“It sounds as if it was a moving experience,” said Rostnikov, adjusting his leg.
“I did not kill Vladimir Kinotskin,” Primazon said, suddenly quite serious. “As you can tell, I have great reverence for history, for the past. History is my passion. What else is there but family and history? I would not kill a man before the house of Lermontov.”
“Would the lobby of the Russia Hotel be an acceptable location for murder?” asked Rostnikov.
“Oh yes, certainly. It has no history, not yet. We will all be long gone like the czar and his family before it deserves such reverence,” said Primazon.
“But you know who did kill Kinotskin?” asked Rostnikov.
“I know why,” the man said with a smile, “and I am waiting for you to find out who.”
“Then,” said Rostnikov, “let us now ask why.”
“Splendid,” said Primazon, sitting back, still whispering. “Then that will leave us only who. Perhaps I should tell you who I am and what I do.”
“Perhaps,” agreed Rostnikov.
“My task is not to kill cosmonauts but to protect them,” he said. “My small group is part of the Space Security Organization. We protect the launch sites and villages where cosmonauts and visiting astronauts and others are trained and housed. My small group is assigned to the present and past cosmonauts.”
“Who would want to harm cosmonauts?” asked Iosef.
Primazon looked up as if he had forgotten the younger “presence.
“Who? I think we have ample evidence that someone would, don’t we? We have a murdered cosmonaut and others who have died under some suspicion. Why would one want to harm cosmonauts? Terrorism? Insanity? Revenge?”
“Revenge for what?” asked Iosef.
Primazon shrugged. “We have a list of hundreds in the space-exploration program, a list that goes back before 1957. Hundreds have been terminated for incompetence, mental illness, as scapegoats for missions or experiments that went wrong. See, I am being honest with you.”
“I appreciate that, Anatoli Ivanovich,” said Rostnikov.
“Then I will be even more honest,” the umbrella man said, still whispering. “I have not done a particularly good job in the current situation. Only one cosmonaut remains in Russia of the six involved in that troubled mission. The two who are out of the country are being protected by my colleagues.”
With this, Primazon reached into his jacket pocket and dramatically pulled out a photograph, which he turned toward Porfiry Petrovich.
“Tsimion Vladovka,” said Primazon.
Rostnikov had the same photograph in his small suitcase. He had looked at it, memorized each feature and detail. Primazon turned the photo to look at it himself as if for the first time and said, examining the picture, “I must save him, you must find him. There is none better than you for such a task, or so I have heard. I’ll be honest again. If something were to happen to Tsimion Vladovka, I might well end my career by cleaning the statues of poets and authors in the squares of Moscow.”
“And since you could not hide in such a small village as Kiro-Stovitsk …” Rostnikov began.
“… I decided to face you honestly,” finished Primazon, patting his umbrella.
“And at some time, if we find Vladovka and he is safely back in Moscow and under your protection, and I tell you who killed Vladimir Kinotskin? …” Rostnikov tried again.
“Then perhaps I will be in a position to tell you why someone does not want these cosmonauts to live,” said Primazon. “I must ask. Why have you come here?”
“Instinct,” said Rostnikov.
Primazon nodded in understanding.
“Instinct and a belief that Vladovka would not disappear forever, if the choice of disappearance were his own, without making some contact with his family,” said Rostnikov.
“Yes, yes,” said the umbrella man, nodding his head. “He is such a man. I understand. It might be dangerous to see them in person, but such a man … Well, is there some place we can spend the night here? It’s getting late and you have work to do.”
“I don’t know,” said Rostnikov. “Perhaps Iosef could …”
“No, no,” said Primazon, rising and holding out his hand, palm open and facing down to keep father and son in place. “I will take that responsibility. I am, after all, the intruder, and I owe them some explanation.”
“And what will that be?” asked Rostnikov.
“Something novel, unexpected,” the man said, tucking his umbrella under his arm. “I shall tell them the truth. Are you coming?
“We will be there in a moment,” said Rostnikov. “My leg is causing me a bit of difficulty. Iosef can help.”
“Your leg? Oh, yes, I had forgotten. War injury. You have medals?”
“I have medals,” said Rostnikov. “Everyone has medals.”
Primazon nodded again and went down the short aisle and out the doors, closing them behind him.
“There is nothing wrong with your leg?” said Iosef.
“Nothing,” said Rostnikov, still sitting.
“Then? …”
“I wanted to talk to you briefly before we join our new friend on the street as he charms the populace.”
“You have some idea of where Tsimion Vladovka might be?”
“Yes.”
“And,” Iosef continued, looking at his father, who was now rising, “you know who killed Vladimir Kinotskin?”
“Oh, yes,” said Rostnikov, patting his son on the cheek. “The killer just walked out of here with a smile on his face and an umbrella under his arm.”
Chapter Nine
There were three rooms for guests above the shop of Alexander Podgorny. They were all small bedrooms that had belonged to the Podgorny children, who had moved to St. Petersburg and Moscow years before. In one room, the man who called himself Anatoli Ivanovich Primazon was supposedly sleeping. In the center room, Iosef lay in bed, reading the mystery his father had given him. He was not particularly enjoying it, not because he thought it bad, but because his thoughts were with Elena and the man who his father had labeled a murderer, the man in the room next to his. Iosef’s gun was on the small table next to the bed. The light was too dim and the bed too soft.
Porfiry Petrovich was not in the third room. He had quietly asked if Podgorny had a telephone. The storekeeper had said that there was one in the shop, right outside the two rooms behind the shop area where Podgorny lived with his wife.
Rostnikov paid him generously in advance for the call and volunteered to pay now for the room.
“For the phone, yes,” said Podgorny. “For the room, no. You are our guests.”
Rostnikov asked for a receipt that he could hand to Pankov for reimbursement, which might take weeks and might never come.
It took him ten minutes to complete the call to Elena and Sasha, who were in her cubicle at Petrovka. Neither had reason to go home. For Elena, Iosef was eighty miles outside of St. Petersburg. For Sasha, his family was in the Ukraine. They spoke, knowing the conversation was being recorded for later listening by the Yak.
ROSTNIKOV: I have a window in my room. There is a moon and nothing as far as I can see but flat fields and a single tractor. Melancholy and quite beautiful. And Iosef is fine.
ELENA: We did not get the negatives back. I-we, Sasha and I-think that the thief expected a trap. But he did make a mistake. He made a strange call, talked about chess. We questioned some of the players in the park by the chess bench where the exchange was to take place.
ROSTNIKOV:-A name? Description?
ELENA: Perhaps from a beggar at the metro station. An agitated man gave her some coins, the most she has ever been given. He did not wait for thanks but hurried away. Normally, she would have gone back to the business of begging, but the amount had been so much that she watched him hurry to the phone. Her description of him is quite good. That is the description we gave to the chess players in the park. Most did not want to talk. A few said they thought it was a young man they knew only as Kon, who sometimes plays in the park. They said he is a nervous type, good player but impatient. The way to beat him is to wait him out, take your time until he makes a mistake.