Zenin’s smile faltered. “Not our decision. Provably ordered, by the presidential enquiry.”
“We’re still being sucked in too close,” warned Olga.
She was waiting directly outside George Bendall’s ward when Charlie arrived, with the two lawyers. Five chairs were set out in readiness in the room already emptied of guards who hovered further along the corridor. Beyond the woman Charlie saw Bendall was in a chair, too. Charlie was sure the bandaging on the man’s leg as well as the swathe around his shoulder and arm was less than the previous day.
Handing Charlie the list Olga said, “Names you might want to put to him, they’re the men moved out of Bendall’s unit in the first six months of his army service.”
“You haven’t put them to him already?” demanded Charlie, at once. They had to have been. Perhaps they had but she wanted Bendall’s failure or refusal to respond to be on his recording, not on their no longer shared duplicate.
“I’ve only just got them,” Olga replied, honestly. “Only just arrived here myself.”
Would she risk the lie being exposed by Bendall protesting he’d already been asked? It wasn’t important, Charlie dismissed. He had them, to put to the man. He nodded further into Bendall’s room. “Have you interviewed him today?”
Olga shook her head, speaking more to Arkadi Noskov. “Professor Agayan and two colleagues conducted their psychiatric assessment this morning-I’ll see you get them, of course. But I haven’t taken my questioning any further.”
Charlie saw Anne’s eyebrows lift at the name familiarity but didn’t give any reaction himself. He wouldn’t have imagined the previous day’s British protests would have brought about such a totalreversal. Another reflection that wasn’t important. He ushered the two women into the room ahead of him and set up his tape. Noskov overflowed beside him.
“You’re looking better, Georgi.” The schedule was again for Charlie to lead the questioning, although for the lawyers to come in at once if there was something they wanted to pick up upon.
The man’s eyes went to each of them in turn but he didn’t respond. Assessing his audience for the latest performance, Charlie decided. “You feeling OK?”
Bendall shrugged.
“Can’t imagine someone like you found this morning’s meeting too difficult?”
“Didn’t know what they were talking about: rubbish, most of it.”
“That’s what I told you before, you’re cleverer than any of us. But we do need to understand more ourselves, to make it easier for others to get the complete picture of what it’s all about.”
“They’ll find out.”
“It’s the complete picture that’s important,” joined in Noskov. “We mustn’t leave anything out.”
“I don’t intend to.”
It had been a useful interruption, judged Charlie. “It just could happen. Your not being able to remember the name of the man the KGB put into the army with you, for instance. People might not believe that if you can’t recall a name, think you were making it up.” Bendall’s face darkened and his mouth opened for the shout but before he could Charlie said, “We don’t think that, of course. That’s why we’ve done what we can to help you.”
Bendall’s mouth closed but the expression remained suspicious. He needed to be aware of every expression, Charlie realized. Which he couldn’t do and read out the fifteen names at the same time. Without looking at Anne he passed the list across the bed to her, at the same time saying, “We’ve got some names that might jog your memory. People who were in the army with you.”
Anne’s take-over was seamless. “Kirril Semenovich Kashva?” she began.
Bendall remained blank faced, blank eyed.
“Yevgenni Iosifovich Ibrimacimov?”
No reaction whatsoever.
“Sergei Leonidovich Golovkin?”
“Lost his nerve,” broke in Bendall. “Was good at first, had a good eye. But then he developed a shake. Can’t be accurate if you shake.”
“Not like you,” flattered Charlie, wanting to break the recitation.
“No, not like me,” smiled Bendall.
“Ilya Aleksandrovich Dolya?” resumed Anne.
Bendall shook his head, swirling the lank hair. There was no grimace of discomfort from the injury.
“Boris Sergeevich Davidov?”
There was a recognition! Almost imperceptible, a fraction of a second, but Charlie was sure he’d seen the movement in Bendall’s eyes, the vaguest tightening around the man’s mouth.
“Igor Mikhailevich Amosov?” continued Anne, her concentration entirely on the list.
“Had a breakdown, like Sergei Leonidovich. Weak,” sneered Bendall.
“Yakov Ivanovich Lomakin,” persisted Anne, to Bendall’s further head shake. After the following two identities the man stopped bothering even with that rejection, listening but giving no response. The only exception was with the last of the fifteen-Vladimir Grigorevich Pigorov-whom Bendall once more dismissed as weak, unable physically to endure the training.
“So the man the KGB put in with you isn’t one of these?” pressed Charlie.
“Not that I recognized.”
Charlie was sure that both Olga and Anne stirred, at the qualification. He said, “You would have recognized it, if he had been among them, wouldn’t you?”
“Maybe.”
“Do you want us to go through the list again?” offered Anne.
“Not so soon.”
Wrong to push him, remembered Charlie. “Would you like a copy of the list, to look through on your own?”
“Yes,” accepted Bendall at once. “Let me have a copy to take my time over.”
“There’s something that we can’t understand, need you to help us with,” said Noskov. “You only had two bullets and we know that five were fired. So there had to be someone else. Did you know there was to be someone else?”
Charlie tensed for the outburst, remembering the hysteria of the American interview, but instead of answering Bendall softly began the dirge, his eyes fixed somewhere above their heads. Hurriedly Charlie said, “Tell us about February 18, Georgi. The Thursday night Vasili Gregorovich died. You were with him that night, weren’t you?”
The humming stopped. “All of us.”
“The brotherhood?” prompted Charlie.
“Drinking. Singing.”
“Where were you drinking?” Don’t anyone interrupt, try to take over, thought Charlie.
“It was a good night. All there.”
“All six of you?” chanced Charlie.
“Felt good,” avoided Bendall.
“Everyone drunk?”
“Everyone drunk,” agreed Bendall. “Anatoli Nikolaevich’s birthday.”
Charlie wished the others in the room would stop shifting, not wanting Bendall’s reverie broken by the slightest distraction. Keeping his own voice an even, dull monotone, wanting only to stroke the strings, Charlie said, “A lot of toasts?”
“Smashed the glasses, the first time. Traditionally.”
“Vasili Gregorovich was all right to drive, though? Knew how to drink?”
“Best drinker among us.”
“Why didn’t you go home to Timiryazev with Vasili? You often did, didn’t you.”
“Don’t remember. I was drunk. Someone did.”
“Who! Give us his name,” abruptly demanded Olga Melnik, strident-voiced.
Bendall physically jumped and blinked, several times, as if being awakened and the fury surged through Charlie. Anne groaned, audibly,and that annoyed Charlie too. Bendall looked carefully, alertly, from one to the other, smiling, and Charlie’s anger went as soon as it had come.
It was Noskov who tried to retrieve the mood, the thunderous voice soothing, encouraging. “You’re doing well, Georgi. We’re getting somewhere. Tell us about the funeral. You all went to that, didn’t you?”
“How do you know?” Bendall was still smiling.
“I don’t,” said the lawyer. “I want you to tell me about it.”
“Not the time.”
“We’ve got all the time in the world, I told you that,” misunderstood Noskov.
“Not the place,” corrected Bendall.