Dead Centre ns-14 Page 6

  Portable paraffin heaters provided their only warmth, but gave off so much moisture that their windows were still frozen solid on the inside — unless the residents had sold the glass and shoved up plywood in its place. In Putin’s Russia, everyone was an entrepreneur.

  8

  One of the promises I’d made myself during my dying days was to take the time to ‘stand and stare’, as Anna called it — to look at trees and plants, walk through gardens, shit like that. So every time I came out of Gunslingers, I turned left through Victory Park, along ‘Years of War’, its central avenue. Then I got the trolleybus home.

  Victory Park was a new creation. It was only finished after years of fuck-ups in the mid-1990s. Poklonnaya Gora, the hill it sat on, was where Napoleon had waited to be given the keys to the city when his troops surrounded it in 1812. He’d waited in vain.

  The park was finished just in time for the fiftieth anniversary of what we called the Second World War and the Russians called the Great Patriotic War. They had little interest in what had happened elsewhere. Fair one — more Russians were killed between ’41 and ’45 than all the other Allies put together. And eight out of ten Germans killed were dropped by the Soviets. In Western history books, those little details always seem to get lost in the footnotes.

  The ‘Years of War’ had five terraces, one for each year of the conflict, and 1,418 fountains, one for every day. They weren’t working at the moment because everything was frozen. But there were chapels, mosques, statues, rockets, all sorts of shit — and then, right at the centre, one big fuck-off statue of Nike, the goddess of victory. I kept meaning to ask Anna the Russian for ‘Just do it’.

  She was going to take me there on Victory Day, 9 May. Veterans, survivors, kids, everybody turned out. I was looking forward to seeing the old and bold. They’d be wearing more medals than Gaddafi. And it wouldn’t be raining.

  I was nearly at the main gate, head down, nose running, hands in pockets, making sure I didn’t slip on the ice, when the front panel and an alloy wheel with the Range Rover logo appeared in what little peripheral vision my hood allowed.

  ‘Hey, fella, want a lift?’ It was the gunslinger without the side parting.

  My head turned but my hood stayed where it was. I pulled the fur aside. Webb was at the driver’s window of a white wagon stained grey by today’s slush.

  ‘Where are you going? We’ll take you. It’s fucking freezing out there.’

  ‘Nah, it’s all right — I need the exercise.’

  I turned through a set of fancy iron gates. The Range Rover’s engine revved behind me, but instead of driving away it turned into the park. The wagon swept past and pulled up about three metres ahead of me. Even the number plate spelt drama. The back door swung open. Mitchell, in a big black Puffa, beckoned me inside. But he wasn’t smiling. ‘Come on, my friend. It’s a lot warmer in here.’

  The driver’s window was still powered down, and I could see that Webb wasn’t smiling either.

  I was about to turn back towards the main when Mitchell stepped out, weapon up. He’d obviously decided not to follow my advice. ‘In — the — fucking — vehicle — now.’

  9

  I swung back towards him, hands now out of my pockets and up by my chest. Head down, I focused on the weapon. I could smell the exhaust fumes billowing from the cold engine. I got to within a couple of paces of the open door. I could smell the rich leather interior as I leant closer, and feel the warmth of the heater.

  I punched out with my left hand and grabbed the top of Mitchell’s Glock. I pushed down, gripping it so I was outside his arc of fire, and jabbed at his face with my right. Short, sharp jabs, three or four in quick succession. Not caring where they hit, just that they did.

  As his head jerked back, I took my chance. I found the trigger of the weapon and pushed down and round until the barrel pointed towards him.

  The Glock jumped in my hand as a shot kicked out and the guy went down. I let go, turned and legged it as fast as I could, back through the gates. I screamed across the road, slipping on ice the other side and going down hard. I got up, legs flailing, and turned immediately right, out of their line of sight and fire. I kept running, not looking back — not that I could have with my hood up — and took another right.

