Филип Керр - Dead Meat

Grushko climbed into the cab and sat in the driver’s seat. It felt more like a limousine than a truck. He looked at all the instrumentation and nodded appreciatively. It was certainly an impressive-looking vehicle.

‘That’s your fire-suppression system there,’ said Gidaspov. ‘And this controls the temperature inside the container.’

‘What about communications between the trucks?’ Grushko asked. ‘I don’t see any short-wave radios.’

‘Er well... the British seem to be having a problem with them,’ he said. ‘You see, it would appear that all short-wave frequencies are owned by the state-security apparatus. We’ve been trying to get our own frequency for some time now.’ He shrugged. ‘But until we do, there are no radios. It’s been several months.’

‘I know the feeling,’ said Grushko. This was the bit he was looking forward to. ‘What happens to the trucks once the waste is removed?’

Gidaspov pointed to another switch on the dashboard.

This operates a special decontamination process. The truck cleans its own interior automatically. Then, when the truck reaches the edge of the exclusion zone, the driver uses an onboard hose to spray the exterior with decontaminant as well.’

‘And how efficient is that?’

‘The radiation levels are considered acceptable, I believe. But I’m afraid it’s not my field. You’d have to speak to Chichikov to get the exact levels. He’s the scientific controller here.’

Grushko smiled and showed him the radiometer.

‘Mind if I check it myself?’

Gidaspov frowned. Grushko was beginning to worry him.

‘No,’ he said reluctantly. ‘Why should I mind? We’ve got nothing to hide. But do you mind telling me—’

‘All in good time, Mr Gidaspov. All in good time.’ He pointed at the dashboard. ‘We operate the container doors from in here, do we?’

Gidaspov nodded and flicked the switch. They stepped down from the cab and went round to the back of the truck. When the big doors were open Grushko climbed into the back and, with the radiometer switched on, he walked the length of the container and back again. Even after having been sprayed with decontaminant the truck’s interior was registering 800 milli-roentgens, which was more than the meat in Dr Sobchak’s laboratory. Grushko turned the machine off and jumped down beside Gidaspov.

‘And then they’re just driven back here empty?’

Gidaspov was looking distinctly unhappy.

‘Well yes, of course. What else would you want to put inside them?’

‘What else indeed?’ Grushko lit a cigarette and regarded the truck with quiet distaste.

‘Tell me,’ he asked. ‘Have you ever heard of black haulage?’

Gidaspov bridled.

‘Of course I have. I have had many years’ experience of managing freight, Colonel. But I can’t see that anyone would want to put any sort of illegal cargo inside one of these trucks. After three or four days in this sort of environment, any cargo would show traces of some contamination. Even after spraying with decontaminants.’

‘Do your drivers know that?’

‘I would have thought so, yes.’ But Gidaspov sounded vague.

‘But you’re not sure?’

‘Well, not absolutely sure. But common sense would seem to indicate that—’

‘Either way it probably doesn’t really matter,’ said Grushko. ‘Not to the Mafia, anyway. They’re not particularly fastidious about things like contamination. Not when there are such large profits to be made.’

‘I think it’s about time you told me exactly what’s going on here, Colonel, don’t you?’

‘Yes, you’re right,’ said Grushko. Experimentally he ran the radiometer over his own person. It showed a small reading that he hoped wasn’t enough to worry about.

‘A Mafia gang has been using your trucks to transport supplies of frozen meat to cooperative restaurants here in St Petersburg,’ he said. ‘EC food-aid that was destined for the people of Kiev.’

Gidaspov’s mouth slackened like a deflating tyre.

‘You can’t be serious, Colonel,’ he said.

‘Oh, but I am. What better way for them to avoid the attentions of customs officials and militiamen on the look out for illicit food supplies? After all, nobody feels much inclined to go near anything nuclear these days. Not since Chernobyl.’

‘But what you’re suggesting, it’s monstrous,’ spluttered Gidaspov. ‘And I can’t see how — I mean, I’m sure our drivers would have had nothing to do with such a thing.’

‘The Mafia have their ways of persuading people to do what they’re told,’ shrugged Grushko. ‘All the same, I shall want to see your personnel files. There may be a weak link, despite your admirable security precautions.’

Gidaspov was still finding it hard to take in. He lit one of his American cigarettes nervously.

‘But the meat,’ he repeated dumbly. ‘It would be hopelessly contaminated.’

‘Yes, you’re right,’ agreed Grushko. ‘But like I said, I doubt that would worry the Mafia. After all, contamination’s not something you can actually see. Just the same I think it must have worried Tolya. Perhaps that’s why he became a vegetarian. Anyway, he decided to take his story to Mikhail Milyukin. He even took along a sample of the meat.’

Grushko watched the colour drain from Gidaspov’s well-fed face.

‘I’m not exactly sure what happened next,’ Grushko admitted, ‘but somehow the Mafia — a gang of Ukrainians it would seem — well, they discovered that Tolya had told someone. Perhaps Tolya was foolish enough to have confided his doubts to one of the other drivers. If so, then it cost him his life. The Ukrainians grabbed him, tortured him and found that the person Tolya had told was an investigative journalist. Ogonyok, Krokodil — it would have made good copy wherever it appeared. But with the sort of money involved, the Mafia couldn’t afford to let that happen. There were twenty tonnes of beef on that plane from Britain. At today’s black-market prices that’s worth about five million roubles — as much as any narcotic. So they killed them both.’

‘But why transport the meat here?’ said Gidaspov. ‘Why not just sell it in Kiev?’

‘Have you been in a cooperative restaurant in St Petersburg?’ said Grushko. The prices they charge are many times higher than those people could be expected to pay in Kiev. Because of the tourists. And however badly off for food the Ukraine thinks it is, it’s still a lot better off than we are in Petersburg. After all, the Ukraine is, or at least used to be, Russia’s bread-basket.’

Gidaspov had steadied himself against the truck. He was looking distinctly green.

‘Exactly where are the trucks right now, Mr Gidaspov?’

‘You’d better come inside,’ he said.

They went back to Gidaspov’s office where he showed Grushko the convoy’s position on a map.

‘They’ll aim to be here, in Pskov, by this evening,’ he said. ‘And all being well, they should be back in St Petersburg some time tomorrow night.’

‘Good,’ said Grushko. ‘That gives us time to prepare a welcome for them. With any luck we’ll catch them red-handed.’

He looked at Gidaspov and wondered whether or not he could trust him. The man seemed genuinely shocked by what Grushko had told him, but there was no way to be absolutely sure that, left at liberty, he would not try and warn someone. Grushko knew he had little alternative but to take Gidaspov into custody until the arrests had been made.

That night, an elk came running through the streets of St Petersburg. Someone told me that it was usually about this time of year that they started to migrate and that instinct led them to take the same route that their ancestors had taken before Peter the Great had even thought of founding his city. For a while I sat at a window in the Big House and watched the huge bewildered beast gallop up and down Liteiny Prospekt. It made a pleasant diversion from hours spent dealing with the Georgians.