Black Knight in Red Square Read Free

to gain strength and then as a means of relaxation, a way to escape from the pressures of living in Moscow. Eventually, lifting weights had become an end in itself. It demanded his total attention and he gave it willingly. His body had begun to expand with musculature as he lifted, and before he was named a chief inspector he had already earned the nickname “Washtub” among his fellow police and also among full-time criminals.
    Rostnikov gripped the metal tightly in his hand and moved slowly up the stairwell of the apartment on Krasikov Street, again going over what he would say. His wife, Sarah, had tried to talk him out of this, but he had worked too hard, prepared too well. He moved resolutely upward, dragging his bad leg behind him, and opened the door on the seventh floor. There were no elevators in the apartment building; few apartment buildings in Moscow had elevators.
    Going down the corridor, he took a deep breath. No turning back, he thought, and then he paused before the door and knocked. Beyond the door he could hear two voices, one a man’s, the other a woman’s. He could not make out what they were saying. He knocked again, and a voice answered, “Coming.”
    It was early in the morning, more than two hours before Irina would discover Aubrey’s body, half an hour before Inspector Rostnikov was due in his office at Petrovka—barely enough time to do what must be done. The door opened.
    â€œYes?” A thin man in an undershirt stood at the door. His wife, standing behind him, was extremely plump, with her orange hair pinned in an untidy bun.
    â€œI live in the apartment below you,” said Rostnikov, adopting the official voice he used in dealing with those who appeared frightened.
    â€œWe are Bulgarian,” the man said.
    â€œI know,” Rostnikov replied.
    â€œI am here for six months for a machine trade exchange,” the man said.
    â€œThat’s not important,” replied Rostnikov, shifting the tools in his hand. Both the man and the woman looked down as the tools clanked together.
    â€œYou are a policeman,” said the woman.
    â€œYes.” Rostnikov spoke softly, almost with resignation, trying to give the impression that what he was about to do was regrettable but inevitable.
    â€œWhat have we done?” said the man, touching his chest and looking at his wife.
    â€œYour toilet,” said Rostnikov.
    â€œI’m what?” said the startled man, stepping back.
    â€œYour toilet is broken,” explained Rostnikov. “It is causing a massive leak in our apartment below. We cannot use our toilet.”
    â€œYou cannot use your toilet,” echoed the man dumbly.
    â€œWe can,” Rostnikov went on, “but we are not willing to clean up the floor each time we flush.”
    â€œNo one told us,” said the woman apologetically, putting a hand to her breast and discovering that her dress was not fully buttoned.
    They had not been told, Rostnikov knew, because a decision had been made, in spite of Rostnikov’s threats and pleas to the building manager, a thin Party member named Samsanov, to avoid telling the Bulgarians that their toilet was faulty. Apparently the local political decision was that it would not do to let the Bulgarians see how defective the plumbing was. They might go home and ridicule their Moscow hosts. Rostnikov, in spite of his position with the police, had been told to forget it till the Bulgarians left, but they showed no signs of leaving. So Rostnikov had begun reading plumbing books. For four weeks he read plumbing books. The library was filled with them. There were more books on plumbing than on plastering, cooking, radio and television repairing, automobiles, and crime. He now felt himself capable of repairing whatever the problem might be, if his tools were sufficient and his resolve to defy the local Party decision held firm.
    â€œNo one told us,” the man repeated his wife’s