  I found myself in a service road. Steam spewed from heating vents set into the back wall of an industrial unit and engulfed a line of huge industrial wheelie-bins. I dodged between two of them, three-quarters of the way down, and fought to recover my breath.

  Webb would have had to wait until Mitchell was back in the wagon before coming after me. Even if he didn’t give a shit about him, he couldn’t just leave the boy bleeding into the Victory Avenue snow. The police would soon be asking why.

  I leant against the wall, heart pounding. Now that I was still, the cold began to eat its way into my feet. But at least they were dry; that was all that mattered right now.

  I kept looking left and right to cover both exits of the service road. It wasn’t long before Webb drove past the end I’d come in from. There wasn’t much exhaust vapour now his engine had warmed up.

  I had to assume they knew where I lived. And that meant the only thing I could do was face them up. I had to find out who the fuck they were and why they wanted me.

  It looked as if Dostoevsky would have to wait. There was no way I could risk heading back to the flat or the range — or to any other known location — until I’d sorted this shit out.

  And if the Range Rover’s number plate was anything to go by, there was plenty of shit to sort.

  10

  In Moscow, real people’s cars have white plates with black letters. The Range Rover had red ones with white numbers. Diplomatic plates. That could have meant jack-shit. You could buy them on the black market: they let you travel in the government-designated fast lanes and beat the Moscow jams.

  Lads with red plates were never stopped. About a month ago, the police had a clamp-down on their illegal use. They pulled over a genuine red-plated wagon: the diplomat’s BGs jumped out and overpowered them, spread the officers on the ground, weapons confiscated. How were they to know the police were genuine?

  But even if they were black-market gear, I still had to worry. These things cost at least twenty-five thousand dollars — more if you threw in the blue flashing lights. Which meant that whoever was after me had money as well as Glocks — and that wasn’t good news.

  Fuck it. Running away would only make me die short of breath. And then I’d never know what this was all about.

  I started to retrace my steps. They’d be back along that street sooner or later. They’d hit all known locations: Gunslingers, maybe the flat. Then they’d cruise around for a while longer. But not indefinitely. Mitchell was going to need medical attention, unless Webb was going to let him bleed to death. So I needed them to find me before they made that drop.

  I got back on the main, hood still up, but enough of my face sticking out to be able to spot the nearest mini-mart. These places were even more prolific than Starbucks. They sold everything the man who had nothing could possibly want: cigarettes, alcohol, sulphuric acid to keep your crumbling piping clear, paraffin to keep you warm and your windows frozen.

  I dodged and wove my way through the traffic and went into Apricot Garden. There wasn’t a piece of fruit in sight; they all had names like that. Milky Way, Cowboy’s Stable, you name it.

  The Russian version of X Factor blared from a TV mounted above the counter. An old woman who looked as though she’d been sitting by the checkout since before the Cold War puffed a cigarette and watched Simon Cowellski put the local hopefuls through their paces.

  I scanned the aisles, then grabbed a hammer and some overpriced paraffin in the kind of plastic five-litre container we’d use for ready-mixed screen-wash.

  I arrived at the counter as Simon gave his verdict and the singer burst into tears. A dozen or so brands of cigarette were on display, from Lucky Strike and Marlboro to Leningrad and CCCP
in bold, no-nonsense Soviet-style packaging for those who still missed the old ways. I was interested in the lighters alongside them.

  I grunted and pointed. She hoovered up my roubles without taking her eyes off the screen.

  I headed back to the bins, put down my newly purchased gear and unclipped the wheel retainers on the last one in the line. I unscrewed the top of the paraffin container and pressed my thumb into the seal until it broke, then left it on the ground.

  I retraced my steps to the corner and looked around uncertainly, as if I was waiting for a pickup. I checked once more behind me. They’d be able to get their wagon down the service road, no problem.

  11

  I didn’t have long to wait. The Range Rover was moving a lot faster now. Webb was still at the wheel. He spotted me and his mouth moved in double-time behind the windscreen.

