Brian Freemantle - In the Name of a Killer

‘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.

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.