“I guessed.”
“But Brady was telling the truth—you admitted as much.”
“I did,” she agreed, wondering, with another frisson of panic, where all this might be going. His tone was matter-of-fact, but it was taking all she had not to betray her growing anxiety. “He wanted help finding a home for an orphan boy he’d rescued,” she said, trying not to sound like a supplicant.
“So you said at the time. And I believed you.”
“And the last three years have proved you right,” she retorted.
“I never regretted it,” he said, leaving the impression that he might still do so at some point in the future. “But getting back to Brady—have you seen him at all in the last three years?”
“Once, I think.” She hesitated. “He and Sergei met on the Volga front that summer and discovered they both knew me. After Sergei and I became… well, he turned up with Brady on one of their leaves, and I told Sergei never again.”
“Because you knew he’d informed on you?”
“It was more than that. People die around Aidan Brady, and I’m not talking about other soldiers. He was partly responsible for my brother’s death in England. I know he knifed a policeman in Paterson, and he probably shot two in England. I’d bet money it was him who shot the boy in Kalanchevskaya Square, and now he’s murdering men during robberies. Wherever he goes, people die, and he always gets to walk away.” She looked Komarov straight in the eye. “I know the revolution needed killers like him to win the civil war, but it’ll all have been for nothing if we don’t find a way of taking their guns away.”
Something flickered in his eyes and was gone. “I agree,” he said shortly. “And the English spy—did you ever see him again?”
“He went back to England, as far as I know.” Her heart was suddenly racing, but at least to her, her voice seemed commendably calm.
“I always wanted to go there,” Komarov said unexpectedly.
“To see Marx’s grave?” she asked with a smile, just about managing to ride the wave of relief.
He smiled. “I’ve had enough of graves. I was thinking more of the white cliffs of Dover and Holmes’s flat on Baker Street. Maybe a tour of Scotland Yard.”
“I don’t think they do tours,” she said. This interrogation was apparently over, but she doubted it would prove the last.
As he and Brady walked across the poorly lit town, Piatakov sifted through his memories of the man they were about to see. One stood out. They’d just retaken a village close to the Volga, where half the men were still lying dead in the streets, and most of the women looked like they wanted revenge on any available man for what the White soldiers had done to them. When Piatakov and Rogdayev had come across a young girl cowering in a barn, they had taken her to the nearest dwelling that was issuing smoke and, after shouting a warning, had cautiously walked in through the open front door. The woman they found inside had simply screamed abuse at them, and Rogdayev had screamed right back, whereupon the girl had bolted like a hare in the direction of the river. Their unit had stayed in the village for over a week, but they had never seen the girl again.
Rogdayev lived on Samarkandskaya Street, close to the border between the old and Russian towns. He opened the door himself and, after what seemed a moment’s hesitation, hugged his visitors and led them upstairs to a large, high-ceilinged room with several armchairs and a Persian rug. An open balcony overlooked the street and dried-up river.
The propaganda chief was a big man, almost as big as Brady, with a round face and short, pointed beard. His eyes were almost black and, as Piatakov now remembered, rarely showed any real warmth.
Rogdayev asked them where they were staying and then asked after Aram Shahumian, whom he’d known even longer than they had. He was certainly eager to talk about the past, and the slew of nostalgic anecdotes that followed began to seem suspicious. Why hadn’t Rogdayev asked what they were doing in Tashkent? Piatakov wondered. It was a strange omission, unless he already knew. Piatakov wondered if Brady had noticed and guessed that he probably had—the American didn’t miss much. At that moment he was reminding their host of an action two summers before, a skirmish in a Ukrainian hamlet in which Rogdayev had been badly wounded and carried to safety by Aram. Reminding him of what they’d shared, Piatakov supposed, or suggesting the guilt that would follow betrayal. It was the wrong tactic, he thought. Rogdayev was one of those people who never let beliefs and personal interests stray that far apart.
He was certainly playing the genial host, pouring generous slugs of vodka and laughing too loud at Brady’s jokes. “You’re very quiet,” he told Piatakov. “Missing your lovely wife, I expect?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “I must make a telephone call,” he added abruptly, rising to his feet and walking across to the wall-mounted receiver.
Piatakov stiffened and saw Brady do the same, but neither of them moved. Rogdayev was still beaming at them, waiting for the connection. “At last,” he said, and gave the operator a number. “Pour yourselves another,” he told his two guests. “Alexander Ivanovich?” he said into the mouthpiece. “The booklets have arrived. Yes, today. Can you collect them at the station first thing in the morning? Fine. Good night.”
It sounded innocent enough, Piatakov thought, but in case it wasn’t, the appeal to their old comrade’s sense of loyalty would have to be quickly made.
Rogdayev was giving nothing away. “Stalin’s tract on the nationality problem,” he explained, reseating himself. “A strangely idealistic document, considering its source. But the Uzbeks here will be reassured, and that’s the main thing. You’ve heard of the Basmachi, I suppose? They’re mostly just brigands in the pay of the Turks, but they have to be defeated, and until they are we need to keep our Muslims happy.” He poured himself another measure and pushed the bottle toward them. “And now you must tell me what you’re doing in Tashkent.”
Brady hastened to do so, without going into specifics or mentioning the rendezvous in Samarkand. “We’re not challenging the party,” he said diplomatically. “We accept that there are limits to what can be achieved in the present circumstances, and we don’t want to criticize anyone, like yourself, who chooses to work within those limits. Each to his own—that’s fine. But we want to move on and do what we do best. And no matter what it says—or feels compelled to say—the party needs help from outside. It needs more revolutions.”
Rogdayev listened without interrupting, occasionally shaking his head. “I was afraid it would be something like this,” he said when Brady had finished. “I believe you are wrong; I have to say that. The old days are gone, comrades—we cannot fight forever. Why do you think I threw in my lot with the party—simply because I am an opportunist? Well, perhaps a little”—a self-deprecating smile—“but that wasn’t what made up my mind. Lenin is not infallible, his subordinates even less so, but do you know of any better leaders for this country of ours? We have won, and we must make the best of our victory. You seem—forgive me, but we are old comrades, and I will be frank—you seem to be simply running away the moment things get difficult. Like knights who move heaven and earth to free a damsel in distress, then leave her locked in the tower because she has a few pimples on her face. Pimples can be treated once the damsel is free.”
“And what if her face is truly ugly?” Brady asked softly.
“Then perhaps we are talking about a different damsel.” Rogdayev looked into his glass. “You will do what you think is right. You do not need my blessing.”