Read Online The Senility of Vladimir P by Michael Honig - Free Book Online

sweaters, shirts and shoes, drawers of underwear, socks, belts and cufflinks. Sheremetev selected a suit, a shirt, tie, belt and shoes, then he put the clothes down on a chair and opened a freestanding cabinet that stood in the middle of the room.
    The cabinet was about a metre and a half in height and half a metre in width and depth. Made bespoke for Vladimir out of a polished hardwood, it had a pair of doors that opened to reveal a column of drawers, each only five centimetres in height. Sheremetev applied a slight pressure to the front of one of the drawers, which slid smoothly out. The drawer was lined in black velvet and had three rows of five niches. In each of the niches nestled a watch.
    Sheremetev perused the watches in the tray, then pushed it back in and opened another, from which he selected a silver timepiece with a blue face.
    He closed the cabinet, gathered up the clothes, and took every­thing into the bedroom.
    â€˜Come on, Vladimir Vladimirovich, let’s get dressed.’
    As much as was possible, it was good for Vladimir still to do things himself. This meant that simple activities took longer than they might have done, but Sheremetev was determined to help Vladimir preserve his capacities for as long as he could. He stood with the ex-president as Vladimir fumbled with his clothes, gently prompting him when he forgot what he was doing.
    â€˜I wore this on election night,’ said Vladimir, as he slipped on the suit jacket.
    â€˜This suit?’
    â€˜Look, it’s got a spot.’ He raised his left arm and pointed at a place near the elbow.
    Sheremetev saw a very faint darkening in the material. ‘Which election night?’ he asked. In the early years, Vladimir had often told him stories stimulated by items of clothing that he was wearing – meeting President Bush for the first time, hunting a Siberian tiger, flying into Chechnya at the height of the war, opening the Olympics, banqueting in Beijing with President Xi. The stories were endless, as one might expect from a man who had led such a life.
    Vladimir frowned.
    â€˜Well, doesn’t matter which election, Vladimir Vladimirovich. It’s a good suit.’
    â€˜Seventy-two percent on a turnout of slightly over seventy!’ said Vladimir suddenly. ‘First round! What do you think of that?’
    â€˜That’s good, Vladimir Vladimirovich.’
    â€˜Good? It’s perfect! At the start we were naïve – the higher the vote the better. Now, of course, we know, a vote can look too high. Seventy and seventy, that’s what we want. Seventy turnout, seventy in favour, the perfect recipe – actually, just over, so you can say however many turned out, more than fifty percent in absolute terms voted in favour. Once in a while you throw in a lower result to make it look like anything can happen.’ He chuckled. ‘Of course, no matter how we do it, in the west they still say it’s rigged. Last month, in Vienna, some reporter told me that he followed a bus from one polling station to the next and said he saw everyone voting twice. Some Italian reporter. How the hell did he get in anyway? He confronted me at the press conference after the nuclear talks. Thought he was going to catch me out. Takes more than some journalist with a smart arse question to do that, I can tell you! Do you know what I said? “Who did they vote for, these people you say you saw in the bus? Did you ask them?” He said they said they voted for me. Then I said: “So how can you believe such people? They admit to voting twice. You can’t believe a word that comes out of their mouth. They’re self-confessed criminals!”’ Vladimir laughed. ‘What do you think? That shut him up alright!’
    Sheremetev handed Vladimir his shoes and went to the phone that stood on a table in the dressing room. He called the security post in the hall and asked the guard to arrange for Eleyekov, the driver, to