Ready to go – except for the light out there. The sun had gone down but the moon wasn’t going to set for another hour yet. At this time of year and latitude it was rising only a few minutes later each morning but setting later by more like half an hour.
It had been a day of rest, talk, preparation. With an element of wishful thinking. You had to be ready to leave this place tonight – which meant assuming that the steamboat would be there and usable and not too effectively guarded. It would be marvellous if it turned out like this, but…
But…
Waiting in the Hole now. They’d had supper up in the kitchen and spent several hours there off and on, but it was a pointless risk, really. If soldiers or Cheka came to the coachhouse door you’d have to pass through there to get to the trapdoor, and if the visitors were in a hurry – suspected there might be intruders, for instance – and forced that door…
And the women had been living like this for months.
He knew them a lot better now. He and the Count, too, probably understood each other better than they had before. He’d told him this morning, down in this Hole before breakfast – getting it over quickly because it did have to be stated and clear between them – that he had no doubt whatsoever that the story about the Tsar’s daughters had been a lie invented solely for Nikolai Solovyev’s own purposes.
‘Bob – I think you should be careful what you say. The message I received—’
‘No, Nick. Don’t bother – please… Look, if you want to have this argument in public, up there with the others, I don’t mind. But otherwise let’s just have it understood between us, then forget it until we get back. Then, you’ll have to answer for it – that’s what I’m telling you. I might also tell you that personally I don’t blame you all that much: I’m not sure that in your shoes I wouldn’t have been inclined to do something like it. And I am sorry about your mother, Nick. But this has cost two lives already, and a ship, and – well, that’s it, when we get back I’ll be telling the truth as I see it… All right?’
He’d sulked for a while, pretending resentment at being called a liar, but seemed to have snapped out of it now. Might well have decided how he’d bluff his way through, when – or if – the time came.
As for the others: Irina was – well, complicated. But in some ways understandably so. And Maroussia was fantastic – shrewd as anything, apparently fearless and utterly dependable in her loyalty to – or love for – the Solovyevs. While Nadia – Nadia, he thought, was – well, something else again.
He was wearing a knife on his belt in a leather sheath which she’d cobbled together for him this morning. Maroussia’s knife, actually, out of a kitchen drawer. He had his Admiralty-issue seaman’s knife, but it was a heavy thing with a short folding blade – designed for cutting ropes not throats. There was a marlin-spike on it as well, but as a weapon it wouldn’t have been much good. This kitchen knife, one of several that she’d offered, had a sharp, tough blade just under five inches long and a wooden haft that fitted his hand well; but the only way to carry it would be in a sheath, which Nadia had now made for him out of an old leather slipper.
The Count and Irina had been down in the Hole, raising a lot of dust while inspecting the family treasures which Maroussia’s late husband Ivan had stored in there for them. Irina doubtless taking the chance of an intimate family conversation, too – if Bob’s estimate of her was anything like accurate.
Sliding the knife into the sheath… ‘It’s perfect, Nadia. Thank you very much.’
‘Your belt will go through those slots.’
‘Right.’ He’d put it down and taken his belt off. ‘No time like the present…’
‘Are you expecting to have to kill people – really?’ Maroussia had half-turned from the stove to hear his answer. She’d been stirring two pots of soup – one large and one smaller, contents of both mainly turnip – which they and also the Czech prisoners in the cells would be having for supper. Further rations – dried fish and cheese – were to be available either on their return from the reconnaissance, or if they were leaving tonight, to be taken along for consumption en route. The point being that if they were leaving tonight, Bob wouldn’t be returning from the reconnaissance, he’d be staying down there to get steam up in the boat. Nick would be coming back to the coachhouse, but he wouldn’t.
He’d answered Nadia’s question. ‘We’re not setting out with that purpose. But if there’s opposition – can’t very well take prisoners, can we?’
‘I suppose not. But are you so confident that it’s you and Nick who’ll do the killing – if there is any?’
He’d nodded. ‘We have the advantage of what’s called the element of surprise. We know we’re coming, and they don’t.’
‘Yes. I see.’ That same interested but oddly impersonal look, which he’d noticed last night.
