Бесплатный фрагмент - Lieutenant Petrov

Lieutenant Petrov

Detective riddles for those who are tired of the Internet

The Case of Amontillado Barrel

People used to call someone like Armen Ashotovich a hulk. “And he’s even taller than me. He shouldn’t deal with formalins and plastics, but with sacks in warehouses,” lazily pondered Lieutenant Petrov, pretending to make important notes in his notebook. Armen Ashotovich, not the last person in the world of pharmaceutics and industrial chemistry, was pacing from corner to corner waving his huge hands and clattering furiously on the parquet with the heels of his patent leather shoes for about forty minutes. In the reddish glow of the fireplace’s flame his face looked menacing. From his height of two meters he kept repeating the same thing with a strong accent.

“Do you realize how I have been set up?! A dead man in my own basement! I got a partner from India, I got a partner from America, I shook hands with Obama! A dead man is in my basement, and I just moved into my house a month ago, I don’t even know where my basement is!”

Lieutenant Petrov glanced at the dial on his Commander’s Watch and went on the offensive.

“Let me interrupt. So, Armen Ashotovich, I will try to tell you briefly what you told me. You purchased this house which is a monument of architecture of XIX century a little more than a month ago.”

“Monument or not, I don’t know!” The industrialist brushed off angrily and wiped his flushed face with the sleeve of his jacket.

“It is important because the whole country knew where you live because of the great public resonance and newspapers.” Petrov continued. “A month ago you moved here with your personal assistant, and tonight the body of a man with a camera was found in your basement. The body was found by an assistant… Garsan?”

“Garsevan,” Armen Ashotovich corrected. “That’s the name.”

“Garsevan called the police. You were asleep at that time, in the room next door. So that’s your bedroom, then your study, and where is the basement? Can you show me?”

“Come on, it’s a long way down there.”

“It took about three minutes to get to the cellar.”

“A big house!” Lieutenant Petrov, among the antique furniture and gilding, felt he was in a museum. His voice echoed off the high ceilings. “What echo here!”

“The house is big, there are a lot of echoes,” Armen Ashotovich said proudly. “It is so big that I did not manage to walk around everything. Not all the repairs have been made. I want to order new carpets from Iran.”

Armen Ashotovich didn’t have time to tell about all the innovations, as the policeman and the industrialist came to the wooden hatch in the floor of the huge kitchen, just like the owner.

“Garsevan said he found it here.”

The policeman jerked the hatch open without fear of fingerprints. His forensic colleagues had been here for a long time. Lieutenant Petrov gestured to the businessman inside.

“Garsevan said, there are automatic lights when you enter,” murmured Armen Ashotovich, stomping in the absolute blackness of the narrow corridor, more like a tunnel of ancient catacombs.

“It would be nice, because I can’t see anything at… Ouch!” the dreams about illumination came true for Lieutenant Petrov, because he bumped his forehead against something so hard that he saw not only sparks, but all the constellations of the Zodiac. And a second later there was a click, and the policeman found himself in a light-filled room. A classic wine cellar, with dusty bottles and barrels. In the very center of the room lay the body of a man.

“Do you know him?”

“First time I’ve seen him, I tell you!”

Petrov squatted down beside the body.

“A neat hole right on the top of the head, the head was almost pierced through. Our forensic experts say it was blunt force trauma. There’s a camera on his chest with a professional lens. What’s this?”

The policeman ran his fingers across the floor near the victim’s head.

“What is there?” Armen Ashotovich stretched his neck, but did not come closer.

“What? Oh, no, nothing” Petrov showed his fingers with thick traces of dust. “Okay, everything is clear here, let’s go up.”

Armen Ashotovich willingly jumped out of the cellar. Lieutenant Petrov stepped out of the room and found himself in pitch darkness again. In the kitchen he appeared with a new bump on his forehead and face to face with a small, nosy little man standing meekly beside Armen Ashotovich.

“Garsevan.” The little man bowed.

“Pleased to meet you,” Petrov answered, rubbing his forehead. “Tell me, do you have any ice to put on it?”

“As you wish,” bowed again Garsevan. “Is there anything else?”

“Yes,” said Lieutenant Petrov unexpectedly, adjusting his police jacket. “Tell me, did he make you do it, or did you agree to keep silence yourself?”

