Happy?â
âNot entirely.â
âMake a note of my mobile number: 240-80-90. Having seen the postmortem report, shouldnât you have a word with the pathologist?â
âIâm going to.â
âGood man! Donât leave your mobile in the car!â
As he drew up outside their block, his spirits plunged. Once again heâd forgotten to collect their ration entitlement.
Having pocketed his phone and locked by remote control, he still checked all four doors and the boot, before looking round for any likely car thieves. But apart from lonely figures on the track between blocks and metro, there was no one about.
7
Ivan Lvovich returned later than expected, having met someone in a bar.
News of a bar in the vicinity prompted Nik to raise the question of money.
âOf course. I forgot.â
Reaching into an inner pocket, Ivan Lvovich produced an envelope.
âSomething to be going on with, and why not adjourn to the bar.Drinks on me. Just one thing, though, before we go. If youâre not happy, Nik, about what Iâve said so far, you can back out, go to Saratov, live your own life, so long as you remain bound to secrecy.â
âIâm quite happy,â Nik responded, putting on his jacket.
Ivan Lvovich smiled.
âCome on, letâs go.â
Ivan Lvovich ordered, and they sat out on the terrace overlooking the river. The air was fresh and invigorating. He would come back here on his own, Nik decided. It was a pleasant spot.
âTo our joint success!â said Ivan Lvovich raising his squat tumbler of vodka.
Nik downed his in a gulp, before noticing that Ivan Lvovich had merely sipped his.
âIâll get you another.â
A young couple came and stood gazing down at the full moon reflected in the river.
âYou must bring your wife here,â Ivan Lvovich was saying when his mobile rang.
âFine,â he said, with the phone to his ear. âItâs now 21.45 â¦Â Understood.â
Popping a slice of lemon into his mouth and his mobile into his pocket, he took another sip of vodka.
âThings are warming up,â he said wearily. âBut no rush. Weâve half an hour before we go into town.â
âFor what?â Nik asked, only to receive a disapproving look.
Taking another slice of lemon, Ivan Lvovich consulted his watch.
âLike films?â he asked, his friendly self again.
âWhy?â
âYouâll see.â
8
Shooting lights at amber, sometimes at red, the dark blue BMW sped through the deserted streets of Kiev to a backstreet in Podol.
Ordering his driver to wait, Ivan Lvovich hustled Nik along to where, around the corner, a minivan bearing the legend âMiller Ltd Suspended Ceilingsâ was parked. The driver opened the rear doors, and they climbed into something resembling a tiny television studio.
Ivan Lvovich passed Nik a collapsible stool.
âSit and watch.â
One monitor showed a corridor with coat pegs and a mirror; another, a kitchen with a round table, an enormous refrigerator and refinements seen only in such few Western magazines as reached Dushanbe. A third showed a middle-aged man bound to a rocking chair. On the corridor monitor a door â probably the bathroom â opened and a man in jeans and a T-shirt came out carrying a shoulder bag, looked at himself in the mirror, smiled, and passing out of camera view, reappeared in the room with the rocking-chair. From his bag he took an audio cassette which he inserted in a radio cassette recorder.
Ivan Lvovich called for sound.
âComing,â said the young man at the control-panel.
âCan you get it louder?â
Background hiss broken by rhythmical beats, then, from the prisoner, a feeble âThat was nothing to do with me! Nothing! Iâve been framed!â
âCan happen to the best,â said the other man, squatting and taking from his bag an object dangling wires. These he connected to