Red Square - Martin Cruz Smith [41]
As she leafed through her notes, Polina said, “I wanted to put dummies in the cars.”
“Dummies?”
“Mannequins. I wanted thermometers, too. I couldn’t even find oven thermometers.”
“Everything’s so hard to find.”
“Because chemical combustion is inexact, especially in the lead time to ignition.”
“It’s my impression that it would have been more exact for Kim to spray Rudy with a submachine gun. Not that I’m not having a wonderful time watching cars blow up. It’s sort of like suttee. You know, how Indian women immolate themselves on their husbands’ funeral pyres? This is like a grand suttee on the Ganges, except that we’re on the Moscow and it’s not the middle of the day, it’s the middle of the night, and we neglected to bring any widows. Even dummies. Otherwise it’s practically romantic.”
Polina said, “That’s hardly an analytical approach.”
“Analytical? I wouldn’t need an oven thermometer. I smelled Rudy. He was done.”
Polina was stung. Arkady was shocked at himself. What could he say now? That he was tired, upset, wanted to be home cupping his ear to his radio? “I’m sorry,” he said. “That was mean.”
“I think you’d better get a different pathologist,” Polina said.
“I think I’d better go.”
As he got out, the seventh car exploded, shooting fountains of glass high into the air. After the clap of detonation, the glass rang like chimes as it fell and scattered in crystals around his feet. The Moskvitch burned like a furnace at full blast, white flames leaping excitedly from window to window, broadcasting a circle of heat that made Arkady flinch and step back. As the seat burned, the nature of the flames changed into roiling purplish smoke rich with toxin. Paint bubbled and the whole dock glowed with shining glass, like coals.
He noticed that Polina was making notes again. She would have made a good assassin, he thought. She was a good pathologist. He was an idiot.
It’s sad about Rudy. He was very human, warm, concerned about Soviet youth.” Antonov winced as one boy backed another into a corner and knocked out his mouthpiece. “Many’s the time he was here, encouraging the kids, telling them to mind the straight and narrow.” Antonov bobbed sympathetically as the beleaguered fighter slipped free. “Stick him, stick him, move! Well, that’s a good imitation of a propeller! Anyway, Rudy was like an uncle. This is not the center of Moscow. These kids are not going to special schools for ballerinas. Hit him! But youth is our most precious possession. Every boy and girl in Komsomol gets a fair chance. Model planes, chess, basketball. I bet Rudy sponsored every club here. Backpedal! Not you! Him!”
Jaak hadn’t checked in yet. Polina had called, but the last place Arkady had wanted to start the day was the morgue. Didn’t she ever get her fill of gore? On the other hand, watching boys pummel each other was proving no cure for a headache. Master of Sport Antonov gave the impression of a man whose brains had long since been pounded into more solid stuff. He had a gray crew cut and flat, utilitarian features, and in his fists, so knotted that he seemed to have extra knuckles, he held a bell mallet and a watch. The boys in the ring wore leather helmets, tank tops, shorts. Their skin was as pale as potato flesh except where they had been hit. Sometimes they looked like they were boxing, the next moment as if they were dancing badly. Besides the ring, the Leningrad Borough Komsomol gymnasium also gave room to wrestling mats and weights, so the walls resounded with the puffing of wrestlers and lifters. There were two different psychological types, Arkady thought; weight lifters were soloists of grunts, while wrestlers couldn’t wait to get tangled. A dim light penetrated whitewashed windows, and an ancient reek clung to the air. Wrestling and boxing ladders framed the door and a sign that said CIGARETTES AND SUCCESS DON’T MIX!, which reminded Arkady