The Senility of Vladimir P (25 page)

The driver nodded.

Vasya looked back at his father. ‘See, you want some guys, I get them. It's only a question of money. It's not only policemen. If Anna had asked for ballerinas, I could get her half the chorus line for the Bolshoi. Trust me, I've done it before. You can have whatever you want. Not that any —' His phone rang. ‘Excuse me.'

Vasya answered the phone. For the next minute or so he gave a series of monosyllabic answers, then put it away.

He turned again to Sheremetev. ‘What was I saying?'

‘Nothing,' muttered Sheremetev. As if Stepanin hadn't told him enough, he was sick at what he now understood of his son's profession, if that was the right word for it. He would never be able to pretend again that he didn't know.

They were driving stop-start on an eight-lane road with thousands of other vehicles all trying to get out of central Moscow. Sheremetev had lost track of where they were – he only knew that every minute they were in the car brought them closer to the dacha.

Suddenly he looked back at Vasya. ‘Do you think it's because of Mama?'

‘What?'

‘This stuff that you do. Do you think it's because of the way Mama died?'

‘Papa . . .' growled Vasya.

‘I remember the way you cried —'

‘Papa! Please!'

Sheremetev was quiet for a moment. Then he turned to Rost­khenkovskaya. ‘His mother died when he was nineteen.'

‘Papa!'

‘What?' demanded Sheremetev. ‘Are you ashamed of it?'

‘Why should I be ashamed of it?'

‘Then be quiet! You were nineteen. A boy's mother dies. He shouldn't cry?'

‘Of course he should cry,' said Rostkhenkovskaya.

‘My mother only died last year,' chipped in the driver, ‘and I cried like a baby.'

‘Seva, you shut the fuck up!'

‘How did she die?' asked Rostkhenkovskaya.

‘Oh, for God's sake!'

‘Kidney failure,' said Sheremetev. ‘We didn't have the money for the bribes. Others did.'

Rostkhenkovskaya leaned forward and looked past Sheremetev at Vasya. ‘Vasya, is that true?'

Vasya shrugged.

‘Is it?'

Vasya grunted.

‘And did you know it was because your dad didn't have the money?'

Vasya shrugged again.

‘So is this . . . what you do, is that to get back at him?'

Vasya didn't reply.

There was silence in the car – a silence that prickled with the tension of people straining to hear more. Belkin had turned to look at Vasya. Seva, the driver, was frowning, hunched slightly, waiting for the response.

‘Vasily,' said Sheremetev. ‘Is that why you do this? This life that you live, this work that you do – is to punish me?'

Vasya wiped at his eyes. ‘No, it's not to punish you! It's so, if I ever have a wife and I ever have a son, he won't have to watch her die because I'm so damn honest and so damn noble and so damn upright that I don't have the pathetic few thousand dollars it will take to save her!'

Sheremetev recoiled.

‘How much was that watch you brought in today, Papa? Ask yourself that. Three hundred thousand dollars. That's what Anushka offered you, right? And for the sake of how much did Mama die? Was it even three thousand? The watch alone could have saved a hundred of her. And that crook, that man you call your patient, was probably taking that watch from some filthy oligarch the very same day she died. That's what it is to live in Russia, Papa. That's something you've never understood. You have to be like him – or you end up emptying his bedpan.'

Vasya's phone went off. ‘Yes?' he barked.

‘Vasya's not so bad,' whispered Rostkhenkovskaya to Sheremetev, as Vasya snapped answers into his phone.

Sheremetev glanced at her in disbelief. How, he wondered, had he come to be sitting in this car beside his son, the gangster, taking comfort from an extortionist in a black pinafore dress?

The car drove on, a capsule full of greed and recrimination and misery travelling through the Moscow night.

It took almost three
hours to get to the dacha in the traffic crawling out of the city. When they finally arrived, they stopped out of sight of the gate. Sheremetev had told them that if he tried to get the five policemen into the house, suspicions would be raised – especially now that the whole dacha was on edge and everyone was waiting for some kind of war to break out between the Lukashvillis and whoever had shot Artur, although he didn't tell them about that. The driver, Seva, got out of the car and went to join his fellow moonlighting cops in the second car, which parked on a verge at the side of the road. Vasya took his place at the steering wheel.

They drove up to the gate. A security guard came out of the booth to see who was there. Sheremetev lowered his window.

‘I've got a couple of contractors here who have come to see about installing some equipment for Vladimir Vladimirovich,' he said.

‘What kind of equipment?' asked the guard suspiciously.

‘A lift for the stairs. It's getting harder and harder for Vladimir Vladimirovich to walk up and down.'

The guard looked at his watch. ‘So late?'

‘They had to come from Moscow.'

The guard consulted his clipboard. ‘Did you clear them?'

‘They're doing me a favour. They agreed to come at short notice.'

