Siberian Red

unlike, for example, yours, Poskrebyshev, is that Pekkala is the only person I know of who would not kill me for the chance to rule this country.’
    ‘Surely that is not true, Comrade Stalin!’ protested Poskrebyshev, knowing perfectly well that whether it was true or not, what mattered was that Stalin believed it.
    ‘Ask yourself, Poskrebyshev – what would you do to sit where I am sitting now?’
    An image flashed through Poskrebyshev’s mind, of himself at Stalin’s desk, smoking Stalin’s cigarettes and bullying his very own secretary. In that moment, Poskrebyshev knew that, in spite of all his claims of loyalty, he would have gutted Stalin like a fish for the chance to take the leader’s place.
    *
     
    One hour later, as the last rays of sunset glistened on the ice-sheathed telegraph wires, Pekkala’s battered Emka staff car, driven by his assistant, Major Kirov, pulled into a railyard at mile marker 17 on the Moscow Highway. The railyard had no name. It was known simply as V-4, and the only trains departing from this place were convict transports headed for the gulags.
    However miserable the journey promised to be, Pekkala knew it was necessary to travel as a convict in order to protect the cover story that he had fallen out of favour with Stalin and received a twenty-year sentence for unspecified crimes against the State.
    Major Kirov pulled up behind some empty freight cars, cut the engine and looked out across the railyard where prisoners huddled by the wagons which would soon be taking them away.
    ‘You can still call this off, Inspector.’
    ‘You know that is impossible.’
    ‘They have no right to send you back to that place, even if it is to carry out an investigation.’
    ‘There is no “they”, Kirov. The order came directly from Stalin.’
    ‘Then he should at least have given you time to study the relevant files.’
    ‘It wouldn’t have made any difference,’ answered Pekkala. ‘The victim’s dossier is incomplete. There was only one page. The rest of it must be lost somewhere in NKVD archives. As a result, I know almost nothing about the man whose death I am being sent to investigate.’
    The train whistle blew, and the prisoners began to climb aboard.
    ‘It is time,’ said Pekkala, ‘but first, there is something I need you to look after while I’m gone.’ Into Kirov’s hand, Pekkala dropped a heavy gold disc, as wide across as the length of his little finger. Across the centre was a stripe of white enamel inlay, which began at a point, widened until it took up half the disc and narrowed again to a point on the other side. Embedded in the middle of the white enamel was a large, round emerald. Together, the elements formed the unmistakable shape of an eye.

Pekkala had already been working
     
     
    Pekkala had already been working for two years as the Tsar’s Special Investigator when the Tsar summoned him one evening to the Alexander Palace, his residence on the Tsarskoye Selo estate.
    Entering the Tsar’s study, Pekkala found him sitting in a chair by the window. He was relieved that the Tsar did not get up. In Pekkala’s experience, if the Tsar remained sitting when he entered the room, the meeting would go well. If the Tsar rose to his feet, however, Pekkala could be sure that the man’s temper had already been lost.
    Beside the Tsar’s chair stood a small table, on which a candle burned. This was the only light source in the room and in that glowing pool, the Tsar seemed to float like a mirage.
    With his soft blue eyes, the Tsar regarded Pekkala. ‘I have decided that the title of Special Investigator lacks’ – he twisted his hand in the air, like the claw of a barnacle sweeping through an ocean current – ‘the gravity of your position. There are other special investigators in my police force, but there has never been a position quite like yours before. It was my grandfather who created the Gendarmerie and my father who established the Okhrana. But you are my creation, for which I have also commissioned an appropriate symbol of your rank.’
    It was then that the Tsar presented Pekkala with the medallion which would soon earn him the title ‘Emerald Eye’.
    The Tsar rose from his chair and, taking the badge from its velvet cushion, pinned it to the cloth beneath the right lapel of Pekkala's jacket. ‘As my personal investigator, you will have absolute authority in the fulfilment of your duties. No secrets may be withheld from you. There are no