To Kill a Tsar by Andrew Williams Read Free Book Online Page A

great pain.
    ‘I’m sorry, Verochka.’
    Vera Figner was gazing at him intently. She had not released his hand.
    ‘There is no freedom to protest peacefully here, Frederick. No alternative to terror. You’ll see.’
    Old Penkin was a wily bird. He knew to keep his eyes open. He knew when there was a rouble or two to be earned for a little information. They had been coming and going all afternoon. He had watched them from the street and then from a chair at his gate. One of them had even asked him directions to Number 86. A young gentleman in a fine black fur-lined coat had stood gazing at the Volkonsky place only feet from him. Foreign-looking. Penkin had made a mental note of them all. He was the yard-keeper at the Kozlov house opposite, had been for fifteen years, and he knew all about Yuliya Sergeyovna Volkonsky and her friends. He had spoken to Constable Rostislov about them before.
    ‘Fairy tales,’ the policeman had said at first. ‘Fairy tales, old man. Bugger off. You’re not getting vodka money from me.’
    That was before a madman tried to kill the tsar. Since then Constable Rostislov had been falling over himself to pay for the dvornik’s scraps. Of course, no one liked an informer. Penkin hated informers himself. But who would begrudge an old man a little extra money after fifteen years of fetching and carrying in all weathers for kopeks? On the quiet, that was the thing, just a word in the constable’s ear.
    ‘Hey, Tan’ka,’ he called through the kitchen door, ‘I must go out for a while.’
    The maid rolled her eyes: ‘Don’t expect me to lie for you, old man. And don’t come back drunk.’
    Penkin scowled at her: ‘Shut up, you trollop. I’ve got business. Important business.’
    ‘I know your sort of business,’ she replied with a harsh laugh.
    ‘Shut your mouth.’ He wanted to take his hand to her. Heoffered her money instead. ‘Two kopeks for you if you tell them I’m out on house business.’
    ‘Five.’
    ‘Done.’
    The local police station was only a short walk away on Gorokhovaya Street. Penkin was careful to be sure no one saw him enter. As fortune would have it, Constable Vasili Rostislov was on duty and at the station. They sat in a large office full of empty desks and bookcases stacked high with police files. Penkin could not read but he could count. He knew it was important to count.
    ‘They began arriving at a little before three o’clock. Her footman told me she was inviting politicals, so I knew to be looking out for them.’
    ‘Names?’ the constable asked.
    ‘No. But I can tell you what they looked like. You can ask Yuliya Sergeyovna for the names, if you want them.’
    Rostislov pulled open a drawer and took out a notebook and small leather folder of photographs. He opened it and began placing pictures on the desk in front of the dvornik. ‘All right. Only the truth now. If you lie I’ll find out and you’ll regret it.’
    Penkin began to move the pictures round the desktop with a dirty finger, picking them up, peering at them, scratching his nose thoughtfully, shifting on his chair. Students – men and women – nicely dressed, expensive, some in uniform and some in frock coats and ties. What did they have to worry about? Nothing. There were two he was sure he recognised, and he handed them back to the policeman. Rostislov stared at him: ‘Have you been drinking?’
    ‘No,’ said the dvornik sulkily.
    ‘Are you sure about these two?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘This one?’
    Penkin nodded.
    ‘Wait here. Don’t touch anything.’ The policeman pushed his chair away from the desk and crossed the office to a door in the opposite corner. He opened it and Penkin caught a glimpse of a brightly lit room with clerks bent over desks before it swung to behind him. The time slipped by and the dvornik began to grow impatient. He had been away from the Kozlov house for almost half an hour. The maid could not be trusted to make a decent job of lying for him – not for five