“What?” the little assistant was taken aback. Armen Ashotovich’s face began to grow red.

“There is no poker in the study by the fireplace. Where has it been hidden?”

“What poker?” Garsevan babbled.

“The murder weapon. Don’t worry so much! I know it wasn’t you who killed him, and it wasn’t here. But if you keep silent, you’ll end up in the dock with your master.”

What led Lieutenant Petrov to these conclusions?

The Case of Grannies, Punks, and Banks

Lieutenant Petrov was already quite tired of standing in the middle of Major-General Tryoshkin’s office, but he did not allow himself to relax even for a second, because there was no at ease command. To all appearances, Tryoshkin was in a bad mood, sitting at his enormous desk with his papers and folders around him.

“So, anyway, Petrov. I guess you have already heard about the CIT guard? I’ll bring you up to speed. Last night an armored car crashed. One of the guards shot the driver in the leg and the car skidded, then overturned. But the guys had already checked: the guard had nothing to do with it, the shot was accidental. The usual criminal negligence. Interesting, though. The car was smashed to pieces, one door flew off altogether. When the guards came to their senses, one of the money bags was missing. Absolutely all of the witnesses claim that the three men were outside the crashed armored car of the CIT guards. Take a look, what do you think?”

The major-general held out several cards, and Lieutenant Petrov finally relaxed the muscles of his stiff back and walked over to the table.

“Photographs of three people full-length. One representative of informal subcultures and two grandmothers. The informal man was a young man, looking like a classic member of the punk subculture, but well-to-do…”

Major-General Tryoshkin slammed his palm on the table.

“Petrov! There you go again, you sick Sherlock Holmes! Explain in detail or get out!”

“I beg your pardon, Mr. Tryoshkin. Here, look, looks like a real punk, a scumbag from the nearest pub. A leather jacket, rivets, everything. But on his feet, real Dr. Martens, see the label? And the jeans, though they look ripped, are actually a limited-edition Levi Strauss special collection, dedicated just to informal people. Finally, the hairstyle is the so-called corporate Mohawk. You can put it upside down on the street, but in the office you can just smooth it out and you get a civilized person. So, he works somewhere and gets a good salary. That’s all for now.”

“I see. What about the grannies?”

“Grannies…” Lieutenant Petrov looked at the pictures and narrowly squinted. “The old ladies seem to pass as one witness. They know each other… I beg your pardon, Mr. Tryoshkin. Each of them has the same badge on their chests, it seems to be some kind of MLM company. It’s unlikely they don’t know each other. They’re dressed quite smartly and modernly, which means they often go out and have meetings. Both wear headscarves in the manner of bandanas, another point in support of modernity. Both wear glasses with expensive frames. Real businesswomen.” Petrov shrugged his shoulders. “That’s all for now, too. The pictures are not very good.”

“Good ones!” snapped back at Tryoshkin and handed Petrov another piece of paper. “Here are the contacts. So it’s like this. The grannies really work for a Chinese MLM company. You can find them in the office on Swan Street. They both claim they ran to the car right after the accident, saw if anyone was dead, wanted to help. There was a strong smell of gunpowder and gasoline around the car, so they covered their faces with tissues. Our punk, meanwhile, looked into the car itself and ran away. And according to this guy, he was walking down the street when the armored car almost hit him. The wheel of the car crushed all the toes on his right foot. The guy wanted to ask the driver for a first aid kit, looked inside, but found no one there who was conscious, so he went to the nearest trauma center. Now he’s lying at home in a cast. Is that clear?”

“Sir, clear, Major General, sir!” Lieutenant Petrov reported.

“And if it’s clear, go ahead. We need to check the testimonies, identify suspects and check alternative versions. Tomorrow morning, be at my place with the report. Dismissed!”

Lieutenant Petrov took a deep breath.

“Mr. Tryoshkin, why go when the lie is obvious at a glance? The circle of suspects is outlined.”

Who did Lieutenant Petrov catch in the lie?

The Case of Lieutenant Petrov

The officers were gathered around the famous giant table of Tryoshkin. The number of stars on their shoulder straps made the eyes glaze over. Major-generals took every vacant chair, spreading out the similar folders in front of them. Colonels took seats on both sides of the head of department, and he did not take away his heavy gaze from Lieutenant Petrov, the only man in the room who stood, and even at attention.