The guard peered into the car. ‘Turn off the engine,' he said to Vasya.

‘You want me to turn it off?'

‘Yes! Turn it off!'

Vasya turned it off. ‘Touchy,' he said.

The guard gave him a hostile glance and then looked carefully at the other occupants. Rostkhenkovskaya gave him a winning smile. He didn't react.

‘Do you know these people personally, Nikolai Ilyich?' he asked.

‘Of course,' said Sheremetev. ‘I can vouch for them.'

The guard looked them over again. Sheremetev waited. Normally, the guard would have waved them through by now, but everyone in the dacha was jittery.

The guard walked around the car. ‘Open the boot,' he called out. Vasya released the boot lock and the guard looked inside, then slammed the door closed.

He came back to the window. ‘You know you're meant to get people cleared in advance, Nikolai Ilyich.'

Sheremetev nodded. ‘It was short notice.'

‘I need to see identification.'

Belkin and Rostkhenkovskaya pulled out their driving licences. Vasya did the same.

The guard took the licences and noted down the names and date of birth of each person. H returned them without a word and then went back to the booth.

They could see the guard making a call.

‘Remember what I told you,' said Belkin to Sheremetev as they waited. ‘If you try anything, we show the watches and say you sold them to us.' He clicked his fingers. ‘Like that! Ten years in jail for you, minimum.'

Still the gate didn't open.

‘What's the holdup?' muttered Vasya.

‘Things are a bit . . . It's just takes a little while,' said Sheremetev. He frowned. ‘Funny he didn't notice you've got the same name as me.'

Vasya rolled his eyes, as if his father's naivete knew no bounds. ‘That's not the name on the licence, Dad.'

By the time Sheremetev understood what his son meant, the guard inside the booth had put down the phone. The security gate opened a few seconds later.

Vasya restarted the engine and they headed up the drive.

Without uttering a word,
the security guard in the hall ran a metal detector over them and checked the briefcases that Belkin and Rostkhenkovskaya carried. Lyosha stood beside him, watchful and silent. When the guard was finished, Lyosha gestured for them to come through.

Upstairs, Sheremetev left Vasya, Belkin and Rostkhenkovskaya in an empty room while he went to get rid of Vera. Vladimir was in his sitting room, mumbling aggressively.

‘How has he been?' asked Sheremetev.

Vera rolled her eyes.

‘I'm sorry,' said Sheremetev. He would need Vera again the next day so that he could take Oleg the money that he was going to get from Belkin. ‘Listen, Verochka, can you come again tomorrow?'

‘Kolya, I don't think so.'

‘Please. One more day. He's getting used to you.'

She looked unconvinced.

‘Come on, Verochka. It's important.'

‘What are you doing every day, anyway?'

‘I just need to get away a little. I told myself, this week, I'll take a few afternoons off.'

She looked at him knowingly. ‘Have you met someone?'

‘No.'

‘You have!'

‘I haven't,' he said impatiently. Vasya and the two extortionists were sitting in a room not ten metres away, and although he had told them explicitly to stay there until he came for them, he knew that if he left it too long they might decide he was trying to pull some kind of trick – and there was no knowing what they would do then.

‘Kolya, it's six years since your wife died. It's time you met some­one. Give yourself some credit. You're very attractive to a woman if she likes small men.'

‘Thank you, Verochka, but now's not the time.'

‘Now
is
the time!'

‘Believe me,' said Sheremetev, ‘it isn't.'

‘Kolya, it's too easy to keep saying that. How much longer will you wait?' Vera shook her head, eyes filled with emotion. ‘Kolya, if you're not careful, you'll be an old man before you know it and your whole life will have passed. You deserve more than that.'

‘We'll discuss it,' he said, trying to push her out the door.

She held firm. ‘When?'

‘Not now.'

‘Kolya, don't pretend.'

‘Pretend what?'

Vera batted her eyelids coyly. ‘You know what.'

Sheremetev felt like tearing his hair out.

She came closer.

‘Vera,' he said, trying again to usher her out of Vladimir's suite, ‘let's talk about this tomorrow.'

‘Tomorrow? Really?'

‘When you come to look after Vladimir Vladimirovich.'

Vera sighed. ‘Oh, I'm really not sure I can come tomorrow.'

‘Vera, please! I need you tomorrow. We can talk then.'

‘But you won't be here.'

‘When I come back. I'll only be gone for a few hours. I'll put Vladimir to bed, then we'll have plenty of time.'

‘All night?'

‘If we need it.'

‘What do you have in mind?'

‘Wait and see,' he said, finally shoving her out the door and into the corridor.

She stopped. ‘Kolya, you devil! You've been playing hard to get. The things you made me say! Shall I bring something special tomorrow for when you get back?'

‘Whatever you like,' he replied hurriedly, pulling on her arm to get her moving again.

