“May I say that I find your reasoning convoluted,” she said.
“It is a skill which I have nurtured and in which I take some pride.”
Elena was about to speak again when the children in the pool shrieked and Rostnikov turned his head to look at them.
Five minutes later Elena was in the bath with the water running. Twenty minutes later she was asleep in her bed. Five floors below children were still squealing in the swimming pool.
Had he arrived five minutes earlier or later, Emil Karpo would have missed the boy with the red Mohawk and the slender blue-haired girl in black leather. The sky was dark with the threat of rain or early snow, and people were hurrying in and out of Petrovka to beat the weather.
They were at the sentry gate, arguing with the uniformed guard, who was repeating that they could not see Inspector Rostnikov, that he was unavailable, that they could leave a message, that they were holding up the line. The line consisted of a short, fat, shivering man carrying a briefcase and looking at his watch with impatience.
“Capones?” Karpo said, stepping around to the sentry station.
The red-haired boy looked up at him, and the girl, whose eyes were made up with dark circles so she looked like an owl, smiled.
“Yes,” the boy said. “We need to see the Washtub.”
“Come,” Karpo said, motioning them to follow him into the street. The uniformed young officer motioned for the short businessman to step forward.
Karpo crossed Petrovka Street with the two Capones at his side. A low fence and some trees faced the Petrovka station. Karpo stopped beneath the trees near the bus stop and turned to the Capones.
“We want to see the Washtub,” the boy said defiantly.
“What is your name?” Karpo asked.
“I’m called Matches.”
“Why do you want to see Inspector Rostnikov?’ asked Karpo. He was aware of the owl girl looking at him with something that appeared to be fascination.
“We want Yellow Angel’s body,” said the boy.
“Her name was Iliana Ivanova,” said Karpo.
“She hated her name,” said the girl. “She didn’t want to be buried with that name over her. She wanted a headstone with a yellow angel.”
“We are trying to find her family,” said Karpo. He felt the first drops of slushy rain begin to fall.
“You found it,” said Matches. “The Capones are her family.”
“When the examiners are finished with the body, I’ll see what can be done,” Karpo said, looking at the girl.
“You’re the Vampire,” she said. “The one they call the Vampire.”
Karpo pulled the leather notebook from his pocket.
“When?” asked Matches, nervously pulling up the collar of his jacket to keep the sleet from his neck. “When can we get her?”
“Have Xeromen call me at this number in an hour, at nine-thirty,” Karpo said, handing the boy the sheet of paper.
Matches looked at the sheet and then at the girl, who was still admiring Karpo.
“Take it,” she said.
Matches put the paper in his jacket pocket.
In the red treetops of Matches’s hair, beads of gray sleet clung, slipped, and melted.
The girl smiled at Karpo again and shifted her weight from foot to foot. Her dress was short and her legs covered with thin tights. Karpo was sure she was no more than fifteen or sixteen. The cheeks and thighs of childhood gave her away, even though her eyes revealed experience that added five years to her heavily made-up face.
“Well?” said Matches, reaching up to brush the sleet from his hair.
“Nine-thirty,” said Karpo. He now looked directly into the girl’s eyes.
Her grin disappeared. She blinked and turned away.
“Let’s go,” said Matches, touching her arm. “Ginka, let’s go.”
The sleet was falling harder now. Matches pulled at the girl’s arm, and finally, reluctantly she followed him. As they hurried down the street she looked back at the motionless pale policeman in black, whose eyes followed them as they reached the waiting black Volga and got in.
EIGHT
The Moscow Metropolitan Railway, with more than 100 stations, 160 miles of track, 8,000 trains, and over 2 million passengers a day, is-in terms of layout, efficiency, extent, and even beauty-the best subway system in the world. It is probably the highest lasting achievement of the Soviet Union in Moscow.
Stations are scrubbed and polished constantly. Air is changed four to eight times an hour depending on the traffic. Smoking is forbidden in stations and on all trains, which run until one in the morning and arrive every ninety seconds at all stations during the rush hour.
There are seven lines, each color coded, with convenient transfer stops in the center of the city and along the Koltsevaya Line, which runs in an almost perfect circle around the central city. A map of the system looks like the wheel of a cart with its spokes extended well beyond the rim.
The cost of travel on the Moscow Metro is one ruble, the equivalent of an American penny.
The system is semiautomatic, operated by computer, monitored by uniformed drivers who check the control settings.
When plans for an underground railway were considered before the revolution, in 1902, the newspaper
The first shaft of the Moscow Metro was finally sunk in 1931. When the first train ran on May 15, 1935, there were thirteen stations. Even when the war with Hitler began, construction continued.
Stone and wood from all over the Soviet Union were used to construct each station. Architects, sculptors, painters, and designers considered it a great honor to be assigned to a Metro station. Many of the stations in the center of the city look more like cavernous museum galleries than train stations.
Each stop on the Metro line is different from all the others. The Mayakovskaya Station is known for its massive red marble columns and its mosaics created from the cartoons of Alexander Deineka. The lighting system in the Kropotkinskaya Station was designed to give the impression that the station is on the surface and that sunshine is beaming in on a bright summer morning. Supported by seventy-two pillars, the Komsomolskaya Station, with its eight massive mosaics depicting the struggle for independence, is more than two hundred yards long.
In the winter, Gypsies and the wandering homeless ride the trains for warmth and the opportunity to beg from captive travelers.
The Metro police division, a branch of the Moscow police with almost one thousand uniformed and plainclothed men and women, patrols the vast system, dealing with a range of crimes that includes purse- snatching, pocket-picking, and the recent outbreak of American-style muggings by youth gangs.
“And so,” said Sasha Tkach, sipping tepid tea, “what does this tell us about
Karpo stood next to him in the office of Inspector Rostnikov looking at the Metro map he had brought from his room and carefully laid out on the desk.
“I have considered this,” said Karpo. “The odds are approximately two hundred to one against the selection
