The Alchemy of Murder (34 page)

I follow him into a kitchen breakfast nook that has a window to a rose garden. Three of the four chairs in the nook are covered with newspapers and there’s a stack on the table. He appears to read every radical paper in the city.
L’Venger
, one of the main anarchist rags, is unfolded next to a cup of tea.

He quickly cleans off the table and a chair for me. After he puts on water for tea, he joins me.

“You must think I’m insane,” I say.

“For a certainty, Mademoiselle, for a certainty. Which newspaper do you work for?”

“Mister Pulitzer’s
New York World
.”

“I have heard of the newspaper, but unfortunately, despite having been to America, my English is very bad.”

“Monsieur Chernov, I—”

“Who sent you to me?”

“I’m not at liberty to share the name.”

“Russian?”

“French.”

He grunted. “In the government?”

I laugh. “Not hardly.”

“Ah, a radical. Communist? Other Socialist? Anarchist?”

“No doubt all of those.”

“What were you told about me?”

“That you work for something called the Third Section, some sort of Russian secret police.”

“
Nyet
,” he shakes his head vigorously like a dog shaking off water, “it can’t be that secret if word of it is passed around like Italian ices. What did the person say I would do for you?”

“Nothing. I was simply given your name as an expert on Russian radicals. I believe the man is a radical, probably an anarchist.”

“Who do you seek?”

“A man by the name of Gilles de Rais?”

He shakes his head. “That is not a Russian name. Perhaps French, Belgian, Spanish, something, but not Russian.”

“I’ve been told he’s Russian.”

“Really…”

He gets up and makes the tea and pours me a cup before sitting back down. He clasps his hands across his big belly and smiles. “Start at the beginning. Tell me everything. Please avoid lying … too much.”

I sigh. And start at the beginning in the madhouse at Blackwell’s Island.

He listens with a quiet intensity. But is most interested in my description of the man I came to call the German doctor. Unfortunately, a man with a beard and long hair would fit millions of men in France alone. I stop the narration at the graveyard.

He purses his lips, drawing them together not in disapproval of me but of the man who kills women. He mutters something dark in Russian and then reverts to French.

“Your French, you speak it much better than me, you have hardly any accent. Have you been in France long?”

“No. Russia has a special affinity with France. My own education in French came as a result of a French tutor in the noble household where I was raised. Many young men from wealthy Russian families go to university in France. French is the second language of educated Russians, French literature, clothes, food … one is not considered educated or sophisticated in Moscow or St. Petersburg if one is not as French as
frites
.”

It occurs to me that it would be easier for a Russian raised in the French tradition to assimilate without suspicion in Paris than New York.

He reads my mind. “Yes, it is easier for Russians here in Paris than any other city. Not only because we Russians ape the French, but Paris is the most international of all cities. It is also the most politically open. Revolutionary ideas simmer in Paris like a political stew. Occasionally the pot boils over.”

“From my tale, is there anything you can tell me about the anarchist I believe is responsible for these killings?”

“One fact you already know. His appearance fits the description of almost every anarchist in Paris. If you’re asking me about whether I specifically know of a Russian anarchist who murders women, the answer is no. If I did, I would have informed the French police.”

He purses his lips again. “But perhaps we can sift through the facts and arrive at a list of suspects. You’ve told me about the manifestations you have observed about this man—his actions in New York, London, and now Paris. To link your suspicions to a Russian anarchist, you need to know something about that type of person.”

“Yes, of course.”

“Are you familiar with the movement?”

“A little. I know that anarchists consider government as inherently tyrannical and believe they can destroy governments and free the people through acts of violence, especially by killing off a country’s political leaders.”

“I’m sure you know that not all anarchists believe in the path of violence. In Paris and London, it is considered fashionable among the writers, artists, and other intelligentsia to advocate radical views. These people don’t believe in the path of violence, the so-called ‘propaganda by the deed.’ It’s the Italian and Russian anarchists who have proven the most aggressive practitioners of violence. I’ll give you a cast of characters of Russian anarchism, Mademoiselle, and we shall see if we recognize the creature you seek.”

In a low, grave voice, he begins. “Have you ever heard of the Society of the Pale Horse?”

I start to shake my head no, but then remember Jules’ remark about the horse pendants on the circus performers and the two thugs at the anarchist café.

“I’ve seen horse pendants on anarchists. Are they membership badges for an anarchist group?”

“Yes, but we will come back to that society. To understand Russia and violence, you must appreciate the vastness, harsh climate, and isolation. France is a large country in Europe in terms of its area, but
forty
Frances would fit in Russia. There are wolves in Russia, not just four-legged ones, but hunger, blizzards, violence. A Russian must not only learn to work with one hand but be prepared to battle wolves snarling at him with the other. It’s natural that the people who advocate change in the country would resort to violent acts to accomplish it.

“It was an Italian anarchist, Enrico Malatesta, who spread the doctrine of propaganda by the deed. Russian revolutionaries adopted it wholeheartedly. They believed that if they killed the head of the government, the people would rise up against the nobility and rich landowners who exploit the common man. Initially, the person standing in their way was Czar Alexander II.

“The czar had freed the serfs and planned to give some constitutional rights to the people, but he moved slowly, and the reforms did not go far enough for the radicals who claimed the serfs got an unfair share of the land distributed, and had to pay an exorbitant price. Incredibly, the conspiracy to kill the czar began over two decades ago and took about fifteen years to accomplish.

“The czar had an uncanny ability to avoid assassination, and his flaunting of death was legendary. The attempts began when a radical, one Karakozof, saw the czar standing by his coach. He drew a pistol from his clothes and raised it to fire, but his aim was spoiled by a bystander who rushed him. Two years later, right here in Paris, the czar was riding in an open coach with Emperor Napoléon III when Berezowski, a Polish fanatic, fired two shots and missed him.

