Read Online Red Moth by Sam Eastland - Free Book Online Page A

here, Valery.’
    Semykin’s eyes bulged. ‘You took this from the Kremlin Museum?’
    ‘Borrowed it,’ Pekkala corrected him.
    ‘Then see that it finds its way home,’ said Semykin as he carefully rewrapped the icon, ‘before Fabian Golyakovsky has a heart attack.’
    ‘It may be too late for that,’ muttered Kirov.
    ‘I may have lost faith in the country that owns this work of art,’ Semykin told them, ‘but the art itself is sacred, and will remain so, long after you and I and the butchers of Lubyanka have turned to dust.’

As they walked across the courtyard
     
     
    As they walked across the courtyard to their car, a van arrived at the Lubyanka. These vehicles, which shuttled inmates to and from the prison, were camouflaged to look like delivery trucks. Painted on their sides were advertisements for non-existent bakeries, cigarette companies and distillers of vodka. Inside, in spaces barely big enough to hold a human being, the inmates were packed in side by side, bent double, shackled by the wrists to bars fixed at floor level against the walls of the truck so that the prisoners had to ride with their heads forced over to the level of their knees.
    Only the most oblivious of Muscovites believed that these vans actually contained what their cheerful logos promised. By seeking to hide their real cargoes as they careened through the streets of Moscow, the illusion they created became even more sinister than the truth.
    ‘Are you all right, Inspector?’ asked Kirov, as they climbed into the car.
    ‘What do you mean?’ asked Pekkala.
    ‘You don’t look well. You’re sweating.’
    With a swipe of his palm, Pekkala smeared the moisture from his forehead. ‘I can’t stand it in there.’
    ‘Is there any way to get Semykin released, Inspector?’
    ‘Probably, but as miserable as Semykin might be inside that cell, he is still safer there than out walking the streets of this city.’
    ‘I don’t understand.’
    ‘As you yourself mentioned, Semykin has a talent for choosing his enemies. Bakhturin is one of the worst. Our visit to Semykin will not have gone unnoticed by the commissar. As soon as word gets out to him, you can be sure Bakhturin will pay us a visit. And as for Semykin, he wouldn’t last a week outside that prison cell, as long as Bakhturin is watching. And if we successfully petitioned for Semykin’s release, how long do you think it would take for Bakhturin to conjure up another reason to have him arrested?’
    ‘I did not think of that,’ whispered Kirov.
    ‘And here is something else you did not think about,’ continued Pekkala. ‘Bakhturin would see to it that Semykin did not go back to prison. At best, he would find himself on a train bound for the east. At worst, the Lubyanka guards would drag him down into the basement, and you and I both know what happens there. There are worse things than sitting in prison. Five years might seem like a very long time to Semykin, but it is one of the shortest sentences given out to convicts at the Lubyanka. You know as well as I do that there are men who’ve been behind those walls for ten or fifteen years or even longer.’
    A long silence followed, in which each man retreated into his thoughts.
    For Pekkala, the sight of Semykin, soaked in his own blood inside that windowless cell, had brought back memories whose vividness had failed to dull with time. Nor could he find a way to frame within the scaffolding of words what his own time in prison had done to him. The truth was that he did not know the answer. Although he could remember every detail of his life in the service of the Tsar, in those memories he no longer recognised himself. It was like looking at the anonymous photographs he saw heaped upon tables in the Sukharevka market, along with the chipped plates and mismatched cutlery which were all that remained of those who had been swept away by the Revolution.
    It was Kirov who broke the silence. ‘Do you think you would have