The air in the Kurgan court was thick with the scent of old parchment and the palpable tension of a scandal that would make a Fleet Street hack tremble with excitement. At the centre of this storm stands one Mr. Alexander Gontsov, a man accused of the most loathsome corruption, and his former superior, Mrs. Irina Sablukova, who stepped into the witness box accompanied by her legal counsel, looking very much like a woman attempting to navigate a fog of forgotten memories.

Of Coffers and Cobblestones

Mr. Lomakin, the defence barrister, began his cross-examination with a series of inquiries regarding a contract for a road in the Shadrinsk district. Mrs. Sablukova, with a measured tone, recalled a four-year venture—a 'life-cycle' contract, as they call it in the trade—whereby the road was to be both built and maintained. She spoke of shifting contractors and the movement of funds from the regional road fund, as if describing the flow of tides in the Thames.

When pressed by the barrister whether funds might return to the treasury upon a contract's dissolution, the witness was adamant: 'Impossible.' The gold, she insisted, is earmarked for the object and nowhere else, locked away in the regional coffers like a miser’s hoard, reachable only by the presentation of the proper scrolls and vouchers.

Reports and Secret Commands

Then came the question of oversight. Did the lady receive reports? Indeed, she admitted to weekly conferences via those modern magic-boxes of video communication. She spoke of troublesome electric lines and the sliding of deadlines into the following year. "Such matters are for the contractor and the curators," she declared, noting that the head of the GKU is the one who appoints these curators—the very men who act as the eyes and ears on the ground.

Mr. Lomakin sought to uncover if Mrs. Sablukova had personally commanded the signing of the 'KS-2' acts—those cursed documents that certify work as finished when the road is but a dream. The witness denied it flatly, claiming such an order would be utterly devoid of sense. She remarked that in recent years, the budget has become a timeless reservoir, where funds linger without the urgency of a calendar.

As for the contract with the Chelyabinsk firm, it ended in a bitter rupture, though the witness found her memory suddenly failing her as to the precise nature of the quarrel.

The Matter of Bribes and Bonuses

Could these forged acts of completion have padded Mr. Gontsov’s pockets with bonuses? The witness replied with a cool detachment. Bonuses, she claimed, are governed by strict regulation, and no extraordinary sums were granted for this particular stretch of road. She maintained that a Director of the Department possesses no power to arbitrarily reward or punish the head of the road structure.

A Walk Through the Mire

Then the Crown Prosecutor, Mr. Karetskiy, took his turn. He questioned whether the witness had taken a personal interest in the Shadrinsk works. She conceded that she might have asked inquiries during their electronic meetings—merely to be 'informed,' she claimed.

When asked about a letter from 2023—a plea to sever ties with the Chelyabinsk contractor due to their wretched delays—Mrs. Sablukova played the card of the overwhelmed bureaucrat. "So many letters flow into the office," she sighed, suggesting the court look into the departmental archives if they wished to find the truth.

Most revealing, however, was her admission that she had indeed visited the site while journeying from Shadrinsk to Shumikha. She remembered a scene of utter incompletion: patches of coarse gravel here, a strip of asphalt there, and labourers still struggling with the kerbstones of the pavement while the accounts were already being settled.

The Final Reckoning

To conclude, Judge Denis Cherkasov inquired after one Mr. Andrey Anisimov, the curator of the works. The witness admitted to seeing him and perhaps chatting with him and Gontsov on matters of business. "It was simply the way of things," she implied.

Alas, the way of things in this case is a dark one. Mr. Gontsov stands accused of exceeding his authority and accepting bribes to pay for phantom works. The Crown alleges a staggering loss of 142 million rubles, a sum that would tempt the most honest man to villainy. Mrs. Sablukova herself now walks the precarious line of the accused, charged with the same exceeding of power and the same ruinous sum.