“I heard the storm,” said Karpo.
“They say the roof of the Bolshoi was ripped off, cars were overturned, children picked up and tossed about like … tossed about.”
“Probably gross exaggeration.”
“Probably,” said Zelach as they passed the main floor and headed down. He knew where they were going now. Perhaps he should have brought his wet lunch bag. It was not going to be a pleasant morning.
Two flights below ground level, Karpo walked to a steel door and opened it. Zelach reluctantly followed. The room was large and had the smell of the dead. Zelach knew the smell. He had been a policeman for half of his life. But the laboratory of Paulinin was something different. It was low-ceilinged, large, and cluttered with tables and shelves filled with objects and jars. Inside the jars of liquid floated specimens taken from the recently and sometimes long-dead that Paulinin had examined. Knives, saws, lamps, boxes, machine parts, clothing, table legs, and books-hundreds, maybe thousands of books-were piled on the floor. The room was a death trap if fire should break out, and the only way to the rear of the room where Paulinin now stood over a corpse was through this labyrinth of books, shelves, and objects.
Zelach followed Karpo to the rear of the room, the most lighted area of the dark space. Lights shone down on the white corpse.
Paulinin was concentrating on the hole he had opened in the skull of the bearded, slightly overweight corpse on the table before him. Paulinin’s hair was, as always, wild and his white coat stained with things that Zelach did not wish to think about.
Paulinin looked up and saw Karpo wending his way toward him. “Emil Karpo,” he said with clear pleasure. “And who is … ah, Zelach. Coffee?”
“I think not,” said Karpo. “Not at the moment. We must get to the center by ten.”
“But we are still scheduled for lunch Friday?”
“Yes,” said Karpo.
“Zelach, you are lucky to be working with this man,” Paulinin said, pointing a scalpel at Zelach but not looking up from the corpse. “Very lucky.”
Praise coming from Paulinin was always suspect. It was acknowledged that Paulinin, as good as he might be-and he was very good-was rather mad, and if he did not like you, you were certain to be subjected to undisguised scorn, abuse, or ridicule. Normally, Paulinin reserved his anger for the pathologists “upstairs.”
As good as Paulinin was, there were few in either the procurator’s office or uniformed police divisions who came to him. They preferred second-rate scientists to one who attacked them about amateur work and befouling crime scenes.
“I have been talking to your friend here,” Paulinin said, putting his hand gently on the shoulder of the corpse of Sergei Bolskanov. “He has told me a great deal. The hammer you found was, indeed, the murder weapon. Even one of the idiots called in by the fools upstairs should know that; even Doldinov, the new young one, destined for increasing incompetence and promotion, would know the rest. No, he probably would not.”
“What would he not know?” asked Karpo, standing with Zelach across the table on which the corpse lay, eyes open.
“Ah,” said Paulinin. “Our killer was not particularly powerful. The blows were not deep. Our killer was angry, in a rage, frantic. The blows were many. Our killer was in a state of panic, searching for the brain. There was probably premeditation, an incompetent premeditation. The hammer is not large. It is not the best weapon for someone planning a murder. And Sergei here almost certainly knew his killer.”
“How do you know?” Zelach said before he could stop himself.
Paulinin smiled. He welcomed the question.
“There are no defensive wounds on Sergei’s arms. Someone approached him, raised a hammer, probably one hidden behind his back, hit him twice in the face. Baklunov did not raise his arms, made no move to protect himself. After that he was in no condition to protect himself. He was killed by someone he knew, someone he did not expect to attack him. Someone he didn’t even turn to more than glance at. Someone he didn’t consider a physical threat.”
“What else did he tell you?” asked Karpo, standing with his hands clasped before him at waist level.
In the shadows of the bright light pointed downward, Karpo looked particularly ghostly to Zelach.
“A few whispers, a few whispers,” Paulinin whispered. “Our Sergei’s skull has an old scar beneath the hair, and his brain has a healed lesion where something, probably a tumor, has been removed, perhaps a decade ago or longer. Sergei is suggesting his killer was going after that very spot with the hammer, that very spot. I can’t be sure yet, but it appears to be the case.”
“Did he tell you why?” asked Karpo.
“Not yet, not yet. But if it is so, and I think it is, our murderer knew Bolskanov well, knew his skull hid a vulnerable secret. Would you like to know what he had for his final meal and approximately when he had it?”
“If you believe it is relevant information,” said Karpo.
“Interesting information but probably not relevant. I would tentatively conclude that Sergei was a vegetarian. You might ask some of his colleagues or his family. I am curious. It might or might not mean anything.”
“We will ask,” said Karpo.
“Well,” said Paulinin, looking at the open skull on his table. “In addition to the brain injury, he has had two broken ribs in his life, but they are not recent. I would conjecture that the ribs were broken about the same time he developed the tumor or whatever it was that was surgically removed from his brain. That is about all that is pathologically interesting. His killer left no blood of his or her own at the scene, as far as I can tell at this point. The hammer, however, is a bit more interesting. The murderer wiped the handle on Sergei’s laboratory coat. How do I know? Because there is a smudge of blood from the handle at the bottom of the coat where there is no splattering of blood from Sergei’s wounds. The killer either flung the hammer, holding on to the bloody head of the hammer to which clung bits of brain, into the corner, protecting it from prints with the coat, which would be very awkward and make it difficult to throw that far, or the killer let it fall to the floor. Most people would choose not to do that. In addition, the head of the hammer did not appear to have been handled. Skull and brain fragments, not to mention blood drops, seem reasonably intact.”
“Then what?” asked Zelach.
“The murderer,” said Paulinin, standing short but erect in the pose of a lecturer, “simply dropped the hammer and kicked it into the corner. A very close examination of the floor yielded very small scratches from the hammer as it slid along, leaving tiny fragments of brain, blood, and bone too far from the body to have been there as a result of the attack. So what do we learn from this?”
Zelach had no idea.
“The murderer may have stepped on these traces of blood, brain, and bone,” said Karpo. “The solution to your murder lies in a pair of
“You are nearly perfect, Emil Karpo, very nearly perfect,” said Paulinin with delight. “Only Porfiry Petrovich himself approaches you. Our killer certainly washed or got rid of clothing, but being Russian and seeing no significant trace of anything on his shoe, he would, at most, merely have wiped it as a precaution. Maybe not even that. I prefer it if he did wipe it. The game is only good if there is a challenge.”
“As always, Paulinin, you have been
“Only from you would I find such praise meaningful,” said Paulinin, looking at Zelach, who nodded, praying that they could now get out of this dungeon. “One more observation. Our friend here was slovenly, probably very slovenly. His fingernails are uneven, bitten. There are signs of old dirt under those fingernails. The trousers he was wearing were badly in need of cleaning. His socks had holes and there was a significant hole in one pocket. In the other he had accumulated four pens, three paper clips, some keys on a ring, coins, and lint. I would guess that his home and work space are a mess.”
Zelach avoided looking around the cluttered room. The word
“Lunch Friday,” said Karpo.
“And a game of chess?”
“Certainly, a game of chess.”
“We are talking about the life of Tolstoy. We are talking about an announced major screening at the Cannes