“Lieutenant, we’re all friends here,” the department head began. “Let’s dispense with titles for the time being and talk man to man.”

Lieutenant Petrov nodded.

“Petrov, do you know why you are here?”

“I am accused of premeditated murder. I can’t know whose murder exactly.”

The generals exchanged chuckles, and a whisper was heard among the colonels. The department head, without standing up, showed the lieutenant a portrait photograph.

“Do you remember Haim? You sent him to Siberia for life. And the murdered one was his brother Nachman. You must remember him too.”

“That’s right, Major General, sir, I remember him. He was the one who, after Haim was sentenced, came to our office in person, shouting, throwing papers, demanding that the case be reconsidered. I think he even bit an orderly while he was being sedated.”

“Yeah, he’s a nervous one. After his brother’s conviction, he lived in a sanatorium for eight months, then returned to his apartment in Perm. And a day later, on an early weather morning, his downstairs neighbor’s apartment was flooded with boiling water.”

The head of the department looked at the crowd, wiggled his fingers, and everyone rustled their folders in unison. Petrov noticed his old friend, Major-General Tryoshkin, frowning anxiously.

“So, case materials. The neighbors were flooded, they could not reach Nachman, they called the rescuers and the police. The apartment was found trashed in the truest sense of the word. The furniture was broken, everything had been turned upside down, in one room even the radiator pipe had been knocked off. That’s what caused the flooding in the apartment below. Nachman was also hanging from a chandelier hook in the same room.”

“Hanging?” Lieutenant Petrov interrogated, frowning his forehead.

“Yes, in a loop of clothesline. But suicide was out of the question: there were no objects around the body from which to jump. There were only small pieces of furniture everywhere, three yards from the radiator. Best of all, they found a note in his pocket: ‘Petrov came to kill me’. All the evidence, as they say…”

“Major-general, sir, tell me, how much time elapsed between the discovery of the leak from above by the neighbors and the opening of Nachman’s door?” Petrov took the floor.

“According to the testimony of the neighbors, about 40 minutes. Plus fifteen to twenty minutes from the time the rescuers entered the apartment, discovered the mayhem, and closed the door before the police arrived. And, if you must know, yes, the neighbors heard the noise of the struggle from upstairs.”

Lieutenant Petrov smiled such a kind smile that the faces of the policemen involuntarily warmed.

“Major-general, sir, the picture looks like a real brutal murder. And it is not for me to decide here, but all the facts indicate that citizen Nachman actually committed suicide and at the same time decided to frame his enemy…”

How did Petrov figure out that Nachman had committed suicide?

The Case of the Dead Herpetologist

Lieutenant Petrov was digging his hoe into the withered grass with such fierceness, as if the weeds represented all the evil in the world. The mood was lousy. Not long ago he had been a police officer and had even solved cases that didn’t match his seniority. A week ago he had solved the case of a major industrialist murderer. Not a day went by when Petrov himself was pinned up for murder. What now? Now the police lieutenant is forced to spend his indefinite vacation time at his dacha near Talitsa, spending his time weeding the garden and mending the fence. True, Lieutenant Lazarus, to whom all Petrov’s current affairs had been temporarily transferred, had promised to visit today.

Lazarus, as usual, jumped out from behind the trees like a jack-in-the-box.

“Petrov, howdy!” Shouted Lazarus in the very ear of Lieutenant Petrov.

“Hello, Gosha!” The policeman in exile responded. “Well, what’s out there?”

Lazarus climbed over the fence of Petrov’s dacha and sat down in a plastic armchair.

“As you might expect, everything is bad, Petrov. Your industrialist was acquitted, he got away clean as a goose. Your case is being discussed on the Internet, and the chief hasn’t decided anything about you yet. And then there’s that… Herr… pedologist in your neighborhood.”

“Who’s Herr Pedologist?” Petrov put the instrument of destruction of the world evil aside, picked up another chair from the ground and sat down next to Lazarus.

