The Third Section (Danilov Quintet 3) Read online

  ‘Fifth player!’ said Manin, looking at the newcomer behind Dmitry.

  ‘Under the table!’ said the other two in unison, pointing there as they spoke. It was a common enough response to unwanted advice. Dmitry felt the man move away and head over to the bar. Manin bid nine diamonds and nobody countered. Only then did Dmitry glance at the newcomer. He immediately turned back, fixing his gaze on his cards, his blood suddenly cold.

  It was Ignatyev, the michman he’d met briefly in the casemate in the fourth bastion. At the time he’d seemed pretty chummy with Mihailov and Wieczorek, though he hadn’t returned with them later. Even so, Dmitry could not ignore the possibility that Ignatyev might, like them, be a voordalak.

  For his part, Ignatyev did not even look in Dmitry’s direction. Since he had come into the room, he had been behind Dmitry, with no opportunity to see his face except in the brief moment when Dmitry had glanced over at him, and then he had been turned away. If he had seen and recognized Dmitry, surely he would have reacted. Dmitry missed two possible tricks, but Manin had overbid horribly. He finished two under. Just as Ilyin was tallying the scores, Ignatyev walked briskly out of the room.

  Dmitry was on his feet in an instant. ‘That’s it for me,’ he announced.

  ‘But you’re ahead,’ complained Manin.

  ‘Give us a chance to win it back,’ added Volgin.

  ‘Keep it,’ said Dmitry, striding to the door and grabbing his knapsack from beside the chair where he had left it.

  He heard muttered comments of ‘Choodak!’ and ‘Better with three, anyway,’ but then he was outside.

  It was a warm night, the sort of night that made you want to do nothing. Despite the proximity of the sea, the air was thick and humid; it reminded him of Moscow. Outside, the noise of the guns was louder. Dmitry could clearly distinguish the direction that the explosions came from, either from the land to the south and east, or from the sea. The glare that lit the sky preceded their accompanying blasts by seconds, and they were frequent enough to make it impossible to connect a particular report with a particular flash.

  Ignatyev was nowhere to be seen. Dmitry had come out of the mess on to the bank of the Military Harbour. Almost immediately opposite, a boat bridge stretched across it, connecting the eastern and western halves of the city. The harbour was calm, but the boats bobbed up and down in the water. Someone had just run across. Dmitry followed.

  The west was a mass of small streets. Dmitry chose the one nearest to the end of the bridge and walked briskly down it. Above him, a shell sailed through the sky like a meteor, launched from one of the ships and aimed not into the city itself but at the bastions beyond. He heard the blast of its impact and tried not to imagine the carnage it must have caused.

  He carried on down the street, glancing left and right at each side road that branched off. The entire area was all but deserted – those who were not on duty at the fortifications remained indoors for safety. Occasionally Dmitry saw someone, but not Ignatyev. Half the buildings he passed had been boarded up, some in hasty repair of damage caused by stray cannonballs, others simply because their owners had fled.

  At last his eyes fell upon the figure he had been seeking. Ignatyev was no longer alone. Another man was walking beside him – this one in civilian clothes. Had Ignatyev found a victim, or a comrade? Dmitry scurried along the short distance to the next block of buildings, then turned into the road that ran parallel to where he had seen Ignatyev. He ran down that and then cut back to the right so that he would be ahead of them when they reached the next junction. He ducked into the doorway of one of the abandoned houses and waited. He could hear low voices approaching.

  As they passed, Dmitry saw that there were now three of them. There probably had been before, but the third man had been obscured by the shadows. Like Ignatyev, he was in a naval uniform, and taller than the other two. He walked between them, as if they were leading him somewhere. Dmitry could not see his face.

  The three men did not have much further to go. They stopped at the door of one of the houses, just beyond where Dmitry stood, hidden in the darkness. Compared with its neighbours, this building was in a decent state of repair – probably still lived in. Ignatyev unlocked the door and opened it, indicating that the other two should enter. At the same moment, a shell whistled low overhead, clearly off target. It landed a few streets away, shaking the ground and illuminating the sky. The three men turned to look, their faces momentarily lit by the blast, and Dmitry saw what he had already suspected.

