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By Root 2040 0

the skull’s activity, would issue no orders, and the officer was not about to undertake an action without a direct instruction, preferably in writing. As an experiment, he went out and, halfway down the steps, selected an Amerikan at random. He shot it in the head and the finally dead bag of bones tumbled out of the queue. Zharov kicked the remains, and, coming apart, they rolled down the steps into a snowdrift. After a pause, all the dead behind Zharov’s kill took a step up. Valentina was in the steam baths with her specimens: news of her acquisitions spread through the Spa, inciting vigorous debate. Tarkhanov complained to the Director about his colleague’s usurpation of authority, but was brushed off with an invitation to examine the miraculous skull. Dr. Dudnikov placed several phone calls to the Kremlin, relaying matters of interest to a junior functionary, who promised imminent decisions. It was Dudnikov’s hope the developments could be used as a lever to unloose vital supplies from other institutions. As ever, the rallying cry was “Chairs for the Spa!”

In the afternoon, Chirkov napped standing up as he watched Kozintsev at work. Although the jaw continually made small movements, the skull was cooperative and did not try to nip the Director. He had requisitioned Toulbeyev’s Jew’s harp and was implanting it among thick neck muscles, hoping it would function as a crude voicebox. To Chirkov’s disgust, Rasputin was becoming expert in the movement of its unseeing eyes. He could suck the glass orbs so the painted pupils disappeared in the tops of the sockets, showing only milky white marbles. This was a man who had been hard to kill: his murderers gave him poison enough to fell an elephant, shot him in the back and chest with revolvers, kicked him in the head, battered him with a club and lowered him into the Neva, bound in a curtain, through a hole in the ice. The skull bore an indentation which Kozintsev traced to an aristocrat’s boot. In the end, men hadn’t killed the seer; the cause of his death was drowning. As he worked, the Director hummed cheerful snatches of Prokofiev. To give the mouth something to do, Kozintsev stuck a cigarette between the teeth. He promised Grigory Yefimovich lips would come soon, but there was nothing yet he could do about lungs. His secret dream, which he shared with the skull (and, perforce, Chirkov), was to apply his process to a complete skeleton. Regrettably, and as Rasputin had himself predicted while alive, most of the monk had been scattered on the wind.

Lyubashevski barged into the cubicle bearing a telephone whose cord unreeled through the maze of the Pool like Ariadne’s thread. There was a call from the Kremlin which Kozintsev was required to take. While Chirkov and Lyubashevski stood, unconsciously at attention, the Director chatted with the First Secretary. Either Dr. Dudnikov had tapped into the proper channels or Tarkhanov was the spy everyone took him for and had reported on the sly to his KGB superior. The First Secretary was briefed about what was going on at the Spa. He handed out a commendation to Kozintsev and insisted extra resources would be channelled to the morgue. Chirkov got the impression the First Secretary was mixing up the projects: Kozintsev was being praised for Valentina’s studies. The Director would be only too delighted to employ any funds or supplies in furthering his work with the skull.

Following the telephone call, the Director was in excellent spirits. He told the skull a breakthrough was at hand and insisted to Lyubashevski that he could hear a faint twang from the Jew’s harp. Grigory Yefimovich was trying to communicate, the Director claimed. He asked if he remembered eating the poisoned chocolates. After the jaw first moved, Kozintsev had constructed rudimentary clay ears, exaggerated cartoon curls which stuck out ridiculously. Having abandoned any attempt to simulate the appearance in life of the monk, he was attempting instead to provide working features. Since Rasputin’s brains must have rotted or burned years before, it was hard to imagine