The Polished Letter

0:00 The Woman on the Doormat

0:04 Narrator: Moscow, the summer of two thousand and fourteen. Volkov and I kept a cluttered flat near Chistye Prudy, and that afternoon the woman at our door came no further than the doormat. Come in, sit, move the newspapers. Vera, is it? You telephoned.

0:23 Vera: I won't sit, Doctor Melnik. If I sit I shall— no. I'll say it standing. Volkov: Four flights with a folder clamped to your chest. So someone has already looked at it and frightened you.

0:36 Vera: Petrovka has my complaint. Stamped. They weren't unkind. No— they were bored, which is worse.

0:45 Narrator: A complaint of what? Vera: This week the American papers printed a bank warning. I polished that warning. I knew it by my own commas.

0:56 Volkov: Papers don't print bank warnings. Vera: They do when it's the bait. Someone in Washington believed it, and fourteen thousand emails walked out of the National Reform Council.

1:08 Volkov: Ah. Narrator: And you tidied the bait. You couldn't have known that.

1:13 Vera: Someone will be blamed, Doctor, and I am the one with the commas. Volkov: Your thumb stays on one corner of that folder. Something small in there.

1:23 Vera: A memory stick. A man who calls himself Nightjar has posted the first of those emails. A Romanian, he says, quite alone. I saved his file. I haven't opened it.

1:36 Volkov: You're afraid your letter is in— Vera: No. I do not want to have read them. Stolen letters, one can't unread. Take his post, on paper, the words only. The file stays with me.

1:50 Volkov: Who stands near your work? Vera: Nobody. I work alone. Well— there's my stair, my old neighbours. Stas, a boy at Savyolovsky market, mends my machine.

2:03 Volkov: Tomorrow, your block. Show me your people. Then your boy at the market.

2:09 Boiled Tea and Old Dog at the Lodge

2:13 Narrator: Next morning we stood in a lodge on Frunzenskaya Embankment that smelled of boiled tea and old dog, the concierge's arm across the stairs. Pantelei: Book first. Pantelei's lodge, Pantelei's book. Name, flat, hour. Pen's on the string.

2:31 Narrator: Melnik, doctor, for the third floor. That dog has a ruined hip and a better coat than you do. Pantelei: He belonged to the fifth floor. He eats. Somebody in this house should.

2:44 Volkov: Volkov. What's the house short of? Pantelei: Money. Pensions come late, then short, then a clerk comes to explain. Second floor's six weeks behind. Fourth floor's nine.

2:55 Narrator: Good grief. Volkov: You know it to the week. So their letters pass through—

3:01 Pantelei: Not through. They carry them down here to me. Eyes gone, legs gone, wives gone. Somebody has to read the things out.

3:11 Narrator: And the translator? Does she come down? Pantelei: Vera? Alone up there with her dictionaries, lamp on till two. Used to bring them soup. This week she takes her post and looks at nobody...

3:24 Volkov: You count everyone who passes that door. Pantelei: Somebody should. Lift's been dead since the rouble fell, so they don't pass often. Eleven old soldiers when I came. Four now. Mind the stairs.

3:39 Two Flights Up, a Door That Would Not Answer

3:43 Narrator: Two flights up, the landing gave us a man with a ledger, a laptop under one arm, and a door that would not answer him. Forgive me. Did you just click your heels at a door?

3:57 Zimin: Old soldier behind it. They open quicker, as a rule. Zimin, pensions fund.

4:04 Narrator: Do they. Volkov: Volkov. This one hasn't opened.

4:09 Zimin: Deaf since Afghanistan. I'll send the form. Wake up, Felix Edmundovich, we have paperwork.

4:15 Narrator: Felix Edmundovich? Dzerzhinsky! Founder of the Cheka. I watched them lift him off his plinth at Lubyanka in ninety-one. Who christens a laptop that?

4:27 Zimin: My old post called me that; I kept their forms as if lives hung on them. So I handed it down. He's slow and nobody likes him either.

4:37 Narrator: Ha! Volkov: Your fund keeps its old stock for clerks it doesn't value. Zimin: My fund gives me a ballpoint. He's my own. Twice passed over for section head, you buy your own.

4:49 Narrator: Who got the chair? Zimin: A nephew. Both times. Different nephews.

