“That could be the reason?” replied the American, although without conviction. “What’s the inscription mean in the cigarette case? What’s a ‘First’?”
Another good try, conceded Charlie. “A high college pass.”
“So you’ve a direction?” she persisted.
Shit, thought Charlie. “It could be from a hundred schools: more than a hundred,” he lied. “And have been gained anywhen over a period as long as twelve years, if we accept the top age estimate of thirty-five. It’s a search we’ll have to make, of course. But I’m not hopeful.” He wasn’t volunteering, but he wasn’t learning, either. Which was significant enough in itself, proving how determined everyone was not to share the smallest scrap.
“Why would an American officer carry a magnifying glass and tweezers?” asked Lestov.
It was a question that Charlie couldn’t yet answer, although he had a vague, half-formed thought prompted by the fact that none of the uniforms carried regiment or corps crests on their buttons. Once again it was the absence of an article rather than its presence that Charlie considered important: wearing a Sam Browne proved the man wasn’t armed. Would the other officer whom Charlie was sure had been at the scene have been wearing a more practical battle dress, complete with sidearm? There were no markings on the uniform to show the American might have carried a weapon, either. Whoever they’d been and whatever they’d been doing, neither had belonged to a fighting unit. Which narrowed the possibilities.
Miriam Bell lifted and then dropped her shoulders at the Moscow detective’s question. “My only thought is that it could have something to do with a hobby.”
People didn’t bring their hobbies to Yakutskaya then or now, thought Charlie: it was the first slip Miriam had made. Hoping to generate something-anything-Charlie said, “We need more than we’ve got to take this inquiry forward … to take it anywhere.” If he suggested a comparable photographic check against graduation pictures from America’s military academy at West Point she might come back at him with the British counterpart at Sandhurst, so he decided to leave it.
“In view of the media interest, there might be a response if the photographs that Dr. Erzin took today were issued?” suggested Kurshin.
There could, Charlie conceded, be satellite television somewhere in the town, but the Ontario didn’t have CNN, because he’d already checked. So how, apart from monitoring Charlie’s British embassycall during which Cartright had talked of the publicity leak, could Kurshin have learned of the media awareness? Charlie was glad he hadn’t booked a traceable call to Natalia through the hotel switchboard. He wouldn’t attempt to reach her while he was here. And needed to be more careful than he had been the previous night when he next spoke to the Moscow embassy. Charlie looked between the two doctors and said, “The Russian woman had childbirth marks. Is there any way to establish how recent to her death she’d had the baby?”
“It should be possible for a gynecologist,” Novikov said at once.
“It’s a test I intend to make when I get the organs back to Moscow,” said Olga.
“Something else I look forward to receiving from you,” reminded Charlie.
The pathologist nodded but didn’t speak.
“The child could still be alive,” Charlie pointed out. “Conceivably, so could the woman’s partner. There could be an identification if her photograph was published in Moscow.”
“I’ll suggest it,” agreed Lestov.
Charlie doubted that either London or Washington would issue pictures until a reason was found for the two men being where they had been, despite media pressure. But it didn’t hurt to go along with the local homicide chief’s suggestion.
“Now that we’ve agreed on the nationality of the victims, I assume there’ll be no difficulty repatriating the bodies?” said Miriam.
“That’s more a political decision,” avoided the police commander.
“But you won’t object to the release of the bodies?” pressed Charlie, hoping to infer something from the reply.
Before either local man could respond, Olga Erzin said, “I really do need to get all the organs back to Moscow. There’s absolutely no reason for anything to remain here any longer.”
“It has to be the decision of the Executive Council,” said Ryabov.
Awkwardness for awkwardness’s sake? Or something else he couldn’t at that moment fully understand? Charlie’s first thought would have been perverseness, but now he wasn’t totally sure. There would have to have been some local official awareness all that time ago of a tweezer-carrying American and an unarmed English officer being where no other Westerner had been before. And increasingly,as he tried to fit the pieces together, Charlie was getting a nagging feeling that the reason for their presence might be buried locally far more successfully than the bodies had been. Maybe it made sense after all for him to play diplomat and meet some local leaders. He said, “Perhaps we need personally to make the request?”
“That would be best,” agreed Kurshin.
The convoy arrangements definitely established, Charlie lingered for Vitali Novikov when the meeting broke.
The man said, “Thank you, for what you said. Putting it on the record like that.”
“Nothing that wasn’t the truth,” flattered Charlie.
“You’ll want some protection from insects out at the grave tomorrow,” offered Novikov, trying to reciprocate.
“
“Have you any arrangements for tonight?” asked the pathologist.
“None,” said Charlie, at once.
“My wife would be very happy for you to join us for dinner.”
“So would I be, to accept.”
Charlie had completely orientated himself and knew they were driving north from the town center. Very quickly the brick houses for crooked people gave way to wooden ones on stilts, securely upright without any subsidence, although the connected streets were haphazardly disjointed, afterthoughts to link places originally erected where the whim took the builder, before roads were considered.
Novikov said, “Certain trades, professions, could get people out of the gulags. A lot of people lied, of course. When they were found out, they were shot: publicly, in front of the original camp from which they’d tried to escape, as a warning to others. Being shot was another way of escaping.”
“Who was it who was exiled here?” asked Charlie, picking up the lead.
“My father.”
“Was he a builder?”
“A doctor. That was even better.”
“And why you became one, too?”
“Yes,” confirmed Novikov, at once. “There aren’t many safe professions,even now. Everything is the mines. Which is slave labor, as it’s always been.”
“How close are they to the town?”
The pathologist shrugged beside him in the car. “The nearest is maybe five or six kilometers.”
“What about prison camps?”
“Much farther away.”
“But prisoners still work the mines?”
“Until they die. Which they still do, very quickly.”
Novikov’s house was immaculate, the wooden lining clearly insulated against the outer wall. Novikov’s family was waiting in the main room, in which a fire flickered from habit rather than need. Marina was plump and rosy- cheeked. Charlie guessed she was about forty, although her hair was completely white. The boys were fair, like their father. They were dressed in what was clearly their best and newest clothes, the woman in a thick blue wool dress, the boys in matching gray trousers and sweaters. Novikov had been sure he would accept the invitation before it was offered, Charlie acknowledged.
Everyone embarrassingly remained standing until Charlie sat, the boys waiting after that for their father’s permission. Charlie estimated Georgi to be about fourteen, Arseni maybe two years younger. Novikov served vodka
