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  Isabella forced herself to relax her forehead.

  "She smoked all her life. It happens, Is. It happens all the time."

  "Yes ... yes, I know." Isabella tipped tonic into what remained of her vodka. "Actually, I've been thinking the same."

  "You have?"

  "Yes ... I mean, not specifically cancer. But I've been thinking that she might have been ill." And now Isabella saw what she had been looking for: a chance to take those last few steps. "It would explain something that she wrote in her last letter. She said that I should make sure that I visited her here, in Petersburg, before I ... before I visited Dad."

  Her brother was silent.

  Isabella asked, "Do you think he s going to come?"

  "Who, Dad?" As if she meant anyone else.

  "Yes—Dad."

  But Gabriel, either too tired or past caring or vodka-quelled, surprised her again by speaking in a flat and emotionless voice. "He's only been back here once since they got married. And that was to sell Grandpa Max s house and plunder all his stuff. He hates this place."

  "Yeah, you re right ... But this is slightly different, isn't it? It s not like they re divorced."

  "Is, Dad doesn't give a fuck about Mum." She watched him put out his cigarette. "All he will care about is recouping the money we made him give her. They haven't spoken properly for ten years."

  Isabella wanted to ask her brother how he knew this. But she guessed that he didn't, that it was a belief, a quasi-religious assertion. Gabriel loathed their father as much as he loved their mother, and to such an extent that he could not countenance the fact that the two of them had ever got on at all. Their marriage was opaque to him—an abomination he refused to consider. And now was not the time to dispute this or indeed any of the hundred credos of their family lore.

  "Are you bothered about his paying for things?"

  "Let him pay. Even if he is trying to make us feel guilty. It doesn't matter. The result is that Mum gets buried where she wanted to and has a decent funeral."

  "Do you think he'll try and get in touch?"

  "Not with me."

  She felt the challenge behind this and automatically rose to it. "Well, he s hardly going to call me direct either, is he? The last few times I saw him, I took good care to tell him he was a bastard and a failure."

  "He won't come. He won't try to get in touch. he'll just do everything through his brand-new puppet at the consulate."

  "That's not fair. Julian is a decent bloke."

  "Maybe." Gabriel finished his drink. "Why did you ask about all that autopsy shit?"

  She was caught out by the question but knew she had to tell the truth—and immediately, because even in his current state, her brother wouldn't miss the hesitation. Sometimes the speed and accuracy with which he read people reminded her of ... her father.

  "I had this mad idea Dad killed her."

  Gabriel shook his head. "Jesus, Is. You are more fucked up than I am."

  But this was her other suspicion.

  17 A Plan Enacted

  There was no point in locking the door. The cardboard they had tacked over the gaping wound in the wall would fool no one. In any case, there was nothing left to steal. So he pulled it shut and made his way into the darkness of the unlit stairwell.

  Once on the street, he paused and looked around for a moment, as if assessing the fighting weight and shape of the night. He set off at a slow jog, following the same route they had taken two nights previously on the way to the gig—through the gap in the railings and into the cemetery. His muscles felt loose and limber and he moved with the ease of fitness, listening to the fall of his own step, the rasp of his own breathing. Above the swaying trees, a gibbous moon seemed to follow him, slipping from cloud to cloud.

  On the far side of the cemetery, he saw a group of figures gathered by the gate on the corner of Maly Prospekt. He slowed. Ordinarily he would have taken the most direct route and run straight at them, through them, beyond them. But tonight he did not want any distraction. So he ducked left, soundlessly crossing first one grave, then another, careful with his footing on the wet stones, until he came to the small parallel path. Here the trunks were thick and the way was darker and he had to slow for fear of low twigs and thorns scratching at his face, unwilling (from lifelong habit) to use his hands as protection. Dogs were barking somewhere, discordant, out of time.

  He climbed the railings and emerged onto the roadside opposite the canning factory. In the shadow of an overhanging pine, he paused a moment to check that the envelope had not slipped out of his pocket. He was an anonymous figure dressed in dark colors: Henry s V-neck pullover over gray T-shirt, his old tracksuit bottoms, his boots, and his playing shoes around his neck. The money was still there.

