The Baron patiently returned to his questioning. “And your Mukden contact. Does he have a name? Or is his identification also an impossibility?”
Andreev shook his head. “He’s safely returned to Mukden.” He looked over his shoulder nervously, although they were alone, bracketed by ridges of empty train tracks.
“Your mysterious contact had no other information?”
“I told you that there wasn’t enough light for him to see.”
“But he recognized the soldiers.”
Andreev laughed. He appreciated the joke, as Russian soldiers in their huge fur hats and stiff-skirted coats were unmistakable.
His feet were numb on the uneven ground. It was useless to try to provoke Andreev into revealing more information. It was too cold. It had been a mistake to interview him outside.
“You claim there are two bodies that cannot be located or identified. And your source of information about the bodies is absent and anonymous. If you were younger, if you were a child, I would dismiss you without kindness for wasting my time.”
“That’s all the information I have for you, Baron.” Nothing fazed Andreev. The conversation had been concluded.
“Can I offer you something in exchange for your generous information? A token of appreciation?”
“You owe me nothing, sir.” Andreev grinned. “Situations change. Someday I may need a favor from you.”
This question and answer of Andreev’s pretended graciousness was a ritual between them. The Baron’s sheepskin mittens were thick as a towel and he fumbled, pressing several rubles into the other man’s outstretched hand.
He watched Andreev’s bulky silhouette vanish into the blue shadow of Central Station. Although shivering with cold, he was unwilling to walk into the building, as the heat would dissolve his clarity of thought. He needed time to collect himself.
A few minutes later, he slowly walked through Central Station, suddenly aware that he stank inside the closed animal skins of his clothing. He watched two soldiers fidgeting with the guns slung across their chests and approached them cautiously, as they were probably already drunk, though it was barely past noon. The soldiers, from habit, did not pay attention until he introduced himself as a doctor. Everyone has a complaint for a medical man.
The younger soldier was disheveled, sweating in his thick coat. He managed a lopsided grin along with his name, Shklovskiy. “We’ve been standing here for days.” He shuffled his boots. “Mother of God, my back aches.”
The Baron made a sympathetic noise. “Your gun is heavy.”
“We can manage.” The second soldier, Rakhimanov, scowled.
“You soldiers hardly need my advice. I see all the beggars are gone from the station thanks to your good work.”
“Gone for the moment. But trouble arrives with every train. No undesirables allowed here. Move along!” Rakhimanov slapped his gun.
“Difficult to push so many undesirables from the station.”
Rakhimanov glanced around, clearly enjoying his ability to intimidate. “We watch everyone who walks in the door. Some pretend not to see us. Some move away too quickly. Chinese beggars. Army deserters. Smugglers. We lock up anyone we please. Anyone suspicious.”
“That could be everyone here.” The Baron offered a flask of vodka.
The soldiers laughed and greedily shared swallows from the flask.
“Who gives you orders?”
“Diakonov. General Khorvat’s deputy.” Shklovskiy volunteered more information. “We stopped five passengers last week. Four men and one woman. Russians and Chinese.”
“Did you register their names?” The Baron let his eyes wander to the door, allowing his distraction to soften the question.
“No. We don’t carry paper and pencils. Others do the petty work.” Rakhimanov scratched under his hat and thick blond hair fell across one eye. “But I could do without the sick.”
“The sick?”
“Anyone who looks weak. Has a cough. Stumbles. Or maybe they’re just drunk. It’s hard to tell the difference.”
“What happens to them?”
“We bundle up the Chinese, and not tenderly, I can tell you.” Rakhimanov leaned closer and his breath was strong with alcohol. “Men come and pick them up.”
“Who picks them up? The police?”
“I don’t know. They have a cart.” Rakhimanov studied the rifle in his hand.
“Where are they taken?”
“No idea.”
“And the dead?”
The soldiers didn’t look at each other, but their hesitation betrayed shared information. Shklovskiy crossed himself. “The dead are respected, sir. But there are no corpses here at the station.”
“Don’t waste your sympathy,” said Rakhimanov. His fingers nervously tapped the handle of his gun.
Shklovskiy poked his fellow soldier. “He’s a doctor.”
Rakhimanov ignored him. “Tell me something. Is it true the Chinese have no souls? Everyone in the border guard says that it is so. They do not worship God.”
The Baron’s expression appeared tolerant. No point in delivering piety. “I’m a medical man serving the body. How could I say whose soul is blessed to enter the kingdom of God?”
His evasion disappointed them. For Russian soldiers, the Chinese were faceless dogs, indecipherable pagans who deserved rough treatment. An early name for the first Russians who traveled in China was luosha, a tribe of man-eating demons.
The Baron wished the men luck. Distracted, he moved across the cavernous, dimly lit station, misjudging distances, gently colliding with travelers in bulky padded coats, the physical contact as muted as if he were walking underwater. Heat radiated from the massive white-tile stoves in the corners of the waiting room. A group of Russians stood near a wall, crossing themselves in front of an icon of Saint Nikolas, the city’s patron saint. The bank of small candles below the icon, wavering at every movement, were the brightest spots in the space.
It was against protocol that the sick hadn’t been taken to the hospital where he was in charge. City bureaucracy had been circumvented, but by whom? Someone had given orders to remove the two dead Chinese from outside the station. Were the bodies and the passengers detained by the soldiers linked? Was he the only official who hadn’t been notified? Since this had been deliberately hidden from him, he couldn’t discuss it with General Khorvat. Perhaps the general was also in the dark.
Was the search for sick passengers a screen for another purpose? It reminded him of the secret police in St. Petersburg. After threats were made against the czar, the police searched residences and businesses, supposedly for illegal church literature from Baptists and Old Believers but actually for evidence of bomb-making.
His speculation produced nothing but a clumsy half-drawn picture. He left the station and was slammed by cold air. Outside, the snow’s dizzying progress was measured by its sting against his cheek.
Later, he finished a cup of tea standing by the window in his office, purely a habit, as there was no view. The double glass panes were filled with white sand as insulation from the cold and remained opaque until May, when snow first melted from one side of the immense tile roof of Central Station.
At home, he didn’t share the day’s events with his wife. Li Ju turned to him when he entered the room, as always, invariably looking up from her embroidery, a book, or a game of mah-jongg, ready to change the direction of her day for him. He would insist that he didn’t wish to disturb her but was secretly pleased. Other women had turned their eyes to him in calculation or desire but her attention was a bouquet.
Li Ju was polishing a bowl at the table, and he stooped slightly to lift it from her hands. “Let me carry the bowl for you.”