EF06 - The State Counsellor (20 page)

There was only one thing Green still had to find out - whether Rahmet had been collaborating with the Okhranka for a long time or had only been recruited yesterday.

He asked him: 'How long?'

'Let's say from the very beginning. You lifeless, long-faced bastards have made me feel sick for ages. And especially you, you thick-headed dolt! Yesterday I met a man far more interesting than you.'

'What does "TG" mean?' Green asked, just in case.

'Eh?' Rahmet said in surprise. 'What's that you say?'

There were no more questions, and Green didn't waste any more time. He flung the knife that was clutched in his right hand and dropped to the floor, to avoid being winged by a shot.

But there was no shot.

The Bulldog fell on the carpet as Rahmet clutched with both hands at the handle protruding from the left side of his chest. He lowered his head, gazing in amazement at the incongruous object, and tore it out of the wound. Blood flooded the entire front of his shirt; Rahmet stared round the room with blank, unseeing eyes and collapsed on to his face ...

'Let's go,' said Green, taking a running jump into the sleigh, flopping into his seat and then slipping the small chest under it. The chest held everything they needed: detonators, false documents, spare guns. 'The rod fell under a chair. Barely managed to find it. Together as far as Khludovsky Lane. You get out there, I go on to meet Ace. And one more thing: don't come back here. After the ex, go to the lineman's place. And Arsenii too.'

Ace was already strolling along the pavement dressed as an undistinguished commercial traveller in a beaver-skin peaked cap, short coat, checked trousers and foppish white-felt boots. Green was dressed, as they had agreed, like a shop assistant. 'Where the hell have you been?' the specialist shouted at Green, getting into his role. 'Tether the horse over there and get yourself over here.'

When Green came close, the bandit winked and said in a low voice: 'Well, you and I make a right pair. When I was still a young 'un I used to like fleecing geese like us. If only you could see Julietta - you'd never recognise her. I dolled her up like a real common little lady, so they wouldn't gape at her in the India. What a ruckus - a real scandal! Didn't want to make herself look ugly, no way she didn't.'

Green turned away in order not to waste time on idle conversation. He surveyed their position and decided it was ideal. The specialist knew his job all right.

Narrow Nemetskaya Street, along which the carriage would arrive, ran in a straight line all the way from Kukuisky Bridge. They'd be able to see the convoy from a distance, and there'd be plenty of time to take a good look and get ready.

Lying across the road just in front of the crossroads was a long timber beam of exactly the right thickness - a man on horseback would ride by without any trouble, but a sleigh would have to stop. Fifty paces further back on the right there was a gap between the buildings: Somovsky Cul-de-Sac. The gunmen should be there already, waiting in ambush behind the stone wall of the churchyard. A head appeared round the corner: Emelya, taking a look.

Ace's plan was a good one - sound and simple: there was no reason to expect any complications.

It wasn't quite getting dark yet, but the light at the edges of the sky was already dimming slighdy, turning a murky grey. In half an hour the twilight would thicken, but by then the operation would already be over, and darkness would be very handy for the disengagement.

'It's five o'clock,' Ace announced, clicking shut the lid of an expensive watch on a thick platinum chain. 'They're just leaving the despatch room. We'll see them in about five minutes.'

He was taut and collected, his eyes sparkling merrily. Fate had played a cruel joke on the archpriest by planting a wolf cub like that in his family. Green was suddenly struck by an interesting theoretical question: what was to be done with characters like Ace in a free, harmonious society? Nature would still carry on producing a certain proportion of them, wouldn't she? And innate natural traits couldn't always be corrected by nurture.

There would still be dangerous professions, he thought; people with an adventurous bent would still be needed. That was where Ace and his kind would come in useful: for exploring the depths of the sea, conquering impregnable mountain peaks, testing flying machines. And later, after about another fifty years, there would be other planets to explore. There would be plenty of work for everyone.

'Clear off!' Ace shouted at a yard-keeper who was grunting as he struggled to roll the beam aside. 'That's ours; the cart'll be back in a minute to pick it up. Ah, these people, always looking for something they can pick up without paying for it.'

Faced with this furious assault, the yard-keeper withdrew behind his iron gates, leaving the street completely deserted.

'The money's coming; our little darlings are on their way,' Ace drawled in an unctuous voice. 'You get across to the other side. And don't go too early. Take your lead from me.'

At first all they could see was a long, dark blob; then they could make out individual figures - everything was exactly as Ace had said it would be.

At the front - two mounted guards with carbines over their shoulders.

Behind them - the despatch office's financial instruments carriage: a large enclosed sleigh, with a driver and two other men, a constable and a delivery agent.

Riding beside the carriage - more armed guards, two on the right, two on the left. And bringing up the rear of the convoy was a sleigh, which they couldn't make out clearly from where they were standing. It ought to be carrying another four guards with carbines.

Emelya came out from round the corner and leaned against the wall, watching the procession as it passed by. He was holding a small package: the bomb.

Green stroked the fluted handle of his Colt with his finger as he waited for the front riders to notice the beam and come to a halt. The clock above the pharmacy showed nine minutes past five.

The horses stepped indifferently over the barrier and ran on, but the driver of the carriage roared out 'Whoah!' and pulled hard on his reins.

'Where are you going?' the constable yelled, half-rising to his feet. 'Can't you see that beam? Dismount and drag it out of the way. And you give a hand too,' he added, nudging the driver.

Once he saw the convoy had halted, Emelya began strolling slowly towards the final sleigh from behind, like a curious onlooker.

When the two guards and the driver bent over and grabbed hold of the beam, Emelya took a short run, hurled his bundle and shouted in daredevil style: 'Hey-up!' He had to shout so that the guards would realise who had thrown the bomb. That was crucial for the plan.

