She Lover of Death: The Further Adventures of Erast Fandorin (20 page)

‘Oh, Lord, Masa,’ Genji sighed. ‘That’s g-going too far.’

He leaned down swiftly and squeezed the dog’s nose between his finger and thumb. The little beast snorted and immediately opened its jaws. Then Genji took it by the scruff of the neck and tossed it into the hallway with a remarkably accurate throw. There was a squeal, followed by hysterical barking, but Masa’s tormentor didn’t dare come back into the room.

And at that point Rosalia Maximovna returned, a little calmer, but Genji had already assumed a relaxed pose, leaning back slightly in his chair, with his fingers clasped across his stomach in a most innocent fashion.

‘Where’s Zhuzhechka?’ Rosalia Maximovna asked in a voice hoarse from sobbing.

‘You still have not told us what happened that evening,’ Genji reminded her sternly, and Lorelei’s aunt started blinking in fright.

‘I was sitting in the drawing room, reading the
Home Doctor
, Lyalechka subscribes to it for me. She’d just got back from somewhere or other and gone into her boudoir. Then suddenly she came running into the room with her eyes blazing and her cheeks bright red. “Aunty Rosa!” she cried. I was frightened, I thought it must be a fire or a mouse. But Lyalechka shouted: “The last Sign, the third one! He loves me! He loves me! There is no more doubt. I must go to him, to the Tsarevich! My Matvei has waited too long”. Then she put her hand over her eyes and said in a quiet voice: “No more, my torment is over. Now dost Thou release Thy servant, oh Lord. No more playing the jester for me.” I didn’t understand anything. You can never tell with Elena Semyonovna if something has really happened or she’s just fantasising. “Who is it who loves you?” I asked her. “Ferdinand Karlovich, Sergei Poluektovich or that one with the moustache, who arrived with the bouquet yesterday?” She had lots of admirers, you couldn’t remember them all. Only she didn’t care a brass farthing for any of them, so her raptures seemed strange to me. “Or has someone else turned up?” I asked her, “Someone completely new?” But Lyalechka laughed, and she looked so happy, for the first time in all those years. “Someone else, Aunty Rosa,” she said. “Someone quite different. The genuine one and only. I’m going to go to bed now. Don’t come into my room until the morning, whatever happens.” And she walked out. In the morning I went in, and she was lying on the bed in her white dress, and she was all white too . . .’

The aunt burst into tears again, but this time she didn’t go running out of the room.

‘How am I going to live now? Lyalechka didn’t think about me, she didn’t leave a single kopeck. And I can’t sell the furniture – it’s the landlord’s . . .’

‘Show me where Elena Semyonovna’s b-boudoir is,’ said Genji, getting to his feet.

Lorelei’s bedroom was startlingly different from Ophelia’s simple little room. It had Chinese vases as tall as a man, and painted Japanese screens, and a magnificent dressing table with a myriad bottles, jars and tubes standing in front of a triple mirror, and all sorts of other things too.

There were two portraits hanging above the luxurious bed. One was a perfectly ordinary photograph of a bearded man in a pince-nez (obviously the deceased husband Matvei himself), but Columbine found the second one intriguing: a swarthy, handsome man dressed in blood-red robes, with immense half-closed eyes, sitting astride a black buffalo and holding a club and a noose in his hands, and there were two terrifying four-eyed dogs huddling against the buffalo’s legs.

Genji walked up to the lithograph, but it was not the image that interested him, it was the three black roses on the top of the frame. One had not completely wilted yet, another was badly wrinkled, and the third was absolutely dry.

‘My God, who is that?’ Columbine asked, looking at the picture.

‘The Indian god of death, Yama, also known as the King of the Dead,’ Genji replied absentmindedly, staring hard at the gilded frame. ‘The dogs with four eyes are searching for p-prey among the living, and Yama uses the noose to pull their souls out.’

‘Tsarevich Death, come in your bloody-red apparel, give me your hand, lead me into the light,’ said Columbine, reciting two lines from Lorelei’s last poem. ‘So that was who she meant!’

But Genji failed to appreciate her astuteness.

