Siberian Red

helping himself to the best food in the camp, Pekkala slipped into the freezer.
    By the light of the single bulb, hanging like a polyp from the metal ceiling of the freezer, Pekkala surveyed the bowls of offal, like coils of slippery orange rope, the white bricks of tallow fat, and the huge and severed tongues of cows. At the back of the freezer, four pig carcasses hung from gaff hooks, their skin like pink granite and glittering with frost.
    At that moment Pekkala heard someone enter the kitchen – the creak of the spring on the outer door and then the gunshot slam of the inner door being closed.
    Realising he was trapped, he darted to the end of the freezer and hid behind the pig carcasses. On his way he yanked the dirty pull-string of the light. The freezer was plunged into a coffin-like darkness but, seconds later, the sharp glare of a torch burst like an explosion in the cramped space.
    Pekkala glimpsed the unmistakable silhouette of Melekov. Immediately he began to calculate how much trouble he might actually be in. He hadn’t actually eaten anything, so perhaps Melekov would let him off. He could say he found the door open and went in to see if any food had been taken. It was a flimsy excuse, but the only one he could come up with. It would all depend of what mood Melekov was in. He might laugh it off, or he might decide to make life difficult.
    Knowing there was still a chance he could escape detection, Pekkala remained silent, while Melekov’s footsteps scuffed slowly across the concrete floor and the torch beam played across the carcasses, making them seem to twitch as if there was still life in them.
    Pekkala’s lungs grew hot as the air in them became exhausted. He could only last a few more seconds before breathing out, at which point Melekov would surely see his breath condensing in the cold.
    He heard another footstep, then another. Just when Pekkala had made up his mind to step out into the open and surrender, he heard a dull thump and, in the same moment, the blade of a long butcher knife pierced the meat of the carcass next to him. The point jammed to a halt against the pig’s ribs, only a hand’s width from Pekkala’s throat. Then the knife disappeared again, back the way it came, like a metal tongue sliding into a mouth.
    ‘Melekov!’ shouted Pekkala, still blinded by the torchlight and holding up his hands to shield himself. ‘It’s me!’
    ‘You walked into my trap,’ snarled Melekov.
    ‘This was a trap? For me? But why?’
    Melekov’s only reply was a bestial roar. He raised the butcher knife, ready to strike again.
    Pekkala jumped to the side, crashing into a shelf, as the blade glanced off the wall, leaving a long silver stripe through the frost. Bowls of food tumbled from the racks. Jars of pickled beets smashed in eruptions of ruby-coloured juice and cans of army-issue Tushonka stew clattered across the floor.
    Snatching up one of the heavy cans, he hurled it at the silhouette.
    Melekov howled with pain as the can struck him full in the face. The torch fell from his grasp.
    Pekkala dived to grab it, turning the beam on his attacker.
    With one hand, Melekov covered his face. Blood poured in ribbons from between the fingers. His other hand still gripped the knife.
    Intent on disarming the cook, Pekkala grabbed a frozen pig’s heart off the shelf and pitched it as hard as he could.
    The rock-hard knot of meat bounced off Melekov’s face. With a wail of pain, he tumbled back among the bowls of guts and dropped the knife.
    By the time Melekov hit the ground, Pekkala had already snatched up the weapon. ‘Why on earth are you trying to kill me?’ he demanded.
    ‘I figured it out,’ groaned Melekov.
    ‘Figured out what?’ demanded Pekkala.
    Melekov clambered up until he was resting on his knees. Dazed from the fight, his head bowed forward, as if he were a supplicant before the slaughtered pigs. ‘Klenovkin is going to give you my job.’
    ‘I don’t want your damned job!’
    ‘It doesn’t matter what you want or do not want. In this camp‚ Klenovkin decides our fates. And where will I be if he throws me out? This isn’t like Moscow, where a man who loses his job can walk across the road and find another. There are no other jobs for me here. I’m too old to be a guard. I have no training for the hospital. If Klenovkin wants to replace me, I’ll have no place to go.’
    ‘Even if I did want the job, did you ever stop to think that Klenovkin could never hand it to a