The two vehicles Vadim Trishin had reported seeing at Anatoli's compound. It was enough to convince Yuri that he was on the right track. He looked back at the old priest with an indulgent smile. "Wasn't dealing with the KGB major a bit like making accommodation with the devil?"
Father Dedov stared over his glasses. "In your position, you must have been a Party man. Have you become a Christian since the fall of communism?"
"No, sir. But my mother was a Christian. A very devout one."
"Well, she could have told you that God promises forgiveness for those who repent. I have spent many prayerful hours asking forgiveness for what I did. The one redeeming factor was that I helped that poor soul receive a halfway decent burial."
Yuri didn't have the heart to tell him that it had all been in vain. He drove back to the prosecutor's building and found Oleg Kovalenko in his office, a rather grim look on his face.
"You can forget about interrogating that truck driver," he said.
Yuri frowned. "What happened? An accident?"
"No. Evidently he heard we were looking for him. The Port of Gdansk called the trucking company that employed him. It appears he abandoned his rig in a parking area at the port. They've been looking for him since yesterday. The company says it doesn't know why the truck would be parked there. He didn't have any cargo consigned to the port."
23
It was mid-morning when Yuri Shumakov arrived at the KGB office. General Borovsky was not in but was expected in about an hour. Yuri called the hospital and asked for Larisa.
"I just got back in town," he said. "I decided against trying to make it back late last night. I stayed in Gomel and came on after breakfast."
There was a brief pause, as though she were searching for the right words. "Petr was heartbroken that you missed his big game." The tone of her voice said that someone else was equally disappointed in him.
"Damn!" The soccer game with the Cyclers. "I forgot all about it. I'm sorry."
She spoke slowly at first. Then the intensity increased as she began to vent the frustrations that had been building inside of her. "I don't know what's going on, Yuri, but it's something I don't like. You've changed. I don't know if it's this… this whatever you're doing, or if it's your almost fanatical obsession with Anatoli's death. You're running all over the countryside. You come home late at night, dead tired. You aren't eating right. You get up early and rush off. It isn't fair to me or to the boys. And don't think they haven't noticed. Petr tried to hide it last night, but I could see from the red eyes that there had been tears."
He felt like someone had just drilled a very large hole through his heart. "I… I don't… " he stammered. "I know I haven't been much of a husband and father lately. I'm sorry. But this investigation is suddenly picking up speed. I'd like to—"
"Yuri, they're calling for me. I have to go. Will you be home tonight?"
"I swear. I'll try to be early."
He put the phone down and shut his eyes. He could see Larisa's face, large brown eyes that normally flirted with laughter, now downcast. Soft red lips half-open, questioning. No, rebuking. Just when things had begun to brighten on one side of his life, they came suddenly tumbling toward a dark abyss on the other. He hadn't experienced this kind of problem even back in the frantic days of the KGB general's case. Was he really that obsessed with what had happened to Anatoli? This latest turn of events made it virtually certain he would be unable to separate the explosion on that Ukrainian state farm from the ominous activities that had General Borovsky and Chairman Latishev impatient for answers.
He had worried about the conflict between his job and the desire to protect his brother's good name. Now another dimension had been added to the dilemma, the budding destruction of his family life. It was like trying to smother a fire by throwing sheets of cardboard on the flames. The smoke was beginning to suffocate him. Regardless of which way he resolved the first conflict, the second would remain there smoldering.
Finding himself staring down a dead-end street, he turned to an avenue that offered a real possibility for progress. He reached into his briefcase and took out the envelope containing the small square of fabric he had removed from the casket in Kiev.
At the nearby militia headquarters, he headed for the crime lab. He had worked with a forensic analyst named Selikh who had once identified minute amounts of chemicals on a suspect's clothing. Yuri was a befuddled infant when it came to chemistry, but Selikh could accomplish miracles with something called a gas chromatograph.
"Chief Investigator Shumakov," Selikh greeted him warmly. He was about Yuri's age, a small man, almost like a kid except for his balding head. "It has been awhile since you brought us any business."
"Well, things have been routine long enough," Yuri replied. "I have one for you that may prove a dud, but let's give it a try."
He opened the envelope and tapped one end of it. The small piece of cloth slid out onto the sparkling white table in front of Selikh, who promptly seized it with a pair of tweezers and held it beneath a magnifying glass.
"Nice piece of material. Expensive. Silk. From a lady's gown, perhaps?"
Yuri smiled. "How about the lining of an expensive casket?"
Selikh nodded. "Yes, that would fit. Are you looking for body fluids?"
"No. I think something much more exotic than a corpse was kept in this one."
"I've seen some rather exotic cadavers," Selikh said.
"I'm sure you have. How soon could you give me a report on this?"
"I'll get to it as quickly as possible. I have a couple of other jobs ahead of you."
"I'd really appreciate it. Call me at this number." He wrote his KGB phone number on a card and laid it on the table.
Shumakov hurried back to his office. He had been gone only a short while and General Borovsky still had not returned. He began asking around until he found an employee of Polish descent named Paul Kruszewski. His father had been a brilliant young mathematician in Bialystok, not far from the Belarus border, when he was lured to Minsk's Lenin University in the late 'twenties. Born shortly before the Nazi invasion, Paul had lived a precarious existence the first few years. Conditions had improved markedly by the time he reached adulthood. He was now in his fifties, a plump, red-faced veteran in the identification field. He showed up at Yuri's office door shortly.
"You the fellow looking for Paul Kruszewski?" he asked.
"Right. Come in." Yuri walked around the desk and shook his hand.
"I'm Yuri Shumakov. Thanks for coming."
"The Minsk investigator who's helping the General on some special project?"
"That's me. Have a seat. I understand you speak Polish?"
Kruszewski gave a dry laugh. "With a name like mine, what else would you expect?"
Yuri shrugged. "I speak fair English, but no Polish. I need somebody to make some phone calls around the Port of Gdansk."
"What is it you want to know?"
Yuri explained about the trailer rig from Kiev found abandoned at the port. He wanted to know whether any cargo from Kiev, or elsewhere in Ukraine, had been delivered in the past couple of days for shipment through the Port of Gdansk. And if so, what ship had it been loaded on and what was its destination?
"For starters, I suggest we call the port office. Hopefully they can steer us in the right direction." He pushed the telephone across to Kruszewski.
After a brief discussion with a port official, Kruszewski made some notes, hung up the phone and turned to Yuri.
"I have the names and numbers of several agents for shipping companies. They had a freighter depart yesterday, and another is due to sail tomorrow."