‘Everything you know is classified from
everyone
,’ said Cowley, repeating the earlier warning. ‘That includes Burden and the ambassador.’
‘Don’t worry,’ assured Andrews. He lighted a cigar, slumping into a facing chair. ‘I’m glad this happened. Us getting together like this. Just like the old days, right?’
‘Close,’ agreed Cowley. They’d practically been a threesome in London. He supposed it had been inevitable that Pauline would turn to the other man, when things got as bad as they did between them.
‘Right that it should be like this. Adult.’
‘Yes.’ Cowley guessed the other man had had quite a few drinks before his arrival. Just as quickly he refused the criticism. How many times must Andrews have thought the same about him, at dinner parties in London? Had he sounded like this? Probably worse. Poor Pauline.
‘This
is
the social scene in Moscow, eating in people’s houses. Pauline and I will introduce you around: there are some great guys at the embassy.’
‘It could all be over quite soon,’ reminded Cowley. ‘I could be on my way back.’ What would the orders be from Washington tomorrow? He didn’t enjoy working like this, having constantly to delay and get guidance from the other side of the world. He would have liked to have confronted Hughes that afternoon, after getting all the Russian evidence.
‘I really don’t feel I’ve done enough, workwise.’
‘You’ve helped a lot,’ assured Cowley, meaning it. Andrews had taken a lot of the routine transmission stuff and evidence-logging off his shoulders. What
would
he say, if were asked about having Andrews in his Russian division back in Washington?
‘You want me to do anything more, all you’ve got to do is ask, OK? Really.’
‘OK,’ Cowley accepted.
The meal was magnificent, as Pauline’s meals always were, and the evening became easier as they ate. By the end there were even reminiscences about their time in London together, the husband roles reversed, which Cowley imagined at first would have been difficult but wasn’t. Over coffee Andrews asked what it was like at Pennsylvania Avenue, without openly admitting his expectation to be posted there after Moscow, and Cowley talked of the differences from field work. ‘A lot of internal politics.’
‘But necessary, careerwise?’
Mr Ambitious, thought Cowley, Pauline’s expression still in his mind. ‘Certainly the place to be seen and to impress.’
‘Just give me the chance,’ said Andrews, eagerly.
The evening ended with their insistence that he should come again very soon and not stay by himself in the new compound and with other people from the embassy the next time. Cowley insisted in return that he should reciprocate by taking them to a restaurant they liked. At the door Pauline came forward for a parting kiss, which Cowley gave her lightly on the cheek, because it seemed quite natural to do so. He said he’d enjoyed it, which he had. And thought so again, back at the embassy suite.
He wasn’t tired so he made himself coffee and sat thinking about the evening. He was intrigued by her response to the question he probably shouldn’t have asked, about her being happy. Unthinking answer to unthinking question, he decided. She seemed very quiet, deferring to Andrews’s approval a lot of the time. But that could have been his imagination. And was it any of his business? She wasn’t his wife any more. Not his responsibility. Not that he’d shown enough – none, which had been the problem – when they had been married. Their first protracted time together since the divorce, Cowley reflected. So how had it been for him? A lot of nostalgia. A lot of regret, too, at what he’d done in the past. Love? Of course. He’d never fallen out of love with her, just destroyed hers for him.
You’re the sort of person who needs to be married
. Was he? Cowley felt discomfited by the assertion. He certainly felt lonely, most of the time. Lost even. But easing loneliness wasn’t marriage. So what was his definition of marriage? A question he wasn’t qualified to answer: didn’t want to answer, certainly not tonight. If he wasn’t completely happy as he was, at least he wasn’t completely unhappy: he had made his private adjustments, marked his own boundaries. To anyone outside, he was a success. Only he felt otherwise: knew just how much he’d failed, a failure for which no professional achievement could compensate. He
had
enjoyed the evening. And would enjoy more with her. With them. And he wanted to take them out, too. Somewhere special. But where? No problem. He’d ask Danilov. Who better than one of the city’s foremost detectives?
