"Incident in City T" by Lev Brusilov, summary

Lev Brusilov’s novel, published in 2024, takes place in early May 1889 and is structured as a historical detective story with a complex plot, where the private lives of high society quickly intersect with a criminal case. The plot’s core is provided by the figure of Foma Fomich von Spinne, the chief of the detective police, who solves the case not through force, but through observation, pauses, and the ability to connect disparate clues into a coherent chain.

At the beginning of the book, the Tatar governor, Count Ivan Arkadyevich Mozhaisky, returns late one evening from the English Club in a foul mood. He is tormented by both a card loss and a family incident: not long before, he allowed himself to express crude suspicions about his wife, Elena Pavlovna, believing her to be intimate with Prince Bogomilov, the provincial marshal of the nobility. Personal jealousy, from the very first pages, establishes a motif that will long seem central, although in reality it merely masks a larger plot.

Very soon, an attack on the governor himself occurs, and this event brings the city’s detectives to the forefront. The investigation is entrusted to von Spinne, alongside him is the special assignments officer Mercury Frolych Kochkin. From the very first steps, it becomes clear that the assassination attempt cannot be reduced to random street violence or the simple story of a jealous husband and an unfaithful wife.

Von Spinne isn’t pursuing just one line of investigation, but several at once. He studies the Mozhaiskys’ circle, investigates rumors about Elena Pavlovna, and keeps a close eye on the servants, family acquaintances, and those who might have used domestic discord as a convenient cover. Almost immediately, a sense of hidden agenda emerges: some people talk about love, others about money, and still others act as if they fear not the governor’s wrath, but the exposure of an old criminal network.

One of the investigation’s ramifications leads to the murky outskirts and Torfyanaya Street — a place depicted in the novel as a zone of poverty, filth, and a near-total absence of witnesses. It is here that traces of the murder are discovered, and the street itself proves a convenient setting for clandestine meetings, substitutions, and sudden disappearances. Agafonov’s murder, committed in a tenement house, makes the case significantly more complex: now it’s not just an attempted murder, but a whole series of criminal acts.

A lace woman’s glove is found at the murder scene, and this item becomes one of the most dangerous pieces of evidence in the entire investigation. Then a cab driver appears, delivering a second glove and recalling that he dropped off a lady there the day before. The trail naturally leads to Elena Pavlovna Mozhayskaya, and from that moment on, her position becomes truly vulnerable.

Von Spinne’s conversation with the Countess is structured like a psychological duel. He doesn’t press directly, but rather deliberately speaks sluggishly, averts his gaze, confuses his interlocutor with irrelevant details, and forces her to reveal too much with a gesture, a pause, or an awkward response. When the glove is presented to the Countess, she recognizes it as her own, but her reaction reveals that she understands the danger of this piece of evidence and is unaware of how much the investigation already knows.

It gradually became clear that Elena Pavlovna was indeed involved in secret movements and meetings, but not in the sense initially suggested by rumors. She violated the rules of her circle, gave in to her emotions, and indulged in secret activities hidden from her husband, aided in these actions by her maid. The Countess’s scheme of disguise, substitution, and deception of domestic surveillance served her personal purposes, but this very loophole provided the criminals with a convenient tool.

The investigation expands and reaches another family, the Savoteevs, around whose money and inheritance settlements the true center of intrigue begins to coalesce. Vsevolod Savoteev, his stepmother Efrosinya Karlovna, and non-commissioned officer Shchekoldayev, who gradually rises from a secondary figure to the hidden mastermind of the entire criminal conspiracy, begin to play a role. As the novel progresses, it becomes clear that it is the Savoteevs’ money, and not just Mozhayskaya’s romantic connections, that drives many of the characters’ actions.

Another strange strand of the case involves a mentally ill old man from the Panteleevskaya hospital, who, in his delirium, speaks of a certain village. Kochkin follows this trail and finds a nearly empty, disturbing place, reminiscent of a bad dream, where ordinary logic seems to fail. This trip at first seems almost like a fantastical episode, but within the detective structure of the novel, it is necessary to demonstrate that the criminals used secluded spaces where they could hide people, things, and evidence, remaining beyond the usual city surveillance.

As he progresses, von Spinne separates true guilt from indirect involvement. He realizes that Elena Pavlovna was not the mastermind of the plot against her husband, although her carelessness and secret meetings made her a convenient pawn in someone else’s scheme. The Countess’s maid, who was having an affair with Shchekoldayev, exploited her mistress’s trust and her desire for secrecy, and then helped direct suspicion toward Mozhayskaya herself.

In the final analysis, Shchekoldayev emerges as the man who attempted to appropriate the Savoteyevs’ money and, to that end, plotted the elimination of those who stood in his way. Initially, as von Spinne explains, he hoped to eliminate Vsevolod Savoteyev through Efrosinya Karlovna or with her participation, and then, in all likelihood, he planned to eliminate Efrosinya Karlovna herself. The assassination attempt on the governor, the murder at Torfyanaya, the disguises and false trails all form part of a single scheme, in which personal passions serve as cover for the pursuit of other people’s fortunes.

The final scenes of the book are structured like a re-examination of a previously solved case. Von Spinne explains to Elena Pavlovna, point by point, how she unknowingly assisted the criminals, and makes it clear that the investigation has succeeded in arresting the key players in the chain of events, including the maid and those who assisted in the crime. However, certain details remain that the investigation still needs to clarify, particularly the criminals’ connections to the hospital and the technical details of some of the substitutions.

The personal outcome for Elena Pavlovna is no less difficult than the formal outcome of the criminal case. She learns that her feelings, her secrecy, and her dependence on her maid have made her a tool in the hands of others and nearly led to her being accused of orchestrating an assassination attempt on her husband. In her final conversation with von Spinne, the Countess asks for silence, and the detective makes it clear that everything said in his office will remain there.

The novel ends not with the triumph of justice, but with a scene of restrained moral defeat for several people at once. The criminal scheme is uncovered, the culprits are apprehended, but the Mozhaiskys’ family life is shattered by mistrust, and the solved case leaves behind not a sense of peace, but a clear understanding of how easily, in this world, private vice, self-interest, and weakness combine into a single crime.