Stalin’s Ghost

“Consider yourself fired, dismissed.”

The footing was uneven, a surface of fine snow over icy sled tracks. As a kid, Arkady had sledded and skated in the park a hundred times.

“Be careful.”

“Don’t worry about my health. This is the man who asked me if I made enemies.”

“If you have to talk, whisper.”

“I’m not talking to you. Consider this conversation finished.” Platonov trudged in silence for a step or two. “Do you even know who the Russian Patriots are?”

“They sound a lot like Communists.”

“They sound like us, that’s the idea. The Kremlin brought in Americans. The Americans polled people and asked which political figure they most admired. The answer was Stalin. They asked why, and the answer was that Stalin was a Russian patriot. Then they asked people if they would vote for a party called Russian Patriot, which didn’t even exist. Fifty percent said they would. So the Kremlin put Russian Patriot on the ballot. Just on their name they’ll get votes. It’s a subversion of the democratic process.”

“What if Stalin comes back from the dead and campaigns for them?”

“That’s the outrageous part. Stalin belongs to us. Stalin belongs to the Party.”

“Maybe you can copyright him, like Coca-Cola.”

Platonov stopped to catch his breath. Arkady heard shouts and saw two figures on the snow fifty meters behind. The beam of a flashlight swung from side to side.

“It’s Bora and the cameraman,” Arkady said.

“I knew we should look for a car. Why did I listen to you?”

Platonov started moving again, but at a slower, shambling pace.

“How is your heart?” Arkady asked.

“It’s a little late to be concerned about my health. Don’t you have a gun?”

“No.”

“You know the trouble with you, Renko? You’re a pantywaist. You’re too soft for your job. An investigator should have a gun.”

What they needed was wings, Arkady thought. Bora seemed to fly over the snow, correcting the false first impression of clumsiness.

“Where are we going?” Platonov demanded. They had been headed down the middle of the park. Now Arkady turned toward the street.

“Just stay with me.”

“This makes no sense at all.”

Bora had already halved the difference and far outstripped the cameraman and the reach of the flashlight. By the way he pumped his knees he might have been a professional athlete, Arkady thought. Arkady admired men in that sort of physical condition; he never seemed to find the time.

Platonov took air in gasps. Arkady pulled him by the sleeve back in the direction they had originally been headed; it was like helping a camel through the snow. The two turns had cost time and distance. Finally, Platonov could go no further and hung onto an oil barrel in which shovels were deposited.

Bora approached through hanging flakes. Something bright hung from his hand. Left far behind, the cameraman shouted at him to stop. Bora took quicker, more purposeful strides.

“You laughed,” he told Arkady.

“When?”

“In the Metro. For that I will carve out your eyes and fuck you in the face.”

Bora drew his arm back. He was in midstride when he plunged through the snow and vanished. Snowflakes seesawed in his place. Arkady brushed snow aside and saw a hand pressed against the underside of ice.

The cameraman caught up, his beard frosted from his breath. He was just a boy, soft and heavy with red flannel cheeks.

“I tried to warn him,” the cameraman said.

“The name should have been a hint,” Arkady said.

The wartime Kirov Station had been renamed Chistye Prudy for the “clear pond” that cooled the park in the summertime and provided skating in the winter. Soft spots were posted with Danger-Thin Ice! signs that were perfectly visible in the daytime. The pool was shallow and the hole Bora had plunged through was just out of reach, but by a freakish chance he was on his back under more solid ice and faced the wrong direction. He couldn’t get his feet under him and, with such poor leverage, could only use his fists, knees and head. Arkady had only expected Bora to get soaked in icy water. This was a bonus.

“Your name?” Arkady asked the cameraman.

“Petrov. Don’t you think we should-”

“Your flashlight and papers, please?”

“But-”

“Flashlight and papers.”

Arkady matched the cameraman to the ID photo of a clean-shaven Pyetr Semyonovich Petrov; age: twenty- two; residence: Olympic Village, Moscow; ethnicity: Russian through and through. Petrov was a pack rat. Arkady delved deeper into the holder and came up with a business card for Cinema Zelensky, membership in Mensa, video club cards, a second mini cassette, a matchbook from a “gentlemen’s club” called Tahiti and a condom. A telephone number was scribbled inside the matchbook. Arkady pocketed the matchbook and tape and gave the ID back.

Bora squeezed his face against the ice. He was moving less.

Arkady put his arm around the cameraman. “Pyetr, may I call you Petya?”

“Yes.”

“Petya, I am going to ask you a question and I want you to answer as if your life depended on it. Do you understand?”

“I understand.”

“Be honest. When passengers on the Metro think they see Stalin, what are they really seeing? What is the trick?”

“There’s no trick.”

“No special effects?”

“No.”

“Then how do people see him?”

“They just do.”

“You’re sure?”

“Yes.”

“Okay.” Arkady took a snow shovel from the oil barrel, raised it high, walked onto the ice and chopped at the ice over Bora’s head. The blade skipped and sang. No other effect. Petya aimed the flashlight at Bora’s eyes. They had the flat stare of a fish on ice. A second chop. A third. Bora didn’t flinch. Arkady wondered whether he might have waited a little too long. Platonov gaped from the edge of the pond. Arkady swung the shovel and the first cracks showed as prisms in the flashlight’s beam. Swung again and as the ice split Arkady sank halfway to his knees in water, no worse than stepping into a tube of ice cubes. He worked from the head down until he got a hold under Bora’s arms and hauled him out onto land. Bora was white and rubbery. Arkady turned him face down, straddled him and pushed on his back. With all of his weight, he pushed and relaxed while his own teeth chattered. Pushed and relaxed and chattered. When Arkady had come to Chistye Prudy as a kid, he was always watched by Sergeant Belov, who taught Arkady to catch snow on his tongue. The sergeant would tell Arkady, this delicious one has your name on it. Here’s another. And another. When Arkady skated, he chased snowflakes like a greedy swallow.

Bora gagged. He doubled up as pool water spewed from his mouth. Caught a deep breath draped with saliva. Retched again, wringing himself out. Sodden and freezing, he shivered not in any ordinary way but violently, as if he were in the grip of an invisible hand. He twisted his eyes up toward Arkady.

“It’s a miracle,” Petya said.