Stuart Kaminsky - Fall of a Cosmonaut

With this, Primazon reached into his jacket pocket and dramatically pulled out a photograph, which he turned toward Porfiry Petrovich.

“Tsimion Vladovka,” said Primazon.

Rostnikov had the same photograph in his small suitcase. He had looked at it, memorized each feature and detail. Primazon turned the photo to look at it himself as if for the first time and said, examining the picture, “I must save him, you must find him. There is none better than you for such a task, or so I have heard. I’ll be honest again. If something were to happen to Tsimion Vladovka, I might well end my career by cleaning the statues of poets and authors in the squares of Moscow.”

“And since you could not hide in such a small village as Kiro-Stovitsk …” Rostnikov began.

“… I decided to face you honestly,” finished Primazon, patting his umbrella.

“And at some time, if we find Vladovka and he is safely back in Moscow and under your protection, and I tell you who killed Vladimir Kinotskin? …” Rostnikov tried again.

“Then perhaps I will be in a position to tell you why someone does not want these cosmonauts to live,” said Primazon. “I must ask. Why have you come here?”

“Instinct,” said Rostnikov.

Primazon nodded in understanding.

“Instinct and a belief that Vladovka would not disappear forever, if the choice of disappearance were his own, without making some contact with his family,” said Rostnikov.

“Yes, yes,” said the umbrella man, nodding his head. “He is such a man. I understand. It might be dangerous to see them in person, but such a man … Well, is there some place we can spend the night here? It’s getting late and you have work to do.”

“I don’t know,” said Rostnikov. “Perhaps Iosef could …”

“No, no,” said Primazon, rising and holding out his hand, palm open and facing down to keep father and son in place. “I will take that responsibility. I am, after all, the intruder, and I owe them some explanation.”

“And what will that be?” asked Rostnikov.

“Something novel, unexpected,” the man said, tucking his umbrella under his arm. “I shall tell them the truth. Are you coming?

“We will be there in a moment,” said Rostnikov. “My leg is causing me a bit of difficulty. Iosef can help.”

“Your leg? Oh, yes, I had forgotten. War injury. You have medals?”

“I have medals,” said Rostnikov. “Everyone has medals.”

Primazon nodded again and went down the short aisle and out the doors, closing them behind him.

“There is nothing wrong with your leg?” said Iosef.

“Nothing,” said Rostnikov, still sitting.

“Then? …”

“I wanted to talk to you briefly before we join our new friend on the street as he charms the populace.”

“You have some idea of where Tsimion Vladovka might be?”

“Yes.”

“And,” Iosef continued, looking at his father, who was now rising, “you know who killed Vladimir Kinotskin?”

“Oh, yes,” said Rostnikov, patting his son on the cheek. “The killer just walked out of here with a smile on his face and an umbrella under his arm.”

There were three rooms for guests above the shop of Alexander Podgorny. They were all small bedrooms that had belonged to the Podgorny children, who had moved to St. Petersburg and Moscow years before. In one room, the man who called himself Anatoli Ivanovich Primazon was supposedly sleeping. In the center room, Iosef lay in bed, reading the mystery his father had given him. He was not particularly enjoying it, not because he thought it bad, but because his thoughts were with Elena and the man who his father had labeled a murderer, the man in the room next to his. Iosef’s gun was on the small table next to the bed. The light was too dim and the bed too soft.

Porfiry Petrovich was not in the third room. He had quietly asked if Podgorny had a telephone. The storekeeper had said that there was one in the shop, right outside the two rooms behind the shop area where Podgorny lived with his wife.

Rostnikov paid him generously in advance for the call and volunteered to pay now for the room.

“For the phone, yes,” said Podgorny. “For the room, no. You are our guests.”

Rostnikov asked for a receipt that he could hand to Pankov for reimbursement, which might take weeks and might never come.

It took him ten minutes to complete the call to Elena and Sasha, who were in her cubicle at Petrovka. Neither had reason to go home. For Elena, Iosef was eighty miles outside of St. Petersburg. For Sasha, his family was in the Ukraine. They spoke, knowing the conversation was being recorded for later listening by the Yak.

ROSTNIKOV: I have a window in my room. There is a moon and nothing as far as I can see but flat fields and a single tractor. Melancholy and quite beautiful. And Iosef is fine.

ELENA: We did not get the negatives back. I-we, Sasha and I-think that the thief expected a trap. But he did make a mistake. He made a strange call, talked about chess. We questioned some of the players in the park by the chess bench where the exchange was to take place.

ROSTNIKOV:-A name? Description?

ELENA: Perhaps from a beggar at the metro station. An agitated man gave her some coins, the most she has ever been given. He did not wait for thanks but hurried away. Normally, she would have gone back to the business of begging, but the amount had been so much that she watched him hurry to the phone. Her description of him is quite good. That is the description we gave to the chess players in the park. Most did not want to talk. A few said they thought it was a young man they knew only as Kon, who sometimes plays in the park. They said he is a nervous type, good player but impatient. The way to beat him is to wait him out, take your time until he makes a mistake.

ROSTNIKOV: Then that is what you should do. Have you given the description to Kriskov?

ELENA: Yes. He had no idea of who it might be. Nor, apparently, does his wife.

SASHA: Porfiry Petrovich, our Elena has a few other ideas, one of which makes sense, the other … I leave to you.

ROSTNIKOV: Have you? …

SASHA: I’ll call Maya and the children tonight, when I get home. I shall probably wake them and she will probably comment on my bad timing and insensitivity.

ROSTNIKOV: You do not sound concerned, Sasha.

ELENA ( in English ): He is in a state of inexplicable euphoria. I don’t know which is worse. This near-Buddhist placidity or the old morose and sullen Sasha.

ROSTNIKOV ( in English ): This too shall pass.

SASHA: You are talking about me.

ROSTNIKOV: Yes, but it is with concern. I have learned that one can be manic and depressive at the same time. It is a paradox, but it is true. The problem is that one will eventually dominate if you do not deal with Maya.

SASHA: Perhaps Elena will tell you now, in Russian, what she feels intuitively.

ELENA: I think it possible that the money was just a ruse to deter us from the real purpose of this theft. I think it possible that the real goal was to find an excuse for murdering Yuri Kriskov and make it look as if it were being done because he failed to deliver the demanded money. The threat was always there.

ROSTNIKOV: And why would our thief want to kill Kriskov and make it look like retaliation?

ELENA: Possibly, and I add that it is only possible, to conceal the real reason for killing him.

ROSTNIKOV: And what might that be?

ELENA ( after a very long pause ): Yuri Kriskov is not a very pleasant man. He abuses those who work for him and keeps a mistress, about whom everyone around him knows. His wife has been at his side, consoling, attentive, holding his hand, touching his shoulder, bringing him tea. She is nearly a saint.