‘What roses are these?’ he asked, turning to the aunt. ‘From whom?’

‘They . . .’ she said, and started blinking very, very fast. ‘How can I remember, when so many people used to give Lyalechka flowers? Ah yes, I do remember. She brought the bouquet home on that last evening.’

‘Are you sure?’

Columbine thought Genji was being too severe with the poor old woman. Rosalia Maximovna pulled her head down into her shoulders and babbled: ‘She brought them, she brought them herself.’

There seemed to be something else he wanted to ask her, but glancing at Columbine, he obviously realised that she disapproved of his manner and, taking pity on the unfortunate woman, left her in peace.

‘Thank you madam. You have been a g-great help.’

The Japanese gave a ceremonial bow, from the waist.

Columbine noticed that as Genji walked past the table he inconspicuously placed a banknote on the tablecloth. Was he feeling ashamed then? Yes, that must be it.

The expedition was over. Columbine had still not found out if Genji was in love with her, but that was not what she thought about on the way back. She suddenly felt quite unbearably sad.

She imagined how her mother and father would feel when they found out that she was gone. They would probably cry and feel sorry for their daughter, and then, like Ophelia’s mother, they would say: ‘She stayed in the world for a short time, and then she flew away.’ But it would be easier for them than for Serafima Kharitonovna, they would still have their sons, Seryozha and Misha. They’re not like me, Columbine comforted herself. They won’t get picked up by the wild east wind and carried away into the sunset to meet their doom.

She felt so moved that the tears started pouring down her cheeks.

‘Well, how did you like our excursion?’ Genji asked, looking into his companion’s wet face. ‘Perhaps you will l-live for a little longer after all?’

She rubbed her eyes, turned towards him and laughed in his face.

‘Perhaps I will, perhaps I won’t,’ she said

In front of her house she jumped out of the carriage, gave a careless wave and ran into the entrance with a light clatter of heels.

Sitting down at the table without even taking off her beret, she dipped a pen in the inkwell and wrote a poem that came out in blank verse, like Lorelei’s. And for some reason it was in traditional folk style – could that be because of Ophelia’s mother, the old provincial secretary’s widow?

Not with white linen, but black velvet
Was my wedding couch arrayed,
A narrow bed, and all of wood,
Covered with lilies and chrysanthemums
.

Dearest guests, why look you so sad,
Wiping teardrops from your cheeks?
Feast your eyes in joy on the bright glow
Of my slim face below the plaited wreath
.

Ah, you poor and wretched, sightless souls,
Look closely now and you will see
That on this bed ringed with candles bright
My own true love lies here along with me
.

Oh, how divine the beauty of his face!
Oh, how bright the twinkling of his eye!
How sweetly do his gentle fingers play!
How happy you have made me, bridegroom mine
.

She wondered what Prospero would say about the poem.

III. From the ‘Agents’ Reports’ File

To His Honour Lieutenant-Colonel Besikov
(Private and confidential)

Dear Lieutenant-Colonel,

I always knew that helping you was a risky and dangerous business – both for my reputation as a decent individual and, possibly, for my very life. Today my very worst fears have been confirmed. I really do not know what causes me greater torment, the physical suffering or the bitter realisation of how little you value my self-sacrificing efforts.

I indignantly reject your repeated offer to ‘pay my expenses generously’, although it is unlikely that any of your highly paid ‘collaborators’ demonstrates as much zeal and devotion to the cause as does your humble servant. However, my unselfish scrupulousness does not change the essence of the matter – you have in any case effectively transformed me from a principled opponent of nihilism and devilry into a vulgar spy!

Have you never entertained the thought, dearest Vissarion Vissarionovich, that perhaps you underestimate me? You regard me as a pawn in your game, whereas perhaps I am a piece of an entirely different calibre!

I am joking, only joking. How can we grains who have fallen between the millstones ever grow up to the heavens above? But even so, you should be more tactful with me, a little more formal. After all, I am a cultured man and also of European stock. Do not take this as an attack on yourself or an out-burst of Lutheran arrogance. I only wish to remind you that the fancy social graces mean more to a ‘pepper-and-sausage German’ than they do to a ‘Russak’. As it happens, you are not a Russak, you are a Caucasian, but that does not change the essence of the matter.

