digital.”
“You have popcorn on the other side of the glass? “I asked.
“I ain’t tellin’,” he said.
There was a knock on the door, and a uniformed jailer ushered Skripkin in. “I’ll be leaving you now,” said Harry, and meaningfully picked up the fourth chair and took it with him. Now, in order to obtain a weapon, Skripkin was either going to have to ask Hester or me for our chairs, or stand up and use his own. Not too bad an idea.
My first impression of Skripkin was that of a tall, very thin young man, with large blue eyes, blond hair, a large and narrow nose, and a very pale complexion. He was about two inches taller than I was, making him close to six feet six. He had very long fingers, with the nearly round nails you sometimes see in an ectomorph. He appeared pretty calm to me. Like they say, always take your cue from the suspect.
“Hi,” I said. “My name’s Carl Houseman, and this is Hester Gorse. I’m a deputy sheriff over in Nation County, Iowa, and she’s a special agent of the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation. We’d like to talk to you about the murder of Rudy Cueva.”
“Sure, no problem. What do you want to know?” Although he spoke pretty slowly and did have a Russian accent, his English was pretty damned good.
“Have a seat,” I said. “We need to explain a few things to you before we go any further.”
“Sure, whatever you need.” He sat, and so did we. I was rather surprised at his seemingly relaxed demeanor. I’d expected more tension, especially since Harry had told us he was worried.
“Okay, your first name is…” I said, wanting him to say it so I had a pronunciation guide.
“Yevgenny Ilyavitch Skripkin,” he said. “I am U.S. citizen since July 23 of this very year.”
“Excellent,” I said, and meant it. It was nice to be on familiar territory. “Congratulations.”
“Thank you.”
“First, let me advise you that you have the right to remain silent, and that anything you say can and will be used against you in a court or courts of law. You have the right to an attorney, and to have him present during questioning. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed to represent you at no cost to you.” I said it slowly, and with as little expression as possible. “Do you understand those rights?”
“Yes, I do.”
“With those rights in mind, do you still wish to talk with us without the presence of an attorney?”
“Sure, why not?”
I hate it when suspects append things like that. An attorney can have a field day, asking why you didn’t explain to him why he shouldn’t really talk to you. All over what is essentially a figure of speech.
“Okay. You know that you have been charged as an accessory to the murder of Rudy Cueva, is that correct?”
“Please explain this ‘accessory’ to me. Please.”
“In this case, it means that you were there when Rudy Cueva was killed, and you either helped to kill him or did nothing to prevent him being killed.”
He considered that for a moment. “I did not think Hassan was going to kill him, okay?”
“By Hassan, do you mean a man who calls himself Hassan Ahmed Hassan?” asked Hester.
“Yes I do. I mean, too, a man who calls himself Juan Alvarez. This person is the same.”
“That would be ‘Juan Miguel Alvarez,’ as far as you know?” asked Hester.
“As far as I know.”
He looked at us for a second, digesting Hester’s use of Alvarez’s middle name. He was smart enough to have picked up on it, but did he realize the implications? It had definitely dawned on him that we already knew something about Alvarez. I wondered if he realized Hester had done it deliberately.
“Can I ask here a question?”
There might be a time when you say something about being the one doing the questioning, but we wanted Yevgenny relaxed and as comfortable as possible.
“Go ahead,” I said.
“Do you think truly that I wanted Rudy to be dead?”
“I don’t know yet,” I said. “I don’t have enough information.”
He thought again. “Okay. I understand. I did not want to die, this Rudy, at all. I will explain to you why I mean that.”
“Fine. What happened that day? “I asked. “What were you doing there in the first place?”
According to Skripkin, he had come to the Midwest with his friend Hassan Ahmed Hassan, also known as Juan Miguel Alvarez, back in August. They lived in Harmony, Minnesota, for about a month, and then moved to Iowa City, Iowa. They were unemployed but Hassan always had cash. Skripkin claimed that he had no idea where the money came from. That seemed to be the first lie.
He then claimed they would drive around sometimes, and on one of those little drives, they came up north to Battenberg, and that was where he and Hassan met with Rudy Cueva for the first time.
“You came up specifically to meet Rudy Cueva?” I asked.
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t think that a hundred-mile drive without knowing who you were going to see was a little… strange?”
“How would I know that? I think…no, I am guessing that Hassan he knew Rudy already. Is that right, guess?”
“Could be. Why do you say that?”
“That was my guessing when we got there, because he…just a second, I reach for word… recognized him. That is it, recognized.” He looked genuinely pleased.
“How do you know that?” I asked. “That he recognized him.”
“Because we were driving around looking for address of Rudy and Linda, and we went by the Casey’s store, and there was a man filling gas into his car, and Hassan turned in the driving place and said, ‘That’s him there.’ That is why.”
“Does it for me,” I said. “So, you two came up to see Rudy and Linda, then?”
“No, just Rudy. I did not know both of them, and I think Hassan, he also met Linda that night for first time when we went to the apartment.”
“So,” asked Hester, “why did you come up to see them?”
Skripkin leaned a bit forward. “It was business, lady agent.” And he winked.
Lady agent. I suspected that the troops on the other side of the glass were going to have a good time with that one.
“Narcotics? “asked Hester, not missing a beat. “Drugs, dope?”
“No. No drugs. No.”
“What for, then?” She was pretty insistent.
“This makes me frightened,” he said. “I do not know what to say.”
“Why’s that?” I asked.
He thought. “I tell you, because you have my fingerprints. You will know soon, if you do not know already.” His whole demeanor had changed, just like a switch had been tripped. He became much more confident, and more assertive.
“My real name is truly Yevgenny Skripkin. I am wanted in Ukraine for murder, which I did kill that man, because I am hired to do that. I do that for a job. I was brought to this country in 1996, arrangement from my old boss with the boss of Hassan. I come to this country from Canada, then to Chicago. I had job, and pretty good visa and not so good green card. I was cook at restaurant there.” As I started to speak, he held up his hand for silence. “No, I do not know boss of Hassan. I do not know that Hassan knows boss of Hassan.” His prominent jaw muscles clenched. “It is good for me not to know those things. I know this.” He appeared to relax a bit. “So, I am wanted to become hard to find in Ukraine, and this is good deal for bosses. I am to help the boss of Hassan whenever he asks. Otherwise, I am to be a U.S. citizen as soon as I can, so I keep my nose pretty damn clean.”
I thought I heard a muted thump from behind the one-way glass, and imagined that Volont had just sent George scrambling to run Skripkin’s prints through AFIS.
“What’s the name of your old boss? “asked Hester.
“Vladimir Nadsyev.” He said it very freely, which surprised me.
