Stalin s Ghost

  “When will the neurosurgeons arrive?”

  “They are all occupied. Children, you are the team. With brain trauma we do not wait for anyone or anything. Seek and you shall find. Here inside the entry wound, between the occipital bone and the dura, a bullet, bone fragments and a good-sized clot. Gauze, please. This is not a hopeless case. Maria, now that you have the tube in, please keep this man asleep.”

  “I have no halothane. I’m using ether.”

  “Ether? Wonderful, the choice of the nineteenth century.”

  “Elena Ilyichnina, this is not what I trained for.”

  “You are all doing an excellent job. We want to be sure everything is nice and clean. We will have to remove the clot before we secure the bleeding point. I stand corrected, bleeding points. Valentina, step in or step out.”

  “I’ll stay.”

  “You do it, then. Delicately. You’re not drilling for oil.”

  “I don’t understand. When he was prepped there was gunpowder in his hair. He was shot at point-blank range, but the bullet only penetrated the skull?”

  “Evidently he is a hard nut to crack.”

  “Did you see the ligature marks on his neck? I understand that strangulation can sometimes be a sexual game.”

  “How do you know these things, Tina?”

  “Only saying, he’s been hung by the neck and shot in the head and he’s still alive. He’s a lucky man.”

  A silence.

  “We will see. It depends on what you call lucky.”

  Snipping and the ping of monitors.

  “Good. Drill, please. Remember, the brain has no nerve endings; it feels no pain. Suction, please, and for the forehead a smaller bit on the drill.”

  “The forehead?”

  “To monitor pressure on the brain. Not pretty, but accessible.”

  “Are you sure he doesn’t understand?”

  “Let’s hope not. He would be very discouraged.”

  Arkady started by wandering among picnic blankets looking for Zhenya. Instead he saw his parents, who were sitting with an open hamper on a quilt weighted with bottles of champagne.

  “Reporting in?” the General asked.

  Arkady saluted. “Reporting in, sir.”

  “Is the camp secure?”

  “The camp is secure.”

  “You hear that, Belov? Arkasha is going to be my new aide de camp. You’re out of a job.”

  “Yes, sir,” the sergeant said.

  “But we’d better check, hadn’t we?” He easily swung Arkady up onto his shoulders and ran across the lawn. They called it a lawn even though it was mostly an untended meadow of wildflowers bounded on one side by the dacha—a four-room cabin and porch—and, at the lower end, birches and willows and the bright glints of a river.

  His father whipped through high grass and the white heads of daisies and Arkady, even in short pants, felt like a Cossack with a saber.

  “You’re getting too big.” His father let Arkady down and they were at the quilt with Arkady’s mother and Belov enjoying tea sandwiches. They had champagne, he had lemonade. The lawn was covered with the blankets and hubbub of officers and their families. None were as handsome as Arkady’s father in a tailored uniform with stars on his shoulder boards or as beautiful as his young wife, Arkady’s mother. In white lace, her black hair falling to her waist, she was wrapped in a dreamy aura.

  “You know what you remind me of?” his father said to his mother. “During the war I spent a few days in a nondescript place with a beautiful legend of a lake where all the swans go. A lake that only the truly innocent can find, hence no one has seen it for hundreds of years. But you are my swan, my redeeming swan.” He leaned across the blanket to collect a kiss and then turned to Arkady.

  “How old are you now, Arkasha?”

  “Seven, next month.”

  “Since you’re almost seven I have an early birthday gift for you.” The General gave Arkady a leather box.

  His mother said, “Kyril, you’ll spoil him.”

  “Well, if he’s going to be my bodyguard…”

  From the smell of gun oil Arkady knew what the present was before he opened the box, but it was better than he imagined, a revolver his own size.

  “You two are a pair,” said his mother.

  His father said, “A lady’s gun to start with. Don’t worry; you’ll grow into bigger ones. Try it.”

  Arkady aimed at a small, brown bird that trilled on a wooden post.