I have re-read what I have written and I feel sick with myself. How amusing you must find my rapid transitions from voluptuous self-abasement to unbending pride.

Ah, but it is not important, really it is not. The important thing is to remember that what is good for the Russian is death for the German.

And apropos of death.

From the latest instructions that I have received from you it is clear to me that you are no longer much concerned about the fate of the poor ‘Lovers of Death’, who dwell on the very edge of the precipice. You demonstrated far more interest in one of the members of the club, whom in previous reports I have dubbed the Stammerer. I have the feeling that you know far more about this man than I do. Why do you find him so intriguing? Do you really believe in the existence of a secret organisation called ‘Lovers of Life’? And who is this ‘very highly placed individual’ whose personal request you are carrying out? Which of your superiors has taken an interest in this man?

Whatever the answer might be, I have dutifully performed the strange assignment you set me, although you did not even condescend to tell me the reasons for it. I followed the Stammerer, and although I was not able to establish his place of residence, it was not, as you shall see, due to my own fault.

No, this really is absolutely outrageous! Why can you not set your own police agents to follow the Stammerer? You write that he is not a criminal ‘in the strict sense of the word’, but when has that circumstance ever been an obstacle for you and your kind? Or is your reluctance to attach official agents to the Stammerer explained by the fact that he has, as you informed me rather vaguely, ‘too many well-wishers in the most surprising places’? Surely not in the Department of Gendarmes too? Are you concerned that one of your colleagues might inform the Stammerer that he is being followed? Then who is this man after all, if even you are being so cautious? Why must I be left to wander in the dark? I absolutely demand explanations! Especially after the monstrous incident of which I, through your good services, have been the victim.

Nonetheless, I am presenting my report. I do not know if you will extract anything useful from it. I abstain from making any comments of my own, for I do not understand very much myself – I simply present the facts.

Tonight there was another game with the Roulette Wheel of Death, again without any result (we must assume that Blagovolsky has indeed installed a more powerful magnet). We have new members to replace the lost Ophelia and Lioness of Ecstasy. Since Lorelei Rubinstein’s suicide, the young maidens of Moscow have gone absolutely insane – the number of them wishing to join the mysterious club has increased several times over, for which we must thank the press’s fondness for carrion. The most persistent of these young persons attain their goal. This time Prospero introduced Iphigenia and Gorgon to us. The former is a plump student with bushy golden hair, very pretty and very stupid. She read a poem about a drowned child: ‘The little mite could not be saved, they lowered him into his grave’, or something of the kind. Why a foolish sheep like that is drawn to the embraces of death is a mystery. The latter is a nervous brunette with sharp features, she writes jerky and extremely indecent poems, although she herself is probably still a virgin. But then, our voluptuous Doge will soon put that right.

Gdlevsky read some new poems. Prospero is right, he is a true genius, the hope of the new Russian poetry. But then, you are not interested in poetry, I believe. Even so, there is something worthy of note here. Recently Gdlevsky has been in a constant state of excitement. I wrote you once that he is literally obsessed with the mystic nature of harmony and rhyme. He read in some spiritualist book that it is only possible to associate with the World Beyond on Friday, and therefore this day of the week is special. Every event that takes place on a Friday has a magical significance, it is a message, a sign, one only needs to know how to decipher it. And Gdlevsky is putting all his energies into deciphering these messages. It started last Friday, when he declared that he would tell his fortune from a rhyme. He took the first book that came to hand down off the shelf, opened it, jabbed his finger at the page and hit upon the word ‘breath’. He became indescribably agitated and started repeating ‘breath – death, breath – death’. Since today was also a Friday, as soon as he had greeted us, he grabbed a book that was lying on the table, opened it and – can you imagine – it happened to be Shakespeare, and it opened at the first page of
Macbeth!
Now the boy is absolutely certain that Death is sending him messages. He is waiting impatiently for the third Friday in order finally to make certain, and then he will feel perfectly entitled to do away with himself. Well, let him wait, coincidences like that don’t happen three times in a row.