Kovalevsky grunted disapprovingly, then headed off again towards Okhrana headquarters.
The next day, on Vassileyev’s orders, they were back at the tram stop, opposite the telegraph office.
Kovalevsky was in an even fouler mood than he had been the day before. ‘This is not what I signed up for.’ He glared at Pekkala. ‘Did you sign up for this?’
‘No,’ Pekkala told him. ‘I did not sign up at all. It was the Tsar who sent me here.’
At two minutes past five, when Worunchuk made his usual departure from the telegraph office, Pekkala and Kovalevsky set off after him, following at a safe distance.
As he did every day, Worunchuk paused before the butcher shop.
‘For pity’s sake,’ growled Kovalevsky, ‘go in and buy something today!’
Suddenly, as if Kovalevsky’s suggestion had forced itself into his mind, Worunchuk stepped into the shop.
‘Finally!’ groaned Kovalevsky.
The two men slowed their pace and came to a halt one door down from the butcher shop.
‘We shouldn’t stop here,’ said Pekkala. ‘We’ll walk slowly past the shop and wait for him on the other side. He’s bound to come out soon.’
As the two men strolled past the butcher shop, they were shocked to find Worunchuk standing in the doorway.
He had not entered the shop at all, but only stood at the entrance, waiting for the men to walk by.
Stunned, Pekkala and Kovalevsky met his stare, unable to hide their true purpose.
Angrily, Worunchuk pushed past them and set off towards the Potsuleyev bridge. He did not run. Nor did he turn to look back. It was as if he knew they could not touch him.
Pekkala had taken only one step in the direction of the fleeing man before he felt Kovalevsky’s arm on his sleeve, holding him back.
‘It’s no use,’ whispered Kovalevsky. ‘He’s made us. Somehow he figured it out. We might as well go back and tell Vassileyev we have failed.’
Gloomily, the two men watched him disappear into the crowd.
Half an hour later, Pekkala and Kovalevsky presented themselves at Vassileyev’s office.
Vassileyev was sitting at his desk, smoking a cigarette which he had taken from a gold and red box labelled ‘Markov’. ‘Well?’ he demanded, raising his chin and whistling a thin jet of smoke towards the ceiling.
‘He spotted us,’ explained Pekkala.
‘How?’ Vassileyev’s face showed no emotion.
After a deep sigh, Kovalevsky continued with their story. ‘He was waiting for us in the doorway to a butcher shop. He stopped there every day but never went inside. This day, he finally went in, at least we thought he had. .’
‘Did the shop have a window?’
‘Yes, for displaying the meat. Every day he went to see what they’d set out. But he never bought anything!’
‘He wasn’t looking at the meat,’ said Vassileyev. ‘He was studying your reflections in the window.’
As the truth became apparent, Pekkala lowered his head in shame and stared at the floor.
Kovalevsky’s lips began to twitch. ‘But when he crossed the road, back and forth, he never looked back. He didn’t see us then.’
‘He didn’t need to. He was testing who kept pace with him. Anyone not following him would maintain their speed along the pavement, but you would return to the exact same distance behind him. And all the confirmation he needed would be there for him to see in the shop window when he stopped.’
‘I am sorry,’ muttered Kovalevsky,
‘We are sorry,’ added Pekkala.
For a moment longer, Vassileyev’s face remained stony. Then, all of a sudden, he began to smile. ‘You have both done very well.’
The two men stared at him in confusion.
‘You did exactly what I hoped you would do,’ explained Vassileyev.
‘You mean to let him see us?’ asked Kovalevsky.
‘You didn’t let him,’ said Vassileyev. ‘He outsmarted you. That’s all.’
‘And that was what you wanted?’ asked Pekkala. ‘I don’t understand, Chief Inspector.’
‘Worunchuk is not the man we’re after. As I told you‚ he is only a courier.’
‘Then who are you trying to arrest?’ asked Kovalevsky.
‘A bomb maker named Krebs. We believe he might have been the one who built the device that killed Tsar Alexander III. He has no politics, no convictions. He simply builds bombs for whoever can afford to pay him. We learned from an Okhrana agent at the telegraph office that messages had begun arriving regularly for a certain Julius Crabbe, a known alias for Krebs. The messages are coded, of course. We have no way of knowing exactly who he’s building for now, or what will be done with the bomb when it is ready. Our only chance is to arrest Krebs before he has a chance to deliver the bomb.’
‘But why not simply follow Worunchuk to the place where he’s delivering the telegram?’ Kovalevsky asked exasperatedly.
‘Oh, we’ve done that.’ Vassileyev dismissed the suggestion with a wave of his hand. ‘He lives in a flat across the road from the Petersburg Wind Instruments Factory.’
‘And why not arrest him there?’ asked Pekkala.
Vassileyev smiled patiently. ‘Because we happen to know that Krebs has prepared explosive devices strong enough to destroy the entire building, along with half the others on the street, if anyone should try to force their way into his apartment. We need to catch him when he is out on his own. Otherwise, he will kill as many or more people than would have been killed by the bomb he’s constructing now.’
‘But Worunchuk will have told him by now that he was being followed by the Okhrana. Surely he’ll be on the next train out of town.’
Vassileyev shook his head. ‘Worunchuk is a professional. He probably realised you were following him the first day you showed up outside the telegraph office.’
‘Then why would he come back the next day, and the next and the day after that?’
‘He was studying you,’ said Vassileyev, ‘seeing how well you were able to track him without being noticed.’
‘Not well at all, apparently,’ said Pekkala.
‘Exactly! And Worunchuk would quickly reach the conclusion that he was not dealing with agents of the Okhrana, who would have undergone months of training. What he would have seen were a couple of amateurs. Forgive me, boys, but what I needed from you these past few days was not your expertise but rather your lack of it.’
‘Then who will he think we are, if not government agents?’ asked Kovalevsky.
Vassileyev pursed his lips and let his hands fall open. ‘Most likely, just a couple of local thugs looking to shake him down. The fact that you would only follow him as far as the Potsuleyev bridge would have convinced him of this, since the gangs in this city co-exist by operating in specific territories. The bridge is one such boundary marker, and a line gang members would not dare to cross.’
‘We could have gotten him,’ said Kovalevsky. ‘He was standing right in front of us.’
‘It’s lucky for you that you didn’t try,’ replied Vassileyev. ‘He would have killed you both for sport.’
‘So what do we do now?’ asked Pekkala. ‘Do we simply show up tomorrow at the telegraph office and start following him all over again?’
‘There would be no point, ‘Vassileyev told him. ‘Worunchuk won’t be there. The fact that he was being followed, even if it was only by a couple of thugs such as yourselves, means that he can no longer function as a courier for Krebs. As soon as he has informed Krebs of the situation he will vanish, probably to another city. No doubt we will run into him again someday. But, for now, that leaves Krebs without a courier to receive his messages. He hasn’t got time to engage another courier.’
‘He will have to collect them himself,’ said Pekkala.
Vassileyev nodded. ‘And when he does, we will be waiting.’
‘What about the person who is paying for the bomb?’
‘In the city of Kiev, there is another equally humiliated pair of young Okhrana agents, and a courier who thinks he’s gotten the better of them. It won’t be long before the man who ordered the bomb is face to face with the oblivion he had planned for many others.’ Vassileyev stubbed out his cigarette and immediately reached into the box to find another. ‘Congratulations, boys. You have just completed your first successful mission.’