  He went on through the mostly dead Vasilevsky streets, stray cats all that he saw, until he reached the river. Then he slowed his jog to a brisk walk and crossed the Neva on the Leytanta Bridge, the river as black tonight as liquid obsidian.

  Entering the central district, he stiffened a little, continuing at a more casual pace, ready to appear drunk should a car slow or show undue interest. Soon enough he was sloping along the banks of the Kryukova Canal by the pitchy water of New Holland—a derelict place, unvisited by all but small-time criminals, addicts, and the gangs of homeless insane. Though he kept his head down and his gaze on the pavement in front of him, he was listening, his meticulous ear primed for the slowing note of an engine or the fall of another step. He knew well that it was in these dead hours, when Petersburg slipped off its creamy European robes and revealed itself a mean and swarthy peasant once more, that the real business of Russian life got done. Boy and man, he had seen it: the black Mercedes rolling down the half-lit street, the tinny police car idling, smear-faced street girls slipping like sylphs along the railings of the canals, and the drugged and the drunk always watching from their darkened doorways, glassy-eyed and desperate, crawling back and forth between heaven and hell, one scabby knee at a time. And all of it dangerous. He glanced up.

  A figure had appeared on the pavement ahead.

  "Arkady."

  "Oleg."

  They did not shake hands but, after a moment s mutual assessment, fell swiftly into step, walking side by side in the direction of the Mariinsky Theatre. The other was a man of average height but on the brink of irreversible obesity, balding, with a puffy, pastry-fond face, small eyes, and the fastidious manner of the superfluous employee.

  "You've not changed, Arkasha."

  "You've lost your hair and you are fatter."

  They spoke in the most familiar Russian.

  "I was married. There is nothing to do but eat and talk about food. You have the money?"

  "You should do some exercise," Arkady said. "Or you will die even faster. Yes, I have the money. Not here, though. Do you have what you need?"

  "Yes." Oleg raised the hand that was carrying a dark sports bag a fraction. "But you know, I can't do the security gate. I told you that."

  "You did."

  Oleg was already regretting that he had agreed to meet his old school friend again—and fuck the money. He had forgotten: like nobody else he had ever met, Arkady Alexandrovitch made him immediately nervous, made him feel as if everything he said or did was somehow a low-down lie. They had shared bunks in the final two years, which was as close to close as anyone came back at the orphanage. Arkady was somebody that most of the others left alone, even the ugliest of the bastards—someone you couldn't change, reason or fight with, someone who would always go crazier faster. And Oleg had felt privileged to be one of the few that Arkady spoke to about anything. Then they'd been phartsovschiks together in the 1990s for a while, trading small-time contraband on the black market, Arkady bringing him the stuff to sell from God knew where and no questions asked. That had been a frantic time. And even now, years later, there was something flattering about Arkady's asking for help. Plus the money. Okay, not fuck the money. The money was good. But the inescapable truth was that he
, Oleg, had not actually picked a single lock in five years. And somehow he sensed that Arkady knew this. Still, if it came to it, he could just give the banknotes back. Arkady wouldn't kill him, and he could live with five more minutes of the other's scorn. There was curiosity too: what was it all about? Arkady Alexandrovitch was no common thief.

  They jinked left, waited at the lights, then walked out in the open, across the wide courtyard in front of the Mariinsky. A police car was crawling toward the river, window down, cigarette glowing, but it was following a group of tourists fresh from one of the clubs, staggering along with their arms around their prostitutes. The Russians would be ignored.

  Arkady had not said where they were going. And Oleg felt it would betray too much anxiety to ask. So it was only when they had circled around the back of the conservatory, crossed the Griboedova on the bridge of lions, and entered the narrower streets where Arkady began to slacken his pace that Oleg guessed they must be getting closer.

  "Are we breaking into one of the Dostoyevsky flats?" Oleg spoke too loudly, smirked, and shifted his sports bag again.