  The man in the middle was Tyeplov.

  ‘Aleksei Ivanovich Danilov.’

  Yudin eyed Tamara as he spoke. He tried to gauge her reaction, but could infer nothing. The name sounded unusual on his lips, at least in that form. In his mind the man would always be ‘Lyosha’, but to refer to him so familiarly would reveal too much. It was suspicious enough that she should be showing an interest in him. It could be quite innocent – but Yudin would not have lived to anything like his great age if he believed in innocence.

  Tamara’s response was simply to bat the question back. ‘Yes, Vasiliy Innokyentievich?’

  Yudin knew that he did not have to play games. ‘Why the interest?’ he asked.

  ‘He’s a witness to murder,’ she said simply.

  Yudin almost laughed. The idea that Lyosha could have anything to do with the death of Irina Karlovna was beyond ridiculous. But that was not the primary issue. ‘I don’t recall authorizing you to investigate the death of your colleague.’

  ‘Not that murder. A murder in 1812. And another in 1825.’

  Yudin considered her. She was sitting in his office, lit as usual by lamplight, and it was night outside. She was closer to the door than he, but even if she ran for it he could easily catch her. Gribov had shown her in, and might hear her scream, but he could be dealt with too, if necessary. None of it was necessary – yet. The very fact that she had come down here and was telling him indicated how little she must know. He felt safe – but also fascinated.

  ‘Explain,’ he said.

  ‘There was a murder in 1812, just after the French pulled out. A prostitute. In Degtyarny Lane. Her name was Margarita Kirillovna.’

  She gave out each fact separately, as if feeding a line out to Yudin so that he could become well and truly hooked. He knew full well that Margarita Kirillovna had been killed in 1812 – it was he who had killed her, and made it look like the work of a vampire. He had used a weapon he’d constructed himself, formed from two knives, virtually identical, bound together at the handles with leather strapping so the two blades lay parallel. Their upper edges were a jagged sawtooth, and the lower keen as razors. Each ended in a neat, sharp point. He’d made it specifically to imitate the wounds of a vampire’s teeth, and now, even though he was a vampire, he still sometimes preferred to use the knife, and always carried it with him. It allowed him to look into his victim’s eyes as he worked. He could recall the thrill as he had turned it on Margarita, her expression of surprise and terror. He felt an excitement inside him as he considered telling Tamara the truth and seeing that same look on her face, but he restrained himself. ‘Prostitutes get murdered all the time,’ he responded.

  ‘Her injuries were almost identical to those of Irina Karlovna.’

  ‘Almost?’ He refrained from adding, ‘That’s not how I remember it,’ but he was curious to know what differences there were.

  ‘She’d also been stabbed in the chest.’

  That, Yudin presumed, would be Aleksei’s handiwork. Yudin had clearly done a good job of making it look like the work of a voordalak – good enough for Aleksei to take precautions. ‘And how was Danilov involved?’ he asked.

  ‘He found the body.’

  ‘Did they catch the killer?’ It was a delightfully unnecessary question.

  She shook her head. ‘No, but that’s not it. In 1825 there were five more murders.’

  ‘In 1825 there were dozens of murders,’ he snapped.

  ‘In five the cause o
f death was a similar throat wound. In one, the man who found the body was Aleksei Ivanovich Danilov.’

  Yudin raised an eyebrow, hoping it would disguise the true nature of his surprise. Aleksei had clearly been a busy man in 1825. He had come to Chufut Kalye and helped to destroy all Yudin’s work there, he had saved Aleksandr I from a fate worse than death in Taganrog and he had taken part in the Decembrist Uprising in Petersburg. All this Yudin knew because he had been present. He had not been in Moscow at all, but it seemed that there too Aleksei had not been idle.

  ‘When in 1825?’ he asked.

  ‘Early October.’

  That was before the events in the south of the country. It must have been what brought Aleksei down there. ‘I see,’ said Yudin. ‘And now you think he might have come back and killed Irina Karlovna – for old times’ sake.’

  ‘I think it unlikely.’

  ‘Because?’