  He hit the brakes just past the service road and the wheels spun in the slush. Mitchell was forced up and forward from where he was lying in the back seat and I saw him give a silent scream of pain as I turned and legged it down the service road, giving my best impression of a headless chicken. I shoved the lighter between my teeth.

  The Range Rover reversed at speed. I heard the engine roar as it powered into the narrow space. I reached the wheelie-bins, slid behind the last one, back against the wall, and shoved against it with both arms and then my right foot. The bin toppled into the path of the oncoming wagon.

  There was a flash of grime-covered white as Webb stood on the brakes, but he was too late. Metal screeched on metal and the bin clattered off down the road.

  The air-bags kicked off in the Range Rover’s cabin.

  I grabbed the hammer in my right hand and the paraffin container in my left.

  Webb tried to exit but his door smashed against the wall. There wasn’t room for him to get out. I swung the hammer at the bottom left-hand corner of the rear passenger window before they had time to draw down. The safety glass starred, then shattered.

  Shouts of anger and pain came from inside. I shoved the paraffin container against the frame and pushed down on it with my right forearm. There was a fine spray for a couple of seconds, then the rest of the seal gave way and fluid gushed into the interior. The fumes burnt my nostrils and can’t have been much fun for theirs.

  I dropped the container and shoved my left fist through the hole, lighter at the ready, thumb on the roller.

  ‘Show me your hands!’

  They got the message loud and clear. Webb put his straight on the steering wheel. He wasn’t pleased. ‘You’ve fucked up, Stone. Just stand down.’

  ‘Who the fuck are you? What do you want with me?’

  I didn’t get an answer. Maybe I wasn’t sounding crazy enough.

  I cranked it up. ‘What the fuck do you want? Tell me or I’ll fucking torch this. Tell me — tell me now!’

  I glanced down. The paraffin had mixed nicely with Mitchell’s blood on the tan leather. His leg was a mess.

  I heard a squeal of brakes and the scream of an engine coming towards us from the other end of the service road. Another Range Rover, two up. Black with a blue flashing light on the driver’s side of the roof. That was all I had time to register before I turned and started running in the opposite direction.

  I heard no shouts, no commands to stop, no gunfire. I kept on running.

  Then my head exploded. I went down like liquid. My legs moved like I was still running, but I knew I was going nowhere. Hands grabbed me and dragged my face across the hammer that had dropped me.

  12

  It wasn’t long before I was in the back of the undamaged Range Rover, hands secured to my ankles with plasticuffs. I rested my forehead on the leather upholstery of the seat in front of me to try to release the pressure on my wrists.

  My skull had recovered from the initial pain where the hammer had connected, but I knew I was going to have a big fuck-off headache for the rest of the day. I just hoped it wasn’t a fracture and I’d get the chance to sort out the cut. I couldn’t feel any wetness, but I knew there had to be one. Maybe my parka had soaked up the blood before it reached my neck.

  Both wagons backed out of the service road. The driver of mine was a big old Nigerian lad in a blue Puffa. Blue and red beads tied off each braid of his cornrows and he had a shaving rash under his chin. The guy beside him looked like Genghis Khan. He must have come straight from the steppes. He kept turning in his seat to make sure his passenger wasn’t trying to escape — as if I was going to get far even if I did.

  The blue light started to flash. I could see it bouncing off shop windows as we drove down the main. We were heading out of the city.

  I was flapping. None of these guys cared about what I saw or heard, and that wasn’t a good thing. It could mean they knew I was never going to get the chance to tell anybody.

  I checked the dash clock: 11:17. I tried to get a view of the speedo but it was blocked by the driver’s Puffa. The sat-nav was glowing, but it was all in Russian. All I got from it was our direction of travel.

  Genghis had his phone out. He grunted acknowledgements to whoever was on the other end and closed it down. These vehicles were brand new. The white one must have lost its sumptuous showroom smell, but the warmth and luxury of this one almost lulled me into feeling safe.

  I gave everybody time to settle down before I tried to get some sort of relationship going. I didn’t even know if these lads spoke English.