“Oh, you’ll like it!” The guest with a satisfied smile put his foot on the leg and took an electronic cigarette out of his pants pocket. “Anyway, Sherlock, here’s the deal. A certain citizen Oborin fifty-seven years old with a local registration, the quiet and modest owner of the pet store, was found dead in the entrance hall of his own house. The house was a typical Khrushchev building, and the body was lying in a passage between the first and second floors under the mailboxes. Mr. Oborin literally twisted with cramps.”

“Did you read the forensics report?”

“I did. They say it’s typical poisoning. Mr. Oborin, as it turns out, was a big-time herpetologist. I mean, he collected anything crawling or with a split tongue in his store. He kept his creepers in cages, fondled them like children, and wrote some scientific papers about them every evening. It turns out that Mr. Oborin is a great professional, known throughout the world, his articles appeared in all scientific journals. His shop office is even filled with all kinds of junk like hooks, clamping sticks, special bags, and bottles for collecting poison. His wife says Mr. Oborin got three coral snakes at once that day. These are very poisonous snakes, the senior salesman took them, Mrs. Oborin herself signed the act. Around lunchtime she went to a business meeting with the suppliers. The suppliers confirm it, by the way. By about seven, Mrs. Oborin returned to the store; the senior salesman immediately reported to her that Mr. Oborin had suddenly become ill and had gone home. Mrs. Oborin drove urgently to her husband’s house, where a crowd of neighbors and law enforcement officers were already waiting for her in the entryway.”

Lazarus let out a sluggish trickle of white steam into the air.

“Experts confirm poisoning by snake venom. The finger of the deceased was bandaged with a fresh plaster and there were traces of snake bite under it.”

“And you told me all this because…?” Lieutenant Petrov, having already guessed that his colleague did not hurry to finish the paperwork.

“Yes, I have a hunch, something is wrong here. And what do you say?”

“I’d say there was no blood on the inside of the band-aid, right?”

“Well,” said Lazarus, moving his chair closer to Petrov.

“And I’ll also tell you that the policemen had to pull the wires of their spotlights into the nearest apartments, right?”

“Well, well, that’s right!”

Lieutenant Petrov snatched an electric cigarette from Lazarus and pretended to light it.

“It’s elementary, Watson! Go and prepare the mangal, the meat is marinating already. I’ll rest for a while, and then I will tell you how Mrs. Oborin killed our Herr… well, zoologist.”

How exactly did the wife kill her herpetologist husband?

The Case of the Icon Thief

“There’s nothing like a run in the first snow!” Lieutenant Petrov thought happily, doing his traditional morning marathon from Holy Trinity Church to Reshetnikov Square. There was indeed something enchanting in the first snow, which gently covered the neighborhood with white down in the morning twilight. But this time thoughts of the sublime and airy were mercilessly shattered.

“Look out! Killing!” In a shrieking voice a woman came around the nearest curve.

Without slowing his pace, Lieutenant Petrov hurried to the call. The picture that opened to the policeman around the corner did resemble a murder. A short, overweight woman in an unzipped down robe was clutching tightly at the jacket of a young man who was fighting back with all her mighty arms and legs. A little behind the strange couple friendly opened the door and the trunk of an old VAZ, because of the flat tire looks like a sagging stool. Strange as it may seem, a woman was shouting.

“Lieutenant Petrov, the city department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs!” almost shouted the policeman and blushed faintly. In old sweatpants and a jacket with the logo of the hockey team, he looked the least like a policeman.

“Lieutenant, grab him! He’s a thief! A burglar! The icon was stolen!” The woman shouted back, still tugging at the boy’s sleeve.

“You are crazy! Let go of me, you fool!” The young man fought back.

“Please, all of you, stand still!” Lieutenant Petrov noisily exhaled, regaining breath, and approached the fighting. “Citizens, I ask you to calm down! What is going on here?”

“He is a thief!” The woman stopped her absurd movements, but she did not let go of the jacket. “His accomplice stole an icon from our museum, and this one was standing guard outside the car. As soon as I came to the door, he honked his horn, and he went out the window with the icon — and run! And I followed him, and there he was waiting! Accomplice!”

“You’re the accomplice!” The young man answered at once, pulling down his sleeve. “I wasn’t waiting for anybody! Look, I got a flat tire! I stopped here a minute ago to inflate the tire!”

