A Whisper to the Living

“I tripped and fell when I ran from the hotel room.”

He was certain what he should do.

Iosef also believed the Giant, which was why he did not bring forth his gun when Ivan bolted back through the door of the room from which he had entered. Instead of firing, Iosef darted after him. Catching up with Ivan was not a great problem. Stopping him was an insurmountable difficulty.

Iosef tried. And failed.

If he had hopes that Agrinkov and the young boxer would help him, such hopes were quickly dashed. In the darkened room, Iosef leaped upon Ivan’s back. Ivan shook his shoulders and threw the policeman against a wooden crate.

Ivan hurried through the room to the back door that led to the alleyway. Iosef, now in pain, forced himself up and tried to run after the Giant. The consequences and embarrassment of allowing the suspect to escape were too great to contemplate.

Ivan threw open the door and dashed into the alley with Iosef a few wracking steps behind him. It was a useless pursuit. Perhaps, Iosef thought, I can shoot him in the leg. No, if Ivan Medivkin was innocent, Iosef might well be ending his career and find himself responsible for having done so.

Once in the alley, Ivan turned to his left. Something hurtled toward him. He was unprepared for the sudden battering ram to his stomach. He went down, sitting awkwardly, and tried to catch his breath. Before he could rise, Iosef was through the door and twisting Ivan’s arms behind him.

Iosef had witnessed the scene but could not fully appreciate what had happened.

“Is he injured?” asked Zelach.

“You knocked the wind out of him,” said Iosef, looking down at the still-seated but now-cuffed Giant.

Iosef had seen Zelach launch himself headfirst into Ivan an instant after the boxer cleared the door.

“You were supposed to go to the hotel,” said Iosef, looking through the doorway at Agrinkov and Osip, who were now standing there.

“I was going to, but then I thought that Medivkin might bolt and that you were alone with him,” said Zelach. “I did not think you would shoot him. I thought the hotel room could wait till we brought Medivkin in.”

“You were right,” Iosef said.

The policemen helped the huge boxer to his feet.

“Ivan did not kill Babinski,” said Agrinkov as the boxer was ushered back into the gymnasium.

“How do you know this? Did you kill him?” asked Iosef.

“Me? No, of course not,” said Agrinkov. “No more than Osip killed him.”

The young boxer was quite confused now.

“I did not kill Babinski or anyone else,” said Osip.

“No one thinks you did,” said Agrinkov, touching the young boxer’s shoulder reassuringly.

“I must try to find the killer of Babinski myself,” said Ivan, starting to breathe almost normally again.

“Why must it be you who catches the killer?” asked Agrinkov. “The police can handle it.”

“I do not know,” said Ivan, dropping his shoulders in defeat. “Sometimes. . I do not know. I want to know why Fedot killed Lena. I want to know who killed Fedot. I want something, someone I can pound until they talk.”

“We will find him,” said Iosef.

Zelach was going to alter Iosef’s words but thought better of it. He needed a bit more evidence before he named the killer of Fedot Babinski.

“Ivan, no one would blame you for killing him if you walked in on Babinski right after he killed Lena,” said Agrinkov.

“I did not kill him,” said Ivan Medivkin.

“I believe you, Ivan Medivkin,” said Agrinkov.

“Thank you,” said Ivan.

Ivan repeated his innocence a few minutes later when he was squeezed into the backseat of the marked police car. He repeated it when he was fingerprinted. He repeated it when he was examined by a doctor. He repeated it again when he was placed alone in a cell. He repeated it again when he was allowed a telephone call and spoke to Vera Korstov.

“I did not kill him. They are not even looking for the real killer.”

“I know,” Vera said. “I will find out who did this.”

Iosef whispered something to Zelach, who nodded and shuffled out the door of the gymnasium.

Iosef had held back one essential piece of information that Paulinin had given him. Babinski had been struck from behind by a heavy object. The blow had cracked his skull, the crack not visible until Paulinin had shaved the dead man’s head, chiseled and sawed his way into the skull, where blood had seeped into the brain of the fallen boxer, killing him almost instantly. Babinski was dead before the first punch crashed into his face.

Iosef had sent Zelach to bring in the object that had felled Babinski. It had recent fingerprints on it, clear prints that matched nothing they had on file or could access through the computer. The fingerprints were definitely not those of Ivan Medivkin.

“What was he doing there?”

Aleksandr had two possible answers to the question he asked himself.

One was that the man with the false leg, Chief Inspector Rostnikov, was now certain that Aleksandr was the Bitsevsky Maniac, and was there to make him panic and confess. He wanted to be caught. He had trod dangerously close to the policeman, fascinated by the flame of discovery.

The other was that the man with the false leg was not there at all. Aleksandr was hallucinating, imagining. It was possible. As vivid as the image of the policeman was in the apartment across from him, it was possible that Aleksandr was creating him.

When Aleksandr was a child and told his mother stories he made up of killing nightmare creatures with a club, she had attributed his tales to a vivid imagination. She had told him that he might one day write books, possibly books for children. He had battled and slain imaginary enemies from the age of two until. . When did it stop? Had it ever stopped?

If the policeman in the apartment across from him was not real, then how could Aleksandr ever know when something was real and when something was not? No, Aleksandr Chenko would have to assume that he was not going mad. The policeman was there. Did he sit there waiting for a sign of guilt? Well, there would be no sign. Aleksandr felt no guilt. He had murdered many and felt exhilaration, excitement, a sense of accomplishment. All people were but animals. What difference did it make if one or ten or twenty or fifty were slaughtered? They were all doomed anyway, as was he. It felt so good, so sweet, so right, when he struck with a godlike hammer. Few had the courage to play God on earth, to decide who would die and who would live. The role of God suited him. He was certain there was no real God to challenge him.

On television just the night before, he had witnessed a weeping woman who had survived a car crash on the Outer Ring. Five had died, including an infant. The weeping woman had sobbed, “Thank God I am still alive.”

And, Aleksandr had thought, thank God I killed those others. Maybe I should kill a baby or a young boy who is on the way home from school. Maybe it would be the boy I saw seated on a park bench talking to the one-legged policeman. Talking about what? About me?

Stop, he told himself. Control your thoughts. Cope. Do I ignore him? Do I acknowledge him with a smile and go about my business?

It was a test of wills. It was a game Aleksandr could play and win. The policeman thought he could drive Aleksandr to confession. He would not confess. It would be the policeman who would give up and go home.

Aleksandr cleaned the last of his dinner dishes and finished preparing for bed. He took a long time, far longer than he usually would. He put on a fresh T-shirt and blue briefs and when he was finished turned out all the