4:56 Narrator: Oh, dear. Volkov: Ring, Doctor. That's the translator's door.

5:01 Narrator: Nobody. Not a footstep. Zimin: She's out till evening. Old men sleep. Next month, then.

5:09 A Market Stall No Wider Than a Coffin

5:13 Narrator: By noon we had crossed the city to Savyolovsky market and a stall no wider than a coffin, where a young man held court over gutted laptops. Volkov: You're Stas. You mend Vera's machine.

5:26 Stas: Stas, yes. Mend it, clean it, tell her stop sticking passwords on the lid. Volkov: So you've had her password without asking. You've been all through her—

5:37 Stas: Her lid. Through her lid. Yellow note, anybody can read. You police?

5:42 Narrator: Worse, a doctor, and I take notes. How does a letter rob an office in Washington? Stas: No robbing. Letter frightens you. Your bank, your money, something wrong. You click. False page, pretty, same colours. You type.

5:58 Narrator: Just like that? Volkov: And the page hands your password to whoever built it. Stas: Hands it over, smiling. Passwords? Those are easy, very easy. Clerk in Washington, clerk in Kazan: same dog, same birthday.

6:13 Volkov: Four sentences, and you've explained what the American papers took a page for. You're wasted on a stall. Stas: Tell my landlord. Six years here. They pay me to glue screens for grandmothers.

6:27 Narrator: You've seen the Romanian's first post? Vera gave us a printout. Stas: Whole row's read him, Doctor. On their phones, between customers.

6:36 Narrator: Then indulge an old man. 'They call me sophisticated. I am very pleased. But in fact, it was easy—'

6:44 Volkov: The rest, Doctor. Narrator: 'Very easy.' Signed Nightjar.

6:50 Stas: Write that down. Good line. That Romanian has taste.

6:55 Dusk at Vera's Table over the River

6:59 Narrator: Vera was home by dusk, when we climbed back, and she sat us at her table over the river with the folder squared between us. Volkov: Who hired you, Vera? Vera: A voice. On the telephone, in March. Muffled— a cold, I thought. No, a scarf. A bank's consultant; he'd email the draft and pay the same day. He did.

7:26 Volkov: A man who pays that fast doesn't want an invoice with his name on it. Vera: Half my clients are voices. One doesn't ask.

7:34 Narrator: What did a bank letter want with you? Vera: Rhythm. Bank English is all elbows. I made it walk. I was rather pleased.

7:44 Volkov: Were you. Narrator: And our boy at the market. When did he have your machine?

7:50 Vera: April. Two days— no, three, with the Sunday. His ticket is in here.

7:56 Narrator: I'll take that, if I may. Volkov: You keep every ticket and every draft. That's someone who's been cheated.

8:04 Vera: Twice. No— three times. Agencies sell my work as theirs. So I read the author line of every file.

8:13 Narrator: The author line? Vera: Hidden, at the top. However many hands polish it, a file keeps the name its owner gave his computer. Boss. Kitten. Zenit the Champion.

8:27 Narrator: Zenit the Champion, in Moscow? That man wants watching. Volkov: And the voice's file? What did he call his machine?

8:36 Vera: In March? I read a hundred that month. Something silly, they're all silly. I haven't opened that letter since the papers...

8:45 Narrator: You could look now. We're both here. Vera: It's the best-mannered thing I ever wrote, Doctor, and somebody— I cannot— I can't look at it...

8:57 Volkov: Then don't. A machine's name only tells me what a man finds funny. People first. Vera: Nightjar's file stays shut too. Petrovka said touch nothing: open stolen mail on my own machine and I'm in their report.

9:14 A Full Ashtray at Petrovka

9:18 Narrator: Inspector Kravchenko received us at Petrovka Thirty-Eight behind a full ashtray, with a stamped complaint pinned under her elbow. Kravchenko: Unlawful computer access, launched from Moscow; that's what your translator has handed me. And a Romanian on the internet.

9:36 Volkov: What does Washington say? Kravchenko: One post from him, one answer from them inside the day: no Romanian, only Russians. Now the world waits for him to answer back.

9:48 Volkov: Charming. Narrator: Inspector, he may not be far. Vera's repairman at Savyolovsky market had her machine three days in April. Here's his ticket.

