Death on the Nevskii Prospekt (24 page)

The young woman laughed. The borzoi awoke and shuffled over to the tea trolley. ‘Why, he stayed with me. My husband was away with his ship, most of those years. He would be away now, in
Japan, fighting that terrible war, but he had to come back with a badly damaged ship that needed repairs.’ She broke a piece of cake into small pieces and gave the dog his tea. He seemed to
like the cake. Mikhail Shaporov stroked his white coat as he listened to the conversation. He sensed that some dramatic thought had gripped Powerscourt a few minutes before but he had no idea what
it was.

Powerscourt gave no sign at all of excitement now. ‘Do you mean that Mr Kerenkov is in St Petersburg right now, attending to the repairs?’

‘Why, yes, Lord Powerscourt, he has been here since the middle of December.’ She smiled at him. Powerscourt thought that naval officers must be pretty good shots with a revolver. Not
a problem to shoot a foreigner in the heart and dump his body on the Nevskii Prospekt. He thought the young woman was daring him to ask the next question. He asked it.

‘Might I ask, Mrs Kerenkova, why you are here at the family estate when your husband is in St Petersburg?’

She laughed again and now she too began to stroke the borzoi. ‘See what questions they ask us, Potemkin,’ she began by addressing the dog. ‘I could say,’ there was
another of those tosses of the head to clear the face of that blonde hair, ‘that I came here to prepare things for his coming a little later. But that is not the truth. Things are not very
good between us just now. I am sure, Lord Powerscourt, that even in England the aristocratic husbands and their wives sometimes do not get on as they should. Is that so?’ Powerscourt nodded,
betraying an entire class in an afternoon. ‘At first Vladimir did not care about me and Roderick. He thought it was just an infatuation, that it wouldn’t last. Even when we met up for
all those Januarys he didn’t seem to mind.’

‘So what happened?’ asked Powerscourt. ‘How did he come to change his mind? I presume he sent you out here because of some family disagreement?’

Tamara laughed bitterly. ‘Disagreement? I suppose you could call it that. You see, Lord Powerscourt, I’d always told Vladimir when Roderick was coming. Always, so it wouldn’t
be a surprise. Then,’ she stopped as if trying to fix a date in her mind, ‘round about the middle of last month he heard Mr Martin was coming, coming to St Petersburg. He didn’t
believe me when I said I didn’t know. And I didn’t, you’ve got to believe me, Lord Powerscourt. Of course I’d have told him if I’d known, I’d have told all of St
Petersburg that he was coming to take me dancing once again, I’d have been so happy.’

Powerscourt was growing used to the shocks now. ‘I believe you, of course I believe you, Mrs Kerenkova,’ he said quickly, and he did, ‘but could I confirm something you just
said? You said your husband knew Mr Martin was coming to St Petersburg round about the middle of last month? Is that right?’

The young woman nodded. ‘That’s right. I might be a couple of days out, I can’t remember exactly. Is that important?’

‘It might be,’ Powerscourt replied, ‘but could I just get one thing clear in my mind? Did your husband send you out here because he felt you deceived him about Mr
Martin’s visit? Or was there another reason as well?’

Potemkin growled as if he didn’t like the question or the tone. Mikhail scratched his head once again.

‘There was another reason, Lord Powerscourt,’ said Tamara Kerenkova. ‘Vladimir said it wouldn’t have mattered if Mr Martin hadn’t been English. Russian naval people
are very annoyed with the English at present. I think our ships sunk a couple of British fishing boats on their way to Japan and the Russians thought the British were making too much fuss. Who
cares about a couple of bloody fishermen anyway, was what Vladimir said. He said my affair with Mr Martin could make him very unpopular so he wanted me out of the way for a while.’

‘Quite so,’ said Powerscourt. ‘Did your husband give any idea how he learnt Mr Martin was coming to St Petersburg?’

‘I’m afraid he did not. Could I ask you a question, Lord Powerscourt? Do you know what Mr Martin was doing here, why he came to St Petersburg?’

Now it was Powerscourt’s turn to smile. Potemkin padded off to inspect the snow falling in the garden. ‘If I knew the answer to that question, my dear lady, I would be well on my way
to solving the mystery. At the moment, I have no idea.’

‘Can I give you my theory? I believe he must have been sent here on government business. I’m sure your Foreign Office told him he was not to breathe a word to a single soul.
Otherwise he would have told me.’

‘How did he usually let you know he was coming?’ asked Powerscourt. Visions of messages in a bottle, of coded signals hidden in the advertisement pages of
The Times
, of slaves
with shaven heads, flashed through his mind. He had visions too of a mythical elderly relative living in a distant part of Britain perhaps, a sort of Scottish Bunbury in Martin’s life, who
had to be visited every year in early January.

