The car pulled up in front of the station in Little Russia. Field watched through the window for a moment as three priests, with long black beards and metal crucifixes, crossed Avenue Joffre and walked slowly in the direction of the Russian church. They passed a small group of Chinese children begging, without a glance.
He asked the driver to wait and got out of the car. He stretched, every muscle in his body aching after his exertions on the rugby pitch the previous afternoon.
The police station stood between, but twenty yards back from, two rows of shops. On one side was a tailor’s, on the other another fur shop. Sergei’s apartment was not more than a hundred yards away.
Inside, the station felt almost like a gentleman’s club. A wide hallway was filled with tropical plants, their leaves swaying gently under the ceiling fans. A Vietnamese constable in a clean, freshly pressed uniform stood behind the front desk. Field introduced himself, produced his identification, and waited while the constable went to find the officer in charge.
He tried to control his impatience.
The lieutenant was like a caricature of the colonial Frenchman. He was almost as tall as Field and wore jodhpurs, riding boots, and an open-necked, loose-fitting white cotton shirt, which emphasized the depth of his suntan. His hair was dark, his nose big and broken. His posture and easy manner reminded Field of Lewis. “I am Givreaux,” he said, his handshake firm.
“Field, S.1.”
“How can I help you, Mr. Field?”
“I’m trying to trace the whereabouts of an Igor Mentov, whom we believe used to live on Avenue Joffre.”
Givreaux shrugged. “I don’t know him.” He spoke with only a slight accent, but “him” was still clipped.
“We think he was here for only a short period, but our understanding is that he was arrested for an offense, possibly a minor one, at this station on or around May 1.”
Givreaux shook his head and exhaled noisily. “More than a month ago . . . I don’t know. Maybe.”
“Would it be possible to look through the incident reports for that day?”
“It is necessary for you to liaise with our intelligence section. They will fill out the papers, come down with you.”
“My secretary has prepared the paperwork. I understand it will be on its way today, but our intelligence is that this man is going to board the train for Harbin tonight. Time is running out for us.”
Givreaux looked less sure. “How will it help to look at an old—”
“It’s about being sure of who he is and what he’s been up to before we close in. He is part of a conspiracy.”
Givreaux pursed his lips. “I will have to call them.”
“Of course.”
“Please have a seat.”
Field sat in the rattan chair beneath one of the fans, enjoying the flow of cool air. He crossed his legs and lit a cigarette, glad to be out of the office. The question of the fingerprint file gnawed away at him. He heard Granger’s voice in his head: “It’s a time for knowing who your friends are.”
Givreaux came back into the room, his leather boots echoing on the old wooden floorboards. “All the officers are out,” he said. “I should make you wait, but . . .” He seemed to make a decision. “It is not such a big deal,” he said, mostly to himself. “The constable will go down with you. Put your head around the door when you are finished.”
The constable was a young man with an open, friendly face. He led Field down a corridor behind the counter to a big airy room at the end of the building. Every available inch of wall space was filled with wooden box files.
“What date?” the constable asked.
“Let’s start with May 1.”
The man fetched a stepladder from the far end of the room and placed it in the middle of the section directly ahead of them. He climbed up and removed one of the file boxes, which he placed on a low wooden desk.
Field sat down. For a few moments the man stood uneasily beside him, then he walked quietly away to the window. Field began to leaf through the cards. He found May 1 and worked quickly through it, but the incident reports were restricted to assault, robbery, and lesser offenses. There was no reference to the murder he had read about in the newspaper.
Field went back and looked through the cards again. Most of the reports had been filled out by a Detective Constable Ngoc and countersigned by a Detective Sergeant Pudowski. There had been two armed robberies on May 1, one in the morning at a fur shop on Avenue Joffre, another at a jeweler’s on Rue des Colonies, both by two masked men carrying machine guns. There was an assault on a Vietnamese driver in the French Park and an incident in which a woman’s handbag had been snatched. Field counted the cards. There were fourteen in all. Not one even hinted at what he was looking for.
He began to work backward. There were only five incidents on April 30, all written up by Ngoc, none of them serious.
“Would you like some tea, sir?” The constable was smiling at him. He did not appear suspicious.
“Yes, please. Lemon, no sugar.” Field listened to his retreating footsteps. “Constable . . .” He waited until the man had turned. “If an incident occurred within this area, there would always be a report?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Even if it were, for the sake of argument, a serious crime, say a murder, and the call had gone first to headquarters on Rue Wagner, you would file a report, because it occurred in your area.”
