-18-

Hannibal quickly suited up for business again. While he was tying his tie, Ivanovich went into the next room and returned in a nondescript sport coat.

“It was Dani Gana,” Ivanovich said while Hannibal pulled on his gloves. “He realized that he could not take Viktoriya away and leave a loose end like her mother to hunt him down one day.”

“Let’s not jump to any conclusions,” Hannibal said. “My police contact says I’ll be allowed to survey the crime scene because I could tell if anything was stolen. While I’m there, I might find a clue that would help me find out where Gana took off to.”

Ivanovich put a hand on Hannibal’s shoulder. “Why are you doing this? I have released you from any obligation.”

“That’s right,” Hannibal said, sliding his Oakleys into place. “And that means this is no longer about you. Now it’s about the girl. If you’re right and Gana had anything to do with this, she’s in danger. If it was a near-miss by one of his enemies, she may be in even greater danger. Either way, she probably doesn’t know her mother is dead. I need to find him and tell her what I know so she can make an informed decision about whether she wants to stay with this guy.”

“Then I’m going with you.”

Hannibal shook his head. “Bad idea, Aleksandr. Not only will the place be crawling with police, but anybody who really thinks you killed Nikita Petrova will be out for blood now that Raisa has been murdered. Whoever your enemies are, they’ll all be out tonight. Just let me go find out what I can.”

* * * * *

When Hannibal pulled up across the street from the Petrova residence that evening, every light in the house was on, including lights on the front and back porch. The front door and upstairs windows glowed like the eyes and mouth of some ghastly jack-o’-lantern. Neighbors probably thought there was a party going on inside, but he knew the opposite was true. As he pushed the fob button that locked the doors, he made a conscious decision to leave his guilt out in the car. Yes, he had stirred up some old stories that might better have been left alone. And yes, he might have inadvertently fingered Mrs. Petrova if someone was looking for her, or if someone thought she knew something that should not be shared. Of course, he didn’t know any of that. The suspect pool was running over. Both of the Sidorovs appeared to have motives. Russian mobsters may have decided to silence her before she said the wrong thing to Hannibal. Or, for all he knew, Ivanovich’s theory was correct.

The walk up the steps to the door seemed twice as long as it had before. When he arrived, Rissik was there to meet him. They nodded, then Hannibal got to the matter at hand.

“Where is she?”

“Backyard, just past the patio,” Rissik said. “Neighbor kid found her when he was cutting across the yards to visit his girlfriend.”

Hannibal digested that information and considered all it might imply. He really didn’t want to see her dead, but he supposed it was necessary. After a deep breath, Hannibal stepped toward the house. Rissik took his arm to stop him.

“Local people have done a lot of looking and collected forensic evidence. The body is still in place, but the medical examiner will be here soon to pick it up. This is not my case, Jones. I’m only allowed to be here as a courtesy, because of the connections to the husband’s death. You are here as a favor to me.”

“Bottom line?”

“You can look around the house for anything that might be significant, based on what you know. Do not touch the body. Understand? Do not take anything out of the house. And do not discuss what you might see with any member of the press.”

“I won’t embarrass you,” Hannibal said. Rissik nodded. Hannibal opened the door and went inside.

The house was as he had left it, a little cluttered, ornately decorated, warm and friendly with hardwood floors and a great room serving as both living room and dining room, separated by beautiful pocket doors just like the ones that separated the rooms in his own apartment and office. A small squad of detectives scurried around the four finished levels.

As he entered the kitchen, the smell told him she had been preparing dinner. A look at the stove and the bowls beside it told him why the smell was so strong. Cabbage rolls were already prepared and mushroom soup was in process. Someone had interrupted her. Red spatter on the counter between the stove and the door told him where the crime took place. Two drops on the floor between the stove and the door implied she had moved pretty quickly afterward.

Crickets made the backyard garden sound like a Hollywood jungle. Hannibal walked down a narrow cement path toward the flashlight in a patrolman’s hand. The boy in the uniform looked as if he would start shaving any day now. He kept his light on the body, maybe hoping it would keep the bugs away until the city’s angels of death arrived to spirit her off to the city’s purgatory where she would wait in a drawer until others moved her to her final resting place.

