SPECIALISTS AT WORK
‘No doubt about it – it’s suicide,’ said Moscow criminal police investigator Sergei Nikiforovich Subbotin, pressing the yoke of his spectacles into the bridge of his nose in his habitual manner and smiling as if in apology. ‘This time, Erast Petrovich, your hypothesis has not been confirmed.’
Fandorin couldn’t believe his ears.
‘Are you joking? A man ripped open his own stomach and then, all on his own, locked the door from the outside and hung the key on the board?’
Subbotin giggled in acknowledgement of the joke. He blotted his sparse white hair with a handkerchief – it was getting close to dawn and he had already put in several hours of intense work.
‘I’ll follow your method, Erast Petrovich, and run through the points. You told me that Cornet Limbach had no reason to commit suicide, since he had won a victory in love. According to your information the artiste Altairsky had bestowed her… er… favours on him, is that correct?’
‘Yes,’ Fandorin confirmed in an icy tone. ‘The cornet had no reason to do away with himself, especially in such an appalling manner.’
‘I’m afraid you are mistaken,’ Sergei Nikiforovich said with an even more guilty air, embarrassed at having to correct his former mentor. A very long time ago, twenty years in fact, the young police officer had begun his career under the stewardship of State Counsellor Fandorin. ‘While you accompanied the body to the autopsy room in order to establish the precise time of death I did a bit of investigating here. The artiste concerned and the hussar were not involved in an intimate relationship. The rumours are without any substance. You know what a stickler I am, I established the fact for certain.’
‘They were n-not involved?’
Erast Petrovich’s voice shook.
‘Absolutely not. And what’s more, I spoke to a friend of Limbach’s on the telephone, and the witness claimed that just recently the cornet had been driven distracted by the torments of love and he had declared repeatedly that he would kill himself. That, as you say, is one.’
‘And what will be two?’
Subbotin took out his notebook.
‘Witnesses Gullibin and Nonarikin testified that on the night when Limbach found his way into Madam Altairsky’s hotel room, they heard him on the other side of the door, threatening to rip open his stomach in the Japanese manner if she rejected him. That is two for you.’ He turned over the page. ‘In some way as yet undetermined, Limbach got hold of a pass and sneaked into the dressing room of the queen of his heart. I believe he wanted to punish his tormentor when she returned in triumph after the performance, smothered in flowers. Having lost all hope that his feelings might be requited, Limbach desired to kill himself in the terrible Japanese manner. Like a samurai committing hiri-kiri for a geisha.’
‘Hara-kiri.’
‘Isn’t that what I said? He carves himself open with the knife, suffering appalling agony, he’s bleeding to death and he tries to write her name – “Liza” – on the door, but his strength runs out.’
Getting carried away, the investigator started demonstrating how it had all happened: here was the cornet clutching at his stomach, writhing in agony, dipping his finger into his wound, starting to write on the door and falling. Well, Sergei Nikiforovich didn’t actually fall, it’s true – the floor of the dressing room had just been washed and it hadn’t dried out yet.
‘By the way, the incomplete name is three.’ Subbotin pointed to the door which, on his instructions, had been left untouched. ‘What did the coroner tell you? When did death occur?’
‘At approximately half p-past ten, plus or minus a quarter of an hour. That is, during the third act. The death agony lasted no more than ten minutes.’
‘There, you see. He waited until the performance was almost over. Otherwise there was a risk that someone else, and not Madam Lointaine, might glance into the dressing room, and then the entire effect would have been ruined.’
Fandorin sighed.
‘What’s wrong with you, Subbotin? All your deductions and the reconstruction aren’t worth a bent farthing. Have you forgotten that the door was locked? That someone must have locked it with a key?’
‘Limbach himself locked it. Obviously he was afraid that if he couldn’t bear the pain, he would go running out in his semi-conscious state. I found the key – or rather, a duplicate – in the pocket of the suicide’s breeches. Here it is – and that is four.’
A key glinted on the investigator’s open hand. Fandorin took out his magnifying glass. Yes indeed, it really was a duplicate, and one made recently – the marks of a file could still be seen on the bit. There was not the slightest trace of triumph or – God forbid! – gloating in the investigator’s voice, only calm pride in a job honestly done.
‘I checked, Erast Petrovich. The keys of the actors’ dressing rooms hang on a board, unattended. The rooms are not usually locked anyway, so the keys are almost never used. Limbach could have had a copy made during some previous visit.’
And Fandorin sighed again. Subbotin was rather a good detective, thorough. Not quite the sharpest pencil in the box, but a police officer didn’t have to be. He could have gone far. Unfortunately, after Erast Petrovich was obliged to resign, things had not worked out well for the young man. In post-Fandorin times quite different qualities were required for a policeman to make a successful career: delivering elegant reports and currying favour with superiors. Sergei Nikiforovich had not learned to do either of these from the state counsellor. Fandorin had always laid more emphasis on teaching him how to gather evidence and question witnesses. And here was the result of an incorrect education; the man was already past forty, and still only a titular counsellor, and he was always given the least advantageous, dead-end cases, which gave him no chance to distinguish himself. If not for Erast Petrovich’s direct request, there was no way that Subbotin would ever have been entrusted with a plum job like a bloody drama in a fashionable theatre. After all, the newspapers would all write about it, and he would become an instant celebrity. Provided, of course, that he didn’t make a mess of things.
‘And now you l-listen to me. Your theory of a “Japanese-style suicide” won’t hold water. I assure you that no one b-but a samurai from a previous age, who has prepared for such a death since he was a child, is capable of performing hara-kiri on himself. Except perhaps for a violent madman in a fit of acute insanity. But Limbach was not insane. That is one. Secondly: did you notice the angle of the cut? No? Well, that is why I went t-to the autopsy room with the body, to study the wound properly. The blow was delivered by a man who was standing face to face with Limbach. At the moment of the attack the cornet was sitting d-down, in other words he was not expecting the attack at all. As you recall, a substantial pool of blood collected beside the overturned chair. That is where the blow was struck. That is three. Now pay attention to the knife. What kind is it?’
Sergei Nikiforovich picked up the weapon and turned it over in his hands.
‘An ordinary clasp knife.’
‘Precisely. The Moscow b-bandits’ favourite tool, which is replacing the sheath knife in their arsenal. Using a weapon like this, a slicing blow can be delivered with no backswing, on the sly. You open it behind your back or quietly slip it out of a sleeve, so that your victim doesn’t see it. The strike is made holding it in a closed fist with the handle towards the thumb. Let me have it, I’ll show you how it’s done.’