“Besides the attempts on the czar himself, there were officials targeted. In one of the most bizarre incidents, a young woman of twenty-six, Vera Zasulich, stood in a line of petitioners appearing before General Trepof, the Governor of St. Petersburg. When it came her turn to present her petition to Trepof, she calmly took out a gun and shot him. She was, luckily for Trepof, a poor shot and only wounded him. What was most bizarre about the incident was that a jury refused to convict her for the shooting.”

I remember Oscar telling me that Vera Zasulich was the heroine of a play he wrote, a play which was actually produced, but closed after a few performances. “My recollection is that the government decided that no more radicals were to be tried before juries.”

“Yes, that is correct.” He clicks his tongue and goes on. “That same year, other high officials were attacked.” He uses a handkerchief to smother a cough before continuing. “This rabid murder lust gets more and more incredible. And insane. The radical Solovy shoots at the czar, again in St. Petersburg, as the czar is walking along a public quay. His Majesty dodges both bullets. The assassin loses his nerve and runs. A passing milk woman tackles him. A rather ignominious end to an attempt to kill the world’s most powerful monarch.

“About ten years ago, the attempts to kill Alexander became the life’s work of two young radicals, Sofia Perovskaya and her lover, Andrei Zhelyabov. Sofia was the driving force behind the attempts. She gathered around her a small, clandestine group of young intellectuals who swore a willingness to give their lives in the cause of regicide.

“They broke off from the Populist Party and formed the Narodnaya Volya, the People’s Will—a terrorist organization of anarchists, nihilists, and other radicals with the objective of murdering the leaders of Russia. They began by attempting to blow up the czar’s train. Andrei placed a homemade nitroglycerin-based bomb on the tracks where the czar’s special train was to pass in the Ukaine. It missed the train. Sofia launched an attempt to blow up the train as it was nearing Moscow. She blew up the wrong train.”

He gets up and paces the kitchen for a moment, then sits back down. “These are only the opening scenes of unusual and diabolical attempts to kill the czar. One of their adherents, Stefan Chalturin, a carpenter, got a job in the Winter Palace. Over a period of time he smuggled in explosives under his clothes. He built a bomb and placed it beneath the dining room. At a time when the czar was scheduled to dine, he set off the bomb. People were killed.”

Chernov looks at me and shrugs. “The czar was late for dinner and didn’t suffer a scratch.”

I shake my head in wonderment. “It wasn’t his time to die. So far, from your narrative, only Andrei Zhelyabov, Sofia’s lover, and Stefan Chalturin, the carpenter, might be the man I seek.”

“Not unless they rose from the grave. But there’s one whose name has not been mentioned but who was a part of every attempt. You say that the man you seek has a laboratory. That would make him a chemist.”

“Or he might be a medical doctor.”

“Why? Because he said he’s a medical doctor? The new biological chemistry of practitioners like Doctor Pasteur and Germany’s Doctor Koch go hand-in-hand with the medical profession. In Russia, many chemists, like Koch, are also medical doctors. Medicine is how they earn their living because there’s little market for the work of a chemist. Except among anarchists.”

“For explosives?”

“Exactly. Dynamite, that invention of Monsieur Nobel in Sweden, is expensive in Russia and hard to smuggle in. But the formula for dynamite and its more powerful and dangerous brother, nitroglycerin, are well known. Any good chemist could make the compounds. And that’s where Perun comes in.”

“Perun?”

“Perun is the chief god of the ancient Russian pantheon, a pagan god whose traits were similar to the mighty Thor of Norse legend. He’s a god of thunder and lightning, violence and war. An ax was his symbol. The radical organization that set out to kill the czar called itself the Society of the Ax, after Nechayev’s movement, possibly to throw suspicion on the already jailed radical. The man who became their chief chemist, who made the explosives, was known outside the inner circle of conspirators only by the code name Perun.”

“What’s his real name?”

“I don’t have that information. But the name doesn’t matter.”

“He’s dead?”

“Unfortunately not. But whatever name he was born with, is not the name he bears today. For our purposes, let’s simply refer to him as Perun, since that is the name he operates under. Our information is that his family background is that of poor tenant farmers, what we call serfs.”

“Isn’t that typical of revolutionaries?”

“Not of Russian ones. Kropotkin, the foremost anarchist theorist, is a prince, Bakunin the son of a landowner, Vera Zasulich the daughter of a nobleman, Sofia Perovskaya’s father was a general. We believe Perun was the son of serfs but orphaned at an early age. He ultimately was taken in by a chemist who provided him a generous education.”

“Including speaking French?”

“Most certainly. Perun’s interests ran toward science and he became a chemistry student in St. Petersburg. Scientific interest is not the typical background for the young revolutionaries of my country. Most radicals were nurtured in law school or the teaching profession. One can assume Perun’s student condition was a step above poverty and starvation, which is the general condition of all but the children of the wealthy and aristocracy. Because of his need for money, he took odd jobs. One such job appeared quite innocent: he picked up printing at night from a print shop and delivered it to an apartment house, leaving it in a box outside. One night he was arrested by the Third Section and the printing materials, radical pamphlets calling for the people to rise and tear down the government, were seized.”

“Was he aware of what he was carrying?”

“Probably not, at least he didn’t confess to it after he was arrested and put to the question.”

“Put to the question … tortured?”

Chernov shrugs. “I wasn’t present, but physical persuasion is not unheard of in cases involving radicals. But I’m told that he was also the victim of a carnal act that occasionally occurs to men in jail.”