amount of force so that he rocked half off his seat, then I grabbed him and pulled him back and he sat with his breath hissing out. 'You'd hit your head on the road because you wouldn't be able to save yourself, you understand?' 'Yes. Yes, I understand.' 'What are the names of your children?' 'Yuri, Irina and Tania.' His head swung to look at me because the question had surprised him. 'You want to see them again,' I said and pulled his door shut and drove up the ramp into the street. 'You must take care of yourself.' 'Yes,' he said, and I heard emotion in his voice, 'I understand.' I turned into the street without slowing down too much and he rolled against the door with a thump and rolled back: I wanted him to know how extraordinarily helpless the human body can be without the use of hands or feet. The evening rush hour was nearly over and the first set of lights was green. 'He's at the Pavilion,' I said to Ignatov, 'is that right?' 'Yes.' I drove north-west along Soldatskaja ulica, feeling the onset of depression. Of all the questions in my head I thought I had the answer to one, and I didn't like it. Ignatov was a professional driver and would have been trained to watch his mirror when he was at the wheel of those big black shiny Zils because the members of the elite Politburo must not be followed about. But he hadn't discovered my tag on the way from Spassky Gate this evening: he had seen the Pobeda several times but hadn't realized it was following him specifically. Certainly I'd taken pains to do the job efficiently, but then I'd taken similar pains two days ago, and he'd known I was there behind him, and there on purpose. It had been daylight then, and this evening it had been dark; but this city was bright by night and visibility was good. So there was an additional factor involved, which had led him to discover the first tag and not the second. I thought I knew what it was. I had probably known for a long time, right at the back of the mind where we put things we don't want to look at. But it would have to be brought into the light, and looked at; and that was going to be painful. I would almost rather be going to Lubyanka again, in good heart and filled with the fierce animal instinct to fight and survive, than to this place filled with depression and unable to do anything about it. Depression is unreachable, the slow death of the spirit. 'What's your wife's name?' I asked Ignatov. The lights changed to red at an intersection and I put out a hand as he swayed forward again: I'd had to do it several times to stop him hitting his face on the windscreen. 'Galya,' he said, and looked at me, wondering why I had asked, and perhaps hearing something in my voice: the depression. 'What does she do?' 'She teaches the ballet, at the Centre for the Arts.' The lights went green and he swayed back on his seat. 'Does she teach your children?' We were almost there, but I wanted this journey to last a long time, and I wanted to talk to this man about his wife and his children and the ballet lessons. 'She teaches our two girls,' he said, his voice wary, suspecting some kind of trap. 'Irina and Tania.' 'Yes,' he said, surprised that I'd remembered. But like most people, I remember most things, and especially those things I'd rather forget. 'I suppose Yuri thinks it'd be sissy for him to learn, does he?' 'Yes, that's perfectly right!' As if I'd discovered a profound truth. But the wariness was still in his voice, the fear that I was building up this little edifice of human intimacy only so that I could knock it down. He didn't have the trust in innocence those children had had in the park. He was silent, but I saw he was watching my reflection in the windscreen. I think he was beyond trying to do anything to help himself now, or to stop my going to see Zubarev. I'd found his weakness, or his strength, whichever you want to call it. But this didn't mean he wouldn't kill me if I gave him the chance and if he believed he had to, for his children's sake. Or of course for his own. The lights were green for us at the turning into Baumanskaja and I didn't have to stop, though I would have liked to stop, and turn back, and never meet Zubarev.