Would there still be amicable contact with Dimitri Danilov? With anyone in Moscow? Tomorrow there was the challenge to Paul Hughes, who had a tell-tale twisted finger and lateral pocket loops in his prints and who’d lied and whose intercepted conversation they now had with Ann Harris, talking of sex and pain and what they were going to do to each other. All to be exposed tomorrow. The warning he’d given Andrews that night would probably be right. Maybe there wouldn’t be the opportunity to meet other people from the embassy or for any more evenings with Andrews and Pauline or pay-back dinners in Moscow restaurants.
Cowley was still feeling no fatigue and didn’t expect to sleep, but he did, very deeply, so he was distantly aware of the telephone ringing several times before he came sufficiently awake to lift it.
‘There’s been another one,’ announced Danilov. ‘She’s lived. I’ll be at the embassy for you in ten minutes.’
The shaking wouldn’t stop: couldn’t stop. Huge, aching shudders. Had to stop it. Get control. Horrible. God, it had been horrible. Terrifying. She’d risen from the dead. Literally. Surged up from the pavement, screaming, snatching out. Sure she was dead; had to have been dead. Felt the knife slide in, although not as smoothly as usual. Felt the life go out of her. And she’d fallen like the others. Lifeless. Lay still while the hair came off. But then surged up, grabbing, as she’d gone on to her back. Screaming. Terrible, terrible screaming. Wouldn’t have seen. Couldn’t have seen. Impossible to be completely sure, though. No description. Too dark. Too confused. No danger then. Had to stop the shaking. It hurt. Ached. Bitch. Cow. Why hadn’t she stayed dead? That’s what she should have done, stayed dead. Only got a few buttons. And dropped most of the hair. Wasn’t the same, only a few buttons and so little hair. Second failure. Worse this time. She hadn’t seen, though: no description. Be able to do it again.
Chapter Twenty-Two
They approached the hospital well before dawn, driving hurriedly through empty, yellow-lit streets: Moscow was utterly deserted and cold, a moonscape with houses. The talk was stilted, just one or two-word exchanges: Danilov knew only that it was a woman in her thirties, that the attack had happened quite near her home on a street named Granovskaya, and that she’d survived. Pavin was already at the bedside.
Cowley brought both their feelings into the open. ‘It was our fault. We spent all our time worrying about diplomatic niceties and gave him the chance to do it again! What the hell were we thinking of? It was all so
obvious
. We knew it could happen!’
‘She lived,’ repeated Danilov.
‘Luck. Nothing to do with us.’
Cowley was initially numbed by the hospital. But for the very occasional sight of a uniformed nurse or a white-coated attendant he would not have believed himself in a hospital at all. Rather it was like moving through a tiled but condemned underpass taken over by squatters, maybe in New York’s Little Italy or Washington’s Anacostia. There was litter underfoot and even beds in the corridors, humped with sleeping, snuffling people like he’d seen in documentaries on American television of homeless derelicts who had moved into public facilities due to be demolished. It took Danilov a long time to find an attendant sufficiently interested to guide them to the emergency section, where there appeared to be more staff: certainly more activity. Here there were no overflow beds in the corridors. Strip lighting gave better illumination than in some of the earlier parts through which they had walked.
Pavin must have seen them approaching, although neither saw him. The burly Major emerged from a minute, single-occupancy side-ward as they reached it. Considerately he spoke Russian slowly, for Cowley’s benefit. Her name – Lydia Orlenko – and an address to trace her husband, a metro train driver, had come from her handbag, which had also contained ten single dollar bills. She was a waitress at the Intourist Hotel who normally got home around 1 a.m., although that morning she hadn’t. She’d been found by a Militia foot patrolman, who’d heard her screaming. She’d been shorn by the time he reached her: he’d seen no one running away from the scene of the attack, in a narrow passageway between two housing blocks. She’d been hysterical, beyond any comprehensible speech: by the time she’d reached hospital she had relapsed into unconsciousness. Fortunately Pavin had arrived before surgeons began operating: he’d been able to ask the doctors to record some medical evidence as they worked. Her blood was B Positive. The wound matched those of Ann Harris and Vladimir Suzlev, five centimetres across at the point of entry of a knife sharp along one edge, five millimetres thick at the other. The difference from the two murders – an important factor in her surviving – was that this time the thrust had not been clean: the attempt had been between the eighth and ninth rib and from the right, like the others, but it had actually caught the upper rib, deflecting the passage to the heart, which had been missed completely. The intercostal muscle had been penetrated and the right lung punctured by a wound only nine centimetres deep. She was still under the effects of the anaesthetic but she was in good health, only thirty-two years old, and the surgeons were sure she was going to make a full recovery.