And just as well – in all the circumstances.
‘Very kind of you, Nadia.’ Threading his belt through the slots she’d cut in the leather, then buckling it on again and slipping the knife back into the sheath. His Service revolver in its webbing holster lay on the table amongst pots and pans and cooking tools; he’d asked Nadia or Maroussia – either – ‘Is there somewhere safe I can hide this pistol?’
Aren’t you taking it?’
‘I’d say not! Might as well send up rockets… Nick has a pistol, incidentally, he’d be wise to leave that behind too.’
‘All right. I’ll remind him, if you don’t.’ She picked up the revolver. ‘Heavy… Is it loaded?’
‘No, I took the shells out. Here…’
‘You’ll want it with you when we leave, I suppose?’
‘Yes, definitely… Could you bring it – or make sure Nick does?’
‘Of course.’
‘You’re a very practical sort of person, aren’t you?’ Studying her: half-smiling, intrigued by her. Aware meanwhile of Maroussia’s short, stocky figure just beyond her, at the stove, as motionless as if rooted there. A very intelligent and observant old woman, he reminded himself: and resourceful – as was this tall, dark girl, who was in her own way rather elegant, even in old, patched and in places threadbare clothes… The grey eyes holding his: he’d wondered whether she might have been seeing him as he saw her – observing his detachment, a similarly friendly but distant interest, from precisely that same distance… Distance, like beauty, being in the beholder’s eye? Reduced by wishful thinking, increased by oversensitivity?
But like a sheet of thick glass between them. You could smash it – but you’d do so at your peril. The fact being that she was engaged to Nick, who seemed prone to jealousy to a fairly bizarre degree: and with that other bone of contention – in temporary abeyance but still there between them – and the fact you were going to have to work together, as likely as not fight together…
Remembering those strained minutes last night: Nadia’s contemptuous ‘And you’re mad enough to imagine I might – what, like one of them?’
Because she worked for the Cheka boss, and the work – as Irina had pointed out – sometimes extended into the late evenings. Crazy… And – Bob guessed – he’d have to be aware of it, simply not able to help himself. With – a guess, this, Bob’s own theory based on one or two small clues – Irina making the worst of it, preying on that weakness. The main clue being that little dig she hadn’t been able to resist: Nights too, sometimes… To which Nadia had reacted angrily but – clue number two – without surprise. Then there was the recollection of the Count having told him that he’d made his long and dangerous trip to Petrograd to see these girls and ensure that when his mother arrived to collect Irina they’d take Nadia along as well. The implication being that this wouldn’t otherwise have been guaranteed, that Irina might have left with Mama, leaving her close friend and her brother’s fiancée to the wolves.
One had also to remember that more recently the possessive sister had been cooped up for months on end, mostly underground and with a dying mother, while Nadia had been free to come and go. Not that ‘free’ would be the most apposite word for it.
‘You only work for the head man, you said. In a small room all by yourself?’
‘At the back of the house.’ She nodded. ‘Must have been a butler’s pantry once.’
‘And you only see this head man.’
‘Normally, yes. He brings me the work, gives me any instructions there are to give, and comes to fetch it later. He’s – all right. To me, anyway. The other two – Khitrov and Orudzhev – Khitrov’s loathsome. A thug – that’s a nice word for him. One time, he nearly…’
She’d shaken her head.
‘Nearly what?’
‘It doesn’t matter. Lesechko happened to arrive back at just that moment.’
‘And – Lesechko himself…’
‘No.’ Her dark hair swirled again. ‘I don’t believe he has any – ambitions of that sort. He’s – I suppose the word’s pragmatic. He needs my secretarial services – so I’m safe – as long as he does need them.’
Maroussia had clattered heavy lids on to the pots and turned away from the stove, ‘I’ll be upstairs, a minute or two.’ Pausing, looking hard at Bob: ‘Hear anyone at the door – down below quick as rabbits, eh?’
‘I’d better go down anyway.’
A nod: as if she’d been thinking exactly that. Female antennae quivering, no doubt… She’d left them. He murmured, hearing her clumping up the stairs, ‘Irina is rather possessive of her brother – am I right?’