“You’re a thief!” The woman interrupted the young man.

“I…!” The guy started, but now they were both interrupted by Lieutenant Petrov.

“Citizens, keep calm! Who are you anyway?” Petrov furrowed his brows and looked at the woman so severely that she stood at attention.

“I am Olga Yudina… I am a janitor there! Every day at five in the morning I come to sweep up, and today… A car was honking, and another man was running out of the window with an icon in his hands. He was so big, you could see by the back of his head that he was a murderer!”

“I see,” interrupted the policeman again. “And you must be…”

The guy understood without any more words.

“I’m driving, I feel a flat tire. I decided to turn aside, to pump it up in a quiet place, and as soon as I stopped, this crazy woman jumps out. Icon, icon! What icon?! There’s the car, here I am, go look for it if you need it!”

“Aha! ‘Look for it’! And who was honking? Stephen Hawking?”

“Maybe I did! I hit the steering wheel in anger! Dang! I’ll show you how now!”

Lieutenant Petrov wrinkled his forehead and approached the car. The wheel, indeed, as if even more wrinkled. The policeman with three fingers took some snow from the car hood and rubbed his forehead with it. From the outside it looked like he was cooling himself after a run, in fact, he was smoothing his bangs.

“Excuse me, where were you coming from?”

“I’m from the South Side, on my way to work.”

“Then I’m going to have to ask you to wait here for the police. You see, I don’t even have my documents with me,” Petrov said with embarrassment. “And you, Olga… sorry, I do not know your patronymic, go to your museum and call the police. Your thief’s accomplice I’ll keep an eye out.”

Why is Lieutenant Petrov sure that the guy was involved in the theft?

The Case of the Beaten Candidate

The good thing about Internet media is that the hottest news appears in them, even on weekends. A day ago, on Saturday, Lieutenant Petrov was ready to burn with shame in front of a crowd of journalists at his doorstep. But today, on Sunday, he looked at the local news and could not restrain a satisfied smile.

Yesterday an impromptu press conference was held almost in front of the house where Lieutenant Petrov lived. As it turned out, a candidate for deputy of the City Duma, who moreover also lived in the house next to Petrov, at about 3:30 was beaten and robbed right under the windows of the lieutenant’s apartment! Headlines alone were telling: “Candidate Bessonov was beaten half to death,” “Robbers left Bessonov with only the Keys to his Apartment,” “A well-known opposition Activist was almost killed under the Window of a Policeman,” “Alexei Bessonov: They were waiting for me to kill,” “Bessonov: The Robbery was necessary to cover their Tracks.”

And the photo reports! Here is Bessonov showing his famous “Kuzma’s mother” gesture, and here his red nose, showing a cold. And here, among a crowd of cameramen, journalists and onlookers, is Lieutenant Petrov himself, wearing his new winter uniform, but scarlet with shame and a shopping bag in his hand. A photograph of Petrov taking the business card from Bessonov’s assistant with the appearance of accepting a summons is circulating all the blogs. The Echo of Perm’s website published a transcript of Bessonov’s emotional speech. “This is arbitrariness and lawlessness! When I’m a deputy, we won’t have this kind of (inaudible) in our city! And I’m sure it’s the machinations of the capitalist ghouls, quaking for their leather chairs! You think I just got beaten up and robbed? Those (inaudible) took all my valuables, emptied my pockets, took my coat, and even stole my shoes to cover up the crime! I could hear them talking to each other, asking each other if it was the wrong one. They were waiting for me, (inaudible)! And the police were sleeping peacefully!”

Journalists mocked the entire police force represented by Lieutenant Petrov. Lieutenant Petrov was always notable for his sensitivity in sleep and slept with the windows open, but here he could only pull his head into his shoulders. Candidate Bessonov turned out to be quite legally savvy. Immediately after being beaten, he called an assistant, a lawyer, an ambulance, the police, and even a professional photographer. It seems that the only person who has not notarized his frostbite, blunt force beating and robbery is the provincial government. Of course, elections are in a week!

