Изменить стиль страницы

Gregorin seemed to be thinking hard, then he looked up at Korolev and from him to Valentina Nikolaevna and her daughter. He seemed to consider the relationship for a moment and then to come to a decision and pointed his gun toward Valentina Nikolaevna.

“You’ll go and fetch it for us then. If you fail, or try some trick, your daughter won’t just be shot. Look at Volodya, he hasn’t had a woman in hours. The girl’s perhaps a little young for him, but he’s not choosy. You won’t mind, will you, Volodya?”

“No,” Volodya said, the deep voice sounding half-amused.

Natasha was crying now and Valentina’s purple bruise was vivid against the shocked pallor of her skin, her pupils large black discs. The tension was like an electric force, humming from person to person. When the creak in the corridor outside the apartment’s front door came, it sounded like the crack of a whip.

At first everything froze. A cart bumping down the cobblestones outside sounded like a tank in the silence. Then there was another noise from the corridor, as if someone were very carefully advancing toward the door. Gregorin’s eyes were now as round as Natasha’s had been and his arms stretched forward as he gradually stood from his chair. He gestured Korolev toward the corner with his gun, away from the door, and then nodded to Volodya, miming turning an invisible handle. Volodya moved across the room in preparation, while Gregorin aimed his weapon. Korolev, crouching against the wall, wished he were a lot smaller than he was. Everyone waited.

When the door smashed in, it pulled Volodya’s wrist with it, and for a moment he was jerked forward. Korolev dropped to his knees as guns fired repeatedly, splashing yellow on the walls of the darkened room again and again. In the flashes Korolev saw Volodya thrown to the floor, his gun tumbling toward the still standing Gregorin, while Valentina tried to cover Natasha with her own body. Then the only sounds were Natasha’s sobbing and a strange muffled banging-like a drum being hit with a sock.

The smell of cordite was sharp as Korolev stood up, watching Gregorin move his gun toward him as he did.

“Stay where you are!” Gregorin’s voice came to Korolev from a distance. The gunfire had half-deafened him. “No. Go to Volodya. But keep your hands in the air.”

Volodya was lying on his side, facing Gregorin, his left leg kicking against the wall in involuntary spasm. That accounted for the noise. The driver’s eyes, caught in a dusty ray of light from the window, looked up at Korolev in confusion. There were bloody black holes in his coat and a dark puddle was slowly spreading around him.

“How is it?” the big man whispered to Korolev. Korolev didn’t answer, his attention caught by Semionov, who’d been thrown against the opposite wall outside in the corridor. Blood was pumping down his chin from a long red gouge that revealed the white of his jawbone. He’d also been hit in the shoulder and chest and his breath bubbled red in his open mouth. He didn’t look as if he’d last long.

“How is it?” Volodya said, a little louder. “I can’t feel my legs.”

Korolev looked down at him and shrugged.

“Not good.”

“Damn it,” Gregorin said. “Back to where you were, Korolev.”

Korolev stood up and retreated toward the corner with slow backward steps, not taking his eyes off the colonel. Gregorin walked over to Volodya, pausing as he did so to pick up the stricken man’s weapon and put it in his pocket. He moved heavily, favoring his right side, and when he dipped to pick up the gun Korolev could see that his left leg was damp with blood. Good for Semionov, thought Korolev-he’d clipped the rat.

When Gregorin reached his driver, Volodya looked up with a calm expression and then breathed out slowly.

“Do it. There’s no way you can get me out like this, I know that. There’s only one way this ends for me now.”

Gregorin looked down at the driver for a long moment.

“I’m sorry, brother,” he said, then pointed his gun, closed his eyes and fired. Volodya’s body jerked once and the kicking stopped. The red puddle around him spread a little faster.

Korolev’s back, meanwhile, had found the wall and there was nowhere further for him to go. He straightened up and began to pray in silence that the Lord would forgive him his sins. Then the muzzle of Gregorin’s gun was a black hole aimed straight between his eyes.

“This was all your fault,” Gregorin said.

Korolev closed his eyes and waited for the bullet. He hoped he’d feel nothing and that the Lord would hear his prayers and spare Valentina and Natasha.

Click. Click. Click.

Korolev opened his eyes at the sound of the trigger pulling on empty chambers. The colonel was looking at the gun in mild confusion, then he looked at Korolev and shook his head in disbelief. After a long moment the colonel dropped the empty gun onto the floor and limped to the door. As he left the apartment, Korolev saw him pull Volodya’s gun from his pocket and hold it straight down his wounded leg. In the distance a Militia whistle shrieked, and Korolev wondered why on earth the colonel hadn’t shot him.

He stood absolutely still, listening to the receding footsteps and then the sound of the colonel going down the stairs. It wasn’t fear that kept him immobile so much as amazement that he was still alive. But he was, and that meant he had to do something. He shook himself, then walked into the kitchen and reached into the drawer where Valentina kept a sharp knife.

“Valentina Nikolaevna, pay attention,” he said as he cut the cord that held her wrists, and then pressed the hilt of the knife into her freed hands. “I need you to do some things for me.”

She nodded, although her eyes were still wide with terror.

“First, you have to call the Lubianka and ask for Colonel Rodinov. Tell him that Colonel Gregorin has shot Semionov. Ask him to send an ambulance. Inform him Gregorin may be making his way to the Metropol and I’ve gone after him. Then, and only then, see to Semionov and Natasha. Understood?”

“Yes,” she managed to say when he pulled the gag off, and the effort of speaking seemed to calm her. He touched her face for a moment and she moved her head around so that her lips rested against his wrist. They held each other’s eyes for a moment and then he stood.

With a grunt of exertion, Korolev managed to turn Volodya’s body, and he pulled his Walther out of the dead driver’s coat pocket. Semionov lifted a hand as he left the apartment and he stooped down to him.

“His car. Emka. On Vorontsovo Pole. That’s how I knew. To come back.” The words came out in bubbles of blood that left Semionov’s lips crimson.

“Help is coming, Vanya. Hold on, friend.”

Korolev went down the staircase four steps at a time. White faces stared from half-open doors as he hurtled past and then he was out of the front door, looking up the alley toward the church for which the street was named. He thought he saw Gregorin turn the corner but couldn’t be sure. Two Militia uniforms were running toward the building and he held up his identity card.

“Korolev. Petrovka Street. You, come with me. You, there’s a wounded man on the first floor. See he gets taken care of. There’s a dead one, too.”

One of the Militiamen ran into the building while the other stood there with his hand on his holster. Korolev turned to the four or five curious neighbors who’d emerged from the surrounding buildings and raised his voice.

“A dark-haired man in a leather coat came out that door not more than a minute ago. Who saw where he went?”

The elderly Lobkovskaya, his downstairs neighbor, stepped forward from the group and pointed up the lane toward the church.

“He went off that way, Alexei Dmitriyevich.”

There was no sign of the limping figure, but then Korolev spotted a trail of dark red drops along the lane.

“Your gun, Sergeant. Make sure it’s ready for use.”