Polina had asked what the worst way to die was. Holding the letter, letting it rest lightly across his palm with the shadow of water running over his name, Arkady knew the answer. It was to realize that when you died no one would care. It was to realize that you were already dead. He didn’t feel that way now; he would never feel that way. Just hearing Irina made him come so alive his heart shook with every beat. What had his father written? The wise course, he thought, would be to leave the letter on the street. The rain would wash it down a storm drain, the river would carry it to the sea, where the paper would unfold and fall apart and the ink would run and fade like poison. Instead, he slipped it back into his pocket.

Minin let him into Rudy’s apartment.

The detective was agitated because of the rumor that speculation would become legal. “This undermines the basis of our investigation,” he said. “If we can’t go after money changers, who can we arrest?”

“There are still murderers, rapists and violent thieves. You’ll always be busy,” Arkady reassured him and gave him his hat and coat. Getting Minin out of the place was like unearthing a mole. “Catch some sleep. I’ll take over here.”

“The mafia’s going to open banks.”

“Very likely. I understand that’s how they start.”

“I searched everything,” Minin said and stepped reluctantly onto the threshold. “Nothing hidden in books, bureaus, under the bed. I left a list on the desk.”

“It’s suspiciously clean, isn’t it?”

“Well …”

“That’s what I thought, too,” Arkady said as he started to shut the door. “And don’t worry about a lack of crime. In the future we’ll have a better class of criminal—bankers, brokers, businessmen. You’ll need lots of sleep for that.”

Alone, the first place Arkady went was to the office desk to see whether anything new had come in on the fax. The paper was clean and bore the same faint pencil dot on the reverse side that he had left after tearing off the messages about Red Square. He picked up Minin’s list. The detective had cut open Rudy’s mattress and springs, inspected bureau and drawers, unscrewed switches, tapped baseboards, disassembled and reassembled the apartment, and found nothing.