  ‘The small guy — he OK? No hard feelings, eh? I—’

  With a rustle of nylon jacket, Genghis turned and put his forefinger to his lips. He shushed me like a child. I nodded, returned my forehead to the seatback and began a close examination of the carpet.

  There wasn’t any point in trying to talk with these guys. They were only the monkeys. And if the organ-grinder wanted me dead, I would have been dead by now. They’d have done it in the alleyway while I was half concussed. But why had they let me see their faces? And why weren’t they pissed off that I’d shot their mate?

  I raised my head and caught another glimpse of the sat-nav. We were still heading west, but keeping off the M1, the main motorway. Suburbia was just beginning to take shape on the Moscow margins. The media were full of it — all the usual moaning about forests having huge holes ripped out of them to make way for gated communities with names like Navaho and Chelsea.

  The road was now lined with trees and the potholes were getting more treacherous.

  13

  An hour and twenty-seven minutes later we turned off towards a village. I’d spent every second of that time trying not to get bounced around in the foot-well, so the small of my back was now as painful as my neck.

  Genghis sparked up his cell again.

  This wasn’t Navaho or Chelsea. The buildings were timber-framed and exuded an air of history. Enormous dachas, three storeys high with huge, overhanging roofs, stood behind big walls. These were the weekend retreats of wealthy Muscovites, built in the time of the Tsar. Tyre tracks led in and out of the driveways. There was no foot traffic at all. The rich didn’t need to walk and their snow was pure white.

  We turned through a massive set of slowly opening wooden gates. I saw cedar tiles cladding a steeply pitched roof. Condensation billowed from modern heating ducts on the side of the old building. It looked like something out of a spy story. The whole village did.

  The Range Rover crunched across the snow, flanking the dacha. Huge trees circled a snow-lined playground, gardens and a swimming-pool. I could just make out the little handles round the edge to help you out of the water. We swooped round to the back of the house and stopped behind another Range Rover with red plates. Genghis jumped out and produced an eight-inch blade from a sheath at his hip. My door opened. The blade flashed in the sunlight and the plasticuffs put up only token resistance. As I straightened, he pointed the tip of his knife towards the wooden veranda.

  The cold slapped me in the face as I headed up the three steps. Crows squawked in a field the other side of the trees.
I touched the swelling on the back of my head. The skin had broken, but the heat of the Range Rover had dried the wound.

  Three doors led off the veranda: a bug screen for the summer, followed by a triple-glazed monster with an aluminium frame and finally the hand-carved wooden original.

  I stepped into a big shiny modern kitchen, all white marble and stainless steel. It couldn’t have provided a more dramatic contrast to the exterior. I stood on a polished stone floor with the sweet smell of Russian cleaning fluids, that really intense mixture of rose perfume and bleach, assaulting my nostrils. And it was even hotter in there than it had been in the Range Rover.

  A small man in his late forties sat facing me at a white marble table. His hair was brushed back. There was a hint of grey at the temples. He was immersed in a Russian broadsheet, the front page full of the Fukushima meltdown. ‘Coffee?’ Without looking up, he pointed to a cappuccino machine the size of a nuclear reactor. ‘Help yourself and sit down over here with me.’

  He was wearing black suit trousers, shiny black leather shoes, a grey shirt and V-neck jumper. A white magnetic board hung on the wall behind him, covered with photos and all the normal family shit. A scaled-down red Ferrari with an electric engine was parked beneath it, next to a Tupperware crate containing every shape and size of game ball. The cappuccino machine stood beside a white marble sink large enough to dismember a body in.

  ‘Relax, Nick. No one else is going to interrupt us, and you’re in no danger. I just want to talk with you.’ His English was precise, but his accent was surprisingly guttural. He sounded like Hollywood’s idea of a Cold War Soviet agent.

  ‘Please.’ He nodded again towards the dozen or so matching blue mugs that were lined up on the spotless work surface. ‘Get yourself whatever you fancy. Then come and sit down.’