  But Arkady seemed not to have heard. Instead he now slowed right down, as if to maximize the walk-by time, and motioned casually toward the building on the corner, facing the next bridge.

  "The first-floor apartment," he said softly. "With the balcony."

  Oleg nodded, glad of the semblance of professionalism.

  The street itself was mercifully quiet. They passed slowly along by the walls, both men peering up at the window. Arkady was listening, Oleg glancing around. There were very few lighted rooms in any of the other apartments on either side of the road. They drew level with the gated entrance. Arkady gripped one of the metal bars and pushed sharply. The lock rattled but nothing gave.

  "Come on." Abruptly Arkady crossed the canal without looking back and walked straight down the stairs that formed the entrance to the CCCP Café.

  Oleg caught up with him and they stood together while their eyes readjusted to the heavier darkness of the stairwell.

  "Here's the money." Arkady slipped an envelope from his track-suit trousers. "It's all there."

  Oleg hesitated. "How are we going to get past the gate?"

  "I don't know."

  Oleg drew a deep breath, shrugged, and put the envelope in the breast pocket of his jacket, unwilling to count the notes or stow them within, given what he saw as the unlikelihood of his actually being able to do anything to earn them. It was not his fault if Arkady was insane. In fact, a good part of him was rather glad that his old business partner had clearly failed to think out any sort of plan, since they'd probably just have to forget about the whole job and that would be that. He wouldn't hear from the mad bastard for another seven years or whatever it was. Get back to his little locksmith's hole in the wall. Cut honest keys.

  Oleg located his cigarettes and with them a mislaid cache of self-assurance. He exhaled. "We can't just stand around and hope someone goes in or out. It's nearly three now—nobody is going to come home at this time. Nobody nice, anyway."

  Arkady had his hands wrapped around his playing shoes. He said nothing. They climbed a few of the café steps together and looked across the bridge at the balcony. There were no lights on in the entire face of the building. The moon was behind clouds for the moment. Some sounds reached them from Sennaya Square—drunks, raucousness, shouts, not too far away. A car turned onto the embankment and began coming slowly toward them. But the headlights brightened with the acceleration—some old piece of Soviet-made shit and nothing to worry about. All the same, they dropped back down beneath street level.

  Arkady half turned. "If we get up onto the balcony, will you be able to get us in through the windows?"

  "Yeah, I—"

  "How long?"

  Oleg affected a businesslike whisper. "Depends. If it's bolted, then I might be able to cut through them. But that could be twenty minutes. Depends. If it's only locked, then I don't know. Quicker. I can't tell until I see. Is there an alarm?"

  "I don't know."

  Oleg exhaled a heavy jet of smoke.

  "Okay." Arkady produced some leather gloves from one of his pockets and began putting them on.

  "But we can't get onto the balcony, and even if we had some ladders, which we don't, then we can't just piss around breaking in up there. The whole street can see that fucking balcony."

  "There's a ladder in the courtyard behind us. It's padlocked, but that won't be a problem, will it, my friend?"

  "Is there?" The realization that Arkady must have been here earlier after all caused Oleg to fall back on his mettle. "Okay. We're still going to be seen by anyone who comes up or down either side of the canal."

  "Only while you are going up it." They were standing close, and Arkady was looking directly into Oleg's face for the first time. "We'll get the ladder. You go up. I take the ladder away. You get in. You open the front door from the inside. You come down here. You let me in through the security gate. I get inside. You can go."

  Oleg climbed two steps away—despite the gloom of the stairwell, the other's eyes seemed to sear through him, as if to accuse him of lifelong cowardice and shirking. The moment of decision had come. He looked across the canal to reassess the balcony. The returning moon seemed to light the window in question. He hooked his thumbs to adjust his belt, which felt suddenly tight. The window would undoubtedly be easier than a quadruple-locked front door, which he had been dreading. There was at least that. In a way, the window would be a relief ... But what if there was some sort of alarm? He turned back to Arkady. His chest had tightened with the smoke. He had asthma. He flicked his cigarette. "Okay, let's get the ladder."

