in pursuit of the tail of that idea.
Ivanov looked up at the barrel of a detective who walked in a small circle.
'There were three of us here,' said Rostnikov.
'Three?' echoed Ivanov.
'You, me, Georgi,' he said softly. 'I wonder if there are more.'
Ivanov rose. This was making little sense.
'I'm going to my room to pack,' said Ivanov. 'Whether I am being watched or not, I will have to report our encounter last night and this morning.'
'What do you know of plumbing, Ivanov?'
'Little, less than I know of human nature. Is there a point to your question, Rostnikov?'
'Plumbing is very simple,' said Rostnikov. 'I have made a study of it. Plumbing always makes sense, is completely logical, and there is a great sense of satisfaction in contributing to its completion. Results are immediate. Function follows form, and there is an end. If it has been done properly…'
'… water flows through the pipes,' said Ivanov. 'I'm fascinated by this discussion of sewage, Rostnikov.'
Anton was heading back toward them now with a tray. Ivanov was torn between waiting to see what food might be on the way and wanting to get away from Rostnikov, about whom he had heard much and in whom he was mightily disappointed.
'You will not be recalled,' Rostnikov said. 'You will be told to remain here and engage me.'
'We shall see,' said Ivanov.
Anton had brought a plate of biscuits. Misha Ivanov scooped up a handful and moved away.
'Thank you, Anton,' Rostnikov said, reaching over to take a biscuit.
'You have a call from Moscow,' Anton said after he had placed the now nearly empty plate on the table. 'An Inspector Karpo.'
On the way to the phone in the lobby Rostnikov saw the huge man he had seen the day before. The man sat alone, taking up two spaces on an uncomfortable-looking sofa with spindly legs. A newspaper lay open in his lap. Rostnikov wondered where the little man with the glass eye was. For some reason, his absence made Rostnikov uneasy.
SEVEN
Sasha hated the smell of hospital corridors.He had spent many hours, whole nights, in such corridors waiting for victims and violators to survive and speak or to die. He remembered the night when his father had lain dying in a hospital that smelled like this one while he waited all night with his mother.
The waiting wasn't bad. The sound of people in pain was not pleasant, but it was tolerable. What he couldn't stand was the smell and its memories. He always wondered why others did not seem to have the same reaction to the strong, sweet-acrid odor he could actually taste, like shaved metal in his mouth.
But this time Sasha Tkach welcomed the smell, for it overwhelmed the scent of Tamara on his clothes. He was pleased that the smell of the hospital would not be easy for him. Rostnikov had said he would suffer, and suffer within he would, and he also needed something physical to punish his senses as he sat talking to Zelach's mother.
They sat on a bench in the corridor, a long wooden bench that had been painted pink, probably under the misconception that it would add a touch of color to the gray ness. It did not.
Sasha had tried to call Maya. He wanted to see her and Pulcharia, but he was afraid that his clothes, his look, would betray the awful thing he had done and she would be unable to forgive him. Maya had not answered the phone. With each ring he had hoped she would not answer.
She had already gone to work. After twenty rings, he had hung up, deeply disappointed that she had not been there, his heart beating wildly. And then he had called Rostnikov. Zelach's mother said something. Sasha apologized and asked her to repeat it.
' 'He will not die?'' Zelach's mother asked for the eleventh time in the past hour.
She was a great lump of a woman, and Sasha could see her son in her.
' 'He will not die,' Sasha reassured her once again, though he had no idea whether Zelach would survive.
'He is my only child,' she said softly. 'Have I told you that?'
'I knew,' saidTkach.
The woman's large nose and eyes were quite red from a constant, slow stream of weeping and nose blowing. She had entered wearing a babushka but had removed it when Tkach had led her to the bench. Her hair had stood up, gone in all directions, wild, ridiculous. She looked like a clown, but Tkach could neither bring himself to tell her nor ignore her.
'Arkady, let me tell you, is not very smart,' she said. 'I know that. I am not a fool. But he works hard. He does what he is told.'
'I know,' said Tkach.
'He does what he is told,' she repeated, watching a man in white push a cart down the corridor.
'He is a good man,' said Tkach.
'He speaks of you fondly,' she said, turning to Sasha with a pained smile.
'I…' Sasha began, knowing that the confession was about to come out unbidden. He bit it back angrily. Confession, he reminded himself, would be a self-serving indulgence.
Zelach's mother was watching him, waiting for him, with her clown face, to fill out the sentence he had begun. He was rescued by a woman in white who emerged from the surgery, pulling a white surgical mask from her face, and moved toward them. Tkach rose and helped Zelach's mother to her feet.
'He will live,' the doctor said wearily with a smile. 'I think you should go home now, get some rest, and come back in the morning, when he'll be able to talk.'
'Thank you,' said Zelach's mother, taking the doctor's hand.
'How is he?' Tkach asked.
'Three broken ribs, one in two places,' the doctor said, nodding at a pair of men in suits who hurried past. 'Concussion, severely lacerated wound on the chin. The left eye was a problem. He will probably have no vision from it.'' 'No…' the mother began.
'For how long?' asked Tkach.
'For the rest of his life,' said the doctor.
'Did he speak?' asked Tkach. 'Say anything?'
'One thing, yes,' said the doctor, massaging the bridge of her nose. 'He said, 'They had a key.' '
Though he now had someplace to go, Sasha had insisted on taking Zelach's mother to her apartment, where she, in turn, had insisted on feeding him a thin fish soup with bread. The idea of food was repellent, and the smell of the fish as he sat was even more threatening than the hospital odor. But he ate, slowly, silently, reassuringly, trying not to think of how tiny the apartment was, how filled it was with photographs of Zelach at all ages, of mementos of the man's life down to a childish framed painting of Borotvitskaya Gate, complete with pyramid tower topped by what looked like an inverted ice cream cone.
'Arkady painted that when he was fourteen,' his mother said proudly when Tkach had entered the room and glanced at the less than skillful but certainly recognizable Kremlin tower.
He ate all of the soup, listened to every word, accepted her offer of her son's razor with which to shave, and gave her reassurances and proper responses. It would be over soon, possibly by morning. Zelach would awaken, would tell the investigators what had happened. Tkach had not lied to the team that had come to the hospital, but neither had he told the truth. He had been too distraught, too anxious to go to Petrovka. He was expected to write a full report before the day ended.
'I must go now,' he said, turning from the sink in the corner and handing the old woman the razor he had just rinsed.
The old woman took it.
