Лия Криз – The Amber Heart (страница 4)

And disappeared behind the bushes.

Polina stood at the window a long time. Her heart was pounding. She thought about going down. Waking someone. But whom? Zaretsky? Viktor, who'd been drinking cognac all evening? She remembered Gleb's words: "Don't use that staircase at night." And she stayed.

Around one o'clock she thought she heard, through the howl of the wind, a short cry from outside. Or maybe it was a gull. Or the wind.

She didn't know.

She got back into bed and lay with her eyes open for a long time, listening to the sea. She fell asleep only towards morning, when the sky outside turned grey.

She was woken by a scream.

A real, human scream, hoarse, full of horror. It came from outside, from the direction of the cliff.

Polina jumped up and rushed to the window. Below, an old man in a quilted jacket and rubber boots was running up the garden path towards the house. The gardener, Timofei; she had glimpsed him yesterday. He was waving his arms and shouting something she couldn't make out.

Polina threw her coat on over her pyjamas and ran downstairs.

People were already gathering in the hall. A sleepy Denis in a sweater pulled on inside out. Marina in a silk robe, pale, without her usual make-up. Liza, wrapped in a shawl. Zaretsky, fully dressed, as if he had never gone to bed. Last, stomping heavily, came Viktor.

Timofei stumbled through the door, gasping. His face was white as chalk.

"There..." He waved towards the sea. "On the stairs... Galina... Galina Stepanovna..."

"What?" Zaretsky said sharply. "What's happened to her?"

The old man looked at him. And Polina understood before he said it.

"Dead," Timofei breathed. "Fell. Where the steps are rotten. Down... onto the rocks..."

Liza gave a small cry and covered her face with her hands. Marina sank onto a stair as if her legs had given way. Viktor swore foully.

And Polina stood in the middle of the hall thinking about the jumping light in the greenhouse. About the dark figure walking towards the cliff. And about the short cry she had taken for a gull.

The police arrived forty minutes later.

Two cars with flashing lights stopped at the wrought-iron gates. Out of the first came two young officers in uniform and a female forensic examiner with a case. From the second, unhurriedly, climbed a tall man in a dark jacket.

Polina stood on the porch, still in her coat over her pyjamas, and watched him walk up the linden avenue. Unhurried, hands in his pockets. The wind ruffled his dark hair with its grey at the temples.

He climbed the steps. Stopped. Looked at her with his pale grey eyes.

"Good morning, Polina," he said. "Though I doubt it's good."

"You..." She was flustered. "You're the police?"

"Investigator Vetrov. Gleb Andreyevich. Investigative Department, Zelenomorsk District." He smiled faintly. "I told you: they don't like me here because I ask questions."

He paused, looking somewhere past her, towards the cliff, where gulls were already circling over the staircase.

"I told you not to use that staircase at night," he said quietly. "Pity I didn't tell her."

Chapter 3. Investigator Vetrov

The staircase to the sea began at the very edge of the cliff, beyond a low stone wall. A hundred and eighty-six wooden steps, eight landings, handrails darkened by rain. At the bottom, a narrow strip of beach and boulders where the waves broke.

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