9:58 Kravchenko: A ticket. Narrator: And yesterday he bragged about passwords in the Romanian's own phrase, word for word, at his own— Kravchenko: A stallholder. Well, well. No minister's son, nobody's telephone ringing. Nobody above me blocks a stallholder.

10:15 Volkov: So somebody above you has blocked something already. Kravchenko: Nobody has blocked anything. Nobody has returned my calls. That's a different sentence.

10:25 Narrator: I see. Volkov: Give me days before you lift him. A boast isn't a case yet.

10:30 Kravchenko: Two days. Then I visit the market with a van. Volkov: You've been chewing on something since the market, Doctor. Say it.

10:39 Narrator: What if— what if there's no Romanian, only Stas at his stall?

10:46 The Row Falls Silent at the Market Gate

10:50 Narrator: Kravchenko kept her word two days later, with a grey van at the market gate, and the row fell silent ahead of us as we walked. Kravchenko: Stas. Inspector Kravchenko, Petrovka. I believe you're a Romanian.

11:12 Kravchenko: You're Nightjar. Alone, masked, robbing Washington. You've had the translator's machine. You read her password off her—

11:20 Stas: Lid, yes. Her lid. Everybody's lid. That's your case?

11:25 Volkov: It's a poor one, Inspector. That job wanted a specialist. This man glues screens.

11:31 Stas: Specialist? One false page, one frightened clerk. I could rob Washington one-handed. Other hand holding a pie.

11:40 Kravchenko: Is that so. Volkov: There. Six years and nobody has asked him. He'd rather be guilty than ordinary.

11:47 Kravchenko: You told me a boast isn't a case. Volkov: This one is. Passwords are easy, very easy, he told us at this counter, before the doctor had read him a line. Same vanity, same words. I'll vouch for it.

12:01 Stas: That's— that's from the post, whole row says— Kravchenko: Unlawful computer access. Everything with a plug goes in the van.

12:09 Narrator: Inspector, those are customers' machines. Some old woman's photographs are in that crate — Kravchenko: You brought me the ticket, Doctor.

12:17 Stas: Not the bench. Six years I— leave my screws, that's my... Narrator: Stas, listen, I never meant—

12:25 Stas: You came friendly, with your pencil. You read it to me for a laugh, Doctor, and then you brought them.

12:32 Vera Sits at Last, Coat Still Buttoned

12:36 Narrator: Before the day was out she had climbed our four flights again, and this time Vera sat, on a stack of newspapers, her coat still buttoned. Vera: He is a boy. He gave me the Sunday for nothing. He does not— no. He can't have done this.

12:54 Narrator: I keep adding it up, Vera, and it comes out no better. His words match the post. His machines are at Petrovka.

13:03 Vera: And nobody spoke for him? Narrator: A fellow— a fellow selling chargers shouted the Romanian's line at the van, for a laugh. And the voice on your telephone?

13:14 Vera: A scarf, Doctor. It might be Stas. It might be the Patriarch. I cannot swear— I won't swear.

13:23 Volkov: Then help him another way. What exactly did you change in that draft? Only you and the voice ever held both versions.

13:31 Vera: Commas. Word order. And the ending simply stopped, as bank English does. So I gave it one line of my own, for the cadence.

13:40 Narrator: Unasked? Unpaid? Vera: Unasked, unpaid, and the only sentence in the thing that breathes. But what has that to do with Stas, why are you—

13:52 Volkov: The voice rang you in March. His ticket says April. So he knew your number before he ever held your machine, or he isn't the voice.

14:02 Narrator: Ah. Vera: He came up for it himself. Once, twice. I don't recall— I never noted when...

14:11 Volkov: The lodge did. Did Stas ever sign Pantelei's book?

14:16 The Supper Hour with the Concierge Out

14:20 Narrator: The supper hour found the lodge without its concierge: only the old dog at home, and Zimin of the pensions fund on one knee beside him. Zimin, isn't it, from the landing? Where's the concierge?

14:34 Zimin: Out. He goes out. Scratch behind the bad hip and this one forgives anybody.

14:41 Volkov: With that hip he gets up for nobody. So you bring him something. Zimin: Heel of sausage. Who else in this house is pleased to see me?