She rolled her eyes: ‘Rather is an understatement.’
‘Had a rough time, though. Stuck inside here – and her mother dying?’
‘That’s true. She’s had a dreadful time… You know the saying, no light at the end of the tunnel – there hasn’t been even a glimmer. Except that after my brother Boris had left with the message, there was just the faint hope – hope, and faith – for as long as those sources of resilience can last in a hole like this one, and they were getting weaker all the time – you can imagine… But for that same reason we couldn’t leave – even if there’d been any way to leave or anywhere to go that could be any safer than we’ve been here. We’ve even wondered how long this could last – suppose we’re still here when Maroussia dies? Imagine! And then last night – so suddenly – after so long with no hope at all…’
‘Bad enough for you, but in some way worse for Irina?’
‘Yes.’ A nod. ‘Yes… but – they’re a little crazy, you know.’ Her whisper was only just audible. ‘I’d never realized, before.’
‘But you’re going to marry him?’
‘He believes so. All I’ve ever promised is I won’t marry anyone else until all these horrors are over.’ She’d shrugged. ‘In any case, what’s going to happen to any of us – in five minutes even, let alone by tomorrow morning—’
‘What’s going to happen, Nadia, is we’re going to get you out of here. But even if Nick’s having his problems at the moment, you know, there’s a lot to be said for him. For instance he’s here – he’s come for you – believe me, it took some doing. And he’s had a hell of a war, one way or another. Even before the revolution, let alone this last year – well, that long march south, Alekseev’s—’
‘I’m sure of his – affection, and I’ve no doubt he’s a fine soldier and a brave man, but—’
‘Oh, here you are…’
Irina, in the doorway. In her home-made felt slippers she’d come up from the Hole and across the coachhouse to this door as soundlessly as a ghost. Nadia rising to the occasion with considerable presence of mind, telling Bob – in the same low tone of voice and with only a glance towards Irina, as if not wanting to be interrupted in what she’d been telling him, ‘It’s not a Cheka headquarters as such, it’s a military section, you see, with the function of maintaining close surveillance of all army units, especially of commanders and staffs. They have individuals and teams in the field, and these three here – the man I work for and his two assistants – administer the system, collect the reports and collate and analyse them, send weekly summaries to Moscow, and much the same the other way about – receiving and passing out Moscow’s orders and pronouncements, and so forth. So yes, there’s a lot of clerical work, and that’s what they need me for. Whatever else they get up to – these Czechs Maroussia says they’ve got now, for instance – I don’t get told and frankly I’d sooner not know. Ask Maroussia, if you’re interested, she sees them twice a day.’
She’d looked up at Irina, finally. ‘Hello, there. How are the Solovyev heirlooms? Gathering dust and cobwebs?’
Still waiting for the damn moon… Remembering that he’d asked her later, when the others had been with them and they’d been planning tonight’s excursion, what she knew about patrols or sentries around the house and grounds… ‘When you come and go between here and the house, for instance, d’you see any?’
‘I never go near the front of the house. I use the back door, and the room I work in is at the back. There’s always a sentry on that door, certainly… The only ones I’ve seen on the move have been – I’ve assumed – going to or coming from the south gate.’
The Count had explained: ‘The gate Maroussia didn’t bring us in by.’ Asking Maroussia then, ‘Sentries at the front of the house – d’you know?’
‘Oh.’ She’d seemed to shiver… ‘Yes. Sentries there. Two, I think. But I come and go by the back door – same as this one…’
This talk had been in the Hole – late forenoon, before a lunchtime snack of black bread and goat’s cheese. Bob had asked Maroussia, ‘Are there guards on the cells where the prisoners are?’
‘Inside, in the cellar. One man always, sometimes two.’
‘Cheka?’
‘No. Soldiers, under the Cheka’s orders. Oh, the Cheka swine show their faces sometimes. But not on the guard duty.’
‘How about in the grounds – woods, the meadows, everywhere. When you go to get your donkey in, for instance, d’you see any?’
‘Sometimes. I couldn’t say where, or what times. But yes, sometimes.’
‘They live in the house, do they?’
