Master of Petersburg by J. M. Coetzee Page B

see it? This is the third time I have called. The first two times that stupid landlady of his wouldn’t let me in. I hope you won’t be the same.’
    Katri. A Finnish name. She looks like a Finn too.
    â€˜I am sure she has her reasons. Did you know my son well?’
    She does not answer the question. ‘You realize that the police killed your stepson,’ she says matter-of-factly.
    Time stands still. He can hear his heart beating.
    â€˜They killed him and put out a story about suicide. Don’t you believe me? You don’t have to if you don’t want to.’
    â€˜Why do you say that?’ he says in a dry whisper.
    â€˜Why? Because it’s true. Why else?’
    It is not just that she is belligerent: she is beginning to grow restless too. She has begun to rock rhythmically from foot to foot, her arms swinging in time. Despite her squat frame she gives an impression of limberness. No wonder Anna Sergeyevna wanted nothing to do with her!
    â€˜No.’ He shakes his head. ‘What my son left behind is a private matter, a family matter. Kindly explain the point of your visit.’
    â€˜Are there any papers?’
    â€˜There were papers but they aren’t here any more. Why do you ask?’ And then: ‘Are you one of Nechaev’s people?’
    The question does not disconcert her. On the contrary, she smiles, raising her eyebrows, baring her eyes for the first time, glaring, triumphant. Of course she is one of Nechaev’s! A warrior-woman, and her swaying the beginnings of a war-dance, the dance of someone itching to go to war.
    â€˜If I were, would I tell you?’ she replies, laughing.
    â€˜Do you know that the police are keeping watch on this house?’
    She stares intently, swaying on her toes, as though willing him to see something in her gaze.
    â€˜There is a man downstairs this very minute,’ he persists.
    â€˜Where?’
    â€˜You didn’t notice him but you can be sure he noticed you. He pretends to be a beggar.’
    Her smile broadens into true amusement. ‘Do you think a police spy would be clever enough to spot me?’ she says. And she does a surprising thing. Twitching the hem of her dress aside, she gives two little skips, revealing simple black shoes and white cotton stockings.
    She is right, he thinks: one could take her for a child; but a child in the grip of a devil nevertheless. The devil inside her twitching, skipping, unable to keep still.
    â€˜Stop that!’ he says coldly. ‘My son didn’t leave anything for you.’
    â€˜Your son! He wasn’t your son!’
    â€˜He is my son and will always be. Now please go. I have had enough of this conversation.’
    He opens the door and motions her out. As she leaves, she deliberately knocks against him. It is like being bumped by a pig.
    There is no sign of Ivanov when he goes out later in the afternoon, nor when he returns. Should he care? If it is Ivanov’s task to see without being seen, why should it be his task to see Ivanov? Even if, in the present charade, Ivanov is the one playing the part of God’s angel – an angel only by virtue of being no angel at all – why should it be his role to seek out the angel? Let the angel come knocking at my door, he tells himself, and I will not fail, I will give him shelter: that is enough for the bargain to hold. Yet even as he says so he is aware that he is lying to himself, that it is in his power to deliver Ivanov wholly and absolutely from his cold watchpost.
    So he frets and frets till at last there is nothing for it but to go downstairs and search for the man. But the man is not downstairs, is not in the street, is nowhere to be found. He sighs with relief. I have done what I can, he thinks.
    But he knows in his heart he has not. There is more he could do, much more.

9
    Nechaev
    He is in the streets of the Haymarket the next day when ahead of him he glimpses the plump, almost spherical