14:51 Narrator: Your Chekist is wheezing on the counter. He wants a mender, and ours is gone: Petrovka has Vera's repairman in a cell. But there must be some other—

15:01 Zimin: A repairman? No. Not for this one. Nobody opens him, nobody dusts him, no fingers on him but mine.

15:09 Narrator: All right, all right. He greets you in English letters, I see. That's no Chekist, that's a tin of cat food.

15:17 Zimin: That's the joke, Doctor. Felix with an x, my own spelling. Iron Felix, on a shelf with the cat food.

15:26 Volkov: Do your veterans laugh? Zimin: Fourth floor eats at seven. Nine weeks behind, and they'll want it explained.

15:35 Narrator: Now then, the book, while nobody's minding it.

15:39 A Dog Who Watches Like a Magistrate

15:44 Narrator: I went through the concierge's book under his own lamp, Volkov at my shoulder and the dog watching me like a magistrate. Stas, here. April, one signature, when he fetched the machine. But look, Volkov: a stub at the stitching.

16:02 Volkov: Clean tear, done slowly. Nobody panicked over that page. Narrator: Last days of February, and Vera's telephone rang in March. So he came earlier, and somebody tore him out. That's a go-between.

16:16 Pantelei: Hands off. Pantelei's lodge, Pantelei's book. Narrator: There's a page gone, Pantelei.

16:22 Pantelei: There is. I tore it. Mine to tear.

16:26 Volkov: Did you, now. Narrator: Who paid you? The boy from Savyolovsky? Did he—

16:31 Pantelei: That boy? Ask me something else. Volkov: You read every letter in this house. You know who works alone and who sits up till two. That's worth money to a man with a telephone, and you—

16:43 Pantelei: You come here with Petrovka at your back, you and your doctor. When officials call, I hide. Forty years— forty years I've hidden.

16:51 Volkov: That isn't a no. A torn page and a bolt-hole: the inspector will call that a friend on the stairs, and the boy's case hardens. Stay where you are, Pantelei— Narrator: Out the back. Volkov, he's left the dog.

17:08 Volkov: So he has.

17:11 Bleach and Cabbage Beneath Petrovka

17:15 Narrator: Under Petrovka, the next afternoon, the corridor stank of bleach and cabbage, and Kravchenko walked us along it herself to the last grille. Kravchenko: Read it out, Doctor. I want to watch his face.

17:29 Narrator: 'This morning Washington says again: no Nightjar, only Russians. I'm here, and I am alone. Here's my answer: a new file from their server.' Signed Nightjar.

17:43 Kravchenko: Washington said that today. He answered today. Every machine this boy owns is in my evidence room, and he was in my cell when Nightjar answered.

17:54 Volkov: Words that didn't exist when you turned the key. He's cleared, Inspector. Stas: Hear that? Cleared. Find your keys and—

18:02 Kravchenko: Cleared of typing. You rang me about a concierge who tears pages and runs. A boy can have a friend with a keyboard.

18:11 Volkov: You don't believe that. Kravchenko: I believe a release needs a signature, and upstairs returns no calls. Show me there's no friend. Then I find my keys.

18:22 Narrator: Stas, I brought you here. I— I will— Stas: Doctor. What's that in your hand?

18:28 Narrator: His post. The inspector printed it. Stas: Paper's got no insides. Your printout is paper. Give Vera the file itself.

18:38 Back Under Vera's Lamp, the River Gone Dark

18:42 Narrator: The river had gone dark when we sat again under Vera's lamp, with a Petrovka memory stick on the table and a sheet bearing the inspector's stamp. Volkov: Petrovka's copy, opened on the inspector's order. Your name stays out of her report.

18:58 Vera: I have that file already, you know I have. It was never— it was never only the report. Those letters, once read, stay in my head. No. I will not.

19:13 Volkov: You won't. One line at the top, then shut it. I was wrong about a boy. I need your habit.

19:20 Vera: Not one stolen word. Volkov: Not one. Vera: There. A Romanian, quite alone, and his author line: Felix Edmundovich.

19:32 Narrator: Felix Edmundovich. Volkov, we've— Volkov: We have, Doctor. Not yet. Vera, your letter.

