The boy carried on,
'The second man had disappeared on to the ice. When the first man finished, he helped the other to lower it down. When they had packed everything away, they stood there awhile and smoked a cigarette and chatted.'
'
But they were not speaking in Russian,' the girl said.
'
When they finished they were joined by a man that we have seen before. He took the bag with the body parts in. He joked with them and said he was going to feed the parts to the wolves of the forest. Then he left,' Pyotr said.
'
This man where have you seen him before?', Georgii's mind was beginning to race.
'
In the daytime, if you are like us, you learn to always keep on the move,' the girl said.
'
Since we came here we have met some strange people. They have tried to take advantage of us ...' Then Pyotr paused and looked towards Anna.
Geo
rgii sat there grimly listening and the girl started to cry. He knew only too well what kind of vermin, given half the chance, would take advantage of two young homeless street children.
'
Clean yourselves up and sleep in the bed through there. You can stay here for the time being. I'll talk to you in the morning.'
The kids went to bed and Georgii made a bed for himself on the sofa.
Long after he extinguished the light he lay there thinking. What was he going to do with the two kids? The party stooge would report him if he knew there were two extra kids living in the hostel. Christ he'd moaned enough when Brusilov and the horse had walked past him on their way out of the building. Food was a major problem; he could hardly feed himself on the meagre Bolshevik rations, let alone two more mouths! What was he going to do? He would do what he had always done leave it to the 'Fates'. Georgii placed great store in. He would leave it to providence, to see what happened next.
Anna placed a cold hand on his forehead.
Georgii woke with a start, he focused his eyes. The sight that greeted them was a sight for sore eyes. On the table there was a black loaf, there was also some ham and a whole chicken. It was still wearing all of its feathers. Pyotr was expertly pulling them out, and placing them in the washbasin. By the side of the ham there were some eggs. The ceiling started to spin and a sharp pain suddenly penetrated down to the pit of his stomach. His senses started to rally, and Georgii began to get a grip of himself.
'
Where on earth did you get this stuff? He exclaimed.
'
Mr Radetzky, you don't need to know where we got the food from. We just know where to find goodies like this.' Pyotr said.
The girl was giggling away gleefully.
To Georgii she seemed to be gaining a lot of pleasure out of this. The two kids prepared the food and he decided not to put up any more resistance.
It was the best breakfast he
'd had in years. In fact he couldn't remember when he had last eaten so well. Before he went to work he explained, he explained to them the procedure if they went out, or more importantly unexpected visitors came in. He showed them how he set the door. The two children had already worked out that the window at the end of the hall would have to be their main point of exit and entry. With that, and a full belly, he set off for the Militsya Station.
His day was routine.
He had to accompany one of Trofimov's lackeys on a tour of the cities defences. This he thought was a complete waste of time; surely the Red Army was responsible for that. But no, it had come down from the top. She was sending an experienced policeman to accompany the relatively inexperienced commissar to conduct an audit of the cities defences. Apparently a column of Whites was two hundred versts away from Moscow and panic was beginning to spread through the city. Despite Trotsky's remarks, from two evenings back, when he had assured all those present that the war might as well be won.
So off they went
and it became obvious that should the Whites breakthrough the cities outer defences, they could get into the city with relative ease. On they went through the snow, by lunchtime two factors hindered their progress. One was the snow fall was rapidly turning into a blizzard and secondly was the lack of cooperation from Trotsky's Red Army. The audit was abandoned and they returned and reported back to the Granite-Faced-Slag. Unusually for her she accepted their findings. They convinced her that maybe now was not the right time to be conducting an audit of this nature, which could only be interpreted as an unnecessary distraction in the face of an impending onslaught from Denikens army. She agreed without the usual argument, and dismissed the pair of them.
Georgii returned to his desk
and attempted to clear some of his paperwork. He looked over to where Trofimov was working and she seemed to be holding meeting after meeting with, he assumed, various visiting dignitaries. He turned around and reached for the file at the bottom of his in tray. He felt for it again, it was not there. Shit he thought, he carefully moved all the files and papers over from one side of the desk to the other without trying to draw attention to himself. It was definitely not there. He could only assume that whoever had placed it there had retrieved it when he had been off on this morning's 'Wild Goose' chase. He looked around him; everything in the office seemed to be perfectly in order. So he carried on as per normal himself; but he could not help thinking that someone was either trying to help him or they were trying to sabotage his enquiries. But he had told no one. The only person that knew was Gerhardt. But Georgii knew only too well that Gerhardt played his cards close to his chest when it suited him and, if he was doing it now, then he - Gerhardt - must be working in conjunction with other interested parties. Georgii sat there and wondered who these interested parties might be. He started to feel sick. He had sat there thinking for a long time, because when he returned to the land of the living, the 1
st
floor office was almost deserted, and Trofimov had got her coat and was heading to the door. He would wait for her to go; then he would go home. He gave her five minutes and then left. It was bitterly cold out on the street. He turned his collar up and decided to take the quick way home across some deserted wasteland. The snow had started to fall again and the flakes were pelting his face with a vengeance. He turned left, down at the end of the street, and hurried down a narrow lane. As he came to the wasteland the fresh snow crunched under his shoes. Georgii could now see the silhouette of the disused factory looming up in front of him. He walked in, something moved up in the rafters, probably pigeons he thought. They were the only things stupid enough to be out on a night like this.
He hurried on through the middle of the factory.
