City of Ghosts by Ben Creed (most important books of all time txt) 📕

green like all the other doors on the floor, and positioned nearest the stairs. Rossel stopped outside the only brown door on the corridor and listened. This was it, all right. The guitarist was not singing any more but they were still strumming gently at the strings. He knocked sharply – his policeman’s knock.

The strumming stopped.

He heard footsteps. Ah, it is not yet evening, Oy, to ny vyecher, the song was the same. Even though the voice was completely different, for the briefest of moments, he allowed himself to entertain the ridiculous notion that it might actually be Sofia.

The sound of a bolt being turned. The door swung open.

It was the woman in the light blue dress Lena had teased him about in the communal kitchen.

She was in her mid-thirties and short. The singer was wearing black workman’s boots and a blue towelling dressing gown, pulled tight at the waist with a cord. Her hair was dark brown and held tight by a battery of plastic red curlers and hairclips. Her eyes were blue, he noticed, and radiated determination.

‘Yes?’

Rossel caught himself eyeing her. Trying to cover his embarrassment, he stared directly into her eyes. She pulled at the neck of her dressing gown, drawing it across the exposed flesh. He saw a vicious red scar, about two inches long and wide, between the nape of her neck and her left breast. She pulled the dressing gown even tighter and hid it.

Rossel risked a grin.

‘It is a beautiful song and you play it delightfully, comrade. But there are children trying to sleep on the fourth floor. May I respectfully request that this is your last rendition of the evening?’

The singer reached up and began to take out some of the clips in her hair.

‘If it disturbs the little ones, sure.’

She began to push at the door to close it, but he put the tips of his fingers on the handle.

‘Have you got a name, comrade?’ he asked, wondering why on earth he was asking.

She glanced down at his hand, which, his cheeks colouring slightly, he immediately removed. Then back up at him; her face softened. Relaxing, he took a step backward into the corridor.

The door slammed shut.

15

Friday October 19

The blue hat with the red band and polished steel star was lying on Captain Lipukhin’s desk when Rossel entered the room. Taneyev, Grachev and Lipukhin himself could not take their eyes off it.

The owner of the cap was an MGB colonel who was occupying Lipukhin’s usual seat. He was middle-aged and portly with a florid complexion. His dark but greying hair was a little too long for regulations and swept down over his brow.

Rossel was holding a tin mug of tea. He parked it on a nearby filing cabinet, stood to attention and saluted.

‘Now, at last, we are all here,’ said the colonel.

His tone was clipped and officious, and he looked at them as if they were merely paperwork that he needed to sort, process and file before sitting down to lunch. He nodded at Rossel.

‘I am Colonel Sarkisov, Fifth Main Directorate of the MGB.’ The Fifth was the department tasked with monitoring internal dissent and counter-revolutionary activity. ‘I have been sent here from Comrade Beria’s office to ask about this current case of yours. The bodies on the line.’

‘Comrade Beria?’ Taneyev whispered, looking as though he was about to swallow his tongue.

‘Indeed. I trust you have no objection?’

‘None at all,’ replied Lipukhin hastily. ‘It is a great honour.’

Colonel Sarkisov sat up straight. ‘Not, perhaps, for me. We shall see.’ He picked up a brown leather briefcase from next to his feet on the floor and opened it. Taking out a file, he flicked through its pages, making the occasional note. He was in no hurry whatsoever to resume the conversation.

‘Five bodies,’ he said after a long while. ‘Unusual, is it not?’

The question was not specifically directed at any of the four militia officers. As a result, no one said anything. Every-body understood speech, of any kind, was a high-risk activity in front of a member of the MGB. Sarkisov turned to Grachev.

‘What about you, Sergeant? Do you think this case is unusual?’

Grachev shifted from one foot to the other.

‘In what way do you mean, Comrade Colonel?’

‘The number of bodies, of course. And also, in the way it is being investigated. Or, should I say, not being investigated quickly enough.’

Lipukhin glanced sideways at Rossel but when Rossel looked back, he tried to avoid his gaze. Rossel realised the captain was sensing an opportunity.

‘I . . . if there are issues the MGB have with the way the militia has handled this particular case, Colonel Sarkisov,’ said Lipukhin, ‘then I can only apologise. Station 17 is a small local station; we would not normally have become involved in a case like this. There were, as you must know from my report in the file, unusual circumstances around our call-out, but we will do everything we can to apprehend the murderer. Or, if you would prefer, I will of course be happy to hand over the case and everything we have on it to higher authorities. To be frank, I had assumed someone from MGB would be assigned to the case from the very beginning, given its somewhat extraordinary circumstances and the death of one of your own.’

‘How do you know it was “one of our own,” as you put it?’ asked Sarkisov.

‘A female victim was in the uniform of an officer of state security, comrade, as you will see from the file.’

‘It could be an imposter. A trick?’

‘But comrade,’ said Lipukhin, ‘Who would dare to? Moreover, how would anyone get hold of an MGB uniform, unless . . .’

Lipukhin stopped.

‘Unless?’ asked Sarkisov. He worked his jaw, as if chewing an errant piece of breakfast.

Unless the killer – or killers – were from the MGB itself, was the unspoken line.

‘Someone could have made it,’ Sarkisov added. ‘A skilled tailor, employed by a member of the criminal class. Perhaps you should have investigated this possibility? Perhaps