‘Rusalka! Rusalka!’
The boatman was yelling, panicked, and striking at the creature with his long heavy pole. One of the conscripts shouted in protest and lunged across the thwarts to grab at his arm, but it was too late. The boatman caught the rusalka a heavy blow full on its head, and it withdrew under the water.
The soldier jumped in after it.
‘Come back!’ he was shouting. ‘Please! Come back!’
He splashed about until he was exhausted and sobbing and gulping for air. At last he let his companions pull him back into the boat. While the passengers’ attention was distracted Lom slipped over the side and waded away towards the edge of the square.
58
Krogh barely looked up when his private secretary came into the office carrying another stack of files. As always, the files would be placed in the in-tray and the completed work from the other tray would be cleared. It would be done without speaking. That was the routine. Minimal disturbance. Krogh was slightly surprised when the private secretary lingered, and walked around behind the desk to stand in the bay and look out of the windows. The rain was pouring in sheets out of the ruinous, bruised sky.
‘The floods are rising,’ the private secretary said.
Krogh grunted. The interruption irritated him. He was already unsettled following the call from Lom.
‘I won’t go home tonight,’ he said. ‘I’ll sleep in the flat. I may need to speak to the Novozhd later. There’s no need for you to stay, Pavel. Go home now before the bridges are closed.’
‘It’s too late for that.’
There was something in the private secretary’s tone that surprised him.
‘Well,’ said Krogh, ‘get them to find a launch to take you. Tell them I said so. I don’t want you any more, not till tomorrow.’
‘There was a message from Commander Chazia.’
‘What did she say?’
‘That you were a stupid old fucker.’
Krogh realised too late how close behind him the private secretary had come. The loop of wire was round his neck before he could react. It tightened, cutting into the folds of his flesh. He felt it slicing. Felt the warm blood spill down his neck inside his collar. It splashed the papers on his desk. He tried to get his fingers inside the wire, but could not. His fingers slipped on the blood. He felt the wire cut them. He tried to stand up, he tried to fight, he tried to call out, but the private secretary was leaning away from him, pulling at his neck with the wire loop, tipping him backwards, unbalancing him. He tried to throw himself sideways but the private secretary hauled him upright. No sound could escape from his constricted throat. He could get no air in. He felt the back of his chair digging into his head. It hurt. Then he died.
59
When Maroussia Shaumian reached the building where Raku Vishnik lived, she found the street door shut against the rising waters. She pushed it open and waded into the dim, flooded hall. Her splashing echoed oddly. She felt the weight of her sodden clothes dragging at her as she climbed the stairs to Apartment 4. The door was ajar.
‘Raku?’ she called softly. ‘Raku? It’s Maroussia.’
There was no answer. She pushed the door open and went in.
What was left of Vishnik lay on the couch, adrift on a sea of littered paper and broken household stuff. He was naked, on his back, his arms and legs lashed by neat bindings to the legs of the couch. There was blood. A lot of blood. Three fingers of his right hand were gone.
She must have made some sound — she didn’t know what — because he turned his pulped and swollen face in her direction. He was watching her with his one open eye. She had thought he was dead.
She went across the room to him. He was moving his mouth. He might have been speaking but she couldn’t hear him over the sound of the rain against the windows. She knelt down beside him. The water from her dress soaked the drift of notebooks and scattered photographs.
‘Maroussia—’ he said. ‘I didn’t…’
What should I do? she thought. What should I do?
‘It’s OK,’ she said. ‘I’ll help you.’ What should I do? She tried to undo one of the knots, but it was tight and slippery with blood. Her fingers tugged at it uselessly. ‘What happened?’ she said. ‘Who did this? What can I do, Raku?’
‘I found it,’ said Vishnik. He was staring at her with his one remaining eye. They had taken the other one. ‘It’s here and I found it. I didn’t tell them what I know.’
‘It’s OK, Raku,’ she said. ‘It’s OK.’
‘No. I want to tell you. I wanted to. I was going to.’ He tried to raise his head from the couch. There was blood in his mouth. ‘I found it. I found it. And they were here… But they didn’t get it. Even they… even they are human. And stupid.’
‘Raku?’
He laid his head back against the couch. His mouth fell partly open. His face was empty. He was gone.
Maroussia stood up. She was trembling.
I need to get out of here. I need to get out of here now.
The horror of the thing on the couch — what they had done to him… She could not stay. It was impossible. But the storm was raging outside, and the floods… She had almost not made it here. Where could she go? How?
She went to the window, parted the curtains and looked out into storming darkness. The casement was rattling in its frame; the reflection of the room behind her flexed as the panes bowed under the force of the wind. She pressed her face against the glass, trying to see.
The street lamps were out. The only faint light came from the windows of neighbouring houses, but she could see by their glimmering reflection on the waves down below that the flood had risen further. There must have been ten to fifteen feet of surging water in the street, whipped into choppy, spray-spilling peaks.
And there was a boat.
A diesel launch was nosing its way up the flooded street, half a dozen uniformed men in the open stern, hunching their shoulders against the rain, MILITIA OF MIRGOROD in white lettering on the roof of the cabin.
She heard a movement in the room behind her, and spun round, thinking wildly that it was Vishnik, raising himself somehow from the couch.
But it was Lom.
‘We have to get out,’ said Maroussia ‘We have to go. They’re outside now. They have a boat.’
‘I know,’ said Lom. ‘I saw them.’ He was looking at Vishnik. ‘I came for him.’
‘Raku’s dead,’ said Maroussia. ‘He was… He spoke to me when I got here, he said… he said he told them nothing.’
‘He had nothing to tell. They didn’t need to do this.’
From down below there came the sound of hollow thumping, wood striking against wood, heavily. Glass breaking.
‘There’s no time,’ said Maroussia. ‘We have to go now.’
Lom stood looking at Vishnik for a moment.
‘Take the stairs,’ he said. ‘Not the lift. Go up. In houses like this the roof space is usually open from house to house. All the way to the end of the row if you’re lucky. Keep going up. You’ll find a way.’
‘What about you?’ she said. ‘Aren’t you coming?’
‘I’ll keep them occupied. You can find a boat on the quay.’