It was only when he had rounded a large idle machine that he thought he heard something. He stopped and listened. There it was again, but this time it was clearer. He wasn't sure but it sounded like a whimper. Georgii instinctively found himself moving towards the sound. At the same time he was reaching for his revolver
[9]
. Now he could definitely hear something. It was the sound of scuffling feet, and it was coming from over there. He peered around the corner of a giant lathe, and he was shocked at the sight that confronted him.
Two men were holding Trofimov, one on each arm, and a third was laying into her with his fists.
She was taking it defiantly. Georgii looked around him. On the floor was an empty bottle. He picked it up and threw it. The bottle sailed through the air over to the other side of the factory and smashed. The three men looked around to see which direction the bottle had come from. Georgii seized the opportunity and fired a shot at the man who only a second before had been working over Trofimov. He fell over like a sack of potatoes and lay on the floor clutching his belly. He then rushed them. Before he got to them the two men released her and she fell to the ground. They picked up their groaning colleague and made for the exit at the far end of the shed.
Geo
rgii looked at Comrade Trofimov. She had a bleeding lip and her eye was swelling up. He propped her up against a pillar. She moaned something unintelligibly at him. He looked around and saw it just in time. One of the assailants had thrown something at them. It was long and had a fuse attached to its end. Instinctively Georgii picked it up and threw it back in the direction it had come from. He threw himself on top of Trofimov and waited. She moaned. There was an almighty explosion, the force of which went upwards towards the ceiling. They lay there through the roar. Glass rained down from on high; a layer of dirt covered them both. Silence eventually returned to the building, they lay there and waited. When he was sure that they were both alone Georgii got up and dusted himself off. He looked down at Trofimov, she was slightly more composed. They were both talking, but they could not hear what the other was saying. He lent down and picked her up and, with his gun at the ready, they both headed for the outside.
They walked in silence.
Georgii thought the best thing that he could do would be to take her back to his place and get her cleaned up. She shook her head and tried to shake free, but he insisted that they were going back to his place.
After about ten minutes they walked into a group of Red Army guards who were investigating where the explosion had come from.
They told them what had happened and then headed on their way. Georgii was holding Trofimov's arm in a vice like grip.
They walked into the foyer just as the writer, from upstairs, was walking out.
God knows what he must have thought; the pair of them were covered in glass, dirt and cobweb. They shuffled past him and then went up the stairs, Georgii heard Rezhnikov mutter something. He opened the door.
They walked in; the place was its usual plain self.
He sighed, a heavy sigh of relief; thank god the two kids were not in. Trofimov immediately set about cleaning herself up. When she had finished Georgii offered her a drink. She declined and then said she had to leave. Trofimov slammed the door shut behind her. Georgii stood there in a bit of a daze. He was floored by her lack of manners; she had left without even saying a word of thanks. He looked out of the window and watched her walk off down the street. He turned around and nearly jumped out of his skin. The wardrobe door started to move and then Pyotr and Anna emerged. They had witnessed everything ...
The following day Trofimov said nothing, she blanked him.
Georgii just got on with his work. That night after supper he was sitting at the small table with the two kids. He decided to broach the niggling subject of the man they had seen before.
The girl spoke first.
'All through the autumn we wandered the streets by day and slept anywhere we could by night. One day we were in Red Square there seemed to be a public meeting of some kind going on ...'
'
There were hundreds of people there. We were begging for food hoping that someone might take pity on us ...' Pyotr said.
'
We were near the speaking place and there seemed to be a lot of important persons waiting. We were walking around asking them all if they could help ...' Anna said.
The boy interrupted.
'We got the usual Bolshevik answer. Clear off 'Besprizorniki
[10]
' scum!'
'
When the man, who we also saw at the dock, turned around, he smiled and put his hand into his pocket and gave us some sweeties. Then he told us to run along,' the girl said.
'
You would not forget a face like that. His face had shell holes in it and he had a 'Turned Up' moustache!' the boy said.
'
But he seemed very important. People were always coming up to him and shaking his hand or they whispered in his ear. He also spoke Russian with a funny accent!' The girl said excitedly.
'
You say you have seen this man before. Would you recognise him again?' Georgii said.
'
Most definitely ...' The two of them exclaimed.
Since he gave us the sweets, we have seen him all over Moscow,
' Pyotr said.
After they had gone to bed Georgii lay on the sofa and thought.
He went through the description of the man the two children had given him. He also wondered if there was a connection between 'The Man' with the funny accent, Goldstein, and these Kevshor crooks.
The next day there was no contact between Geo
rgii Radetzky and Anya Trofimov or, for that matter, the day after that. The second Thursday came around quickly and he found himself walking at a brisk pace to meet Gerhardt. By the time Georgii arrived at 'The Immaculate Winter Garden,' Auguste Gerhardt was seated on the bench patiently waiting for him. Comrade Radetzky was late.
He looked up with a
frown and then shook Georgii's hand. 'Georgii, I'm so glad that you could make it.' He paused, 'So now that you've got here, what have you got to tell me?'
Georgii told him about his visit to
'The Cheka', and the mysterious arrival of the two files and their equally mysterious disappearance. Georgii Radetzky talked at length about Isaak Goldstein and his connection with 'The Kevshors. 'He believed that the whole key to the case lay with this organised group. But he had to be honest with Gerhardt he did not have a clue where all of this was leading. Gerhardt listened intently to Georgii's debrief.