Nikifor Naumovich did not want to answer stupid questions. He dialed a forensic phone number on his mobile phone so that a car-hearse was sent urgently and put the body in a morgue for the required procedures. He called the address of the sanatorium.
“When the body is taken away, it will be necessary to clean the room, since all the towels came from the shelves,” he asked the maid a supplication.
“I’ll try,” she said sadly.
“They say that here such incidents with tsarist people occurred occasionally…”
On the victim were visible traces of the struggle and the hands of the dead old man, tied to the side racks, and caused an unpleasant impression of lost hopes and disappointments in a successful rest at the best sanatorium of the resort city.
“The secret will not be disclosed by any of the personnel, God will give,” the administrator said, assuming the functions of a lawyer.
The frightened maid almost came to herself after the shock, but it was felt that a middle-aged woman could hardly give rants and long lexical expressions. She trembled noticeably and nervously sorted through a bunch of keys from the hotel building.
“Why did not you call us at the picket, and reported to the administrator?” the investigator asked officially, whose eyes radiated warmth and support
“It seemed better to me,” said the woman, leaning against the wall, calming down the words of the investigator.
“Do you have someone at the reception?” the investigator asked again.
This time he turned to the administrator, whose tall figure, physique, healthy complexion and smile aroused the respect of every newly arrived guest. Almost thirty years of service in the internal affairs agencies forced the lieutenant-colonel to choose those with whom he should work and investigate crimes. In this criminal case, none of those present had any doubts about it, he was assisted by lieutenant colonel Seregin, whom Regimov trusted as to himself.
“My colleague replaced me. He has already started his immediate duties,” the administrator replied, moving away from the pantry door, when the investigator carefully took a rough woolen blanket from the shelf, pushing aside the stick for washing the floors with his elbow, so as not to erase the fingerprints on a possible murder weapon.
The three of them with the administrator made a stretcher out of the blanket. They freed the old man’s hands from the wooden rack, untangling the twine ropes used in the trade for carrying heavy purchases by buyers. Put the corpse on the resulting stretcher. Above they threw the same sheet, which Sveta so carefully smoothed, throwing to the top of the stack with sets of linen. They raised a hammock. He bent, but the victim did not immediately take the proper form.
“Once or twice, they took it,” said the administrator, when they carried a load of more than a hundred kilograms to the exit and down the stairs (since the old man was large), to be sent for examination.
A covered police car was already standing near the entrance, preventing the pesky vacationers from monitoring the manipulations of the police. Then spread rumors among the staff of the kitchen and doctors of fiction about the criminal incident that occurred during their vacation at the resort, causing panic to the local population, whose care and attention balanced the daily routine and the regime of people who dreamed of getting a charge of cheerfulness for a whole year.
“Come to us tomorrow at lunch. We have to fill out all the necessary documents on this case,” Seregin said, giving Sveta a place near the deceased next to him when she sat down on a bench in the caravan to escort the victim on her last journey.
“You will answer us now with some questions in the department, and we’ll let you go.”
“I’ll try to collect my thoughts.”
Then she was going to return to her workplace, to do her specific duties on cleaning the deluxe rooms and economy class.
Nikifor Naumovich took a seat next to the driver, and the car moved out of the main gate, passing all the buildings, a dance floor, gardens and flower beds. The administrator went to the main building to calm his colleague, sitting at the computer with a frustrated look, surfacing the Internet page.
The day was just beginning. Holidaymakers resorted to the dining room along the wide paths under the watchful eye of the chief doctor – a tall, fat man in a white coat – Mitrofanov Peter Samsonovich, whose well-being depended on the number of paid procedures taken by his patients. The immense power of the Caucasus Mountains captivated the spirit of the Masters of Sports in mountaineering and foreign tourists who preferred to appear in the dining room on the second shift after the elderly patients had eaten. Athletes after heavy competitions were received with open arms in this sanatorium. Immediately appointed treatment for damaged limbs, spine, internal organs, corrected the posture, and those recovered returned to the system to enter the new Olympic level.
The administrator, who was present at the discovery of the corpse by policemen – Vladimir Kormushenko, looked proudly at the colorful flower beds, pulled up the uniform and stepped over the threshold of the main building. He stopped at the counter where his substitute, Ira Chetvergova, was sitting at the computer, a tall blue-eyed blonde in a white silk jacket with a badge on her chest. She took the maid – Topilko Sveta to work until the end of the year with a probationary period. She also designed and registered on the second floor of Soshin Vladimir Viktorovich two days ago.
They arrived on the same day by the same train from Tarasov, handed over the passports to Ira, which first aroused Kormushenko’s perplexity, and then, taking into account that both new vacationers are unfamiliar with the resort, internally calmed down. Cursing her for slowness and vanity, hoping that everything will be settled quickly, none of the hotel guests will ever find out about what happened.
“You need to find in the safe the passport of the deceased and transfer it to the police. Let them understand. It’s good that they did not touch me. And where do such brutes come from, capable of attacking quiet old men, one kind of which causes pity and compassion,” thought the administrator, sighing and enjoying the freshness of the summer morning.
A light haze spread over the green mountains. In some places, rocks and steep paths were visible. The cable car allowed holidaymakers to enjoy the panorama of the resort area.
“Hello, are you back already?” Ira asked in a low voice, as if she had eaten ice cream yesterday, stressing the specifics of her work, maintaining always good relations with the whole people of staff: doctors and medical nurses.” “Something happened? Do I understand your silence correctly?”
“Nothing serious happened. It is necessary to increase vigilance, to invite a representative from the travel agency for agitation of convalescent holiday-makers to see the best sights of the Stavropol Territory: Kislovodsk, Mineral Waters, Pyatigorsk and Essentuki.”
“Are you concerned about something?”
“Anyone can not hide anything from you,” Kormushenko answered unequivocally, watching how she casually turned the pages on the plasma monitor, looking closely at her visit to the park of a mountain massif among tall coniferous trees and flowering chestnuts. “I’m tired of running around here and there.”
“Make coffee?”
It meant to go to the automatic machine with different kinds of coffee, choose the most expensive drink, having substituted a ceramic mug of the administrator, to pour in one container at once two portions of a smoking elixir of vivacity.
“I will not refuse. Make me like last time with chocolate. What’s the name of your recipe?” Kormushenko translated the conversation with a colleague on another topic, so that he should not worry himself, but gather his thoughts.
“How