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incomprehensibly in futile preparation for the return of Vassili Ivanov.

Vassili Ivanov
    Leningrad, winter 1928
    Vassili Ivanov had been at sea for several weeks, the last two without a break, and he was going to make the most of his first night back home – he and all the others. The vodka had come out long before they disembarked and, as they made their way through the dark streets and along the icy lengths of the Fontanka Canal, they were already itching for violence. They found the steps of the drinking den and stumbled down past the women who lingered on the stairs, Vassili in the lead, bellowing. He shoved past a group of men near the door, noticed their uniforms too late, swore at them anyway as he passed. He had come across them before, right here, in the very same place, the last time he was home. They had blocked his way then too, as if they had the right, just because of those uniforms. He rubbed his head as he entered the bar, smearing his hair back across his scalp, feeling the lumps and bulges beneath, the places where life had battered him. He took his usual table near the bar and the others crowded in, jostling for the stools. Vassili Ivanov sat and looked at his hands, ran a thumbnail across the tabletop. He looked at the black grime beneath the nail and scraped it out again with the corner of a tooth, rolled the knot of dirt across his tongue and spat it out onto the floor. Then he stood up and roared at the barman. He shoved past the men who were blocking his path. Then he saw their uniforms, inside the building now, waiting for him to make the mistake he had just made, one indiscretion too many, an obvious lack of respect. He swore at them again, pushed away the hand that tried to hold him, pushing his way along the bar now, shouting at the barman still. Then more hands were on his shoulder and he wasnear the door, the OGPU men shoving him out, out into the well of the stairs, down onto the ground as the women looked on and his mates still squabbled over the stools inside. Then a knife came out and it went into him and the OGPU men looked at each other.
    â€˜Look what you’ve gone and done,’ one said.
    â€˜He deserved it.’
    â€˜Yes, who cares?’ said the other.
    â€˜You’ll care if the truth comes out.’
    â€˜Who’s going to say anything? Them?’ He glared at the women on the stairs. They turned away. ‘Come on, let’s go.’
    They went up the stairs and along the canal.
    â€˜Have you got the knife? Chuck it in the canal.’
    â€˜I left it.’
    â€˜You what?’
    â€˜I left it. Back there.’
    â€˜You fucking idiot. Go back and get it. It’s evidence, isn’t it?’
    The man hesitated.
    â€˜I said go! It’s evidence!’
    â€˜He’s right,’ said the other. ‘Go get it, bring it back and chuck it in the canal.’
    He hurried off, avoiding the women’s gaze as he stumbled down the stairs. He found the knife at the bottom, picked it up and hurried away.
    â€˜Here it is,’ he said, as he got back to the others.
    â€˜So chuck it, then. Into the canal.’
    He chucked it. It clattered across the ice.
    â€˜Fuck it,’ he said. ‘The water’s fucking frozen.’
    â€˜What did you chuck it there for, then?’
    â€˜You told me to.’
    â€˜Not there, you idiot. At the edge, where the ice is thinner, right by the wall. They’ll find it now, won’t they, in daylight. Blood on it and everything. Fingerprints.’
    â€˜What now?’
    â€˜You’ll have to go out and get it.’
    â€˜Get it? Are you joking?’
    â€˜Crawl out on the ice. Go slowly and you’ll be all right.’
    He looked at them. ‘Are you sure?’
    They looked back at him.
    â€˜Go. And that’s an order, as if from Comrade Stalin himself.’
    â€˜All right, all right, I’ll go.’
    He clambered over the wall and onto the ice and gingerly lay