caught his arm.
‘A moment,’ he said, turning to Hadfield again: ‘We owe you thanks too for helping Anna with the informer.’
‘What informer? I don’t know what you mean.’ Then it came to him with a little shiver of disgust. ‘The drunk at the clinic? You murdered him!’
‘No,’ said Mikhailov coolly. ‘He was executed by an agent of the executive committee.’ He paused again to be sure he held Hadfield’s eye. ‘The party has a long arm, Doctor.’
He dropped his hand and nodded to Kibalchich to open the door. But Hadfield did not move. For three, four, five seconds, he stared at Mikhailov, making no effort to hide his distaste. Then he turned away and walked out of the apartment and out of the house.
As he walked he could feel the man’s shadow at his back, or was it his subtle poison? What was he being drawn into? Every day new threads were binding him tighter to The People’s Will, small favours, small deceptions, the fine silk of intrigue woven into a web he would not feel until he was trapped, without independent thought, and with no hope of escape. It must stop.
‘Do you trust him?’
‘He seems to be a good doctor.’
‘That wasn’t what I meant.’
‘I know,’ said Mikhailov with a small smile. ‘Of course I don’t trust him.’ He was standing in the makeshift laboratory gazing at the instruments shattered by the charge. ‘He’s a sentimental liberal,’ he said, picking up a spatula from the workbench and rolling it thoughtfully between his thumb and forefinger. ‘But Anna has him wrapped round her little finger.’
‘Oh?’ There was a puzzled look on Kibalchich’s face. He was an unworldly sort of revolutionary, first and foremost a scientist, his true passion not politics but rocketry, but the party was fortunate to have such an accomplished explosives engineer.
‘I suppose she’s an attractive woman,’ he ventured after a little thought.
‘Yes, she’s an attractive woman,’ said Mikhailov tersely. ‘But we must consider your work. The date has been fixed ’
He was interrupted by a low moan of pain from the bedroom. The ether had worn off at last. The injured man groaned again and in a dry sticky voice called: ‘Nikolai, I’m going to be sick.’ A few seconds later they heard Valentin retching and whimpering with discomfort.
‘You need more help,’ said Mikhailov. ‘We have four days and we need all the explosive we can manage.’
Kibalchich nodded slowly. ‘Will the cellar be empty long enough to connect the charge?’
‘Our friend has invited the workmen he shares with to celebrate his engagement at a tavern nearby.’
‘He has a fiancee?’
‘No, no, my friend,’ said Mikhailov, slapping him on the back good-humouredly. ‘At six o’clock he’ll tell them he’s going to fetch his fiancee, but he’ll go to the cellar and light the fuse.’ He stroked his beard thoughtfully for a moment. ‘We’ll have a fiancee close by in case things go wrong.’
But nothing could be allowed to go wrong. It was the perfect opportunity. The tsar, his sons, the entire imperial family gathered about a table to eat off fine china and drink from crystal twinkling in the candlelight, and below them — three hundred pounds of dynamite. The People’s Will be done.
26
For once Anna had arranged to meet him in person and in a public place, trusting to darkness and the inclement weather. It was snowing heavy soft flakes she could reach up to and catch in her open hand. Beyond the cemetery railings, the tombs of the great, the dome and towers of the Alexander Nevsky Monastery were merely indistinct shadows on a billowing sheet of snow. She pulled her scarf tighter about her nose and mouth and stepped out of the light to rest her back against the railings. It was almost eight o’clock. It would be too dangerous for her to wait for more than a few minutes, but not since his first visit to the clinic almost a year ago had he been late for a meeting. Sure enough, the droshky slithered up to the cemetery gates before the monastery clock began to chime the hour.
Hadfield jumped down and kissed her on both cheeks. Then pulling off a glove, he gently wiped the flakes from her eyebrows with his thumb. ‘I thought skating and then dinner?’
‘Let’s just eat.’
‘Fine. Hey, Vanka — Baskov Street.’
The driver — a bear of a man in his thick furs — nodded sullenly, showed the whip to his horse, and a moment later they were gliding along Nevsky. Hadfield reached for her hand and gave it an affectionate squeeze. ‘I’ve missed you.’
‘But we only saw each other two days ago.’
‘Yes. But I missed you.’ He was a little aggrieved. ‘Haven’t you missed me?’
She laughed and shook her hand free, pulling the fur rug to her chin: ‘It’s going to snow like this for days.’
The restaurant was a simple whitewashed cellar a short distance from the Preobrazhensky barracks, and a number of the regiment’s officers were drinking and bantering noisily at its tables.
‘Are you comfortable here?’ Hadfield whispered as he helped her with her coat.
‘Yes, this is all right.’
They were shown, at his insistence, to a discreet table in a corner where Anna sat with her back to the rest of the restaurant. The waiter took their order and brought a bottle of rustic wine Hadfield declared to be undrinkable.
‘We must have something better,’ he said, clicking his fingers for service. He was on edge, fiddling with his napkin, the cutlery, the stem of his glass, smoothing his hair with the palm of his hand.
‘What is it?’ she asked, leaning forward.
He looked up and, catching her eye, gave her a weak smile. ‘I have acquired two new patients.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Your…’ he paused to let a waiter sweep past, ‘your comrades called upon me again. The unfortunate Valentin has injured his hand in an explosion.’
‘Is he all right?’ she asked mechanically; she barely knew the man.
‘He’ll have to learn to write with his left. But,’ he looked at her sternly, ‘I don’t want you or your Alexander Mikhailov or any of your other “friends” to think they can call on my services.’
‘What do you mean? Isn’t it your job to help the sick?’
‘Yes. But I don’t want to be drawn into your conspiracies. The explosives laboratory, the informer murdered at the clinic…’
‘Executed.’
‘So you knew about that.’
‘Keep your voice down!’ she hissed. ‘This is not the place to talk.’
‘No one can hear us.’ He tried to reach across the table for her hand but she drew it away.
‘You’re afraid,’ she said contemptuously.
‘No. That’s not true. I don’t believe killing anyone will change things for the better in this country. And —’
He stopped abruptly as the waiter approached with their Shchi and bread. As the soup was served, Anna was conscious of him trying to make eye contact and of his foot reaching for hers beneath the table. But she was boiling inside. Did he think so little of her? She had taken a solemn pledge to dedicate her life to the people. After a few seconds she picked up her spoon then banged it down again: ‘I must go.’
‘Why?’
‘I must go.’
