17
Katrin Cajthamlova's Paris studio is on swish Avenue Victor Hugo, a short walk from the Arc de Triomphe, in a building that houses the Icelandic embassy; a thickly-built man in a tightly-fitted suit opened the door with a false smile. He assumed Blanche and I looked at the haute-couture clothing and the impossibly high-heeled stilettos Cajthamlova designs and sold under her KC brand.
"They are press," Cajthamlova said when she spotted Blanche's notebook. She looked at the thickly-built man pleadingly and spoke with a note of panic in her voice. "They are here to talk about Daler Kuzyaev."
The man walked briskly to the door and opened it. "She will say no more to you," he said curtly in French. "She's had problems with the press. It's bad for her business."
I held up a hand in protest. "We are not the press, and we are investigating the death of Daler Kuzyaev, Robbie Chase, Igor Akinfeev and Alexis Zelenyy."
Cajthamlova is well over 6 feet tall,
18If, for a contented mind, time is peace, then for a fevered one, it is the opposite. The nearly three hours or so it took us to return to London were close to torture. The more I thought about Paris, the more I wondered what was wrong.We cross-referenced everything Katrin Cajthamlova had told us and what she said to the press and social media. She never told the same story twice. The inconsistencies were acute, but they were there.But why?Was she scared?Or was she playing us?Once we had arrived at St. Pancras, Blanche, we intended to catch the Northern Line train from Kings Cross to Woodside Park and continue with our work over a Chinese Takeaway, but only as we walked from one mainline station to the other did I realise that we had a tail.I thought I had sensed it on the Eurostar, but it took me some time to be sure.We stopped at a paper shop, bought a paper without actually looking at it, tucked it under my arm, and
19Using her mobile phone at an internet café we found near Kings Cross, Blanche studiously researched Mariella Novotny, the reporter of the article in the newspaper. Fortunately, Novotny people are rare, with only a total of six of them having Facebook pages. Only one of those was a Mariella Novotny, who appeared to live in London, which was promising. Blanche went through Mariella's page, looking at all her posted photographs and noting down the names of those who had made any comments about them. Then, she read through her profile and made a list of those people she was following. But was this the right Mariella Novotny? According to Blanche, the clincher was tucked away in her likes. Way down at the bottom was the declaration of
20Two detectives have turned up. One of them is Detective Chief Inspector Sandra Burton, and Inspector Brooks accompanies her; neither of them appears happy.A paramedic flushes out my eyes with distilled water while I sit on the back ramp of the ambulance, head tilted, while she tapes cotton wool over my left eye."You should see an eye specialist," she says. "It takes a week before the full damage is clear.""Permanent damage?""See the specialist."Behind her, fire hoses snake across the gleaming road and firefighters in reflective vests are mopping up.My left thigh corked; my knuckles scraped and raw. There are questions. Answers.The name Mariella Novotny is fresh in their minds after the article."Explain to me how come you ended up breaking into the house.""I came out of the pub and thought I saw a burglary in process.""Why didn't you call the police?" Burton asks."I don't have a mobile p
21The most extraordinary faculty our minds possess is the ability to break apart and compartmentalise. It's how we juggle multiple demands and how we cope with pain and trauma. After my wife died, I saw a string of therapists and grief counsellors and psychologists. One of them suggested I take my memories, lock them in a chest using heavy chains and padlocks, and drop the trunk into the deepest part of the ocean, beneath millions of tons of water.I tried it for a while, but it didn't work. The memories are still with me. They are like wolves hunting me through the forest. I have hacked a clearing from the undergrowth and built a fire to keep them at bay, but I have to keep collecting wood, or the fire will burn down, and the wolves will creep closer.The newspaper arrived, and the headlines were full of the explosion—the cause given as a gas leak leading to journalist Mariella Novotny's untimely death. Other victims include a retired gay couple, a thirt
22The tower block has internal stairs and an out of order lift that serves all levels.The entrance smells of disembowelled bin bags, cat piss and wet newspapers. Victoria Usheava lives on the third floor.I watch as twelve officers in body armour climb the stairs. Four more use the lift. Their choreographed movements seem overblown and unnecessary, considering the suspect has no history of violence.Police no longer knock on doors. Nowadays, they dress up in body armour and break the doors down with battering rams. But, again, privacy and personal freedom are not as important as the safety of the public. I understand the reasons, but I miss the good old days.The lead officer reached the flat and pressed his ear against the door. He turns and nods, and Detective Chief Inspector Sandra Burton acknowledges. A battering ram swings in an arc. The door disappears. The arresting group halts. A snarling Alsatian lurches at the closest policeman, who ste
23DCI Burton organised six boxes delivered to my home address. They must be back at the police station by the following day. A courier will collect them just after six o'clock the next day.Inside the boxes were witness statements, timelines, phone calls and crime scene photographs relating to the eleven deaths.Closing my study door, I turn the key and take a seat before opening the first box. In the boxes stacked around my feet is evidence of eleven lives and eleven deaths. Nothing will bring these people back, and nothing can harm their feelings anymore.I feel like I am intruding, flicking through photographs, statements, timelines, videos, all different versions of their pasts.They say once is okay, twice is a coincidence and the third occasion is a pattern. But I possibly have eleven crimes to consider. Eleven victims. All involved in a business project in Moscow, except Mariella Novotny, the journalist.Ten men. Property developers,
24The blue-and-white crime scene tape was a great deal further back than usual. But, to our surprise, DCI Burton was on this side, having aged about ten years by the time we arrived, forcing our way through the already gathering media."Thanks for coming," she says with sincerity. "I am really out of my depth with this one.Greater London's Metropolitan Police Service Terrorism Unit has taken over this investigation. The United Kingdom Government COBRA committee has already met to discuss the research, and the FBI will assist the analysis for their expertise on radioactive weapons.""Looks like you've got everything covered," I say."No, we haven't," Burton said, directing us away from the media so that no one would detect dissension in the ranks. "The police and Dr Baker, the Home Office Pathologist, declared it a suicide – concluding that Dr Brett had somehow managed to stab and slash himself repeatedly with two separate knives before succ
25University College Hospital is a teaching hospital in London, England. It is part of the University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and is closely associated with University College London. The hospital is on the south side of Euston Road in the Bloomsbury area of the London Borough of Camden, adjacent to the main campus of UCL. Its tower faces Euston Square tube station. Not far away west is Warren Street tube station, and Euston station is beyond Euston Square Gardens, situated east.I put the money in the machine and got out two coffees. Blanche had driven me to the hospital to see if Jimmy Raistrick would say anything.The very least we would want was an ID of the shooter. I handed a coffee to Blanche."White, no sugar."Blanche took the coffee in both hands.Hospital waiting rooms are useless, helpless places, full of whispers and prayers. Nobody looks at us.Doctors and nurses wander in and out, never able to re