‘You’re thinking of some romantic roundabout way of letting me know, Lord Powerscourt, I can tell from the look on your face. It was perfectly simple. He wrote to me, that’s
all, usually a couple of months in advance.’

‘Did he ever mention Mrs Martin, Mrs Kerenkova?’

‘Very seldom. She had him, Roderick, I mean, for eleven and a half months of the year,’ Tamara Kerenkova said bitterly. ‘I don’t think she knew what she had. I
wouldn’t have let him wander off like that if I’d been married to him. Anyway, he wouldn’t have wanted to.’

‘Forgive me this question, Mrs Kerenkova.’ Powerscourt was staring straight into those pale blue eyes. ‘Would you have said your husband was a violent man?’

‘Violent?’ Those pale blue eyes opened very wide suddenly. ‘Of course he is violent. All those naval people are violent, very violent. They’re in charge of enormous guns
that can sink a ship in a couple of minutes and drown a thousand sailors. I think that’s a rather naive question, Lord Powerscourt.’

‘I do apologize, Mrs Kerenkova, I wasn’t referring to his professional life.’ Powerscourt said no more. The young woman flushed.

‘If you mean what I think you mean, it is did Vladimir kill Mr Martin, or was he capable of killing Mr Martin? I must tell you the answer is No.’

‘You’re sure about that?’ asked Powerscourt crisply.

‘Lord Powerscourt,’ the young woman said, laying a hand on his arm, ‘I should say that at some point in your life you have been a soldier. I should say that if you were faced,
in your professional life, with a charge of your country’s enemies, all racing towards you at full speed like those Zulus with their spears at Rorke’s Drift our governess used to tell
us about, you wouldn’t hesitate for a second before you killed as many as you could. But in your personal life, I don’t believe you could kill anybody, unless perhaps it was in defence
of your family.’

Powerscourt bowed slightly. Suddenly Potemkin launched into an enormous fit of barking. He raced out of the room towards the front door. There was a tremendous ringing of bells.

‘Please excuse me, gentlemen, I must go and see who that is. Forgive me. I shan’t be long.’

‘Mikhail, what do you think?’ said Powerscourt. ‘Do you believe this Tamara person?’

Mikhail cut himself another piece of cake now the coast was clear. ‘I think she’s a very good actress,’ he said. ‘I think she’s been rehearsing this part for days
and days. And I’m sure she’s holding something back but I have no idea what it is.’

Potemkin charged back into the room and sidled up to Mikhail. ‘My uncle used to give his dogs very strange names, Lord Powerscourt. He had a retriever called Raskolnikov once and then he
had a pair of hunting dogs called Nicholas and Alexandra, after the Tsar and his wife.’

‘Were they any use?’ asked Powerscourt.

The young man laughed. ‘He had to get rid of them in the end. Said they couldn’t make up their bloody minds which way to go.’

‘Forgive me, gentlemen.’ Tamara Kerenkova was back, smiling at her guests. ‘Those, believe it or not, were my nearest neighbours, only ten miles away, dropping by to invite me
to a party at their house next weekend. Now, where were we, Lord Powerscourt?’

‘I am most grateful to you for your time, Mrs Kerenkova. It is nearly time for us to go and catch our train. Let me ask you this though: did Mr Martin ever talk to you about his work at
all?’

She paused and looked at the fire. ‘Roderick wasn’t one of those men who have to tell you everything they’ve done during the day the minute they walk in the door. He used to
talk to me about his work sometimes at the balls. I was amazed at how many people he knew at these functions, ambassadors, politicians, lawyers, financiers, all sorts of people.’

‘I didn’t so much mean at the grand functions,’ said Powerscourt, ‘rather when you and he were alone together.’

‘Pillow talk, do you mean?’ said the girl, laughing, and then something snapped inside her and her laughter turned into tears, tears which she could not stop.

‘I’m so sorry,’ she said, wiping away the tears with Mikhail Shaporov’s handkerchief, ‘I’m so sorry. You see, I told myself I had to be brave for this meeting
and I’ve practised it for days in my head. I’ve tried to lock out of my mind the fact that he’s not here, that I’ll never see him again. It’s hardly any time at all
since I heard of Roderick’s death, you see.’ She broke down again. The two men waited. Potemkin came to snuggle up beside his mistress. ‘I wanted to be cheerful and happy and
English stiff upper lip and now I’ve let myself down.’