‘The Cheka?’ Her monkey eyes had shifted to Nadia for a moment… ‘Yes. Soldiers too. They lie about on the floors, like pigs.’
‘Perhaps because all the furniture’s in this Hole?’
Irina had laughed; but the Count took the comment seriously. ‘Not by any means all of it. Ivan only carried down what he thought were the best pieces.’ He asked Maroussia, ‘Must be quite a lot still in the house?’
‘Not much that isn’t smashed up. And what they’ve left intact is filthy from their boots and cigarettes and God knows what else.’ The little eyes rolled upwards: ‘My little flat’s luxurious compared to the state of your house now, Nikolai Petrovich.’
Then over lunch – at the kitchen table – they’d had the story of the Dowager Countess Solovyeva and her one and only visit from a doctor. It had started from his asking Maroussia, ‘Have the Bolsheviks ever been in here?’
‘Only when these two and Maria Ivanovna were first here. Then, they came.’
‘Cheka?’
‘Lesechko – the head man, the one Nadia works for – and a Red Army person with him. They went away after only a few minutes, and the next day Lesechko came back with the doctor.’
Irina murmured, ‘The only time she saw any doctor.’
‘They didn’t see you, though, Irina?’
‘No. I stayed in the Hole.’ Solovyevski-green eyes flickered towards Nadia. ‘I lived in it. Well – still do… But they’d already seen Nadia, you see, she’d taken Mama outside for a breath of air, and – it was just bad luck. They’d gone out there at Mama’s pleading, that’s the truth… Anyway, there’d have been no point in Nadia hiding, after that, and we wanted a doctor for Mama, so – Maroussia had this idea of saying Nadia was her daughter.’
‘What about identification?’
Nadia had explained: ‘I showed my papers. In the name of Nadia Schegorova – papers Boris had got for me in Petrograd. Maria Ivanovna was never asked for hers, it was enough that Maroussia told them she was her sister – nobody disbelieves Maroussia, you see, that honest face?’
Maroussia had shrugged. ‘I’m the loony, see.’
‘But also the doctor informed them that she hadn’t long to live, so—’
‘The doctor—’ Irina had cut in, telling Bob – as she’d already described it to her brother, evidently, in one of the long private talks they’d had – ‘this doctor knew us. Knew Mama, would have known me if he’d seen me, and knew full well that Nadia was not Mama’s daughter. And of course that Mama wasn’t Maroussia’s sister either. Quite a young man, apparently; his name’s Martynov. Face like a full moon, they said – round and white. May not have been quite so white before he saw Mama, of course.’
‘He didn’t say anything – obviously… But was this Cheka person present?’
‘Well, not when he was examining her!’
Nadia put in: ‘He and I and Maroussia were here, in this kitchen. Maria Ivanovna was in Maroussia’s bed upstairs. And this was when he suggested I should work for them – he’d checked my papers, and I’d told him I’d been doing secretarial work—’
‘The doctor—’ Irina again – ‘Mama told us when they’d gone that he’d burst into floods of tears. He hadn’t been our regular doctor or known us very long – he’d been called in once or twice for minor family emergencies – children’s ailments, she said… But he wept, all the time he was examining her the tears were running down his moon face and dripping on to her, she was getting so wet that it made her laugh – she made a funny story out of it, this little doctor crying and his patient giggling…’
‘So…’
‘He told her, ‘Madame, I have to tell you the truth, which is that you’re going to die. There’s nothing I can do to save you, all I can offer is to leave you to die in peace. If it could be called peace… That’s to say, I must warn you that you’ll be in pain. As you are already, I know, but – worse, worse than you’ve ever known. I’ll give the young lady who calls herself your daughter some pills which you shouldn’t take until it’s too bad to stand without – well, some degree of alleviation… But you know, Madame, I couldn’t have you admitted to hospital here. Even if they could do anything to save you at this late stage: and believe me, they could not. While you’d be in a – well, a different kind of danger…’
The Count had murmured, ‘I can’t say I remember him.’