  "Good. Once you are up, I will take it away and nobody will know. I will wait. If you have a problem, whistle. Don't worry. I'll be listening." Arkady grinned. "I have very good ears."

  He was leaning close to the gate beneath the shadow and he heard Oleg coming long before he saw him. He stood up straight and peered through the rails, his boots swinging around his neck, the playing shoes now on his feet. A moment later he made out the heavy shape of the locksmith walking hurriedly through the shadows of the inner courtyard.

  Arkady's voice was calm, to counter the agitation he sensed in the other's footfall: "I think the button is over there."

  Oleg grunted.

  Even in the penumbra of the streetlamps Arkady could see the sheen of sweat on his companion's high forehead.

  The gate began to jerk open. Oleg had to stand back to let it swing inward. His voice was close to a hiss: "It's the staircase in the corner. I propped the door so it can't shut. There is nobody there. Everything is quiet. You'll be—"

  "Good." Arkady was already slipping through.

  For a moment their eyes met.

  "Right, well, I'll see you, Arkady Alexandrovitch."

  "Yes."

  And with that Arkady was gone.

  Oleg turned on his heel and walked as quickly as he could in the direction of the demented anonymity of Sennaya Square.

  Arkady stood alone in the darkness of her hall, his face expressionless. The front door was shut behind him. For a long while he remained quite still, listening for any sound of movement coming from the other apartments in the building. But aside from the muffled cough of a distant pipe, there was only silence. Gradually he was beginning to be able to make out the shapes of photographs on the wall.

  He lifted his boots off his neck, put them down on the mat, turned to his right, and walked noiselessly toward the open doorway at the end, the direction from which he guessed Oleg must have entered. He wanted to be sure that the curtains were drawn before he began his business here tonight.

  He found himself in a large room with high ceilings. Lighting from the street relieved the darkness, and he looked about at the unfamiliar shapes and their stretched shadows: a deep chair, a chaise longue, a large desk against the far wall, and a table to one side, in the shallow bay of the window. He walked over, treading as lightly as he could.
Cold air was coming in at waist height through a small circular hole in the glass. Arkady cursed violently under his breath and drew the curtains. Evidently Oleg had been unable to deal with the locks and had cut through the pane to open the balcony windows from the inside.

  Arkady's business: he wanted names and addresses ... He wanted contact with her family. And through contact, he wanted money. Not just a few thousand stolen rubles but the kind of money that would change his life—money to pay for the next two years at the conservatory, of course, but in his fiercest imaginings more than that: money to pay for a decent apartment, a proper piano, travel in Europe, flights to the U.S., big hotels in which he could fuck and sleep until four in the afternoon after all the hundred concerts he would play ... The kind of bank-account-swelling money that the shit lice at the British and American embassies would consider enough to make him "safe" for visa approval. No more of this bullshit existence. He wanted the full life that was rightfully his. He wanted the life that she had denied him, the life to which he was entitled. Legitimacy. Everything or nothing.

  With the curtains closed, there was no sense working in the dark. So he crossed over to the desk and bent to follow the flex of the lamp, his gloved fingers seeking the switch. His eyes had grown used to the dimness and he blinked a little when the room suddenly declared itself in detail: paintings of landscapes and a portrait of someone he did not recognize on the wall, a chandelier, thick rugs on the floor, another lamp by the chaise longue, a stack of English-language magazines on a low table he had not seen between the chairs, an expensive stereo with twin freestanding speakers in front of the wall opposite, which was, he now saw, one vast bookcase, crammed and bursting.

  He turned back to the desk. The surface was empty save for a map of the Moscow underground and some lens-cleaning solution. There were no photographs ... Another car was passing along the embankment. He stiffened, listening. But the engine note did not change; it was not stopping. He breathed in sharply through narrowed nostrils. He opened the drawers. They were all empty. He slid them shut, stood back, and looked around. A single courier's shipping carton lay on the floor by the side of the desk. The label simply displayed the number six. He took off the lid: newspaper clippings, bills, official-seeming letters in English that he did not understand, but no personal correspondence. Obviously somebody had already been here and started clearing up.