‘You haven’t let yourself down at all, Mrs Kerenkova,’ said Powerscourt in his most emollient tones. ‘You’ve been very brave. Please compose yourself and
we’ll take our leave of you.’

The young woman made a desperate effort to control herself. ‘I just want to answer your question, Lord Powerscourt. About Roderick talking to me about his work.’ She blew her nose
loudly on the Shaporov handkerchief. ‘It was one day last summer. We’d just gone to bed. He’d been very worried all day and he wouldn’t tell me what it was. I went on and on
at him, the way women do about a secret. I was amazed when he told me. “Tamara,” he said at last, “my government are about to do a very foolish thing. They’re going to make
an alliance with France and they’re going to call it the Entente Cordiale.” “Surely that’s a good thing, making alliances with your neighbours,” I said, not that I
cared very much who was allied to whom, nothing like as interesting as who’s married to whom. Roderick sat up in bed and looked very solemn. “There is only one reason France wants
allies,” he said, “and that’s to find other countries to fight Germany. One day we will have to fight Germany because of this alliance with France and it will be terrible.”
Then he went straight to sleep.’

She looked up at Powerscourt, her eyes still red, her cheeks still stained with tears.

‘If there’s anything else you remember later on,’ said Powerscourt, rising to his feet, ‘you have Mikhail’s address in St Petersburg. And thank you so very much for
being so helpful. ’

‘Not at all,’ she said, ‘thank you so much for coming. I hope I was of some use.’

Potemkin raced their carriage down the drive until it turned the corner by the side of the cherry orchard. Powerscourt was wondering what other high diplomatic secrets might have been divulged
between Roderick Martin and his mistress in between the sheets. Another thought struck him when Volkhov and the Kerenkov house and the borzoi Potemkin were far behind. He remembered the question he
should have asked. Suppose there was an estrangement between Martin and Tamara, a falling out, maybe an end of the affair. She suspects him of being involved with another woman. That could be why
he has not told her of his latest visit. And when she hears of his impending return to St Petersburg, does she borrow her husband’s revolver and return to the city in a fit of Russian passion
to shoot the man who had been her lover?

As they headed back towards St Petersburg, out at the Alexander Palace at Tsarskoe Selo Natasha Bobrinsky was pacing up and down her room in stockinged feet, desperate for the time to pass. It
was, she had decided, much much worse than waiting for a lover. There were still days to go before she could be released from her palace prison to tell Mikhail and Powerscourt what she knew, that
shortly before his death Mr Roderick Martin of His Majesty’s Foreign Office had been received, alone, in his study quite late at night, by Nicholas the Second, Tsar of All the Russias.

The note was waiting for Powerscourt at the Embassy a couple of days after his return from Tamara Kerenkova. ‘Please join me for a small private tour of the Hermitage
this evening. My man will call for you at six thirty. Derzhenov.’ Mikhail Shaporov was checking various coastguard offices in case they had custody of the body of Roderick Martin. Natasha
Bobrinsky was still locked up at the Alexander Palace. Rupert de Chassiron, reading volumes of cables that had come in overnight, was sceptical about his cultural expedition.

‘It seems fairly absurd, Powerscourt, with the whole country in ferment, possibly on the edge of revolution, that you and the head of the secret police should be gallivanting round the
galleries of the Hermitage late at night when there’s nobody about. Do you suppose he’s got a stash of pornography hidden away up there?’

‘God knows,’ said Powerscourt wearily. ‘Tell me something, de Chassiron. Who would you say has the best intelligence system here in St Petersburg?’

De Chassiron’s customary look of weary boredom left him for a few moments.

‘Do you mean best intelligence system about the foreigners or about the natives?’

‘Both,’ said Powerscourt.

‘Well . . .’ De Chassiron bent down to retrieve a recalcitrant cable that had fallen on to his carpet. ‘The best intelligence system about the foreigners is run by the
colleagues of General Derzhenov whom you are going to see this evening. As for the best intelligence about the natives, the Americans are too crude in their approach, too liable to barge in and ask
people to tell them what is going on, that sort of thing. We British are more interested in intelligence from Berlin than we are from here, more prepared to spend money there. Cousin Willy more
interesting than Cousin Nicky perhaps. My own knowledge is based on the local papers, a lot of reading, a number of local contacts, and, frankly, diplomatic gossip. I could talk for hours about the
Russians but my knowledge is pretty thin. The best informed people are the ones with the longest cultural links with this country, the ones who provide a home from home for the local aristocracy in
Paris or Biarritz or on the Riviera. The French, I should say, are the best informed. And there is one further reason why they need to know precisely what is going on.’