‘Nor did I.’ Irina, shrugging. ‘Neither the name nor the description. I suppose we were too little – he must have been only just qualified, if he’s so young still… But Mama told him she’d tell them she didn’t want to see him or any other doctor again, that she only wanted to be left to die – as he’d said – in peace. This was as much as anything to save him from any further involvement, you see – in a way, returning the favour… But – imagine it, that moment of mutual recognition, and with this Lesechko creature only yards away…’
Getting near the time to start, now. Maroussia had gone out to see how the moon was doing. One would know which way to go – more or less – because when they’d finished lunch Nick had drawn a map – of sorts…
Nadia had teased him: turning it upside down, pretending she couldn’t make sense of it. ‘A map of what, is this?’
‘You don’t appreciate great art when you see it. Look here. Here – Bob…’ He’d used the bottom of a cardboard box as his canvas. ‘See here, now. River. Meadows. House. Two protruding wings on the river frontage – the house faces just about due south. Pillars along the carriage entrance here: then this is terrace, with a big half-circle of balustrade: the meadow, and the willows along the river-bank there. This isn’t to an exact scale, of course… Here at the back of the house, now, this extension contains the storerooms which we’re told have been made into cells.’ He’d glanced at Maroussia. ‘How many Czechs have they got in there?’
‘Two. One’s an officer and one’s a sergeant. The officer looks like an orang-utan.’
‘When did you ever see an orang-utan, Maroussia?’
She told Irina, pointing at the Count, ‘Saw a picture – Nikolai Petrovich showed me, in a book he had, pictures of different animals.’
‘What a memory…’ He was smiling at her. ‘But – as a matter of interest – are there any other prisoners besides the Czechs?’
‘Not unless they’re being starved.’
‘Right… Now, Bob, the storerooms are reached through the upper part of the wine-cellar – this corner of the house, with the old kitchens and so on along the back here. But there’s no door from the outside so there’ll be no sentries in our view from here. This is where we are now – this rectangle is the coachhouse, with the stables along here. Between here and that corner – the storerooms – is about ninety metres. Gives you an idea of the distances – I’ll admit this is not to scale… But now the drive – sweeps round the front of the house, comes also to the north-east corner here – tradesmen’s entrance, used to be – and then on its way to the south entrance – where Nadia’s seen soldiers coming or going – it divides here, to pass on both sides of the coachhouse and stables. Behind us here, with beechwoods then all the way between it and the road – that’s where the burrow under the wall used to be. Here, roughly, the road’s along this edge, I haven’t room to show it…’
‘Why not concentrate on how we get to our steamboat?’
‘All right… As I said – coachhouse here. Joined to the stables this side of us – under Maroussia’s flat, right? Used mostly for firewood and stuff, Maroussia?’
‘The first stable here is Don Juan’s – in winter…’
Bob laughed. ‘That the donkey’s name?’
‘With good reason.’ The Count nodded solemnly. ‘In his younger days, before he was castrated…’
Irina protested, ‘Please, Nikki…’
‘Bob, we come out here. Cobbled yard, grass area beyond it, and the other loop of the drive – the two parts link up down here – can’t show it, isn’t room, but about three hundred yards to the west. Birchwoods there. The point is, we have to cross it. So – out of the door, turn right, along the front of the stables to the end, then a quick dash across this open area to the trees. Southward then through that wood, and over the drive about here. Then we’ll have willows for cover, the willows that fringe the lake. Lake’s here, you see.’
‘And the meadow where they pulled poor old Stukalin apart—’
‘Here. Remember it’s not to scale. Meadow’s bounded by – here, the front of the house, the drive circling round… Willows all along the edge of the lake. And here – east and south-east, the river.’
‘Where’s our steamboat got to, in all this artistry?’
‘Here. At the landing-stage. This.’
‘So we’ll get nearly all the way to it in the cover of those willows…’
Maroussia came back from checking on the light or lack of it; she told them, ‘Moon’s down. It won’t get any darker.’ They got up. Well rested: they’d all slept during the afternoon, in preparation for what might be a very long night. Bob said, ‘Remember about your shoes. Might be doing a lot of walking.’
He hoped they would not have much walking to do. His daydream for this departure was of the lorry pounding southward through the latter part of this night, of locating the skiff in its hiding-place sometime around dawn, lying up in that marsh all day and – weather permitting – pushing off after sunset.