Raisa Petrova had gone outside in her dressing gown and mule slippers with a scarf over her hair. Hannibal thought that only a life-threatening situation could make her do that. She lay face down on the winding cement ribbon with one arm stretched forward, as if after falling she had decided to try to swim the rest of the way. The spreading stain on her back surrounded a small hole in the dressing gown and, he assumed, her back. It was a very small hole. Of course, a hole in your back doesn’t have to be very big to let all the life leak out. Sometimes it just takes a while. In this case, it took almost ten yards.

Her face, turned to one side, was not placid. Her jaw was set in the stubborn way he saw it in life. She seemed to smirk at him for a moment, the shadows dancing on her face. Hannibal realized that the light had shaken. He looked up at the young cop who was standing over what was sure to be his first corpse.

“She reminds me of my grandma,” the cop said, looking ashamed of his own reaction.

“Me too,” Hannibal said, although he didn’t make the connection until the cop spoke.

Back inside, Hannibal tightened his gloves on his hands and started to explore the lady’s bedroom. The décor gave the room an overwhelming femininity, with silk and satin on the bed and candleholders on every available surface. Music boxes and jewelry boxes cluttered the dresser and chest, and fresh flowers filled a crystal vase on the windowsill. A smiling photo of Nikita Petrova stood guard on the night table beside her bed.

The room carried the slight smell of lavender, and that scent grew ever stronger as he approached the bathroom. Even there, candles and mythological figurines held sway. Hannibal gave the bathroom the onceover, but he expected to find what he was looking for in the bedroom.

Drawers creaked like old knee joints when he pulled them open. He wished he hadn’t known Mrs. Petrova as he flipped through her most personal clothing items, but he had no choice. Important personal papers could be concealed anyplace. Music boxes and jewelry boxes added up to a dozen good hiding places and Hannibal checked them all, surprised at how little jewelry of value he found. Then there were the knickknacks, some of which held hidden compartments.

Finally, he got down to the nesting dolls. A wooden woman’s top half lifted off to reveal a different woman inside. Inside that woman hid yet another different woman. Just like real life, Hannibal thought. It was inside the third one that he found tightly rolled papers. The top page was what he was looking for: a handwritten note in a scroll-heavy feminine hand, addressed to Nikita and signed by Anastasiya. Unfortunately, those two names were all he could read. The rest of the writing was in Cyrillic characters, so he couldn’t verify the content. Not that it mattered. The fact that Raisa felt the need to hide the note told him all he needed to know.

Two sheets down he came to a prize he didn’t expect. This letter was in English, and it was addressed to Raisa. The letterhead, first in Arabic, then in French, and finally in English, was that of the Arab Bank of Morocco. For a business letter it was long and wordy, which Hannibal assumed was what happened when you translated Middle Eastern business language into English.

Music boxes proved useful to pin down the edges of the letters. Once they were secured on the dresser, Hannibal pulled out his cell phone. After only three false starts he managed to photograph the documents. Then he rolled them up, replaced them in their hand-carved hiding place, and carried it out to the front door. The air had turned brisk while he was inside. He found Rissik sitting at the table where Hannibal had first met Yakov Sidorov. Hannibal stood beside Raisa’s chair, but decided not to sit down.

“I told you not to take anything,” Rissik said.

“I’m just bringing this to you.” Hannibal removed the top half of the wooden woman, revealing the rolled papers. “There might be a valuable clue to the murder in here.”

“Really?” Rissik said, accepting the doll. “Something that points to motive?”

“I think so. There’s a note to Nikita from a woman named Anastasiya Sidorov. It’s in Russian so I can’t tell you what it says, but based on what Raisa Petrova told me, I expect it’s a love letter. Now, if Raisa confronted the other woman, or threatened to tell her husband…”

Rissik nodded. “Yeah, that could speak to motive. Thanks for the lead. And hey, it looks like there was an adult daughter. Any idea how we can contact her?”

“Afraid not, Chief,” Hannibal said. “But if I hear anything about her, I’ll let you know.”

* * * * *

By the time Hannibal got back to his office, Ivanovich had emptied the last bottle of vodka and it was too late to order more. Not that Hannibal minded. Coffee was much more to his taste right then. He brewed a fresh pot while he filled Ivanovich in on his final visit to the Petrova house.