  “A finch is God’s choir,” said his mother.

  It exploded into feathers.

  “Is it dead?” Arkady was shocked.

  “We’ll know more in twelve hours,” his father said.

  “I’m going for a walk.” His mother got to her feet. “I’ll hunt for butterflies.”

  His father said, “I have to play the host, I can’t go with you.”

  “Arkasha will take care of me. Without the gun.”

  Arkady and his mother walked along hydrangeas bearing globes of pink blossoms. With a butterfly net for a gun, he shot American agents as they sprang from the bushes. She moved in an absentminded way, eyes down, smiling at something only she heard.

  When they reached the river she said, “Let’s gather stones.”

  1822. ICP: 18 mm Hg. BP: 160/80. HR: 75.

  “What does that mean?”

  “May I have the patient’s chart back? BP is blood pressure, HR is heart rate, and ICP is pressure inside the skull. Normal ICP is up to fifteen millimeters of mercury. Damage starts at twenty and fatal starts at twenty-five. Are you a family member?”

  “A colleague. I was there when he was shot. I thought he was dead.”

  “The bullet penetrated the skull but not the covering of the brain. I don’t know why.”

  “Ballistics says the gun was old enough to be from the war and so were the bullets in it. Gunpowder degrades. A round that old might barely clear the barrel. When I heard this I thought Renko would be walking out in a day or two. Then I get here and—”

  “You can’t smoke here.”

  “Sorry. I get here and he’s on a ventilator, a drip in his arm and tubes running out every side of his head.”

  “His brain is bleeding and swelling.”

  “Is he going to live?”

  “We’ll know more in twelve hours.”

  “You’re not going to look at him for twelve hours?”

  “He is constantly monitored and observed. He’s lucky to be alive. We’re at half staff because of the weather. When he came in I had to organize a group of interns.”

  “Interns?”

  “Getting a tube down such a contused windpipe was no simple feat. You can’t drink here either. Put the bottle away. Detective, first let us deliver him to you alive, then you can blow smoke in his face or put him on a vodka drip, whatever you want. Am I clear? Do we understand each other?”

  “Okay.”

  “Has the family been notified?”

  “There’s a woman who’s not his wife and a boy who’s not his son. The boy was at the scene. Is my friend hearing all this?”

  “Yes and no. He’s in an induced coma to preserve brain function. Words are mere sounds.”

  “Can I talk to him?”

  “Keep it positive.”

  “Arkady, about Zhenya. The little prick took off after you were shot. Nobody’s seen him since. Here’s the kicker: the shooter’s last name was Lysenko. Same as Zhenya.”

  “Can you think of something more positive? I assume this assailant Lysenko has been detained.”

  “He took three in the chest and two in the head. That sounds positive to me.”

  Arkady moved upstream as he hunted so that when he nudged stones with his toes the sediment he raised flowed away. Although the surface of the water was slick with light his shadow unveiled a multitude of guppies dashing back and forth over a bed of rounded stones striped red or blue, green or black.

  “Do you prefer hunting butterflies or stones?” his mother asked
.

  “Rabbits.”

  “You used to hate hunting rabbits.”

  “I changed my mind.”

  “Well, today it’s stones. See, I already have a net full.”

  She waded barefoot like Arkady, gathering her frilly dress in one hand and carrying the butterfly net with the other. From time to time she stopped to receive messages. Not from Arkady, but from people only she heard. The tumbling of water covered her conversation.

  “What do they say?” he asked.

  “Who?”

  “The people you talk to.”

  She gave him a confidential smile. “They say that the human brain floats in a sea of cerebral fluids.”

  “What else do they say?”

  “Not to be afraid.”

  2322. ICP: 19 mm Hg. BP: 176/81. HR: 70.

  “I see, I see. He’s going to die and if he does live he’ll be a vegetable.”

  “Not necessarily.”

  “But surely, not up to the rigors of criminal investigation.”

  “He might get medical permission to return to work. That would also be up to you. You’re the prosecutor.”

