On one incessant dark morning on December fourteenth, 1995, policemen from the DCEC – Department for Combating Economic Crimes – and, for solidity, a bus with riot police drove up to our office. Parallelepipeds in uniform and with machine guns blocked the entire building and penetrated to our floor, put guards at the entrance and exit, suppressed those present with glances and the shine of trunks, ordered: do not walk, do not call, do not turn on computers, do not answer calls. One-two! But, of course, it is difficult to arrest thirty offices at the same time, and in this situation the warning signal went to our leaders – unlike the «mattress period» they did not appear in the office in such situations, and the armed detachment was met not by «evil Chechens», but by peaceful citizens of Slavic and not quite nationality with no hint of aggressiveness on honest faces. Safes were opened, documentation and computer data were seized, ridiculous questions were asked:
– Why do you keep your driver’s license in a safe?
But something still managed to hide from the watchful eye of the authorities. Quite recently, a young and well-mannered girl named Dasha came to work for us as a secretary, her original appearance and the look of the child always evoked sympathy and an involuntary smile. So this incarnate innocence managed to hide two of the most important folders on her chair, sitting in her most beautiful place on these papers and sitting on them for as long as it was necessary in the classic pose of a student of the Smolny Institute of Noble Maidens. Nevertheless, despite the intrepidity and firmness of the staff, the work of several companies was virtually paralyzed, and investigative actions continued for two weeks – the study of accounting and commercial documents, the inquiry of persons involved in the business, and so on. Why suddenly to us, and not to the neighbors? That’s what I’m talking about in this book.
Do I have the right to tell my story this way, does it truly reflect that difficult time, did it really happen to me, are other actors represented as impartially as possible? I think not, this is the view of one person, a subjective picture of a small period of time, twenty years, from the end of the last and the beginning of this century, however, the events described really took place, and the characters are real, but due to certain circumstances their names and surnames have been changed. If the persons mentioned here have a different point of view or interpretation of what happened, the author will gratefully accept their opinion, however, as well as the opinion of readers.
St. Petersburg, December 1992. Three middle-aged men smoke on the stairs of a yellow office building on Suvorovsky Avenue. An ordinary conversation during a short rest, unhurried and full of free topics.
One of the interlocutors shared the news:
– A friend got a job with some serious people.
– And here he is looking for a job, – my friend and colleague Kostya reacted quickly and very correctly, pointing at me.
– Can you give me a friend’s phone number? – I decided to take the bull by the horns right away.
– Write it down.
My career at the Peleng company was coming to an end. Two and a half years of interesting and hard work, the search for new ways – advertising, exhibitions, the St. Petersburg stock Exchange, the director of a brokerage office, the first contacts with foreign businessmen – all this was fresh, interesting, unusual. A youth team, purposeful people with healthy ambitions, fun holidays… I was grateful to these guys, but our paths diverged – I wanted something bigger, large-scale. All this time I had to improve my business English on my own – letters, contracts, methods of communication by phone. And Volodya was lured here from the position of head of the planning and economic department of the NGO Krasnoznamenets, where we had previously worked together. In the evening I call on the home phone of a «friend» and hear:
– We are engaged in business promotion, the green conversion line…
I immediately realized that there were no specifics, and directed the conversation in the right direction:
– Vsevolod Valentinovich, trade operations and foreign partners are closer to me. – Pause.
– Well, then you need to go to Felix Andreevich, he’s doing it.
– Can you give me a phone number?
So, carefully pulling the thread so as not to break, I found a specialist who was engaged in an interesting business for me.
– Come here! – Felix Andreevich was attentive, polite and specific in a conversation with a stranger. So far, everything has been surprisingly easy.
The place for the meeting is familiar to me – the Central Research Institute Rumb, the industry information center of the shipbuilding industry of the country. I was here, on Zaitseva Street, about five years ago, during the Soviet Union – a secret organization, security clearances. And today, without these difficulties. A solid Stalinist building with white half-columns, wide staircases, large windows, high ceilings is a place where it is prestigious to work. Or, in modern terms, «cool»…
