Siberian Red

ask.’
    ‘And how did you know that?’ asked Pekkala.
    ‘Because you’d never have told me, Inspector.’
    They climbed aboard just as the train began to move.
    The railroad siding slipped away into the grainy air. In the distance the grove of trees seemed to disintegrate, atom by atom, until it too was gone.
    If anyone even noticed the absence of the knife-cut man, nobody mentioned it. With a shuffling of feet, the space he had once occupied was filled, as if he’d never been there at all.
    As wagon number 6 swayed rhythmically from side to side, with the clatter of its wheels like a heartbeat echoing across the countryside, the atmosphere inside was almost peaceful.
    *
     
    ‘Poskrebyshev!’
    ‘Yes, Comrade Stalin.’
    ‘Have there been any messages from Pekkala?’
    ‘No, Comrade Stalin. He has not yet arrived at the camp.’
    ‘You must keep me informed, Poskrebyshev.’
    ‘Yes, Comrade Stalin.’ Poskrebyshev stared at the grey mesh of the intercom speaker. Some of the tiny holes were clogged with dust. There had been a particular tone in Stalin’s voice just then; an anxiety almost bordering on fear. I must be mistaken, he thought.
    *
     
    Ten days after its departure from Moscow, ETAP-1889 passed through the town of Verkneudinsk.
    This was the last civilian outpost before the train’s course diverted from the Trans-Siberian Railroad on to a separate track that would bring it to the Borodok railhead.
    Peering through the opening, Pekkala spotted two men standing outside a tavern which adjoined the Verkneudinsk station. Faintly, he heard the men singing. Tiger stripes of lamplight gleamed through bolted window shutters, illuminating the snow which fell around them.
    Afterwards, while the train pressed on into a darkness so complete it was as if they’d left the earth and were now hurtling through space, the singing of those two men haunted him.
    The following morning, the train arrived at Borodok.
    One final time, the prisoners climbed from their wagons, past shouting guards and dogs on choke-chain leashes, and were herded into a lumber yard where thousands of logs had been stacked as high as double-storey houses, waiting to be shipped to the west on the same train which had delivered the prisoners. The air smelled sour from the wood and piles of shredded bark steamed in the cold, melting the snow around them.
    In one corner of the yard, behind a wire fence, stood a mountain of metal fuel drums, each one marked with the name ‘Dalstroy’.
    Pekkala wondered if those drums were already full, with dead men tucked like foetuses inside, or if they had been set aside for the prisoners who stood around him now.
    A guard climbed up on top of the log pile. ‘There are many rules at Borodok!’ he shouted, hands cupped around his mouth. ‘You will know what they are when you have broken them.’
    The convicts stared at him in silence.
    ‘Now strip!’ commanded the guard.
    Nobody moved. The convicts continued to stare at the guard, each one convinced that he must have misunderstood. The temperature was below zero and all they had on were the same threadbare pyjamas in which they’d first boarded the train.
    Seeing that his words had no effect, the guard drew a pistol from a holster on his belt and fired a shot into the crowd.
    The entire group flinched. With the blast still echoing around the lumberyard, prisoners ran their fingers across their faces, down their chests and out along the branches of their arms, searching for the wound which every man felt certain he’d received.
    Only then did someone cry out, a sound more of surprise than pain.
    The crowd parted around one man, whose hands were clutched against his neck. With wide and pleading eyes, he turned and turned in the space which had been made for him.
    Nobody stepped in to help.
    Seconds later, the convict dropped to his knees. Slowly and deliberately, he lowered himself on to his side. Then he lay there in the dirty snow, blood pulsing out of his throat.
    The guard called out again for everyone to strip. This time, there was no hesitation. Filthy garments slipped to the ground like the sloughed-off husks of metamorphosing insects.
    While this was going on, three trucks pulled up at the entrance to the lumber yard.
    Following another order shouted by the guard, the naked prisoners formed a line. With shoulders hunched and fists clenched over hearts, they filed past the trucks one by one. From the first vehicle, each man received a black,