Page 92 of The Collector
Novodevichy Cemetery
“It was all his fault, you know.”
“Not all of it, Gennady. You and your friends from the KGB certainly didn’t help matters.”
They were standing before the grave of Boris Yeltsin. Two of Gennady’s bodyguards had followed them through the cemetery’s redbrick entrance and were hovering out of earshot. Otherwise, they were alone.
“The West adored Yeltsin because he promised to magically transform Russia into a Western-style democracy,” said Gennady. “And then they averted their eyes to the fact that he and the members of his inner circle were robbing Russia blind. He chose Volodya as his successor only because Volodya promised not to prosecute him. And then Volodya raised corruption to an art form.”
“You did quite well for yourself, as I recall.”
“We all did. But these days one needn’t start a business to become rich in Russia. All one has to do is secure a job at the highest reaches of our government. The Kremlin spokesman is worth hundreds of millions of dollars. But he is a pauper in comparison to the secretaryof the Security Council. Nikolai Petrov has spent his entire career working in government, and yet somehow he is worth approximately three billion dollars. I should know. The bulk of Nikolai’s fortune is hidden in my bank.”
They pondered the memorial for a moment in silence. It was, without question, the cemetery’s most unsightly, an undulating Russian tricolor that critics had dismissed as a giant, wobbly birthday cake.
“It’s hideous,” declared Gennady finally.
“Quite.”
“Where’s your phone?”
“I seem to have left it in my car.”
“It appears I’ve made the same mistake.”
They walked along a snow-covered footpath beneath towering elm and spruce. There were graves to the left and right, small plots surrounded by low iron fences. Poets and playwrights, murderers and monsters: they lay side by side behind the walls of Novodevichy.
Gennady was coughing into his gloved hand.
“How much time do you have?” asked Magnus.
“I’m free for the remainder of the afternoon.”
“To live, Gennady.”
“Is it that obvious?”
“It is today, but last evening you concealed it rather well.”
“I have good days and bad.”
“Lung cancer?”
“And heart failure as well. My doctor has informed me that my account is already overdrawn.”
“Which is why you suggested we come here.”
“I find it very peaceful on days like this. It gives me a chance to think about how I wish to be remembered. Will I be a hero of Russian history or just another villain? Will I be celebrated for my courage or condemned for my greed and corruption?”
“What’s the answer?”
“If I were to die this minute, I would be scorned as a greedy villain. A man who used his proximity to power to enrich himself. A loyal lapdog who did nothing when hundreds of Russian boys were being slaughtered each day in the killing fields of Ukraine. That portrait, however, would not be entirely fair.”
“Because you’re Komarovsky.”
“And you,” said Gennady, “are the Collector. Your controller is Konstantin Gromov of the SVR, but your original recruitment was a domestic matter handled by the FSB. Needless to say, you did not volunteer to become a pawn of the Russian government. There was a girl involved. Her name was—”
“You’ve made your point, Gennady.”
