The proprietor was a fat bearded man in gloves and striped shirtsleeves, known only as Clover. If you spoke certain words to this Clover, he would nod, lift the partition in the counter and show you through a dusty glass door into the back parlour. From there you went through a curtained back exit, across an interior courtyard and down a narrow stairway into a mazy network of tunnels and cellars. It was easy to lose yourself in that subterranean labyrinth, but Josef Kantor knew the way well.
It was an unpleasant route. Kantor disliked it and used it as rarely as he could. The way was damp and dark, and stank of stale river-water. The tunnels and passageways were faced sometimes with stone, more often with rotten planks, and always with slime and streaks of mud. The floor was treacherous with dirty puddles and scattered rubbish. These underground passageways extended under much of inner Mirgorod. They were remnants of the original building work, if not — as some said — remains of some much more ancient settlement that predated the coming of the Founder. Kantor tended to believe the latter. Sometimes he heard things — the shuffle of slow footsteps, mutterings and echoes of shouting — and saw the trails of heavy objects dragged through the mud. Not all the original inhabitants of the marshlands had been driven away by the coming of the city, and some that had left had returned. He wasn’t nervous, threading his way through the maze, but he found it… distasteful.
He came eventually to a locked metal gate that barred the way. He had a key, and let himself through onto an enclosed walkway slung beneath one of the bridges that crossed to the Lodka. Out of sight of the embankment and the windows of the building, it led into the upper basements of the vast stone building. Once inside, Kantor traced a circuitous route that led him gradually upwards, through unused corridors and by way of service elevators and blank stairwells, to the office of Lavrentina Chazia.
Kantor picked up a chair, placed it in front of her desk and sat down. Chazia ignored him and carried on working. Her face had always reminded Kantor of something reddish and cruel. A vixen. And the dark, smooth blemishes where her skin was turning to stone. They were spreading. It was getting worse. He watched her unconsciously scratching at the angel mark on the back of one hand. She dabbles too much.
‘It was a complete success,’ he said.
‘What?’ She didn’t look up.
‘The march. On the Lodka.’
‘Oh. That. But we must talk about something else, Josef. Your position is compromised. Krogh knows who you are. He has the name. Josef Kantor.’
‘Krogh is old and tired.’
‘Krogh is clever,’ said Chazia. ‘He knows we’re working against him and he knows he can’t trust his own people. He’s taken steps against you. An investigator. From the east. Someone with no connections here. He’s set him to track you down.’
Kantor grunted. ‘One investigator? That can be taken care of. You’ll do that?’
‘Of course.’
‘We can’t afford distractions.’
She looked up from her papers at last.
‘You and I cannot meet again, Josef. Our plans must change. At least in so far as they involve you.’
‘I’m not dispensable, Lavrentina. The angel speaks to me. Not you.’
Kantor saw Chazia’s vixen head lean forward, her eyes widen a fraction. She scratched at the stone-coloured back of her hand again. Delicately wet her lips with the tip of her tongue. How transparent she is. She gives herself away. She doesn’t know she’s doing it. How she wants to be close to power! How she desires it! She longs to feel power’s hot breath on her skin, and open her legs for power. She is jealous of me, because the angel comes inside me, not her. She felt it once and she wants it again. She’s hooked like a fish.
‘What does it say?’ said Chazia. ‘What does the angel say to you?’
He saw how weak she was. Desiring to be near power is not the same as desiring power. It is the opposite.
‘It is impatient,’ he said. ‘It urges haste. It makes promises.’
‘Promises?’
‘To me, Lavrentina. Not to you. To me.’
‘Of course you would say that. To save yourself.’
‘One cannot lie about the angel. One cannot deceive it.’
Chazia showed the tip of her tongue again, pink between pale thin lips.
‘Is it here? Is it with you… now?’
‘Of course not. I couldn’t speak to you if it was.’
‘Why does it choose you, Josef? Why doesn’t it come to me again?’
Kantor said nothing.
‘Do you know why not?’
‘No.’
‘You could ask it.’
‘No.’
Chazia sighed and leaned back in her chair.
‘So. What does it promise you, Josef?’
‘Stars. Galaxies. Universes. The red sun rising.’
‘Meaning? Meaning what?’
Kantor looked at her and said nothing.
‘Meaning nothing,’ said Chazia.
‘It has given me an instruction. The Pollandore must be destroyed.’
‘It knows about that?’
‘It knows everything.’
‘Then it knows we cannot destroy the Pollandore. We have tried and failed.’
‘It must be done’
‘This doesn’t change your position, of course,’ she continued. ‘The logic is inescapable.’
‘I do not see it.’
‘Think, Josef. See it from my perspective. Soon the Iron Guard will step in and put things right. This weak and backsliding regime will fall. The One Righteous War will recommence with renewed vigour.’
‘With me alongside you, Lavrentina. That is the agreement. It must stand.’
‘But consider this, Josef. How would it be if Krogh makes the connection between you and me? If he can prove it? If he takes this to the Novozhd before we are ready? Surely you see the impossibility of this?’
Kantor watched her steadily. He said nothing.
‘What would you do, Josef?’ she said. ‘In my position?’
He shrugged. ‘It is not complex,’ he said. ‘Krogh must be killed.’
Her eye flickered.
You are transparent to me. You garrulous intoxicated mad old fox-bitch.
‘Nothing is easier than death,’ he said. ‘The more deaths there are, the better for our purpose.’
‘But—’
‘The solution is clear,’ Kantor continued. ‘Krogh must be killed. Of course…’ He looked her in the eye. Held her gaze. ‘If you don’t have the stomach for that, I will do it myself. It doesn’t matter so long as it is done.’
Chazia glared at him.
‘It will be done,’ she said. ‘It’s not a problem.’
‘Thank you,’ said Kantor. ‘Good. Of course, that isn’t why I came to see you.’
‘So why did you come?’
‘I have a couple of requests.’ He smiled. ‘No doubt these also will be no problem.’
Chazia bridled.
‘Be careful, Josef. Don’t go to far. You are not… safe.’
‘No one is safe, Lavrentina. Such is the world. But there are some favours you could do for me.’
‘What?’
‘My former wife, the slut Feiga-Ita.’
Chazia looked at him in surprise. ‘What about her?’
‘Kill her. Kill that bastard daughter of hers too.’
‘I see,’ said Chazia. ‘But… surely you could do this yourself? You have people.’
‘They would want to know why. That would not be helpful.’ Chazia sat back and considered.