“Not good, Captain. Not good at all.”
On the far side of the room, beyond the Gypsies, Komarov could see the two men who had relieved Captain Brovko. The men leaned close to one another, their faces almost touching as they whispered.
They were young men, the same age as Dmitry. Perhaps, while in KGB school, they roomed together…
Although the men on the far side of the room stared at him, they did not know he was awake. Rather than sleeping, Komarov had opened his eyes only enough to see out. Back here in the shadows on the daybed, no one knew he was awake. If he had been a little closer, he might have heard everything Brovko said to Horvath. But he’d heard enough-Brovko and Horvath discussing his lack of humor while Brovko played nursemaid with drinks of water.
Komarov knew he could trust no one. Not Captain Azef, who was most likely looking out Komarov’s office window this very moment, planning a takeover of Kiev operations. And not Captain Brovko, sent by Deputy Chairman Dumenko to “assist.” Obviously Brovko had stood by, allowing Komarov to perform the old-school, iron- fisted work, waiting for the climax so he could hurry back to Moscow and seize credit for the discovery of a conspiracy to destroy Chernobyl. Komarov’s anger became so intense he could no longer lie still.
When Komarov sat up, one of the men hurried for the front door.
“Where are you going?”
“Outside for a moment, Major.”
“Stay here! I want two guards on the prisoners at all times!”
“But the captain asked…”
“Never mind what the captain asked!” Komarov stood and walked to the man. “I’m in charge, and I told you to stay!”
The man stepped back from the door, looked to his partner.
“Yes, Major.”
Komarov walked in front of the prisoners. Horvath stared at him. Bela Sandor was waking up, his eyes blinking.
“A new day has dawned,” said Komarov, adjusting his shoulder holster and tucking in his shirt. “Perhaps you’ve had time to recall where your bitches have gone. Perhaps they’ve found a stallion or some other barnyard creature with which to satisfy themselves.”
Komarov turned quickly, catching the two guards exchanging glances. “Guard them! Not one another!”
It was a sunny morning. Komarov got a drink of water, took a slice of bread from a bread box on a shelf. He chewed the bread and stared out the window. The downslope of the hill beyond the border of weeds made it impossible to see the land between the house and the village. Perhaps, in the dark, the women had been able to find a hiding place only they knew. He wanted to use the children. No one could stand watching a child suffer, not even a Kiev militia detective.
When he arrived the night before last, it had been dark. And although he had inspected the surrounding area with a flashlight, he had told his men to do a more thorough job during the day yesterday. If there had been a place to hide, his men should have been aware of it. But last night, before Horvath arrived, it seemed as though the earth had swallowed them up.
Where would little children hide? Children who might make noise because they are tired and hungry. Unable to play with their toys, they would become fidgety.
When Komarov looked at the stump in the yard with the ax embedded in it, he wondered if his men had adequately searched the chicken coop. Surely a group of women and children would have made an uproar with the chickens if they’d gone in there. Komarov was about to have one of the men search the coop again when he noticed something about the box out beyond the fire pit in the yard.
Yesterday the utensils and tin plates had been on the box. Now they were scattered along one side of the box.
Discarded tin plates and forks! An old box for a table! Children’s toys! Had one of his men knocked the plates and utensils off the box so he would have a place to rest? Or had someone else cleared the top of the box?
Komarov went to the back door and opened it. When he stood in the doorway looking out at the box in the yard, Bela Sandor whined behind him.
“I’m hungry.”
Komarov resisted the urge to go back inside and slap Bela.
“When can we eat? Feed me!”
There was something about the box. Could the Gypsy read his mind? Or had he simply noticed him looking at it? Perhaps there was something in the box.
Komarov threw his remaining bread aside. Ignoring Bela’s protests, he motioned for the guard near the back door to go with him.
When Komarov walked out into the yard, the guard from outside the back door and one of the men farther out in the yard joined him.
Because the tin plates and discarded utensils were scattered on one side, it appeared as if someone had lifted the box up on end.
There was a worn tablecloth draped over the box, but he noticed it was tacked on with nails. Komarov gripped the top edge of the box and lifted. It was surprisingly lightweight. Instead of the entire box tipping upward, only the top of the box with its tablecloth skirt lifted.
Beneath the top, Komarov saw a hole, a deep hole with a ladder leading down into the darkness. It could have been an old well or the entrance to a tunnel or an underground chamber dug during the war so the Gypsies could hide from invading troops. It could lead anywhere!
Once the cover of the hole was tilted back on its hidden hing-es, Komarov asked for a flashlight from one of the men. Using the flashlight, he could see to the bottom of the ladder. There was a dirt floor about three or four meters down. On the side of the hole opposite the ladder, about a meter down, there seemed to be an opening.
Above the opening there was a wooden timber. A smell drifted out from the hole, a smell like something beginning to go sour mixed with
… yes, mixed with the faint scent of alcohol. A wine cellar!
Komarov held his finger to his lips so the men would remain silent. He leaned close and listened. Back in the house, he heard Bela shouting something in Hungarian. Komarov had patience now. In what seemed only a moment or two, his patience had paid dividends. Coming from deep in the hole, Komarov heard the un-mistakable whimper of a baby.
Rather than tell his men that the women and children were down in what was apparently a wine cellar, Komarov kept listening.
He could hear the baby’s cries being muffled. He imagined Bela’s wife clutching the baby to her bosom, perhaps suffocating the baby with her own flesh. Would the woman kill her own child? But then he heard the whimper again, followed by a clicking sound, and he realized the baby was feeding.
Komarov put the flashlight he held into his jacket pocket and lowered his head even farther into the hole. The sound of the baby suckling its mother’s breast reminded him of his wife breast-feeding Dmitry, reminded him of how he had sometimes substituted his finger for his wife’s nipple. He recalled the draw on his fingertip as Dmitry suckled it. Then he remembered Dmitry’s lover, Fyodor, and a wave of disgust and nausea enveloped him as though the hole in the ground were trying to suck out his insides.
34
When the front door of the house flew open and two men ran out waving frantically, Nikolai opened the door of the Volga and followed after Captain Brovko. Once inside the house, one of the men who had waved ran alongside Brovko.
“The major is in the yard. He’s found something. A tunnel, I think.”
When Nikolai followed Brovko out the back door, Detective Horvath shouted after them. “Your major is going insane! You’d better watch him!”
