He looked up at Korolev, who nodded his agreement.
‘Time of death,’ Peskov said. ‘Last night, late, or very early this morning. It’s a guess, based on a number of factors. You see these marks that look like bruising?’ Peskov pointed to a patch of discoloration on the skin. Korolev had been in enough autopsies to know what he was talking about.
‘Hypostasis?’
‘Very good,’ Peskov said. Then, seeing Slivka’s puzzled expression as she looked up from her note-taking, he explained. ‘The blood follows the natural laws of gravity, Sergeant. What you’re seeing isn’t bruising but the dead man’s blood accumulating in the part of his body which was closest to the ground when we found it. It doesn’t generally manifest itself for at least eight hours. It was present when I examined him by the river, so that tells us he’d been dead for at least that long. On top of that, look at his eyes.’
Peskov placed a gloved finger against an eyeball. It gave under the pressure like the softest of jelly and Korolev felt his stomach twist, but he managed to nod his interest, not trusting himself to speak.
‘If I were to put my finger in Captain Korolev’s eye, there would be elasticity,’ Peskov said, and Korolev thought there might also be an uppercut that would lift the doctor a foot or so into the air.
‘But here we have flaccidity, and that normally occurs only after approximately twelve hours. Sometimes as long as eighteen. On top of which rigor mortis has not quite set in, although the first signs are visible at the back of the neck and lower jaw. It might seem delayed, based on the other indicators, but the dead man is old, is quite muscular and the temperature was below freezing point last night. All of these factors would have impeded the process.’
‘He was last seen at about six in the evening out at the College,’ said Slivka looking up from her notebook. ‘And it seems clear he was shot in Angelinivka from the blood spatters.’
‘What are you asking?’ Peskov said.
‘We’re looking for the time of death. The village was searched last night at about eleven and the truck wasn’t there. The snow on his body indicates he was shot before two a.m. Can you narrow it down any further?’ She looked to Korolev for approval, which he gave with a slow inclination of his head.
‘Not at this stage,’ Peskov answered. ‘And, in any event, it’s difficult to be specific about these things. Every corpse is different – I’ll take the temperature of his organs, of course, but that won’t tell me anything that you don’t already know – my examination would agree with a time of death between eleven p.m. and two in the morning. I think I have one good piece of news, though.’
Peskov leant forward and turned the dead man’s left forearm so that it was more easily visible for Slivka, pointing to a small round hole in the skin. Korolev had noticed the wound earlier and been confused by it.
‘There’s no sign of an exit wound, so if I’m not mistaken we may be able to retrieve the bullet. It might give Firtov something to work with.’
Peskov glanced up for a reaction and whatever look was on Korolev’s face, it seemed to be enough for the doctor to set to work, opening the wound wide with a swift stroke of his scalpel. Korolev forced himself to look as Peskov began digging and twisting into the dead man’s flesh and moments later held up a small metallic nugget that had once been the business end of a bullet.
‘I’ll be able to tell you more about internal trajectory later on, but at a guess there was some deflection within the skull and when the bullet came out it lodged in his arm, luckily enough up against the radius. Take it to Firtov, see what he makes of it.’
The bullet chinked in a glass jar in Korolev’s pocket as he and Slivka walked up the steps that led to Pasteur Street.
‘Well, Chief,’ Slivka asked, looking over at him, ‘what did you make of that?’
Korolev grimaced.
‘It’s a strange one. Someone helps him get out of his cell and then, likely as not, helps him to make it all the way to the Romanian border as well. And having done all that, this same person, or one of their allies, shoots him and leaves him for us to find. And even though he had a gun in his hand, his killer managed to shoot him in the back of the head. He must have had a reason for it being in his hand – some sort of threat, but he was facing the other way. And where did his gun come from?’
‘The barrel on it worries me,’ Slivka said. ‘I’d swear it was a Militia weapon. Or…’ She stopped mid-sentence and Korolev had an idea he knew why. If it was an NKVD weapon, the only Chekist involved in the case and close to hand was Mushkin.
The drive to Bebel Street took less than five minutes, and all the way the questions they both had about the gun were a tangible presence in the car. Asking the questions seemed to risk turning suspicion into a fact, so they kept quiet and, in Korolev’s case, tried to think about more pleasant matters, which yet again turned out to be the memory of Valentina’s hand on his chest.
When they arrived, Firtov seemed to share their unease. He nodded towards the Nagant, sitting on a wooden desk in front of him. Firtov was wearing a dirty apron to protect his clothes and white fingerprinting dust covered the gun from end to end.
‘I traced the serial number,’ he said, a dour expression making his cavalryman’s moustache seem less ebullient than usual.
‘Well?’ Korolev said, bracing himself.
‘It was issued to Sergeant Gradov in October 1935.’
‘Gradov?’ Korolev felt a flood of relief. ‘That fool not only left a prisoner unguarded, but provided him with a gun as well?’
‘Perhaps,’ Firtov said cautiously. ‘He was disciplined for its loss last year – in June. It was stolen from the station, or so he claimed, but the investigation at the time led nowhere. He was lucky to keep his stripes and if Major Mushkin hadn’t interceded on his behalf he’d certainly have lost them. Or worse.’
‘Mushkin?’
‘I spoke to the man who led the investigation – he wanted to throw the book at Gradov, but Mushkin went right to the top and Gradov got away with it. For losing his weapon, no less.’
‘So it’s possible Andreychuk could have been the one who stole it?’ Slivka interjected, perhaps a fraction too forcefully.
‘He must have got hold of it somehow,’ Firtov said.
It would be helpful, Korolev thought, if they could find another stage in the Nagant’s journey from Gradov’s possession to Andreychuk’s cold hand – but that Andreychuk had taken the gun was the most logical explanation. In fact, he was almost grateful to Sergeant Gradov; at least the gun didn’t come cursed with a State Security background – apart from, of course, Mushkin’s intervention on the sergeant’s behalf.
‘How about fingerprints?’ he asked, after a brief pause to offer a prayer to the Virgin for that small mercy.
‘On the gun? Yes, and they belong to the dead man. That’s what the Greek thinks anyway, but he’s checking them once more. Speaking of fingerprints, we have a shortlist for that partial on the wall bracket.’
‘So I heard,’ Korolev said, doing his best to keep his anticipation under some kind of control.
‘Three names. Antonova, she’s a cook in the canteen; one of the cameramen, Belinsky; and a more interesting one – that Frenchman, Les Pins.’
‘Antonova was in the crowd scenes that evening,’ Slivka said. ‘And Belinsky was filming them. It’s possible Belinsky helped take the girl down, but I don’t remember anything about that from the interview notes.’
‘And Monsieur Les Pins?’ Korolev said, knowing the answer. They’d never properly questioned him and now his fingerprint had shown up on the bracket from which the dead woman was hung. ‘He told us he was down at the night shoot, but it’s never been confirmed, has it?’
‘No,’ Slivka agreed. ‘Of course, up until now it’s been hands off for the Frenchman.’
‘It was. It may not be any more. On top of this, there are some inconsistencies as to his whereabouts at the time of Andreychuk’s escape. He said he was in his room, but Comrade Mushkina says he was with her, walking near the village. I think we need to have a chat with the fellow, don’t you, Sergeant?’
‘I’ll call the Militia station. See if we can locate him. Do you want me to drive out there?’
‘No, I’ve a feeling we should stay in Odessa today,’ Korolev said, thinking about gunrunners and Slivka’s mother. ‘Ask them to bring him into Odessa, if it’s convenient for our honoured French guest. If it isn’t, well, we’ll