  “Exactly. My office is not a rehabilitation center.”

  “Don’t you think we’re getting a little ahead of ourselves? The crisis will come tonight. If he gets through that, then we can assess the damage. Frankly, I’m surprised we didn’t see you here before. Your investigator is shot, perhaps fatally, rescuing a boy from an armed lunatic and no one from your office comes to see how he’s doing?”

  “All we know for sure is that he was shot outside a casino. The circumstances of the incident are murky. Can he hear?”

  “No.”

  “Then what’s the point in coming? Call me in the morning if he’s still alive.”

  Arkady and his mother watched from a distance as officers decorated the porch.

  She sighed. “Paper lanterns. I hope it doesn’t rain. We don’t want anything to ruin your father’s party.”

  “What do we do with the stones?” Arkady asked. His pockets were so full it was hard to walk.

  “We’ll think of something.”

  “There is no visiting. How did you get in?”

  “I am a physician, but not his.”

  “Then what is your relationship?”

  “Personal. You’ve drilled?”

  “And drained.”

  “ICP?”

  “Five millimeters above normal and we’re nowhere near floodtide. Another five and we’re looking at a fatal outcome or, at the least, permanent damage. Read the chart. Everything that can be done has been done.”

  “The other vitals aren’t that bad.”

  “Or that good. You said ‘personal,’ but you don’t seem upset. Please do not tell me that you have recently broken off this relationship. Depression would be a very bad element at this point.” Silence. “I see. Are you willing to lie for at least a while?”

  “Lying is my specialty.”

  “I thought you were a physician.”

  “Exactly. I lie all day to dying children. I tell them they have a chance to run and play when I know they won’t live out a week. And I tape-record their voices as a game when really the tape is for their families as a memory. A souvenir. So I have small regard for the truth if a lie serves better. The problem is that an investigator has an excellent ear for lies.”

  “You’re Ukrainian?”

  “Yes.”

  “How did you and the investigator meet?”

  “At Chernobyl.”

  “Romantic.”

  His father’s pride was a pond, sixty by forty meters and deep enough for swimming. Sluices from the river brought water fresh enough for communities of sunfish and perch, frogs and dragonflies, cattails and reeds. A rowboat was tied to a dock. A yellow raft and a white buoy floated in the center of the pond. Every morning the General walked in a bathrobe through a stand of firs down to his pond and swam for half an hour. In the afternoon everyone was welcome. It was a golden time as Arkady’s father waited for his long overdue elevation to marshal of the army, which people said was finally coming. They were days of badminton on the lawn and long tables full of guests and endless toasts.

  When they were alone his parents rowed picnics out to the raft. One evening they rowed out with a gramophone and danced on the raft.

  0120. ICP: 20 mm Hg. BP: 190/91. HR: 65.

  “One hour to go.”

  “Maria, all I’ve been doing is staring at that idiotic monitor, trying to will the pressure down and not doing a very good job. Anyway, you children did well; I’m proud of you. Where is Valentina? Weren’t you going home together?”

  “She’s out front.”

  “Alone?”

  “She couldn’t be safer. She’s talking to a detective.”

  His mother smiled as she rowed as if she and Arkady were launched into a secret adventure. Wet stones and butterfly netting lay between her feet. The stones in Arkady’s pockets made them bulge uncomfortably and he tossed one in the water.

  “Oh, no, Arkasha,” his mother said. “We’ll need every one.”

  0403. ICP: 23 mm Hg. BP: 144/220. HR: 100.

  “You’re back and you’re drunk.”

  “I don’t need a doctor to tell me that. The point is, Elena Ilyichnina, if I may use your patronymic, I’m not drinking on the premises. Not even smoking. Just visiting.”

  “Why are you here?”

  “Ask my friend Arkady. I’m his shadow. I may be his drunken shadow, but I am still his shadow. So I am not leaving.”

  “I could call security.”

  “There is no security here. I’ve looked.”

