The Twelfth Department Read Online Free PDF Page B

building at around 9:30 and returned about fifteen minutes before the body was discovered. He’s over there if you’d like to speak to him.”
    The sergeant pointed to a gray-skinned man in his early fifties, wearing a brown suit and an off-white shirt buttoned to the neck. He looked more like an office clerk than a doorman.
    “Comrade Priudski?” Korolev said, approaching him.
    “That’s me,” the doorkeeper said, extending his hand. Priudski’s teeth were yellow and uneven but he smiled with them anyway, a smile that seemed to come too easily to be genuine.
    “You’re the detective, are you? Captain Korolev?”
    “Yes.” Korolev shook the man’s hand—it felt like taking hold of a two-day-old fish. “And this is Sergeant Slivka. You were listening then?”
    Priudski looked momentarily uncomfortable.
    “Only in order to assist in any way I can, of course.”
    “That’s kind of you,” Korolev replied, allowing a little menace to slip into his tone. “Everyone visiting the apartments this entrance serves has to pass by you, is that right?”
    “Yes, each entrance serves a separate part of the building so we know our tenants well. They pass freely but if there are guests or deliveries we call up to the apartments. I keep a record of the comings and goings.”
    “And today?”
    “No deliveries or guests for the Azarovs.”
    “We’ll need that record—and a list of all the residents in the building. I’ll want you to go through it with Sergeant Slivka here and tell me if and when you saw each one of the residents today.”
    “I’d be happy to, Comrade Captain.”
    “Well, what do you think about this killing? Any suspicions?”
    “The professor works at the Azarov Institute on Yakimanka—it’s named for him. All I’ve ever heard is he was a good Party man—and a respected scientist. My guess is it was counterrevolutionary terrorists.”
    “Counterrevolutionary terrorists?”
    “Seeing as he was an important scientist.”
    “Did you see anyone resembling a counterrevolutionary terrorist pass by your office today?”
    Korolev was careful to ask the question completely straight. It wasn’t the kind of thing you could joke about, no matter how ridiculous it might seem.
    “They’re sly dogs. They probably slipped in some other way.” Priudski’s gaze moved away from his as he spoke. A shifty character, it seemed to Korolev.
    “Thank you, Comrade, we’ll consider all possibilities, of course. And if you can think which ‘other way’ they could have slipped in, let us know. What did the professor do at this institute of his that might have attracted such people?”
    “Brains.”
    “Brains?”
    “Research into brains. Secret research, I believe.”
    “Secret research?” Korolev wondered if this case could get any worse. “I see. Did you hear anything unusual today? It’s likely there was a gunshot.”
    “If there was, like as not I wouldn’t have heard it, Comrade Captain. The work on the bridge starts first thing and continues till dark.”
    Priudski indicated the new bridge being built farther along the embankment. And as he did so a pile-driver began to hammer once again. Bang, bang, bang. A gunshot would have as much chance of being heard as a whisper in a gale. All the same.
    “Sergeant Slivka will take your statement—I want you to try and recall every single thing about this morning for her, no matter how insignificant. And every person you saw.” Korolev paused and looked up at the darkening sky.
    “Belinsky, let the residents back in—there’s no point in them getting soaked. Which floor is Professor Azarov’s apartment on?”
    “The fifth,” Priudski said.
    Korolev nodded and turned back to the sergeant.
    “Just ask them to stay away from the fifth floor, Belinsky. And get your men to take their names and ask what they saw, on the way in.”
    The sergeant nodded.
    “Comrade Priudski, can you take me to the professor’s apartment?”
    The doorkeeper opened the