Free The Ice Curtain by Robin White Page A

thousands of senior officers and even appointed a close friend of the dissident physicist Sakharov to head the Moscow office.
    Those were times when anything seemed possible. Levin had seen the great grim statue of Feliks Derzhinsky, Iron Feliks, founder of the KGB, hauled away to a dump as crowds cheered. He’d stayed long enough to see it remounted in Gorky Park.
    Bakatin was first absorbed, then expelled. His reforms followed the same ballistic arc. Levin’s Investigations Directorate was abolished, then reestablished. Now only the KGB’s name was new. Everything else about it had become, like the Tsarist double eagle, recycled, more familiar.
    The guard returned and pointed. “Pull onto the sidewalk down the street and wait.”
    Levin parked the Zhiguli with two wheels up on the curb. He had to slam the sprung door twice to keep it from falling open.
    As he turned, a sapphire-blue Mercedes 600 series glided soundlessly up to the chain barrier. The guard all but genuflected to it as he rushed to pull the stanchions aside.
    Levin walked over. Petrov’s driver got out. He wore a dark leather coat that came down to his knees. Levin had seen the likes of him in those ceramic figurines on sale in places like Manezh Plaza. They came in collectible sets: the miniskirted moll, the dark-suited
biznisman,
the leather-jacketed security bull. The vendors would arrange them in realistic tableaux, authentic right down to tiny cell phones glued to the ear.
    The back door of the Mercedes swung open. Petrov unfolded his legs and got out. “You’re from Goloshev’s department?”
    Levin nodded. “Major Izrail Levin.”
    â€œPetrov. Chairman of the State Diamond Committee.” Petrov was dressed in a long tweed overcoat. Snowy white cuffs peeked from his wrists. A gold watch. Cuff links.
    The businessman. The guard.
Levin glanced into the glittering blue Mercedes.
An incomplete set. Where’s the blonde?
    Petrov said, “I assume it’s about Volsky. You know, I was with him moments before he was killed. The thief was caught?”
    â€œWhat makes you think it was a robbery?”
    Petrov gave him a long look, as though measuring Levin’s sanity. “
Ekipazh
is the best club in Moscow and every thief in the city knows it. Anyone associated with it becomes a natural target.”
    â€œYou weren’t.”
    â€œAnd how would you know?” Petrov didn’t wait for an answer. “What exactly do you want from us, Major?”
    â€œYou met with Volsky last night. What was it about?”
    â€œI’m chairman of the State Diamond Committee. We talked about diamonds. Is that why Goloshev sent you? Or do you have a personal interest?”
    â€œPersonal?”
    â€œWith a name like Levin you must have a relative in the jewelry trade.”
    Levin’s family had been Russian for centuries, yet in his passport, under
race,
the word
Jewish
appeared. “My father worked at a submarine shipyard. My mother was a surveyor. My personal interest is in the murder of Delegate Volsky. You were one of the last people to see him alive. I have been assigned the case.”
    â€œAnother mystery. Why should the FSB investigate street crime?”
    â€œThe assassination of a high-ranking official is a matter for state security. Sometimes, things work as they should.”
    Petrov caught the use of the word
sometimes,
and reevaluated Levin accordingly. “You know, I invited him to stay for dinner. It’s a tragedy he didn’t accept. Who knows what would have happened if he had?”
    He would have died with an expensive stomach.
“You set up this meeting at your club. Why not here at your office?”
    â€œFor Volsky’s sake. A person from the regions has no opportunity to experience a place like
Ekipazh
.”
    â€œBut is it as safe?”
    â€œ
Ekipazh
is like a diamond vault. No one enters without close screening. So far, the club has kept