Brian Freemantle - No Time for Heroes

‘We need some furniture in our flat, first,’ said Larissa decisively. ‘Do you have any friends?’

‘No,’ admitted Danilov, knowing what she meant.

He detected a tiny sigh of disappointment. ‘It’ll be ridiculous trying to get anything from a State shop. We’ll need to go on the open market. It would be useful to have dollars.’

‘It’ll have to be roubles.’ Danilov was uncomfortable how quickly the temptation to fall into the old, compromising ways came to mind. His thoughts ran on logically. After tomorrow there would have to be another meeting with the Chechen. It was the one risk of the mistiming of which Cowley was frightened. Danilov was, too.

‘You’re not doing what you’ve been told,’ said Gusovsky. ‘Do you really think we’ll wait on his convenience! This is all down to you, Yevgennie Grigorevich. You told us he wanted to talk about friendship and all he did was sneer. We’re not going to be treated like this. And you’re very stupid not to have realised it.’

‘We’re making you personally responsible,’ said Yerin. ‘You know what I mean, don’t you?’

‘Yes,’ accepted Kosov, thin voiced. It shouldn’t have been like this! It should have been simple, everyone making comfortable arrangements. Why the hell was Danilov behaving like this?

‘So get him here!’ said Gusovsky. ‘Now!’

Holding Mikhail Pavlovich Antipov completely incommunicado for so long – and in far different circumstances from before – gave them the psychological edge of which the FBI’s Behavioral Science experts would have approved as a disorienting device, but ethically disapproved of as a Fascist torture and outlawed by every legislation – up to and including the Supreme Court – throughout the United States. But Danilov and Cowley were not in the United States. Cowley had given it a passing, unremembered thought; Danilov not at all.

Antipov came into the interview room shuffling and stinking and arguably verminous. Because he – and his wardrobe – had been stripped of every article of clothing, he wore prison canvas made stiffer by the filth of earlier wearers. A ginger-speckled beard was once more furring his face. There was an indentation in the crew-cut, where the sample had been forcibly taken: Danilov saw that even hacked away the man still possessed more hair than he did. The gold Rolex on the list of confiscated articles was probably still working, too: after a brave remission, Danilov’s fake Cartier had permanently expired.

But Antipov was animal-strong, not as eroded as Vasili Dolya or Maksim Zimin. But not, either, contemptuous and bombastic, like he had been at the first confrontation. Instead the attitude was wary, a predator knowing other predators, circling to define boundaries, the direction from which the sudden pounce might come. He looked intently at the clothes that had been seized. Most of them had been tossed into a pile – another psychological pinprick for someone as clothesconscious as Antipov, and again guessed at by Danilov – near to Pavin and the recording apparatus. Some had been isolated. There was a fawn jacket, hung carefully from a specially brought-in metal rack. Next to it were trousers, also on a hanger over which they were just as carefully folded, and a shirt. All were sealed in plastic bags far thicker than normal cleaners’ wrap. Next to the clothes, in a smaller plastic container, were a pair of heavy, dark brown brogue shoes.

‘We’ve got you, in the end,’ announced Danilov. The plan was for him to open, generally: Cowley had to take over when it became more technical.

The refusal to respond wasn’t theatrical arrogance now but protective caution, waiting for the proper attack.

Danilov’s attitude was different from the previous occasion, too, knowing he had every reason for superciliousness. ‘For three of the murders, this time…’ He gave a palms-upwards, so-what gesture. ‘Which leaves us without a legal conviction for the Ignatov murder but we know you did it, so everything’s wrapped up. We score four out of four. No-one could have done better than that, could they, Mikhail Pavlovich?’

‘You’re talking shit.’

‘Oh, no!’ corrected Danilov. ‘This isn’t going to be like last time. No evidence is going to disappear. And you know what? We don’t even need your confession: not a word! How about that?’

‘Fuck off!’

‘Not before you know just how bad it is for you. Not before I’ve told you of the talk I had with Vasili Dolya, about how you got the gun: about the meeting with Nikolai Redin in Lafayette Park, to get the identification of Serov, so you didn’t make a mistake. Doesn’t that worry you, Mikhail Pavlovich: knowing the evidence they’re going to give? And then there’s Maksim Zimin, whom we’re bringing back from Rome to testify against you, under the deal we’ve done with him and the Italian prosecutor…’

Antipov went back in his chair, as if trying to pull away from the litany. There was no outward indication yet, but Danilov knew the man was frightened: he had to be. And this was only the beginning. Danilov thought he was going to enjoy terrorising someone whose life had been spent terrorising others.

‘… And all because of sex!’ Danilov jeered. ‘You know that? If you’d kept your dick in your trousers just for once – and not liked whores so much – I would never have thought of you…’ He hesitated, knowing he had to be careful here because everything he said was being taped: so he couldn’t refer openly to the Pecatnikov club and Gusovsky’s sneer about men liking whores when the Chechen leader had produced the photographs of Cowley. It was almost time for the American to come in. ‘… Someone said something about men screwing hookers and I thought about how you were first arrested, in bed with the mother and daughter pair we found you with again this time… and then I remembered that there was forensic evidence of Lena Zurov having had sexual intercourse just before her death. Just couldn’t stop yourself, could you? Told to kill her but you had to fuck her as well, didn’t you? It excite you in a special way, fucking whores? Something to do with their having to do whatever you want, maybe?’

‘This going to go on very long?’ tried Antipov.

‘You’ve got a lot to hear yet,’ said Danilov, looking towards the American to prompt his scientific entry. ‘We want you to know just how much we’re going to produce against you to put you in front of a firing squad…’

‘You ever heard of DNA?’ demanded Cowley, taking his cue. Speaking more to the recording apparatus than to Antipov, for the benefit of tape from which the later prosecution would be formulated, he went on: ‘It’s the abbreviation for deoxyribonucleic acid: it’s found in the nucleus of human body cells. DNA is the blueprint for the physical difference between each and every individual ever born, anywhere in the world. And so no two people’s DNA is the same – apart from identical twins, and we’re not discussing identical twins: we’re discussing you. Scientists can extract an individual DNA tracing from any cellular material. And the best source of all is semen. A lot was recovered from Lena Zurov. All we needed was a comparison…’

Cowley put his hand up to his own head, covering the spot where the sample had been hacked from Antipov’s skull: an American defence lawyer would probably have argued physical assault and had the DNA evidence declared inadmissible. ‘… A minimum of twelve separate hairs are necessary for a match. And we got a lot more than that from you, so the FBI technicians at a place in Virginia named Quantico got three separate but quite positive sets…’

A nerve abruptly started to tug at the left of Antipov’s mouth, jumping discernibly under his skin. It was discernible to the man himself. Antipov put his hand up, scratching as if it were an irritation, using the cover to swallow heavily, several times. The growing apprehension wasn’t hidden, and both investigators saw it.