She raised an eyebrow. ‘Lingerie?'

‘Whatever!'

‘Yes?'

‘Yes! Yes!' He stopped at the top of the stairs.

Vera ran a finger under Sheremetev's chin. ‘Until tomorrow, Nikolasha.' She gazed at him, and then sashayed down the stairs.

He stayed, stifling his urge to run back, knowing that she would turn at the bottom and look at him again. She did. He smiled, seeming to remember that he had heard Vera mention lingerie and only now thinking about what he had said and wondering how he would get out of it tomorrow. She walked past Lyosha, who was still there with the other security guard, and disappeared

Sheremetev turned to go back but caught a glimpse of Stepanin crossing the lobby below him. As Sheremetev watched, the chef leaned close to Lyosha and whispered something in his ear. Lyosha nodded and they walked away together.

What was Stepanin, who hardly ever emerged from the kitchen, doing in the entrance hall? And where was Lyosha going with him?

Suddenly he remembered the three interlopers. He ran back to the room where he had deposited them. ‘Wait!' he said breathlessly. ‘Five more minutes. Stay until I come to get you!' Then he ran back to Vladimir's sitting room.

Vladimir was still mumbling to himself.

‘How are you this evening, Vladimir Vladimirovich?' asked Sheremetev, trying to slow himself down and keep his anxiety out of his voice.

Vladimir looked around at him. ‘Who are you?'

‘Sheremetev, Vladimir Vladimirovich.'

‘What are you doing here?'

‘I'm looking after you.'

Vladimir sniffed. ‘Can you smell him?'

‘No,' said Sheremetev. ‘I think he's gone.'

‘He's never gone,' growled Vladimir.

‘Vladimir Vladimirovich, I have a couple of visitors.'

‘Who is it?' demanded Vladimir. ‘Is it Monarov? I told him to have the latest on Trikovsky on my desk this morning. Where is he? Has he got it?'

‘I don't know, Vladimir Vladimirovich.'

‘He's been twelve years in prison. I don't understand why no one's arranged an accident!'

‘It's just three workers who need to check something in your dressing room.'

‘Who?'

‘The people who are here. They'll only take a few minutes. Just stay here, Vladimir Vladimirovich, and they won't disturb you.'

‘Go on, then! Why are you taking my time up with such a thing? What do I care? I've got more important things to attend to.' He paused. ‘That fucking Chechen is here somewhere, I'm telling you. If you find him in the dressing room, let me know.'

‘I think he's gone.'

‘He's here!'

Sheremetev left. A minute later he returned with Vasya, Belkin and Rostkhenkovskaya and led them past the closed door of the sitting room into Vladimir's bedroom.

‘Where is he?' whispered Belkin.

‘In another room. Come through. The watches are here.'

Sheremetev took them into the dressing room. He turned on the light and gestured to the wooden cabinet.

Belkin opened the doors. He hesitated, as if heightening the moment of climax, and then slid out the top tray.

At the sight of the fifteen watches nestled in their velvet-lined clefts, he and Rostkhenkovskaya exchanged an awed glance.

‘A Vacheron Tour de l'Ile,' whispered Belkin, pointing.

Rostkhenkovskaya nodded. ‘And another one! There. Look.'

For an instant longer, they stared as if the objects of their lust had momentarily paralysed them. Then Belkin opened his briefcase and his thick, sausage-like fingers reached for the watches. In four quick handfuls, he had cleared the tray.

He opened the second tray and grabbed another clutch of watches as Rostkhenkovskaya did the same. They emptied the third tray, and the fourth. They weren't even looking at the pieces now, just scooping the watches up and dropping them in by the handful. Their greed oozed out of them like an oily sheen.

Sheremetev tried to get a peek into Belkin's case. As far as he could tell, it was empty but for the watches that had just gone into it. But then . . . where was the money they had said they were bringing for him?

Sheremetev took a step closer, trying to get a look into the briefcase Rostkhenkovskaya was filling.

‘
Where's Monarov
?
'

Sheremetev jumped. Belkin and Rostkhenkovskaya froze, watches in hand, then turned to see an old man in a blue sweater and grey trousers standing behind them.

‘Where's Monarov?' demanded Vladimir, peering at each of them to see if anyone was his dead crony. His eyes lingered on Vasya, who stared back at him, mouth agape.

‘I told you, Vladimir Vladimirovich,' said Sheremetev, ‘he's com­ing later.' Sheremetev took Vladimir by the arm. ‘Come on, let's go back. It's just workmen here. They need to finish what they're doing.'

‘Monarov's coming, is he?'

‘Yes, he's coming. Soon.'

Vladimir looked at Sheremetev suspiciously. ‘You're sure?'

‘I'm sure. I'll let you know as soon as he's here.'

‘With his report!'

‘Yes, Vladimir Vladimirovich, with his report.'

