Peter Higgins - Wolfhound Century

Investigator Vissarion Lom sat in a window booth in the Caf Rikhel. Pulses of rain swept up Ansky Prospect, but inside the caf, in the afternoon crush, the air was thick with the smell of coffee, cinnamon bread and damp overcoats.

Why dont you go home? said Ziller. No ones going to come. I can call you if anything happens. You can be back here in half an hour.

Someone will come, said Lom. Hes not sitting out there for no reason.

Across the street, a thin young man waited on a bench under a dripping zinc canopy. He had been there, in front of the Timberworkers Library and Meeting Hall, for three hours already.

Maybe he spotted us, said Ziller. Maybe the contact is aborted.

He could have lost us straight off the boat, said Lom. He didnt even look round. Hes not bothered about us. He thinks hes clean.

They had picked him up off the morning river-boat from Yislovsk. Briefcase that was the cryptonym they gave him, they didnt know his name had hung around the wharves for a while, bought himself an apricot juice at a kiosk, walked slowly up Durnovo-Burliuk Street, and sat down on a bench. That was all he had done. He carried no luggage, apart from the small leather case theyd named him for. After an hour hed taken some bread out of the case and eaten it. Except for that, he just sat there.

Ziller picked up his glass of tea, looked into it critically, set it down untouched.

Hes an arse-wipe. Thats what he is.

Maybe, said Lom. But hes waiting for something.

The truth was, Lom rather liked Briefcase. There was something about him the way he walked, the way his hair was cut. Briefcase was young. He looked vulnerable. Something hatred, idealism, love had driven him, alone and obviously frightened, all the way across the continent to Podchornok, his ears sticking out pinkly in the rain, to make this crude attempt at contact. The call from Magadlovosk had said only that he was a student, a member of some amateurish breakaway faction of the Lezarye separatists. The Young Opposition. The Self-Liberation Will of All Peoples. He was coming to meet someone. To collect something. Magadlovosk had sounded excited, unusually so, but also vague: The contact, Lom, thats what matters, thats the target. The contact, and whatever it is hes bringing with him.

You really should go home, said Ziller. What time did you finish last night?

Im fine, said Lom.

Fine? Youre over thirty, you do twice the hours the others do, you get no promotions, youre on crappy pay, and you need a shave. When did you last eat something decent?

Lom thought of his empty apartment. The yellow furniture. The unwashed plates and empty bottles. Home.

Why dont you come round? Ziller was saying. Come tonight. Lenas got a friend. Her husband was killed when the Volkova went down. Shes got a kid but well, we could invite her

Look, said Lom. I had some paperwork last night, thats all.

Ziller shrugged. He lit a cigarette and let the smokestream drift out of his nose.

I just thought he said. Maybe you could use a friend, Vissarion. After the Laurits business youve got few enough.

Yeah. Well. Thanks.

They sat in silence, awkwardly, staring out of the window. Watching Briefcase staring at nothing.

Shit, said Ziller, half-rising in his seat and craning to see down the road. Shit.

A line of giants, each leading a four-horse dray team and a double wagon loaded high with resin tanks, was lumbering up the hill from the direction of the river quay. They were almost in front of the Rikhel already the rumbling of the wagons iron wheels set the caf floor vibrating faintly and when they reached it, Briefcase would be out of sight. The teams were in no hurry: they would take at least ten minutes to pass.

Youll have to go outside, said Lom. Keep an eye from the alley till theyre gone.

Ziller sighed and heaved himself reluctantly to his feet, trying to shove the loose end of his shirt back under his belt and button his uniform tunic. He took a long, mournful, consolatory pull on the cigarette and ground the stub into the heaped ashtray, squeezed himself out of the booth and went out into the rain with a show of heavy slowness. Theatrics.

Lom watched the giants through the misted window. They walked patiently under the rain: earth-coloured shirts, leather jerkins, heavy wooden clogs. The rain was heavier now, clattering against the window in fat fistfuls. Only one person was standing out in the street. A soldier, bare-headed and beltless, grey uniform soaked almost to black, left sleeve empty, pinned to his side. He had tipped his face back to look up into the rain and his mouth was wide open. As if he was trying to swallow it down. He had no boots. He was standing in a puddle in torn socks, shifting from foot to foot in a slow, swaying dance.

Two kinds of rain fell on Podchornok. There was steppe rain from the west, sharp and cold, blown a thousand versts across the continental plain in ragged shreds. And the other kind was forest rain. Forest rain came from the east in slow, weighty banks of nimbostratus that settled over the town for days at a time and shed their cargo in warm fat sheets. It fell and fell with dumb insistence, overbrimming the gutters and outflows and swelling the waters of the Yannis until it flowed fat and yellow and heavy with mud. In spring the forest rain was thick with yellow pollen that stuck in your hair and on your face and lips and had a strange taste. In autumn it smelled of resin and earth. This, today, this was forest rain.

Ziller was taking his time. The giants and their drays had gone, and Briefcase was still on his bench. The one-armed soldier wandered across to him and started waving his one arm. He seemed to be shouting. He had something in his hand and he was trying to show it to Briefcase. Trying to give it to him. Briefcase looked confused.

Shit. This was it. This was the contact!

Lom crashed out into the rain and across the road.

Hey! You! Dont move! Police!

Where the hell was Ziller?

Briefcase saw Lom coming. His eyes widened in shock and fear. He should have waited. Showed his papers. Said he had no idea who this soldier was, hed just been sitting there eating his bread and watching the rain. Instead, he ran. He got about ten paces across the road, when Ziller came out of the alleyway by Krishkins and took him crashing down into the mud.

The soldier hadnt moved. He was staring at Loms face. His eyes, expressionless, didnt blink. They were completely brown: all iris, no whites at all. He opened his mouth, as if he was going to speak, and Lom smelled the sour, earthy richness of his breath, but he made no sound. His one hand worked the small cloth bag he was holding as if he was crushing the life out of it. Lom snatched it out of his grip.

Give me that!

The mans fingers felt cold. Hard. Brittle.

Lom undid the cord and looked inside. There was nothing but a mess of broken twigs and crushed berries and clumps of some sticky, yellowish substance that might have been wax. It had a sweet, heavy, resinous perfume.

What the fuck? said Lom. What the fuck is this?

The soldier, gazing into him with fathomless brown eyes, said nothing.

Five time zones to the west of Podchornok, on the roof of the Grand Hotel Sviatopolk in Mirgorod, Josef Kantor waited. Despite the ragged fingernails of wind scraping at his face, he was immovable: a pillar of patient rock in a dark and fog-soaked coat. The fog had come and gone. Drifting in off the river before dawn, it had enfolded him in blankness and sifted away at the cold rising of the sun, leaving him beaded with dull grey droplets. He had not moved. He was waiting.