It was a gamble – the weather especially. The odds were long against it ‘permitting’. He wasn’t letting himself think about it. If you did, you’d sit and do nothing. The essential was to get out of here, now.
Nadia had kissed the Count, said with a glance at Bob as she made way for Irina, ‘Good luck, both of you. Be careful.’ Irina was embracing her brother: ‘You’ll be back here soon, I hope.’ Bob meanwhile holding old Maroussia’s hands: ‘I may be back. In case I’m not – well, I can’t thank you enough, and – I wish you would come with us.’
‘Don’t worry about me. Worry about them. Are you ready now?’
In the coachhouse she unfastened the door, pushed it open and stepped out, stood outside it for a minute ostensibly enjoying the cool night air while her small, quick eyes probed the shadows. Bob and the Count waiting inside, behind the door. The girls had stayed down in the Hole.
A whisper: ‘It’s all clear.’
The Count led, Bob following a few yards behind, walking slowly, carefully, along the front of the stables to their right. Pitch black: to start with you were blind.
They stopped at the end of the line of stables. Scents of grass, trees, river. The river’s nearest point from here would be about five or six hundred yards away, but even over that distance you could hear it, the soft but carrying night-time murmur of moving water. And from this angle the side of the house was a high, black cut-out against the eastern sky, with ornate chimney shapes decorating the higher rooftop. The low part, single-storey, to the left – the back of the house – was the extension containing what were now prison cells. All dark there; but there were lights in other windows – big sash windows at two levels, much smaller ones above them, the attic floor which would have been servants’ sleeping quarters.
The Count held Bob’s arm, pointed at a black density of woods about two hundred yards south-west. ‘That way now.’
Taking it slowly, as they’d agreed, treating the darkness like water in a pool across which one had to swim with as little disturbance of its surface as might be possible. Following the Count’s quietly moving figure – knowing that if there were sentries for instance in the edge of those woods they’d be watching you come and you wouldn’t have even a glimpse of them until it was too late.
Off the cobbles now: in ankle-deep grass or weed. He could see the curve of the drive over to his left, where it came after circling the front of the house and led away around the far side of the spinney which they were approaching now. That was where they’d be crossing it, beyond that birchwood spinney. But at this point the drive ran along the edge of the meadow where Grigor Stukalin had had his grisly come-uppance.
One could imagine that scream: hear it in imagination – howl of agony splitting the quiet night…
Christ!
He’d stopped: baffled as to which had come first, the thought or the sound, but realizing in the next second as the breath unlocked in his throat, Owl, not howl… The Count had stopped too, glancing back – no doubt with a grin on his face… Starting off again now but changing direction slightly, aiming for the left-hand edge of the wood as if to skirt around it. It would be a strange experience for him, this clandestine intrusion in a place in which he’d spent so much of his childhood. One could imagine that if it had been one’s own, one’s father’s and forefathers’, there’d be little doubt in one’s mind that a day would come when one would repossess, conceivably live happily ever after.
With Princess Nadia as chatelaine. And Robert Cowan as a guest, in some glorious, peaceful summer.
A guest with an unseemly interest in his hostess.
Trees. The streaky patterns of silver birch.
A whisper: ‘All right, Bob?’
‘Thought that owl was Stukalin.’
‘That owl does it on purpose. Then it falls off the branch laughing… This way now.’
Through the edge of the wood, circling to the left. Better than going straight through – you could see where you were, more or less where you were going. The drive – not visible yet – would be closing in from the left, and you’d follow the curve of it until you had the lake – or rather its fringe of willows – right opposite you, on the drive’s other side. There was hard ground and a crackle of dead leaves underfoot, a breeze stirring the branches. The breeze came from behind – from the north – would be against one, therefore, on the way up-river. Wind and current: he hoped to God the steamboat would be usable. Would be there, to start with.
‘We’ll cross here, Bob.’
The blur of trees over there had to be the willows…
‘Hey—’
Engine-noise – from the right. A motor, and a flicker of light through the trees. And voices…
‘Down!’
