Alex Dryden - Death in Siberia

He paused, watching her face all the time. He saw that a whole wild flock of thoughts were crossing her mind; calculations, assumptions, and just guesswork perhaps. But she was making connections without pause and he saw this from what was in her eyes and what was written in the changing lines on her forehead.

‘So,’ he continued. ‘An internationally renowned German nuclear scientist is found dead in an alley in Krasnoyarsk on the third of June, the same day you left on the Rossiya . With something evidently valuable concealed on his person. For that, surely, was why he was murdered. And then, eight days later, an internationally renowned Russian nuclear scientist is found in a coffin in a truck on the deserted road over there,’ he pointed vaguely northwards, ‘leading away from the nuclear research facility which you were trying to reach.’ He leaned forward on the stool, but it was a movement without threat. ‘You were trying to reach Kryuchkov too, just like Bachman was and, perhaps, did… yes? And you believe this Kryuchkov was murdered by us, by the Russian State. And again, he was murdered in order to conceal something. The connection, it seems to me, is obvious. Bachman met Kryuchkov – or maybe some go-between of Kryuchkov’s – in Norilsk on the second of June. Something was exchanged between the two of them, or between the go-between and Bachman – and it was for this that Bachman was murdered. And now Kryuchkov is dead also, and his secret is presumably intended to die with him.’

Anna pulled herself up on the palliasse until she was more upright against the sled runners. It was painful, but she wanted to find out how painful, how difficult it was for her to move.

‘What you are looking for,’ Petrov continued, ‘has, I believe, something to do with what was exchanged between Kryuchkov and Bachman. You wanted to find Kryuchkov at the research facility, in order to find what you are looking for, yes? And you knew nothing of Bachman and what apparently took place between them on the second of June.’

Anna looked back into the dark, intense eyes of the man who sat beside her, a militsiya lieutenant who hadn’t put her under arrest, but had saved her life.

‘And so that is why you’re here,’ Petrov concluded. ‘Just like Bachman. Kryuchkov.’ Petrov paused. He didn’t know what he possessed in the pocket of his coat. ‘Had Kryuchkov discovered something so terrible, so dangerous, that first Bachman, and then Kryuchkov himself, were murdered?’

Anna sat and watched the man’s gentle but determined face in front of her. She knew she had little – no, no options – now but to open herself to him.

‘My name is Anna Resnikov,’ Anna said quietly. ‘I was an SVR colonel, my father and grandfather were both senior officers in the KGB and its predecessor, the NKVD, before that. My father was head of station in Damascus. I defected from Russia five years ago.’

Petrov just nodded. Then he sat deep in thought, looking down at his hands clasped on his knees in front of him. He still felt that there was no dilemma, but he had no idea why he felt that.

Then he withdrew the satellite phone from a leather bag beside the stool.

‘I was given this by a Colonel Fradkov of the FSB, in Igarka three, four days ago. My orders are to call him every day. My other orders are also to find you. I have seen how much they want you. To destroy you too.’ He wasn’t sure how to go on, so he persisted with facts for a moment. ‘This Fradkov has said that if I find you, I will be made a general. I will be given a pension, an apartment in Moscow, a dacha, enough money to live in the West, if that’s what I want.’

‘As far as anyone can trust the FSB, I believe that’s true,’ Anna replied at once. ‘They will give you all those things. Medals too, anything you want. You will be a great hero.’

Once more, Petrov was impressed by her straightforwardness.

‘But even if I were interested in those things,’ Petrov said, ‘that would not be a reason to hand you over to them. There would have to be other reasons.’

‘I’ve killed eleven Russians in the past eight days,’ Anna said. ‘That should be reason enough for a militsiya lieutenant.’

‘Instead of those things they’ve promised me,’ Petrov continued, ignoring the provocation of her response, ‘I’ve actually decided to downgrade my position. I no longer wish to work for the militsiya , let alone become a Hero of Russia. I intend to remain here, with my people, at least for as long as they allow us to live our old way of life.’

They sat in silence then, but it was a complete, comfortable silence, one of two old friends who had no need to talk. Finally, Petrov looked up from his clasped hands.

‘There were others on board the Rossiya ,’ he said. ‘Like you, they also escaped when the ship collapsed. Four of them have been arrested, according to this Fradkov. Up in the area of Dikson, where our new mobile reactor is waiting to be taken to the Pole. Were you with them, part of them?’

Anna thought of Oleg, with his fanatical eyes and his determination to commit ‘a great act’.

‘I met them onboard, or their leader, anyway,’ she replied. ‘He wanted me to join them, but he didn’t tell me what for. He told me they had access to explosives and a highly dangerous explosive substance called thermite.’

‘And you had no connection with them other than talking with their leader?’ Petrov asked.

‘None.’

‘Good,’ Petrov replied. He was relieved about her reply and, more importantly, he completely believed its honesty. ‘They were arrested, apparently, these boys, before they were able to blow up this reactor. A highly stupid thing to do. To save the world? Is that what they were trying to do? But in doing so, risking the exact damage they purported to be fighting against. Nuclear fall-out – and up in the Arctic of all places.’

‘They were fanatics, certainly,’ she said. ‘The act, for them, was more important than the fall-out – in both senses of that word.’

So, Petrov thought, the way was now clear for him to go on. She was not connected to the stupidity and violent danger of the boys who’d been arrested. It was time to pursue his course to its core.

‘Tell me, Anna,’ he said quietly, ‘what is muon catalysed fusion?’

He saw her whole body tense then, despite the pain of muscular contraction. Her eyes were suddenly wild. Or was it amazement, or confusion? She seemed ready to leap from the palliasse, to reach out at him. In violence? No, he thought not. It seemed to be some kind of desperation.

‘Is it what Professor Kryuchkov was working on? What Bachman was working on?’ he said. ‘What you want?’

‘It’s what Kryuchkov had been working on for many years, and no doubt Bachman too,’ she replied tensely.

‘Then you know what it is,’ he said.

‘And you too,’ she replied.

‘I know nothing. That’s why I’m asking you.’

Anna was silent, her mind reeling. What did the militsiya lieutenant, the Evenki tribesman, know in order to ask such a question?

‘I’d like to stand up,’ she said.

‘Of course. If you feel up to it.’

Petrov stood and began to put his arms around her back to help her. But she put her hand on his right arm and looked at him.

‘I can do it on my own,’ she said.

He watched as she struggled with the pain, until she’d heaved her legs over the side of the low palliasse.

The poultices his mother had put on her wounds were good, she thought, whatever they were. Her hand barely hurt. The gash in her thigh was worse than her hand, but she saw it was well wadded with bandages under which a few sprigs of some herbs were protruding. Only where the bullet on the road, fired by the dying truck driver, had ripped her right side was the pain still very great.