Before the bundle had even touched the ground or the guards had realised what this strange object flying towards them was, Emelya had already spun round and set off back towards the corner.

The boom wasn't particularly loud, because the bomb was only half as powerful as an ordinary one. The power to kill wasn't needed here; this was only a demonstration. A powerful blast would have stunned the guards, or concussed them, but right now they had to have their wits about them and be quick on their feet.

A bomber!' the constable yelled, looking back over the top of the carriage. 'There he goes - ducked round the corner!'

So far everything was going according to plan. The four men sitting in the sleigh (not one of them had been hurt by the blast) jumped out one after another and went dashing after Emelya. The other four, who were still sitting in their saddles, swung their horses round and set off whistling and hallooing in the same direction.

The only armed men left near the carriage were the two who had dismounted, now caught with the beam clutched in their hands, and the constable. The driver and the delivery agent didn't count.

Just a second after the pursuers turned into the cul-de-sac, a sharp crackle of revolver shots came from round the corner. The guards would be too busy to think about the carriage now. They would be stunned by the gunfire and their own fear; they would just lie down and start blazing away.

Now it was up to Ace and Green.

They stepped into the roadway almost simultaneously, each from his own side of the street. Ace shot one guard twice in the back and Green struck the other on the back of his head with the butt of his revolver - with Green's strength that was enough. The beam dropped on to the trampled snow with a dull thud and rolled away a little distance. The driver squatted down on his haunches, covered his ears with his hands and started howling quietly.

Green waved his revolver at the constable and the delivery agent, who were sitting on the coach-box, transfixed. 'Get down. Look lively'

The agent pulled his head right down into his shoulders and jumped down clumsily, but the constable couldn't make up his mind whether to surrender or carry out his duty: he raised one hand as if he were surrendering, but fumbled blindly at his holster with the other.

'Don't play the fool,' said Green. 'I'll shoot you.'

The constable flung his second hand up in the air, but Ace fired anyway. The bullet hit the constable in the middle of his face, transforming his nose into a blackish-red hole, and the constable collapsed backwards with a strange sob, slapping his arms against the ground.

Ace grabbed hold of the delivery agent's coat collar and dragged him to the back of the carriage: 'Open it, serviceman, if you want to live!'

'I can't, I haven't got a key,' the agent whispered through lips white from terror.

Ace shot him in the forehead, stepped over his body and smashed the sealed lock with another two bullets.

There were six sacks inside, just as they had been told there would be. Green hastily scratched the letters 'CG' on the carriage door with the handle of his Colt. Let them know.

While they were carrying the loot to the sleigh, he asked as he ran: 'Why did you have to kill him? And the other one had surrendered too.'

'No one stays alive if he can identify Ace,' the specialist hissed through clenched teeth, tossing another sack over his shoulder.

The driver, who was still squatting down, heard what he said and made a run for it, hunched over.

Ace dropped his load and fired after him, but missed, and before he could fire again Green knocked the gun out of his hand.

'What are you doing?' The bandit clutched at his bruised wrist. 'He'll bring the police!'

'It doesn't matter. The job's done. Give the signal.'

Ace swore and whistled piercingly three times, and the shooting in the cul-de-sac was immediately cut by half - the whistle was the sign that the gunmen could stop firing.

The horse set off at a gallop with its studded hooves clattering and the light sleigh, not at all encumbered by its paper load, slid off weightlessly along the icy roadway.

Green looked back

A few dark, shapeless heaps on the ground. Orphaned horses nuzzling at them. The empty carriage with its doors ajar. The clock above the pharmacy. Twelve minutes after five.

That meant the expropriation had taken less than three minutes.

The India Inn stood on a dingy depressing square beside the Spice Market. A long, single-storey building - not much to look at, but it had a good stable and its own goods warehouse. This was where merchants stayed when they came to Moscow for cinnamon, vanilla, cloves and cardamoms. The entire area around the Spice Market was impregnated with exotic aromas that set your head spinning, and if you closed your eyes to blot out the snowdrifts stained yellow by horses' urine and the lopsided little houses of this artisans' quarter, you could easily imagine that you really were in India, with sumptuous palm trees waving overhead, elephants swaying gracefully as they strolled past, and a sky that was the colour it ought to be: an unfathomable, dense blue, instead of the grey and white of Moscow.

Ace's calculations were right yet again. When Green walked into the hotel carrying two heavy sacks, nobody gave him a second glance. A man carrying samples of his wares - nothing out of the ordinary there. How could anyone possibly guess that what the dark-haired shop assistant was carrying in his sacks was not spices for trading but two hundred thousand roubles' worth of brand-new banknotes - while they were driving from Nemetskaya Street, Green had covered the sealing-wax eagles and dangling lead seals with plain, ordinary sackcloth.

Julie looked strange in a cheap
drap-de-dame
dress, with her hair set in a simple bun at the back of her head. She flung herself on his neck, scorching his cheek with her hot breath, and murmured: 'Thank God, you're alive ... I was so worried, I was really shaking ... That's the money, right? So everything's all right, is it? What about our men? Are they all safe and well? Where's Ace?'

Green had had time to prepare himself, so he bore the rapid, ticklish kisses without a shudder. Apparently that was perfectly possible.

'On guard,' he replied calmly. 'Now we'll bring in two more each, and that's it.'

When they brought in the remaining four sacks, Julie rushed to kiss Ace in exactly the same way, and Green was finally convinced that the danger had passed. He wouldn't be caught out again; his willpower would withstand even this test.

'Do you want to count it?' he asked. 'If not, choose any two. We'll take four to the sleigh and I'll go.'