Light – headlights, yellowish, flickery beams – with the birch-trunks jet-black verticals against it as it grew. Rattly engine reminiscent of the fishing-station’s lorry, and the lights coming up brighter, closer. Passing now… With drunken voices singing, that and the engine-noise in a peak of sound that was falling and the tail-lights fading, pink sparks finally invisible as the truck bore right around the edge of the meadow. A military truck, its canvas-covered rear section doubtless crowded with the comrades back from their weekend junketing in Astrakhan.
Gone now, anyway. And no more coming, nothing moving, except branches and foliage in the breeze…
‘Come on.’ Trotting: over hard, dry ground, then a turf bank, and stopping again with the willows’ twisted shapes all round them and a glitter of star-reflecting water just beyond. The lake – which Nick had said teemed with mallard… Lights in the north-east – at the house. That truck had stopped at its front, headlights yellowing the Palladian-style frontage, pillars extending from one protruding wing to the other and supporting a stone balcony. There’d be a splendid view from there, over miles of winding river.
‘Some cottage, you have there.’
‘Oh.’ Pausing beside him. ‘Not bad, huh?’
‘Remember I’ll be coming as your guest. Yours and Nadia’s.’
‘Damn sure you will.’ A fist thumped his shoulder. ‘Damn sure!’
‘Let’s get on.’
Slightly uneasy: with a sense of one’s own treachery. The mention of Nadia, and the doubt – from as much as she’d said herself – that she had any real intention of marrying her ‘Nikki’, whom one was following now through the erratically wandering belt of willows. Stukalin’s meadow was open to the left and the house in view across it, the truck’s engine audible again as it drove on and round the house’s south-eastern corner: it was dark again there now, and quiet.
But for heaven’s sake, he was devious enough…
He’d stopped. Pointing ahead, as Bob came up beside him.
That sheen was straight on the Volga’s moving surface. The riverbank sloped down at this point; when the river was high the water would be right up here, the landing-stage hauled in closer, between two lines of timber piles driven into the river-bed, one such barrier at each end of it. You’d need them too, he guessed – when the river was in spate… And that was a steamboat, all right. Not unlike one of the Royal Navy’s steam picket-boats. A tall, thin funnel with a belled top to it. Small wheelhouse, engine-room casing abaft it, where the funnel was – engineroom hatchway would be somewhere there, probably immediately abaft the wheelhouse – then coach-top, and a cabin down there that would be accessible from the open stern. You didn’t have to be any closer to be certain of that layout: a glance from this distance, with a sailor’s eye, was all it took.
No movement, and no lights. He felt for the knife on his belt – ensuring that he could free it quickly when he needed it.
‘Nick, listen… I’ll be quieter on my own. You keep lookout here, give me a whistle if there’s any problem – like people or other boats coming.’
‘All right. And if you need help—’
‘I’ll whistle.’
The timber piles, running like exceptionally large, wide-spaced fenceposts down the slope of bank and into the river, made for good cover en route to the landing-stage. The Count saw Bob’s crouching form melt into invisibility against the farther – downstream – line of them; the steamboat was nearer that end of the stage than this. He turned, went back into the cover of the willows and picked his way along through them, parallel to the bank and the landing-stage, to wait opposite that end of it.
Squatting down, he could still see the top of the funnel and the short, stubby mast above the wheelhouse. And the shine of the river beyond it, some distance out. River noise was loud here: from where it flowed between those piles, swirling around the timbers… This was the main channel, the deepwater one which all the larger ships would use when the river was at its lowest as it was now. On its far side you’d come to a big expanse of currently high-and-dry middle ground and then some other, narrower channels, and beyond them – back on mainland now – Selitrenoe, the railway halt where they’d seen the old man being pistol-whipped.
He started: froze… Then stood up slowly, listening hard…
Movement: rustling movement in the trees behind him – between his present position and the lakeside. Turning to face in that direction: his right shoulder against a willow’s trunk, hand sliding down to the haft of his knife, unsheathing it.
