‘You spoke to this policeman soon after nine? Now it’s two. Call your office. See if he’s been in touch again.’
She switched on, got the crackling, and called in.
No. Nothing. No messages.
‘You may be delayed,’ he told her, softly. ‘You want to know if the militia call.’
‘Irina, I may be delayed a little. Let me know if there’s anything — or if the militia call again, right?’
‘Right, Medical Officer.’
He lit a cigarette.
‘Soon they’ll have photographs,’ he mused. ‘Of Khodyan. They won’t match mine.’
‘Things don’t happen so fast here.’
‘Faxes happen fast. They’ll transmit them … Why didn’t they get in touch with Tcherny Vodi? They knew you were going.’
‘They can’t get in touch with Tcherny Vodi. Only the medical office can do that, and on medical business. It’s a sealed line, teleprinter. The commandant can make calls out, the militia certainly can’t call in.’
He nodded, thinking.
‘The inquiry came late last night, from the Black Sea?’
‘That’s what the Chief said.’
‘Then, there it must have been earlier. They’re some hours back, surely — four, five?’
‘Eight, I think.’
‘Eight. Then the inquiry was made during the day. And now it will be, what, six in the morning there? Maybe nothing happened in the night. After all, they’d have to get hold of photos, probably from other regions. We could still have a couple of hours.’
‘For you to catch a plane?’
‘A plane to where? No, no. If Ponomarenko told them who fixed him, maybe they have the agent. I don’t know how much he knew, but I can’t risk … I have to think this out. Well run into Tchersky — to the outskirts, and you’ll call, again. I’ll think it out as we go.’
He started the car again and they proceeded in blackness along the creek. He stopped before the end and took the pouches out of the body belt and gave them to her.
‘What are they?’
‘I’ll tell you later. If I don’t get the chance, hide them. Don’t try to open them, they will be destroyed. They aren’t any danger to you. But keep them safely,’ he said.
She handled the tiny pouches uncertainly. ‘What do I do with them?’
‘For now, put them in your bra. They’re no danger to you,’ he repeated, and got the car moving again.
Outside Tchersky she called in once more. It was now after three o’clock.
Nothing. And also no concern expressed. He listened carefully to the voice on the radio.
‘You’re calling because you want the car unloaded right away,’ he told her, quietly. ‘You’ll be in soon.’
This message she passed; and now he told her what they would do.
Lights were on in all windows of the administrative building in Tchersky, and he drove once round the square looking for any sign of unusual activity.
There was none, so he drove through the gates at the rear to the packing bay of the medical centre. His own bobik was still standing there, and a rubbish truck, and that was all, the dimly lit yard with its stamped snow quite deserted. He helped her out and went in through the swing doors of the packing room. The two packers there expected him and came cheerfully out to unload the van.
‘Kolya, remember the militia,’ she said, as they did so. ‘And don’t forget your papers.’
‘I’ll do it when I’m through.’
‘You don’t have to unload — they can do it themselves.’
‘It’s all pretty light now. I’ll just help finish.’
And this he did, carrying in the very last drums.
‘That’s the lot. See you again, boys.’
‘Sure. And thanks, Kolya.’
He went out and found her in the dim light fiddling with the car keys at the open rear doors. He swiftly entered the back of the bobik, and she locked the doors and went into the building.
It was almost four o’clock, and she didn’t stay long.
The expected headache, she said, after a three-day trip … She glanced over the new paperwork, inquired into a few cases, saw that everything was under control, and left.
Back in the bobik she drove the short journey home. She parked in the shed, and let him out of the back; and he waited there until she had unlocked the front door. She didn’t switch the light on but returned to close the shed, and in the dark he went ahead of her into the house.
47
The militia telephoned at six o’clock, and fifteen minutes later were ringing at the doorbell. The lieutenant and a sergeant found her in her dressing gown.
‘I’m sorry, Medical Officer. A few things the Chief couldn’t go into on the phone. There’s something funny about this fellow who was driving you.’
‘Good God, Lieutenant, you haven’t woken me for that? I’ve been travelling three hard days — I need some sleep!’
‘We can’t find him. He didn’t go home.’
‘Maybe he went to a friend’s.’
‘Not to any we know about. And his bobik is still at the medical centre. He left it there.’
‘Well — he knew he had to go and report with his papers. I think I even reminded him.’
‘You did. The packers at the medical centre remembered it.’
‘Then — probably he found a bottle, and is sitting over it somewhere. You know how it is with them.’
‘Yes, it’s what I think myself,’ the lieutenant said. ‘And he’ll turn up with a sore head in the morning. The thing is, they’re worrying us at Irkutsk for a report. They don’t understand how things are here. Can we sit down?’
‘Of course. I’m sorry. Help yourself to a drink.’ She got a couple of glasses. ‘Irkutsk?’ she said, puzzled.
‘Counter-intelligence,’ the sergeant contributed. ‘They run about looking for spies there. It keeps them happy. Your good health, Doctor. The leg’s improving?’
‘Yes. It’s nothing. A Chukchee spy?’ she asked in surprise.
‘I know, it’s crazy,’ the lieutenant agreed, raising his glass. ‘But this fellow isn’t who he says he is. They sent in some pictures, from Magadan, where he was supposed to have worked. It’s a different man. The chances are, this one stole Khodyan’s papers. It’s how he got in here. The papers are okay — the Transport Company checked them in with us, of course, when he started — but he’d changed the photo. No way we could tell that. A Chukchee’s a Chukchee.’
‘Why would he want to do that?’
‘Who knows? Trouble with a wife, a paternity suit? He must have met Khodyan on the Black Sea. What he’s doing with Ponomarenko’s apartment is a puzzle. They’ve told us nothing yet. To them it’s espionage, of course, so they’re giving nothing away. What these people can think up — a spy from Chukotka!’ he said, drinking, and wiped his mouth. ‘Anyway, if you’ll just give a statement, the sergeant will take it down.’
‘What else is there I can tell you?’
She watched as the sergeant took his book out.
‘Maybe his reaction — when he heard we wanted him.’
‘Well — he was irritated. He thought people were picking on him because he was a Chukchee. I’d had to take him off long-distance journeys, you know — his medical record showed he had a heart murmur.’
‘Yes. He was due for hospital tests next week, I understand.’
‘Cardiological. For the murmur. That annoyed him too.’
‘He didn’t want it?’
‘Well, he wasn’t too happy about it.’
‘Ahah. Did he talk about that?’
‘A little. He understood I had no choice — from his record. I couldn’t risk allowing him on long journeys, whatever they’d allowed in Chukotka. They asked me to arrange a hospital test for him, and I did. He accepted that.’