“You don’t really think Anastasiya Sidorov would murder Raisa Petrova, do you?” Ivanovich asked, slouching into the chair and sipping his coffee.

“Not really,” Hannibal said, fishing an electric wire out of a desk drawer. “Raisa found that letter before Nikita died. Why would she wait until now to confront Anastasiya? Besides, she didn’t even try to get around to the front door. She died trying to get to the rental house. Did she think she might find help there? Or was she trying to point us toward her killer?”

“So, you finally see the light. The shooter was Gana.”

“Maybe,” Hannibal said, fumbling to plug a cord into his cell phone. “At least I might see a reason for it now.”

Ivanovich moved to stand behind Hannibal, looking over his shoulder at the computer screen. “What do you have there?”

“It’s a letter from a bank. The Arab Bank of Morocco to be exact. The same bank Gana transferred a quarter million dollars out of.”

“It looks as if the bank was sending her periodic payments,” Ivanovich said, scanning the letter and records Hannibal also photographed. “Gana?”

“I rather doubt the bank will name the accountholder,” Hannibal said. “But these documents make it pretty clear that she wasn’t authorized to do anything with the account.”

“Yes,” Ivanovich said, pointing to the screen. “And this letter seems to be the bank officially telling her that the account is now empty, so no more payments will be forthcoming.”

“Right. If this account did belong to Dani Gana, then it looks as though Raisa may have effectively sold her daughter to Gana for a monthly stipend. If that theory holds, then Raisa might not have been too pleased when the money ran out. Suppose she threatened to tell the girl the truth?”

Ivanovich slapped his palm down on the desk. “He killed her to keep Viktoriya from learning his filthy secret. Now we must find her, to make sure she knows why her mother let this animal marry her.”

“We?”

“You have got to find them,” Ivanovich said, his fists clenched and shaking with rage. “Find her and get her to safety. Then I will take care of Dani Gana myself.”

“Look, I do think she needs to know the truth, but…”

“I am not trying to blackmail you,” Ivanovich said, palms forward and brows raised. “Please, let me hire you. I will pay you. In fact, I had planned to pay you anyway when our business was over. I have a good deal of money saved up, money I hoped one day to use to give Viktoriya a good life.”

Hannibal read the documents on his screen more closely to avoid Ivanovich’s eyes. “Look, Aleksandr, I’m worried about the girl too, and I will help you find her and Gana if I can find any leads to their whereabouts. But I won’t set up a guy for you to take him out. We clear?”

After a deep, heavy sigh, Ivanovich said, “I understand. The important thing is to save Viktoriya from this monster.”

“It looks like she was getting about five grand a month until last month,” Hannibal said. “Nice pay for doing nothing, but not exactly wealth untold. Hard to believe a woman with old-school values would give up her only child for this.”

“Who knows how badly she needed the money,” Ivanovich said, resting a hand on Hannibal’s shoulder. “I didn’t know this man Tolstaya, but I know that Nikita gambled with him. Constantly. He may have been in a great deal of debt to the man.”

“Enough to kill him for?”

“Maybe,” Ivanovich said, “but dead men don’t pay up. More likely Nikita killed himself, but to a man like Tolstaya that would not make the debt go away. He would take away everything the surviving wife had and if that did not pay off the debt, he would demand more.”

Hannibal sat back, resting his elbow on the arm of his chair and his chin in his hand. “Sure would like to question that guy. But I’ve got no idea where he is. And I don’t know if anybody knows where Dani Gana took off to with his new bride.”

The ring of the desk phone surprised them both. Hannibal glanced at his watch, confirming that it was awfully late for someone to be calling. After eleven, he would normally let the machine take it. But right then, he wanted to know who had something important enough to call him about at that hour. When he answered the phone, the speaker was surprised to hear him.

“Hannibal?” Rissik asked. “What are you doing in your office at this time of night? I intended to just leave a message.”

“You can’t have a break in the murder already,” Hannibal said. “Besides, it isn’t even your case.”

“Not about the murder. Your other matter.”

Hannibal had to think a moment. “Oh, the car. They found the car?”

“Yeah, I just got the call,” Rissik said. “They found the car, kind of smashed up. And they found the owner. He’s kind of smashed up too. They took him to Georgetown University Hospital and I guess they decided to keep him.”