Sheremetev nudged Vladimir again, and the old man shuffled away with him back to the sitting room.

A couple of minutes later, Sheremetev returned. Belkin and ­Rostkhenkovskaya had finished ransacking the cabinet. When they had run out of space in their cases, they had filled their pockets.

‘Well?' said Sheremetev.

Belkin grinned. ‘He really knows nothing, does he?'

The tone of Belkin's question and the repulsive grin on his face brought out a protective instinct in Sheremetev. ‘He's got dementia. That's how it is. It can happen to any of us.'

‘He's worse than he looks on the TV.'

‘Watch out it doesn't happen to you,' retorted Sheremetev. ‘All the watches you can steal will mean nothing then.'

Belkin laughed. ‘They'll mean a lot until it happens, though. Right! We're ready. Thank you, Nikolai Ilyich. You've been very helpful. We'll be going now.'

‘And the money, Aleksandr Semyonovich? The half million?'

‘Yes, the half million. Listen, Nikolai Ilyich, we've been thinking . . .' Belkin grimaced, as if it was a difficult decision that he had to announce. ‘We can't give it to you.'

‘You mean you don't have it with you? Do I have to come and get it tomorrow?'

‘No, I mean, we're not going to give it to you. At all.'

Sheremetev stared at him.

‘See, the way I look at it – excuse me for putting it bluntly, Nikolai Ilyich – half a million dollars isn't a puff of air, and even if one can afford to give it, if one doesn't have to, why should one? What are you going to do? Are you going to go to someone and say, I did a deal with these people to let them steal all of Vladimir Vladimirovich's watches, but then they didn't give me my cut? I don't think you're going to do that. Believe me, if you do, you'll be in prison longer than me. I'll buy my way out of the charges. What will you do?'

Sheremetev's mind reeled. He turned to Rostkhenkovskaya. ‘You never even brought it, did you?'

She didn't reply.

Sheremetev searched for something to say. All he could think of was what Stepanin had done. ‘I'll get someone to firebomb you,' he muttered.

Rostkhenkovskaya smiled.

‘Come on, Nikolai Ilyich,' said Belkin, ‘you're not that kind of guy. You know, I really do believe you're an honest fellow. A rarity – and a conundrum! An honest man stealing watches. What has Russia come to when we see such a thing?' He laughed. ‘You should be thankful to us for relieving you of the temptation. Don't eat yourself up about it. What have you lost? How many years did you say you worked here? Six? For six years, you didn't touch these watches. You were never going to. Here they stayed – now I've got them. They weren't yours before, they're not yours now. You've lost nothing.'

‘But Pasha . . .'

‘Ah, yes, the nephew. That really is what this is all about, isn't it? Tell me, how much do you really need for him?'

‘Three hundred thousand dollars.'

Belkin tutted. ‘So you lied as well. Shame on you, Nikolai Ilyich.'

‘He needs some money to leave the country.'

‘Two hundred thousand?'

‘Forget that. Give me three hundred thousand. Just let me get him out of jail.'

Belkin laughed.

‘Please,' he begged. ‘Three hundred, that's all.'

‘Or what?'

Sheremetev had no reply to that. He turned his gaze on Vasya. ‘Are you going to let them do this?'

‘Papa . . .'

‘Are you?'

‘It's business, Papa. What do you want me to do? They're the client, not you.'

‘But they lied to me!'

‘You lied to them too.'

‘It's not the same.'

Vasya shrugged.

‘And your cousin?'

‘He's an idiot. How many times do I have to tell you that? I'm not responsible. Let him write what he wants and let him take the consequences.'

‘But this is wrong!' cried Sheremetev. ‘Vasya! These two people promised me half a million in return for the millions and millions they've got in those bags. You heard them! And now, nothing? Is that right? Is that just? Go! Go outside and get your thugs. They'll do anything you say.'

‘Papa . . . listen . . . I can't do that. I'm a businessman. It's a cutthroat world, you have no idea. I have nothing but my reputation. I told you, I have a good business with the jewellery people. One talks to the other. Do you know what would happen if I did what you say? No one would trust me. I'd never get another client.'

Belkin nodded gravely. ‘The relationship with the client is sacred, Nikolai Ilyich. You should understand, you're a nurse. It's like you and your patients.'

Sheremetev shook his head, stunned and horrified by the analogy.

‘That's how it is, Papa. You can ask them yourself for the money. I can't do anything. If they say no, it's no.'

Swallowing his loathing for the other man, Sheremetev turned again to Belkin. ‘Please,' he said. ‘Please give me the money to get my nephew Pasha out of jail.'

Belkin glanced at Rostkhenkovskaya, then gestured towards her, as if leaving the decision in her hands.

A flame of hope came alight in Sheremetev's heart.

‘No,' she said.

‘But Anna Mikhailovna —'