After lunch, Sheremetev laid out the clothes on a sofa in Vladimir’s sitting room. A pair of jeans, a white T shirt, a black turtleneck sweater, a leather bomber jacket with a fur collar, thick woollen socks and a pair of black boots.
‘Let’s get changed, Vladimir Vladimirovich. Shall I help you?’
‘No,’ replied Vladimir. He got up, took off his trousers and pulled on the jeans. After that promising start, he sat on the sofa, still in his shirt, and stopped. Sheremetev waited for a couple of minutes, but it was obvious Vladimir had forgotten what he had been doing. Sheremetev glanced at his watch. He had a feeling that Eleyekov wouldn’t wait long if they were late. He prompted Vladimir once more, then quickly helped him to finish.
‘Who are you?’ he asked, as Sheremetev knelt in front of him to put on his socks and shoes.
‘Sheremetev. I’ve worked for you for six years, Vladimir Vladimirovich.’
‘Do you know my mother?’
‘No, Vladimir Vladimirovich. I never had the honour of meeting her.’
‘Shame. I’ll make sure you do.’
‘Lift this foot up, please, Vladimir Vladimirovich. That’s it. Let me put the boot on… that’s it… Push Vladimir Vladimirovich…’
‘Are we going out?’
‘Yes, we’re going out. I told you already.’
‘Where are we going?’
‘To the lake. Now the other boot… Okay, please stand up.’ Sheremetev helped Vladimir into the bomber jacket, then stepped back. Before him stood the Vladimir Vladimirovich of the photographs Sheremetev had seen over the years. Older, of course, balder, thinner, but still recognisable, still upright, and altogether in excellent physical shape for a man of his advanced years, or even for one of ten or twenty years younger.
He smiled. ‘You look good, Vladimir Vladimirovich. Wait. Let me put a watch on you.’
Sheremetev went into Vladimir’s dressing room and opened the doors to the cabinet that contained the ex-president’s watches. He opened one of the drawers – a tray of gold watches, slim, very elegant, not exactly what he was looking for. He opened another tray, and then another, until he found one that he considered more appropriate, a thick watch in black and silver with mini-dials on the face and big silver buttons poking out of the case. A real sportsman’s piece. He went back to the bedroom and put it on Vladimir’s wrist.
‘This one’s from Trikovsky,’ said Vladimir, watching him as he fastened the clasp.
‘Is it?’ replied Sheremetev, for whom the name meant nothing. ‘Do you remember when he gave it to you?’
‘Of course.’ Vladimir chuckled. ‘In the early days, we were almost friends. That’s what Trikovsky was like. If he thought he could use you, you were his blood brother. Nothing was too much.’
‘Okay,’ said Sheremetev, stepping back. ‘Let’s go.’
‘Where?’
‘The lake.’ Sheremetev looked at his own watch. ‘Come on, Vladimir Vladimirovich. We’ll be late.’
Downstairs, Artur was waiting with his deputy, Lyosha, a stocky man with a totally shaven head, and three other guards, all dressed in dark suits and dark shirts, about as inconspicuous for a trip to the outdoors as a flashing light on a police van. While Artur was tall and slim, with facial features that were even delicate, Lyosha was more what you might expect of a security man, thickset, strongly muscled and gruff in manner.
The cars drew up outside the front door.
Eleyekov was driving the Mercedes, a bulletproof beast of a vehicle much favoured by his private clients, many of whom had enemies and good reasons to fear them. His son drove the Range Rover, which was also armour-plated. Vladimir sat in the back of the Mercedes beside Artur. Sheremetev sat in the front beside Eleyekov. Lyosha and the other guards bundled into the second car.
‘All ready?’ asked Eleyekov, eyeing Artur in the rearview mirror.
Artur nodded.
Off they went. At the bottom of the drive, the guard in the security booth opened the gate onto the little-used road that ran to the main highway to the town, and one after the other the cars turned out.
They drove through the forest in silence. From time to time Sheremetev glanced over his shoulder at Vladimir, who sat belted up in the back, staring out the window. He wondered what was going through his mind, where he thought he was being taken. Now and again Vladimir sniffed, wrinkling his nose in distaste.
‘What’s happening with Stepanin?’ murmured Eleyekov to Sheremetev quietly.
Sheremetev had been about to ask the driver the same thing. He shrugged, thinking of Barkovskaya’s veiled threat to him the previous evening. ‘Things are getting crazy.’
‘He has to learn to live with her. If he wants to fight it, it’s his own fault.’
Sheremetev didn’t want to talk about it. The thought of all the thieving and extortion that apparently surrounded him in the dacha sickened him – and right here, in this very car, with Eleyekov sitting beside him, he was in the thick of it.
‘He talks to you,’ persisted the driver. ‘Well? When are we going to have his spicy chicken wings again?’
‘Can you smell something?’ said Vladimir to Artur in the back.
‘It’s up to him what he does,’ murmured Sheremetev.
Eleyekov shook his head in frustration.
‘Can you smell something?’ demanded Vladimir insistently.
‘What’s his problem back there?’ muttered Eleyekov, still irritated by the thought of Stepanin’s futile resistance that was costing him so many dishes that he relished. ‘Why does he keep saying that? The car’s as clean as a whistle. I made sure of it myself.’
‘He thinks there’s a Chechen,’ said Sheremetev.
‘In the car? A Chechen?’ Eleyekov threw a glance at Artur. ‘Are you a Chechen, Artyusha?’
Artur shook his head.
‘Vladimir Vladimirovich, there’s no Chechen,’ said Eleyekov. Then he turned to Sheremetev, dropping his voice to a whisper again. ‘You’re not Chechen are you, Nikolai Ilyich?’
Sheremetev shook his head.
‘See, Vladimir Vladimirovich?’ Eleyekov glanced back again. ‘There’s no Chechen in the car.’
Vladimir smiled craftily. ‘That’s what you think.’
‘Does he think there’s someone in the boot?’ whispered Eleyekov to Sheremetev.
‘I checked the boot before we got in,’ said Artur, as if the driver had offended his professional pride.
‘Forget it,’ murmured Sheremetev. ‘He always thinks there’s a Chechen.’
‘Who is it? Someone he knew?’
‘No idea. He always says he can smell him.’
‘You can smell Chechens?’
‘I knew some Chechens,’ said Artur. ‘They always smelled of… what’s that thing you cook with?’
‘Garlic?’ offered Eleyekov.
‘No.’
‘Onions?’
‘No. Fennel. That was it, fennel.’
‘Fennel?’ said Eleyekov. ‘What’s fennel?’
‘It’s a thing.’
‘A herb,’ said Sheremetev.
‘Vladimir Vladimirovich, can you smell fennel?’ asked Eleyekov loudly.
‘Don’t be an idiot,’ retorted Vladimir. ‘And where’s Monarov? You were meant to get him. He was meant to be in the car waiting for me. Let’s go back now!’