Louder movement: and heavy breathing. A slab of the darkness moved. Big slab…
Puzzled: but knife in hand, crouching, muscles taut…
Then he straightened – in a gust of stifled laughter… ‘Hey – Don Juan! Here, old fellow…’
The animal was motionless again. End-on. Having given him that scare… Could have ended up with a punctured hide – and what might Maroussia have said to that… The knife was back in its sheath now; he left his tree, approached the donkey. ‘It’s me, Don Juan, your old pal Nikolai Petrovich.’ Reaching to pat him. Don Juan had a white streak on his forehead, and it was visible through the darkness at this close range: although one would never have seen his drab-grey bulk if he hadn’t moved. And of course they’d come along the edge of the trees, the meadow edge – maybe fifty feet away, with a lot of willows in between. ‘There, old fellow – have to leave you now…’
The darkness filled. What had seemed like a void was – was not. Bewildering – as if one was hallucinating – like the ground itself rising, humping, here and there: then a man’s voice growled ‘What the devil… Igor, you awake? What’s – who’s that?’
‘You – stay where you are!’
Only the donkey hadn’t moved. Nick Solovyev motionless too now, though. He’d begun to move – with two men in front of him coming up as if materializing out of the roots of trees, he’d sidestepped away, instinctively to put the donkey between himself and them: and now found a third – diminutive, gnome-like – but with a rifle-barrel practically touching his face and a hoarse voice demanding ‘Where’d you spring from, comrade?’
‘Bugger’d have robbed us while we slept. Cut our throats, maybe.’ This one had a heavy local accent. ‘If it hadn’t been for the moke here – trod on my bloody foot…’
‘Where’ve you come from – you?’
Backing away, with his hands halfway up: the attitude of a man willing to surrender but sure he wouldn’t have to once they realized he was a friend, meant them no harm… One of them muttering something about lighting the fornicating lamp, and this other one poking at him with the rifle: ‘Well? Where?’
‘Came in a boat. Only looking for a place to doss down for the night. Why – what’s the fuss, comrades?’
He hadn’t thought about Bob in that moment. His priority had been not to say anything that could possibly point them at the coachhouse.
‘Boat, eh… Where from? Where you headed?’
‘Igor – see if there’s a boat there.’ Crouching over the lamp. ‘Bloody thing…’
Bob had boarded the steamboat right aft, into the wide stern. There was a gangplank further forward, abreast the wheelhouse, but that was all it was, a narrow plank, liable to shift and bang around when weight came on it. In any case access to the cabin would be aft here: and the cabin, which might be inhabited, came first, engineroom second.
Crouching, he crept slowly, as soundlessly as possible, to where the companionway door or doors would be. Finding when he got there that it was a pair of doors, one shut and the other latched open. So there was someone below.
He leant in, listened with his head inside the opening.
Someone was snoring.
He waited. One man snoring didn’t guarantee there weren’t two or three of them on board. Thinking about this, while continuing to listen in the hope of learning more, it occurred to him that the best thing might be to go back, collect Nick and bring him down here. As far as the landing-stage, anyway. Then go down inside. One man would be easy, two should present no great problem, but if there were more than that it might be as well to have some back-up.
Should have brought him down here in the first place.
He’d swung one leg over the side, pausing there for a moment just to check that the crewman was still snoring, when he heard a voice raised – not a shout, not loud, but on a note of alarm. Could only have been Nick calling to him – as agreed, and trying to make him hear but no louder than he had to…
Another voice: low-toned but again urgent-sounding. Bob by this time halfway up the slope of the riverbank, with the timber piles – thick as railway sleepers – on his left. Pausing at the top to listen: then forward again, cautiously… ‘Nick?’
A shout, ‘No, Bob, run.’
‘Hey, you!’
A light had flared in there, farther inside the trees, in about the same moment that he’d heard and recognized Nick’s voice. Then in an overlapping second while his hand was still going to his knife, this voice on his right – close – and the expanding aura of lamplight exposing a dwarflike creature crouching five or six feet to the side with a rifle aimed at his head… ‘Move one inch, comrade, it’ll be your last… Hey, lads, we’ve got another one!’ Bob squinting at the rifle’s unwavering foresight and thinking dazedly that this could not be happening: but then, No sense getting dead – however bloody stupid…