  ‘Because he’s in Siberia.’

  ‘You’re sure of that?’

  ‘That’s what I was coming to check.’

  Yudin thought for a moment. He doubted that she knew any more than she was telling, but even so, it was an impressive piece of investigation. And the fact that they were both now interested in Aleksei could be of use. Her investigations could provide a cover for Yudin’s own – though he still had other lines of enquiry that might allow him to leave Aleksei to his fate.

  ‘He’s still there – in Irkutsk.’

  ‘Any family?’

  ‘His wife died. He has a son, Dmitry.’ Yudin paused, trying to judge if she knew already. She said nothing, but she would soon find out. ‘Whom I know personally.’

  Tamara tilted her head a little to one side. Now she was trying to assess Yudin, but she would discover nothing. ‘And where is he?’

  ‘Sevastopol. He’s in the army. Is that a good enough alibi?’

  ‘Not as good as Irkutsk.’ Yudin could not tell if she was being serious. ‘How old is he?’ she asked.

  ‘Nearly fifty.’ Yudin understood where she was leading. ‘Which would have made him around five years old at the time of your first murder.’ He was amused to find himself defending the man.

  She smiled, and he was now fairly certain that she had been teasing him. ‘What was your interest, by the way?’ she asked.

  Yudin had anticipated the question. ‘As you might expect, I read all the mail to and from the exiles, including Danilov’s.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘He mentioned a name – a possible co-conspirator; another Decembrist.’

  ‘One that got away?’

  ‘Not for very much longer.’

  She seemed satisfied. She did not ask the name of the other man, and Yudin would simply have refused to tell her if she had.

  ‘You think you can put together a case against him?’

  ‘He’ll confess.’

  ‘Simple as that?’

  Yudin smiled. Could she really be that naive? Her work had, so far, only introduced her to one side of the Third Section’s activities, but she must surely guess what happened to the men she informed upon, once they were in custody. It was time to see what the woman was really made of.

  ‘Let me show you something,’ he said. She looked puzzled, but he said no more. He took out his key and went over to the door to unlock it. ‘This way.’

  She stood and followed him. He stepped back and let her go first. He heard her feet on the stone steps coming to a halt. She had reached the point where the stairs divided. He had no plans to let her see the coffins. What she would see would be enough – enough for him to enjoy that first hint of apprehension on her face. It would be their opening step on a journey together that would end in her understanding everything, and being horrified by it, and dying with only fear in her mind. With luck it would be a long journey, of which he at least would relish every moment.

  ‘Down to the left,’ he called lightly.

  Tamara’s steps resumed and Yudin followed her down, closing the door behind him.

  CHAPTER X

  ‘TOLYA!’ DMITRY BANGED his fist against the wooden door and shouted again. ‘Tolya!’ He waited only seconds for a response, but knew this was no question of politely listening for the sound of footsteps and waiting for the butler to open the door and enquire into the nature of his visit.

  He had hesitated just a moment in shouting from across the street and when he had called out his voice had been drowned by another exploding shell. Then Tyeplov and the other two had vanished inside. Tyeplov was forewarned of the existence of vampires and was a strong man, but if it turned out that both Ignatyev and the other figure Dmitry had seen were voordalaki then he would be in no position to defend himself.

  Dmitry stepped back a few paces and then charged at the door, aiming his shoulder at its centre. It did not yield. He tried again, but the only damage he succeeded in inflicting was upon himself. He stood in front of it and kicked, but with the same lack of effect. He stepped back out into the street. It was a large building. All the houses in the block stretched back a long way, and this one had windows on either side of the front door. None of them was showing any light. Dmitry went back up to the door and then stepped out on to the window ledge to the right. He turned away from the building and pressed his back against the glass, finding what little grip he could on the window frame, and then raised his foot.

  Dmitry paused. He did not even know for sure that Ignatyev was a vampire; there might be some entirely different explanation. He might break into the building and chase through the rooms, searching in one after another, only to find the three men quietly playing cards. Tyeplov would regard him as obsessed – a jealous lover who could not stand for a moment to see the object of his affection happy in the company of others. Worse still, Dmitry might find the three men in a situation that genuinely could be a cause for jealousy. He would rather live in ignorance.