  “It’s disgraceful. You’re too drunk to stand.”

  “Then prop me up. Give me some pillows.”

  “Dear God, what is that for?”

  “It’s for shooting people. And the bullets are fresh.”

  Arkady went up the ladder clumsily, trying not to lose any stones. He emptied his pockets onto the raft and helped with the stones his mother handed up from the boat. They were larger and more purposeful than his.

  She sat beside him while the raft slowly rotated, taking in the zigzag of dragonflies, nodding cattails, wormwood and willows that straggled along the riverbank under the peach-colored sky of late afternoon. The dacha was out of view, behind ranks of firs.

  “It won’t last,” she said. “It’s not a natural pond. It will just become a mud hole, a stagnant swamp.”

  “What do we do with the stones?”

  “Keep them here.”

  “Why?”

  “We’ll see.”

  “When?”

  “You have to be patient.”

  “It’s a surprise?”

  “No, I don’t think it’s a surprise at all. I’m going to row you back to the dock now. When you get back to the house don’t bother your father. Wash the dirt off and change into clean clothes by yourself and then you can join the party. Can you do that?”

  Although his mother’s sleeves and the hem of her dress were just as wet he said nothing. But when he was on the dock and before she started to row back to the raft, he asked, “How do you feel?”

  She said, “I feel wonderful.”

  0750. ICP: 24 mm Hg. BP: 210/100. HR: 55.

  “Detective, wake up. Detective Orlov, wake up. Somebody is—wake up. The lights just went out. You’re in the hospital. What an incredibly useless man. Wake up!”

  Arkady wiped off the dirt with a washcloth, found a clean outfit, and joined the crowd on the porch, where the fruit punch was spiked with vodka and a Gypsy trio had been chased by the younger staff officers to make room for the mambo, a popular import from Cuba. Arkady was drawn into a conga line that circled in and out of the house. He didn’t see his mother, but it was exactly the sort of affair that she hated.

  Sergeant Belov led him aside to ask, “Arkasha, where is your mother? The General is looking for her.”

  “She’s coming.”

  “She t
old you that?”

  “Yes.”

  Arkady returned to the festivities. Now that night had fallen, fireworks were in the offing. He looked forward to Saint Catherine wheels and rockets spraying the night with color.

  Half an hour later, his father pulled him out of the dance line. “Where is your mother? I’ve looked everywhere. I thought you said she was coming.”

  “That’s what she told me.”

  “Arkasha, where did she tell you this?”

  “At the pond.”

  “Show me.”

  His father organized a party of eight, including Arkady. They moved through the firs with flashlights that swept shadows left and right. Arkady half expected her to dart out from behind a tree, but they reached the dock without a sign of her.

  The rowboat was tied to the raft.

  “She swam back?” someone suggested.

  The General pulled off his boots and dove into the water. Holding the flashlight high, he swam one-handed to the raft, where he treaded water and directed the beam underneath the barrels of the raft. He hauled himself up the ladder and said, “Not here.” His voice carried across the water. He played the flashlight around the pond and its fringe of cattails and reeds. “Not there.”

  “Where are the stones?” Arkady asked. “I helped her find stones.”

  “Stones for what?”

  “I don’t know.”

  His father looked to the heavens and then brought the flashlight down to the white buoy. As the raft rocked the barrels made a gulping sound. Arkady wished to be somewhere else, anywhere else. His father climbed down to the boat and rowed to the dock.

  “Just the boy.”

  Arkady sat in the stern as his father rowed.

  “Take the flashlight.”

  They coasted the last few meters.

  His mother floated upside down beneath the surface, one arm tied by a cotton strip to the buoy anchor of a cinder block and rope. The light on her white dress made her milky and luminous. She was still barefoot. Her eyes and mouth were open, her hair stirred and, with motes moving by, she looked like an angel flying. She had taken no chances. Not only had she tied a hand to the cinder block, but she had weighted the hand with butterfly netting full of stones.