‘The husband and the patrolman?’ demanded Danilov.
Pavin gestured along the corridor. ‘In the waiting-room.’
The two men were sitting in silence, facing each other from opposite sides of the room, which was quite empty apart from chairs arranged around all four walls. The uniformed patrolman was smoking,
papirosi
, the butts of the hollow-tubed Russian cigarettes already around his feet. The husband was wearing a loud, brown-checked jerkin that reminded Cowley of blanket material, over oil-stained blue work overalls. Both men looked curiously at the American, instantly recognizing a foreigner.
Cowley let Danilov lead. The patrolman had been walking along Granovskaya when the screaming started. It had taken him a few moments to locate the alley, because it was so small. The woman had been propped up on her left elbow, hysterical, shouting nothing he could understand. He’d thought she’d been wildly drunk until he’d seen the blood. At the same time as seeing the blood he’d realized her hair had been cut off, in clumps, and strewn all around her. She became unconscious before the ambulance arrived. She’d been entirely alone when he reached her and he’d neither seen nor heard anyone running away. He’d obviously entered the alley from Ulitza Granovskaya: at its other end, it emerged into Semasko. He hadn’t thought to go on, to check that street for anyone: his concern had been to get help for the wounded woman. He was sorry if he’d done wrong.
Boris Orlenko was a nervous, sharp-moving man who spoke too quickly and stuttered because of it. He said his wife had been a waitress at the Intourist Hotel for five years: mostly she worked in the ground-floor coffee-shop but occasionally she helped out in one of the upstairs restaurants. She always walked home, even when she was on late shift, because they lived so close. He couldn’t understand why she had been attacked and wanted to know if they did. Why had her hair been cut off? It didn’t make sense. None of it made sense. She was just an ordinary person, with nothing worth stealing. They were both just ordinary people. He had to be at the terminus by six: would he be allowed to get away by then? If not he’d have to telephone somebody: it would cause problems at the depot. He could come back to see his wife when he finished work. That would be all right, wouldn’t it?
‘Did your wife ever speak of knowing people – anyone – from the American embassy?’ asked Cowley, coming into the questioning for the first time.
Orlenko fidgeted, uncomfortably. ‘The embassy? No. She knew Americans … not knew them, you understand. Served them, at the hotel. That’s all. I suppose some could have come from the embassy. She never said.’
‘What about regular American customers? Someone who came a lot?’
The Russian shook his head. ‘No one. Not that she said.’
‘Do you think she would have done? Did she talk about the hotel?’
Orlenko frowned. ‘Not a lot. Just sometimes. You’re American, aren’t you? What’s she got to do with the embassy?’
‘Nothing,’ said Cowley, sighing. He looked to Danilov to take over, but the Russian detective shook his head, with nothing left to ask. To the seated men Danilov said: ‘You can both go: we know where you’ll be.’
‘No possible connection with the embassy this time,’ said Cowley in English, as the two filed out.
‘We didn’t know Suzlev concentrated upon embassy customers until we saw his wife a second time,’ Danilov pointed out. ‘It’s the woman here who’s important.’
It was another hour before Lydia Orlenko recovered consciousness and almost a further hour again before they were permitted into the minuscule side-ward. She was lying on her left, the side furthest from the wound, with a pillow behind her to keep her in position. There was an arched frame over the upper part of her body but beneath the bedding, keeping its weight off. Her shorn head was completely covered by the sort of protective mobcap that women wear for hygienic reasons in places where food is prepared. She had her eyes closed and was breathing deeply and Danilov thought she might have gone to sleep again.