Lieutenant Petrov smiled again and sipped a hot black tea without sugar from his favorite half-pint mug. Just one day later, the headlines in the electronic media had changed to the diametrically opposite: “The Candidate Failed!”, “The Attack on the Opposition Turned Out to Have been Faked,” “Bessonov Was Caught in a Lie”. Most importantly, the blogs are now full of posts titled “Perm Police Revealed Candidate’s Swindle”. Of course, the name of Petrov was not mentioned here, but all the credit was due to him. All he had to do was phone call a good acquaintance to the right place!

Where and why did Lieutenant Petrov call to expose a deputy candidate as a liar?

The Case of the Marksman

Businessman Zakhar Katz huddled in the seat of the police Gazelle as if he had just seen a ghost. Lieutenant Petrov was making another report to the police department, so he arrived at the scene a little later than the rest of his colleagues. He did not take a seat and got down to business from the aisle between the chairs.

“Zakhar Borisych, hello. I’ve already talked to my colleagues, I’ve been brought up to speed. I’ll try to tell you briefly what happened here, and you can correct me if I mistake. So, you own a restaurant that takes up most of the first floor of this building. The two apartments on the second floor also belong to you. Today you came out of the house, you walked up to your car…”

“I came out of the restaurant…” Zakhar Borisovich said in a trembling voice and looked around frightened.

“You came out of the restaurant, the entrance is just over there, near the doorway, isn’t it?” The policeman continued. “When you got to the door, there was a loud shot. The bullet hit the hood of your Hummer, you quickly assessed the situation and skillfully took cover under the car.”

“Me?!” The businessman was surprised, then thought for a second and then nodded. “Yes, I assessed… under the car…”

“From this hiding place you called the police and successfully monitored the surroundings. No suspicious persons were seen and no one came out of the driveway. Is that correct?”

The businessman nodded again. Lieutenant Petrov got out of the Gazelle and headed for the entrance. The bullet hit the Hummer almost in a straight line, it was fired from the windows, because the slate sloping roof would not have been able to support itself for such a shot. Officers just found a 1938 carbine with a broken scope on the other side of the building. There’s a chance the marksman is still in the entryway. And considering the fact that Katz ran a 24-hour karaoke restaurant in the building, keeping even the tenants in the neighboring buildings awake, there’s a chance that even one of the businessman’s neighbors was the shooter. Finally, judging by the likely trajectory of the bullet, the shot came from a corner apartment in the building. The second floor was ruled out at once, leaving three apartments.

On the pretext of re-examining the scene from the windows of the tenants, Lieutenant Petrov went around all the apartments. On the third floor he was met by a couple of pensioners. The friendly grandfather, about 90 years old and wearing huge glasses, showed the policeman the kitchen and the only room. In the kitchen, there is a broad oak table, potatoes undercooked on the table, and a fresh cut on the old man’s finger. In front of the window in the room was a double bed, beside which a black-and-white television set rattled desperately. The smell of dust and old age in the apartment was carefully covered with cheap fragrance, no fresh scratches on the window sills were visible, the glass everywhere was intact, and the curtains were not damaged.

The apartment on the fourth floor was opened to Lieutenant Petrov by a gloomy and quiet man of very tall stature with bags under his eyes. A security guard in a supermarket, after his shift. The policeman had to look through the rooms from the corridor and very quietly, because there was an eight-month-old baby sleeping in the apartment. The baby’s mother was almost silently cooking something in the half-empty kitchen. They had just recently moved here. The view from the room, one would assume, is beautiful, especially if you stand on a stool in front of the window. But there were no stools in the apartment, just upholstered chairs on metal legs. The ceiling here has not been whitewashed for a long time, Petrov noted and went on.

There were no adults on the fifth floor. The door was opened by a boy with a bruise under his eye, the son of the owner of the entertainment company. His father seemed to be home only for the night: except for a bed and a nightstand, all the furnishings in the room could be called a child’s room. Toys, a game console, a bicycle, colorful boxes. A boy was holding fancy “jumpers” and a bicycle helmet. There were thick Italian curtains on the windows, soft bags and cushions instead of chairs or stools, and a bar instead of a kitchen table. The only table here was occupied by a computer, printer, and other related electronics.

Petrov went down to the Gazelle in deep thought.

“Well, did you find anything?” Asked a little pink-faced Katz.

“Yeah,” The lieutenant nodded. “We’ll get another specialist down here and take your shooter…”