  But none of that would serve as an excuse. Were Tyeplov to die, he would be unable to listen to Dmitry’s reasons for not coming to his aid, but Dmitry would hear them all, over and over again, becoming less convincing with each repetition. He could not live with it. He thrust his heel backwards and heard the glass shatter. He turned and slipped through the broken window into the house.

  The room was unremarkable – a study of some kind, but Dmitry did not linger to examine it. His only useful observation was that it was empty. There was a door in the far left-hand corner. Dmitry reached into his knapsack and drew out his wooden sword and his pistol. He knew that a bullet could not kill a vampire, but he had witnessed how effective it could be in disabling one, if only temporarily.

  The door led back to the hallway. It was darker here. Dmitry glanced and saw the locked front door. More doors led off the hall as it disappeared into the gloom at the back of the house. A flight of stairs ascended just opposite the point where Dmitry had entered.

  ‘Tolya!’ he shouted again, and then listened. There was no response. He proceeded along the hall, glancing at the bottom of each door he passed, but seeing no sign of light. The sound of cannon firing and shells landing was quieter in here, but still the building shook every minute or so as another explosion brought the fall of the city a step closer. Soon the corridor ended in a door from beneath which shone the faintest glimmer. Dmitry stood and listened, his hand resting on the doorknob.

  ‘Tolya!’ Still silence. He opened the door swiftly. It was a kitchen. On a shelf stood a candle, burned almost to nothing. He was at the back of the house now. The windows looked on to a small yard and beyond it other houses, some with lights in their windows.

  There was a sound – muffled as it penetrated from a different room. It could have been a scream; it could have been a cat. Immediately following came a heavy thud, directly above. Dmitry turned and dashed to the stairs, climbing them three at a time, his arms, still clutching sword and pistol, swinging wildly to speed his ascent. The stairway turned twice and at the top he momentarily lost his bearings. The landing was long and narrow, ma
tching the hall below. Dmitry ran along it, but soon found himself at a window. He looked out and saw the street by which he had come. He turned and ran back down the corridor, ignoring the doors on either side, imagining the layout of the rooms below so that he could place himself directly above the kitchen.

  At the far end he came to a door, in exactly the position he had expected. There was light coming from this one – not just from beneath it, but along one side and through the keyhole. Dmitry scarcely broke his run as he opened it and burst into the room beyond. Then he froze.

  The scene was composed like a painting – a crystallization of domestic ennui as if captured by de Hooch. All three men were in the room. Tyeplov was at the washstand, his wet hands half covering his face as he gazed between his fingers at himself in the mirror on the wall. On the other side of the room, on the floor, on a striped rug just beside the bed though not quite parallel to it, lay the body of the unknown civilian. His head was closer to Dmitry than his feet and it lolled backwards, so that the man’s eyes stared upwards, as if pleading with Dmitry to help him.

  He was beyond help. The gash to his neck was vivid and red. A streak of blood across the carpet revealed the exact spot at which his throat had been severed, where it continued to ooze from the man’s veins, not smoothly but in pulses, as his fading heart struggled foolishly to do its duty to the last. It was a moot point whether the man could yet be regarded as dead.

  Between the body and Tyeplov, still seemingly frozen in the moment of Dmitry’s arrival, was Ignatyev. He was on one knee, halfway through the process of moving on from the first victim of the night to the second. Moments before he must have been kneeling over the dying man, inflicting that fatal wound and enjoying the flavour of the blood that spilled from it. Now he had turned. His left leg was bent, its foot tensed against the floor, ready to launch him across the room at the ingenuous, unseeing Tyeplov. It meant that Ignatyev’s face was turned directly towards Dmitry, and Dmitry could see in every detail the residue of the abomination he had just committed. His chin was red with blood. His mouth – half open – showed tendrils of ruddy saliva that clung and stretched between his teeth. His moustache, normally blond, was fringed by a dark band where blood had soaked into it. Other matter was caught up among the bushy whiskers, whose exact nature Dmitry didn’t care to consider.