsky did not answer. It was heartening to hear someone so formidable echoing his own judgment.
“You wish to arrest her?”
“No.”
“You are a policeman, however.”
“But not an agent of the Okhrana.”
Eugenia’s nose wrinkled involuntarily and Ruzsky thought it a revealing gesture. If you wanted to know the depths of opprobrium the Imperial Crown had fallen to even in the eyes of ordinary, decent, middle-class Russians, it was only necessary to mention the name of the Emperor’s secret police. It was more respectable to be a revolutionary, no matter how violent.
The woman assessed him for a moment more. “Very well, Chief Investigator. Kitty may choose to tell you what she wishes. It is a decision for her. I will say no more than that.”
She spun around and led him out of the door and past a neatly tended lawn. Ruzsky tried to keep pace with her. “The sanatorium has been renamed,” he said.
“Funds were provided.”
“From the Tatyana Committee?”
“There are some officers here.”
As Ruzsky rounded the corner of the terrace, the sight of her stopped him in his tracks.
Maria stood in front of the steps down to the lower part of the garden, by a long line of tall palm trees, looking out over the sea. She was dressed in white, fringed by the rich dawn light, long, dark hair tumbling down her back.
Eugenia Sergeevna was still walking toward her. “Kitty?” she asked.
The woman turned. It was not Maria at all, but the likeness was striking: the same eyes, the same hair and cheeks-the same soft skin delicately lit by the dawn sky.
Ruzsky opened his mouth to introduce himself, but no sound came out.
The look in her eyes was different. It was distant, almost ethereal. But in all other respects she was so like Maria they could have been twins. “Kitty,” Eugenia said softly, “this is Chief Investigator Ruzsky from Petrograd.”
The girl offered her hand, her eyes upon his face. She tilted her head to one side, smiled, and then sat down on the wicker chair behind her. “Hello,” she said, her response delayed, as if her mind only worked very slowly. She stared out toward the sea, still smiling, her face tilted up toward the early morning sun.