—I don’t understand why we’re coming here. We know he’s in Kabul. They’ve already searched his room here and found nothing. What do you expect to find?

Leo shrugged an answer.

—They might have missed something.

Nara pressed her point.

—Such as what?

—A room tells us a lot about a person.

Nara scrunched her face up in earnest concentration, trying to figure out how this might be true. Failing, she observed:

—Searching a suspect’s apartment might make sense in the Soviet Union. There are very few possessions in most Afghan homes, some clothes, basic furniture and cooking utensils. A room tells us nothing about the people. Is this not also true for Soviet soldiers too? They are issued with standard kit. What would be different from one room to another?

—There are always differences, even if two people own exactly the same objects, how they lay them out would still be of interest. And there are plenty of things that are not standardized. What about money, cigarettes, bottles of alcohol, letters, papers, a diary…

Nara pondered this.

—A diary? Do many Russians keep a diary?

—More women than men, but soldiers often find it helpful to make note of the day’s events.

—I would be surprised if there were fifty diaries in the whole of Kabul, maybe in the whole of Afghanistan. Do you expect this soldier to keep a diary?

—We’ll find out.

Fyodor Mazurov had been appointed a small bedroom on the top floor. It was peculiar accommodation for an officer managing a bloody occupation. Instead of a steel bunk of the kind that the military typically slept in, Fyodor Mazurov had slept in an elaborate four-poster bed, for no other reason than it was there to be used. The room was furnished with a chandelier, entirely smashed, like a collection of splintered teeth, and a walnut writing cabinet, one of the few items of furniture in the palace that remained unscathed. Lenin’s portrait stared out from over the bed, nailed up in haste and too small for the space it occupied, the shadow on the wallpaper from the previous portrait dwarfing his image.

Leo walked to the far corner of the room, taking in the sight before him. A man had been given this small space to make his own – his character would surely have made some mark on it. Nara remained by the door, apprehensive of disturbing his process, a sceptical observer. Leo asked her:

—What can you see?

She looked about the room without a great degree of confidence, doubting that she would see anything of interest. Leo ushered her over.

—Stand with me.

She joined him, regarding the room from the same position. She said:

—I see a bed.