Penny Criminal Case. Alexander Cherenov

you think about it, Victor?”

      Bessonov bent over a button for a moment.

      “I think it curious only in one sense: from whom is it? And so… The usual button from a police jacket. Not from the main jacket: from everyday form.”

      “Yeah, things…”

      Starkov thoughtfully processed his chin.

      “Only a maniac policeman, and although a jealous policeman, we lacked…”

      Slowly, as if in oblivion, he looked at the body and his face stretched out.

      “Fuck you: “I did not even notice the elephant!”

      “What kind of elephant?” Bessonov “did not drive” honestly.

      “Is the victim’s identity established?”

      Bessonov suddenly began to turn his head around, as if he had lost someone and could not find it.

      “What are you, Victor?”

      “Where did the district police inspector go?” the major muttered. “It’s him, who found the corpse… Ivanov! Lieutenant Ivanov!”

      “Ask, and it will be given to you; search, and will find; knock, and will open to you”. Christ was proved to be right once again: in a minute, or even less, from somewhere in the night, from the part of the wasteland, the “borderline” with the Central district, a lanky figure appeared. It was not difficult to recognize the district police district inspector Ivanov in it: there was no other such inconsistent size among those present or in the Department of Internal Affairs staff.

      It was a red-haired fellow with a pockmarked face and uncut hairs, always stuck out in all directions from under his uniform cap. How many remarks at the drill he received for “breaking the uniform”, but it was all to no avail!! And, if this district policeman was a person, then only the one, about which they say: “he is still a person!”

      Starkov met this character once only, but one meeting was enough for the character to make an impression on the city investigator. The impression was definitely negative, but unforgettable. The second such “handsome” Starkov saw many years ago, when he passed a real urgent in the army.

      And this one was “still the same”: silly, slow, lazy and slob. When he had to speak, he was silent. When he had to go, he stood. When he had to think, he instantly acquired a “cow-eyed look” and picked his finger on his nose. He “thought”, in a word. When it was necessary to do it, without exerting any effort, it was only due to the “cow-eyed” that he instantly “sought reserves” in the person of those, who could no longer wait for the “beginning of the process”.

      Everybody scolded him, but none of the authorities had raised a hand to sign an order of dismissal: the man was stupid, but simple-minded. He did not do evil to anyone, because he did not do anything. Others did everything for him, so there was little harm from him. There was no harm. It was not for nothing Starkov remembered lines from one poetic tale: “And we have no court for fools for centuries!”

      And only once did Starkov think it was, or in fact, he noticed it, as soon as the “brainless” eyes of the district policeman acquired an evil, intelligent and mocking look for a moment. Therefore, Starkov did not rule out that the inspector simply “entered the image” and did not intend to leave it: after all, “we have no court for fools for centuries!” Nobody saw how he was outside the police uniform. And he combined in his person Ivan the Fool and Emelya from the fairy tale “By the Will of the Pike” (two idlers, who are lucky to become rich).

      Incredibly, according to his passport, he was called Emelyan Ivanovich Ivanov. By name and patronymic – hardly in honor of Yemelyan Ivanovich Pugachev (leader of the peasant uprising in the 18th century). And if it was in honor of the leader, then only in the context of the setting “Let it be at least a day, but it will be my day!” And, perhaps, giving him a name, his parents hoped, that the treasured pike will help him – at least, in the amount of three desires…

      “Where the hell was you?” Bessonov “welcomed” Ivanov more on the way. “And what is this with you: material evidence?”

      The people, gathered around the major, burst out laughing: there was a huge, black cat with a white “collar” in the hands of the lieutenant.

      Ivanov lowered and noisily pulled his nose, pulling the green snot out of her nostril.

      “I heard… meows… Well, I and…”

      “Did you find the main evidence?” Bessonov continued diligently “wiping his feet”. “Did you solve the crime alone?”

      Since the answer was quite expected to re-noisy tightening snot, Bessonov only waved his hand irritably.

      “Okay! Is it you, who find the corpse?”

      Ivanov, with an incredibly idiotic expression on his face, silently nodded his head.

      “Well, and whose is this corpse? Did you know its owner?”

      Without answering the question, the district police officer returned to the snot service.

      “Answer when I ask you!”

      “I didn’t come close,” Ivanov sighed sadly.

      “So come now… fuck you!”

      The policeman sideways, with a slow step, approached the corpse and, without bending down, began to survey him from the height of his meter ninety. He observed slowly – like everything he did or did not do.

      “Well?!” Bessonov could not stand.

      Ivanov stretched his lips, making him even more like a hopeless client of a psychiatric hospital.

      “Seem… this is… Tanya Kotova. I recognize her by the cat…”

      Bessonov stared in awe at the lieutenant. What?!”

      Bessonov stared in awe at the lieutenant.

      Ivanov, in response, poked his finger into the cat’s neck.

      “It’s their cat. So fat and black… with white – only they have.”

      “Lieutenant, did you find a cat in the wasteland, or did you bring it with you?”” Starkov added his “legs” too.

      “In the wasteland,” Ivanov did not even linger with the answer for some reason. “There.”

      And he pointed to the “border line” between the districts.

      Starkov suddenly stopped smiling. Looking at him, Bessonov left “footwork” too.

      “Alex, you want to say, that…”

      “The girl heard the meowing of a cat and went to look for him.”

      Starkov pensive look went somewhere sideways.

      “This was what our incognito needed…”

      “He lured her deliberately, didn’t he?” Rubin joined.

      “It seems so. The cat, most likely, was ‘privatized’ at the time. And, if so, then the killer knew in advance, that the cat runs away from home, and where he runs, and where he will be looked for…”

      “Pre-planned murder?”

      Bessonov paled: this kind of murder for years “hung” with heavy weights on the authority of the criminal investigation department. Starks sympathetically patted the major on the shoulder.

      “Well, Victor, do not die before death… Lieutenant, do you know where these Kotovs live?”

      “I know.”

      “Lead us.”

      Ivanov again hesitated.

      “What else?”

      “So their… this is… no home. They are at work… probably.”

      “Ok,