Stuart Kaminsky: A Whisper to the Living

“We don’t see cars like that here very much,” said Yuri. “There’s no place a car like that could be going.”

“There’s a big dinner at the Posvit Hotel on the other side of the park,” said Porfiry Petrovich. “Our government is trying to convince a Japanese investment group to develop an area called Gargarin Street.”

“How many has he killed now?” asked the boy.

“Many,” said the policeman. “I can’t tell anyone because the number might be important when we catch him.”

The official internal number of victims, Porfiry Petrovich knew, was nineteen. The unreported number of victims was fifty-one. It was assumed that there were other bodies to be found.

“You are not hoping he will come out of the woods to confess?” Yuri said.

“No, I am not.”

“Maybe you are hoping he will come by and try to kill you?”

“I have considered that possibility,” said Porfiry Petrovich. “I expect that at some point he will come and sit down as you have. Or perhaps he will pass by letting our eyes make contact.”

“Will you be here tomorrow?” Yuri asked.

“Perhaps,” said Porfiry Petrovich, urging his plastic and metal leg to allow him to rise with some dignity.

Now that he was standing, Yuri could see that the man was neither tall nor short. He stood with his legs apart, reminding the boy of a cylindrical box of kasha on the kitchen shelf.

“Shall we shake hands, Yuri Platkov?” Porfiry Petrovich said, holding out a thick right hand.

Foot traffic had grown heavier. People streamed from the direction of the subway. It was safe enough. He placed his hand in that of the policeman. Yuri steeled himself to squeeze, but it wasn’t necessary. The policeman’s grip was firm but gentle.

“The Maniac has moved the bird feeders,” said the boy.

The policeman knew the makeshift bird feeders made of shoe boxes or cereal containers. The feeders, tied by string or ribbon, were hung from the low branches of trees with piles of seed inside left by bird lovers. They existed in almost all parks within the city.

“Moved them where?” asked the policeman.

“Farther from the path, deeper into the trees,” said the boy. “People have to move away from the eyes of others to put in seeds or watch the birds feed. And some of the old men with no home eat the seeds.”

No further clarification was necessary.

“I will look at the bird feeders,” said the policeman.

“ Paka , good-bye,” the boy said.

“ Paka , Yuri Platkov,” said Porfiry Petrovich.

Yuri started to move away and then turned to face the standing man.

“Are you important?”

“I am Chief Inspector in the Office of Special Investigations.”

“I have never heard of such an office.”

“Good. That is as it should be.”

Yuri turned and hurried away adjusting the scarf around his neck as he followed the jumble of icy footprints in the thin layer of snow that crackled under his feet.

Porfiry PetrovichRostnikov had been handed the case of the Bitsevksy Maniac only six days earlier. For the past two years, the murders had been under the jurisdiction of the MVD, Ministerstvo Vnutrennikh Del, the Ministry of Internal Affairs.

The existence of the murderer had been kept a secret. But the public began to learn of the Maniac through word of mouth, surviving relatives, and newspapers and small magazines that couldn’t be silenced. They learned of it long before Rostnikov was handed the case. The MVD was embarrassed and the way out of the embarrassment was to issue an internal document, which they were certain would be leaked, stating that their resources had to be concentrated on terrorist threats and that the Office of Special Investigations was ready to take on principal responsibility for finding “the murders in and around Bitsevsky Park.”

Fortunately, Igor Yaklovev, Director of the Office of Special Investigations, was quite willing to take on the high-profile case. The Yak was always willing to take on cases that no one else wanted provided there was a payoff in the end, be it an acknowledgment of his skills as an investigator, the possibility of a promotion, or the likelihood of an opportunity to blackmail a government official or a wealthy citizen.

The Yak, lean and always impeccably dressed in a dark suit and tie, seldom left his office in Petrovka, Moscow’s police headquarters, though it was rumored that he engaged in regular martial-arts exercises with Vladimir Putin, with whom he had served in the KGB in St. Petersburg. The Yak relied completely on Rostnikov and his team to successfully take care of the investigations for which the Yak took credit. In turn, Colonel Yaklovev did his best to protect Rostnikov and his team when trouble arose.

Now in his own office down the hall from the Yak’s, Rostnikov continued to go over the MVD reports on the investigation. The stack was at least three inches high, and he was sure that everything had not been turned over to him. It was only natural that MVD officers and the Yak would pull out possibly vital documents to hold for possible gain or simply to hamper the investigation in the hope of failure.

Still, there was much in the pile of folders and reports, including the photographs of all the victims and the autopsy reports. Rostnikov had divided the pile of reports in two and given one stack to Emil Karpo, the gaunt, almost cadaverous inspector who would certainly read every word placed in his hands. Rostnikov, however, would move through instinctively, catching a word here, something in the corner of a photograph there. Sometimes he knew what to look for, but more often he would simply sense what he needed to know, though he would acknowledge there were times in the past when he missed some vital piece of information. In a few days, he would switch piles with Karpo and go through the same process again. They were a good team. Karpo was an analyst of fact with no imagination. Rostnikov trusted his imagination and doubted facts.

The others on his team who shared an office with Karpo were on other cases. Rostnikov’s son, Iosef, mistakenly named for Stalin when the Man of Steel was still considered the savior of the Soviet Union, was investigating the death of a professional boxer and the wife of a giant of a man who was on the verge of becoming heavyweight champion of the world. That investigation had just begun. Iosef was assisted by Akardy Zelach, the Slouch, a lumbering man of no great investigative skills but often surprising talents.

Zelach’s mother was in the hospital almost certainly dying from an ailment that the doctors could not identify. Zelach, who was forty-one years old, lived with and listened to his mother. He could not even imagine what life might be like without her. On the other hand, Sasha Tkach dreamt of living without the daily unannounced appearances of his mother.

Sasha’s mother, Lydia Tkach, was a retired government apparachnik who was given to shouting directions to her son about how to live, what to eat, and what he could do to try to win back his wife and Lydia’s two grandchildren. Lydia was nearly deaf. Lydia had a pair of very effective hearing aids. Lydia refused to wear them. Sasha was sure this was because she had no interest in hearing what anyone else had to say.

Sasha was still morose and not a joy to be with since his wife, Maya, had moved to Kiev with their two children. Sasha had willingly fallen victim to one woman too many.

Elena Timofeyeva had her own concerns, primarily the coming wedding to Iosef Rostnikov, son of Porfiry Petrovich to whom she was to be married in five days. It was required that they were to be wed exactly thirty-two days from the time that they registered with ZAGS, the all-powerful office that controlled marriages. At the moment, however, Elena and Sasha were assigned to protect a British journalist about to look at organized prostitution in Moscow.