Master of Petersburg Read Online Free PDF

his watch and glances at it crossly, trying to seem like an impatient homme d’affaires in this stuffy room with a stove burning in a corner, he has a premonition of an attack, and in the same movement recognizes that an attack would be a device, and the most childish of devices at that, for extricating himself from a fix, while somewhere to the side falls the nagging shadow of a memory: surely he has been here before, in this very ante-room or one like it, and had an attack or a fainting fit! But why is it that he recollects the episode only so dimly? And what has the recollection to do with the smell of fresh paint?
    â€˜This is too much!’
    His cry echoes around the room. The dozing housepainter gives a start; the desk-sergeant looks up in surprise. He tries to cover his confusion. ‘I mean,’ he says, lowering his voice, ‘I can’t wait any longer, I have an appointment. As I said.’
    He has already stood up and put on his coat when the sergeant calls him back. ‘Councillor Maximov will see you now, sir.’
    In the office into which he is conducted there is no high bench. Save for a huge sofa in imitation leather, it is furnished in nondescript government issue. Councillor Maximov, the judicial investigator in Pavel’s case, is a bald man with the tubby figure of a peasant woman, who fusses till he is comfortably seated, then opens the bulky folder before him on the desk and reads at length, murmuring to himself, shaking his head from time to time. ‘Sad business . . . Sad business . . .’
    At last he looks up. ‘My sincerest condolences, Mr Isaev.’
    Isaev. Time to make up his mind!
    â€˜Thank you. I have come to ask for my son’s papers to be returned. I am aware that the case has not been closed, but I do not see how private papers can be of any interest to your office or of any relevance to – to your proceedings.’
    â€˜Yes, of course, of course! As you say, private papers. But tell me: when you talk of papers, what exactly do you mean? What do the papers consist in?’
    The man’s eyes have a watery gleam; his lashes are pale, like a cat’s.
    â€˜How can I say? They were removed from my son’s room, I haven’t seen them yet. Letters, papers . . .’
    â€˜You have not seen them but you believe they can be of no interest to us. I can understand that. I can understand that a father should believe his son’s papers are a personal matter, or at least a family matter. Yes, indeed. Nevertheless, there is an investigation in progress – a mere formality, perhaps, but called for by the law, therefore not to be dismissed with a snap of the fingers or a flourish of the hand, and the papers are part of that investigation. So . . .’
    He puts his fingertips together, lowers his head, appears to sink into deep thought. When he looks up again he is no longer smiling, but wears an expression of the utmost determination. ‘I believe,’ he says, ‘yes, I do believe I have a solution that will satisfy both parties. Since the case is not closed – indeed, it has barely been opened – I cannot return the papers themselves to you. But I am going to let you see them. Because I agree, it is unfair, most unfair, to whisk them off at such a tragic time and keep them from the family.’
    With a sudden, startling gesture, like a card-player playing an all-conquering card, he sweeps a single leaf out of the folder and places it before him.
    It is a list of names, Russian names written in Roman script, all beginning with the letter A.
    â€˜There is some mistake. This is not my son’s handwriting.’
    â€˜Not your son’s handwriting? Hmm.’ Maximov takes back the page and studies it. ‘Then have you any idea whose handwriting this might be, Mr Isaev?’
    â€˜I don’t recognize the handwriting, but it is not my son’s.’
    From the bottom of