19:39 Vera: Something silly, I told you. I remember now. In March I laughed; one joke in a hundred files. I can't— no. Give me a moment.

19:52 Vera: All my commas, and still it keeps the name its owner typed. The same. The very same...

20:01 Narrator: Half Moscow has called some boss Dzerzhinsky. Two jokers, why— Vera: No, look at the spelling, Doctor. A Russian putting that name in Latin letters writes k, s. Our passports do, the encyclopaedias do. Both of these say x.

20:19 Narrator: Good Lord. Volkov: Then not two jokers. One computer, one x.

20:26 Vera: You've heard that name. Where? Who—

20:28 Volkov: Lock your door tonight, and leave your lamp on as usual. Narrator: So the voice on her telephone and the lonely Romanian— Volkov: One machine hired you and then dressed as the Romanian. People first, I said. Fool.

20:42 Back Down at First Light

20:46 Narrator: We went back down into the bleach at first light, and found Kravchenko at Stas's grille, her keys still on her belt. Kravchenko: Your x, Volkov. Every crate, overnight. No seized machine carries that name.

21:02 Stas: Told you. Keys. Kravchenko: Proves nothing, boy. A friend's machine wouldn't be in my crates.

21:09 Volkov: No. But that machine hired Vera in March, and his ticket says April. Her English was finished before he ever saw her lid. Narrator: And it made the Romanian too. So what does this friend need Stas for?

21:24 Kravchenko: Nothing. He was in my cell when Nightjar answered, and nobody missed him. Some friend.

21:32 Narrator: And your signature from upstairs? Kravchenko: Upstairs isn't answering. So nobody has told me no.

21:41 Stas: Now she's funny. Kravchenko: You know who owns that joke, Volkov. So when do I—

21:46 Volkov: By tonight. Say it in this building and it reaches upstairs first. Stas: You vouched. My counter, my words. Whole market quotes that post. Sock woman says it to her sister.

21:59 Volkov: You tried to tell me that day. I took a quotation for a confession, in front of the inspector. That error is mine.

22:07 Narrator: I'll carry your crates back myself, Stas. Stas: Carry careful. Grandmothers in there. Find who named that machine. My stall stands empty.

22:17 Volkov Silent All the Way from the Metro

22:21 Narrator: Up from the metro we took the river side, and Volkov said nothing until the block stood in sight. You've had it since Vera's lamp. Let's hear it.

22:32 Volkov: Read me the lodge, Doctor. You wrote it down. Narrator: 'Felix with an x.' His own spelling, he called it, over the dog. And last night, that name on both top lines, and Vera saying a Russian writes k, s.

22:48 Volkov: So his private spelling sits on a Romanian's file. Narrator: Zimin. A ballpoint and a heel of sausage. How does that man rob Washington, how does he even—

23:00 Volkov: Perhaps he doesn't. Perhaps the ledger is the costume. Narrator: He clicked his heels at a deaf man's door. Thirty years I've doctored old soldiers, I know drill when I hear it.

23:12 Volkov: One spelling on two files. Who on these stairs ever said it aloud? One man. A clerk, he told us. So ask the concierge; he reads out the fund's letters. He'll be back for that dog.

23:25 Back at the Lodge for the Dog

23:29 Narrator: Pantelei had come back for the dog, and we found him on the lodge floor with its ruined hip across his knees. Pantelei: No book today. You said my page hardens the—

23:39 Narrator: The boy's out, Pantelei. Since this morning. Pantelei: Out? Then I crawled back here for nothing but the dog...

23:48 Volkov: A fifth-floor dog with a fine coat, on a concierge's wage. The men who carried the fifth floor out signed your book: name, flat, hour. That was your page.

24:00 Pantelei: Two lads from the morgue. No page, no— no dead man. I sign his name, the pension comes, and this one eats.

24:07 Narrator: All of it on the dog? Pantelei: Look at his coat, Doctor. Look at mine.

24:13 Narrator: Poor old fellow. Volkov: With a pensions clerk on your stairs? Pantelei: When officials call, I hide, so I hide from him too. Habit. New since March, that one. The old clerk counted her dead like a miser. He's never once asked after the fifth floor.

24:30 Narrator: A pensions clerk who doesn't count the dead? But that's the whole job, that's— Volkov: New in March, when Vera's telephone rang. You read out every letter here. Whose name is on them?

24:41 Pantelei: A department. A stamp. Some woman's initials. His? Never. Not once.

24:56 Volkov: Kravchenko. Does the pensions fund employ a Zimin?

25:01 The Inspector Climbs Coughing to the Landing

25:05 Narrator: Kravchenko climbed to us that evening, coughing at every turn, and found us on the landing with Zimin at the deaf man's door. Kravchenko: Zimin? Inspector Kravchenko, Petrovka. The pensions fund has no Zimin. No file, no desk, no salary. Forged papers are my arrest, so you'll—

25:24 Zimin: Beautifully forged, I hope. Read this before you reach for anything, Inspector. Kravchenko: Military intelligence. Major. Khamovniki. So that's who doesn't return my calls.

25:38 Volkov: You could walk to work from here, Major. Zimin: I do. Good for the knees.

25:44 Kravchenko: Charming. Volkov: Wake up, Felix Edmundovich, you told him, on this landing, and we laughed. That name sits on Vera's letter and on the Romanian's file, with your x.

25:56 Zimin: A joke. All Moscow has some boss called that, you can't— Volkov: All Moscow writes k, s. And you shut the other door yourself, over the dog: no fingers on him but mine.

26:08 Narrator: He's pleased, Volkov. He's been waiting for somebody to ask. Kravchenko: Card or no card, the papers are forged. The machine comes with me.

26:17 Zimin: Take him. Write what you like. Your page goes upstairs and nobody reads it.

26:23 Narrator: Then why the stairs, all those months? A voice on a telephone doesn't need a landing, so what were you— Zimin: I walked these stairs to watch her. She should hear whose line that was.

26:35 The Hour of Lit Kitchens

26:39 Narrator: Moscow, the hour of lit kitchens: Vera let us in, Zimin and the inspector behind us, and his laptop went down on her table. Kravchenko: Open him, Major. Or my technicians take a week.

26:54 Zimin: My fingers, then. Good evening, Vera. I'll email the draft and pay the same day.

26:59 Vera: That voice. That— take away the scarf, it was you. Zimin: Type. You read these things.

27:08 Vera: One new word, saved. And at the top, author line: Felix Edmundovich. With an x.

27:17 Narrator: There it is. Volkov: That proves the machine, Major. The rest only you can say.

27:23 Zimin: Why not? My unit sent her English to Washington. One staffer typed a password, and we carried away fourteen thousand emails. Alone, at night, on this machine, I wrote the Romanian, to hide Moscow's hand.

27:37 Kravchenko: You're saying that to a police inspector. Zimin: Whose report stops upstairs. Tilt an American election and that's a colonel's stars, Inspector. No nephew could have done it.

27:48 Vera: Why tell me? Zimin: My draft stopped at the account number. I laid your English against it, line by line. One sentence wasn't mine.

28:00 Vera: Don't. I won't hear them. Not one stolen word— Zimin: One, then. A staffer to a friend, nine at night: 'The bank says don't wait for morning. So I'm doing it now.'

28:12 Vera: Don't wait for— no. It simply stopped, you see, and I— it was one line of my own, for the cadence, I was so— I was pleased... Zimin: You should be. Mine frightened nobody. Your craft won the password.

28:30 Narrator: Enough. Get him off her floor, Inspector— Kravchenko: Coat, Major. I charge what I can hold: forged papers. The military prosecutors take him by morning.

28:42 Narrator: Still clicking. Volkov, a man that careful, and his own nickname on both files? Volkov: Twice passed over, you buy your own, he told us on the landing. That machine was the one thing in Moscow that answered to him.

28:57 Vera: Is it true, what he said? Volkov: True. And he told you to wound you. You made a letter breathe; he aimed it at a frightened stranger.

29:08 Vera: I used to bring the old men soup. I could— I could do that... Volkov: Pantelei will make you sign for it.

29:16 Vera: He will, too. Narrator: So: Zimin, charged on forged papers and handed to the military prosecutors by morning. Fourteen thousand emails, and the charge was a pensions form. That night I looked down the embankment from Vera's table: her lamp at my elbow, and one window still lit in Khamovniki.