She Lover of Death: The Further Adventures of Erast Fandorin (28 page)

What happened during those five minutes?

She sat down at the desk as usual, to write down all the events of the day in her diary, and then, suddenly remembering Gorgon’s mean joke, she angrily jerked open the drawer, grabbed the two little rectangles of cardboard and held a lighted match to them, in order to destroy the evidence of her shameful gullibility.

Less than a minute later, Columbine was convinced that the messages would not burn. She had used up several matches and singed the tips of her fingers. But the paper had not even darkened at all!

She grabbed her handbag in order to take out her cigarette case. She needed to smoke a
papirosa
and gather her thoughts. The handbag fell from her trembling hands, its contents scattered across the floor and Columbine’s eye was caught by a small piece of white card, exactly like the two previous ones. She picked it up and read the single word that was written on it:‘
Komm
’.
²

So there it was. Irrefutable.

Columbine sat there for a few minutes without moving, and thought. Not about the One who had sent her this summons, but about the Japanese prince. ‘Thank you, dear Genji,’ she thought, taking leave of him. ‘You are clever and handsome. You wished me well. I would certainly have fallen in love with you – everything was leading to that, but an even more impressive admirer than you has put in an appearance. Everything has finally been decided. It’s time for me to go.’

Enough of that.

All she still had to do was write the concluding chapter in her diary. The title simply wrote itself.

How tenderly Columbine departs from the City of Dreams

Tenderly, because tenderness is precisely the feeling that now suffuses the traveller’s entire being as her voyage approaches its brilliant conclusion. And this feeling is both sweet and sad.

Columbine sat at the desk for a long time as the three white candles on it slowly burned down. She thought about various ways in which she could make her departure, as if she were searching through the dresses in her wardrobe for one to wear at a ball, measuring them against herself, looking in the mirror, sighing and tossing each rejected outfit on to a chair. No good, no good. Somehow she did not really feel afraid. The three white cards, neatly laid out on the desk, radiated a calm strength that supported her. Columbine knew for certain that it would hurt a little bit at first, but after that everything would be very, very good: the vain girl was more concerned with something that was not really so important – how she would look when she was dead. But then, perhaps this was the most important problem that she still had to decide in her short life that was now rushing rapidly to its finale. After her departure she wanted to look like a beautiful doll laid out in an elegant box, so the quick means like a rope or a jump from the balcony were not suitable. The best way, of course, would be to take a sleeping draft – to swallow an entire crystal phial of opium, then wash it down with sweet tea and blackcurrant jam. Columbine had tea, and she had blackcurrant jam. But she did not have any soporific substances in her apartment, because she had never suffered from insomnia: as soon as she put her head on the pillow and parted her golden tresses to both sides, she immediately fell into a sound sleep.

Finally the difficult choice was made.

Fill the bath with warm water. Add a few drops of lavender oil. Anoint her face and neck with miraculous Lanoline cream – ‘the ideal way to preserve attractive skin’ – from the little tin tube (she only needed to preserve it for two or three days, until the funeral, after that she wouldn’t need attractive skin). Put on her white lace dress, which was a bit like a wedding dress. Tie back her hair with a scarlet ribbon that would match the colour of the water. Lie down in the bath, run a sharp knife across her veins (under the water, so that it wouldn’t hurt too much), and slowly go to sleep. Whoever found Columbine would say: She was like a white chrysanthemum floating in a glass of
vin rosé
.

Now there was one last thing she had to do: write a poem. And that would conclude the story of Columbine, who flew into the City of Dreams from the magical distance, spread her ethereal wings there for a short while and then darted from the light into the shadow.

From light into shadow she flitted,
Then the little fairy was gone.
There was nothing she regretted,
We shall miss her rapturous song
.

No, that’s no good at all. The first line is from a poem by someone else, and God only knows what that last line means.

I have no faith in any God or Devil
I know to die is no more than to sleep.
A letter has informed me I must travel,
Now I have an appointment I must keep
.

That’s no better. I simply can’t stand that third line, it makes me feel sick. ‘Travel’ – what sort of word is that for a poem? This is really hard. And the water’s getting cold. I’ll have to let it out and fill the bath again. Come on now!

How vain the Prince of Denmark’s hesitations,
His ponderings ‘To be or not to be?’

No. It has to be less heavy, without any irony. Light and airy.

Death is not sleep and not oblivion
I shall be greeted on awakening
By a delightful flowering garden
Where falling water sweetly sings
.

Pinch yourself hard until it hurts
And waken in an open forest glade.
Leave all your dreams of prison in the past
Die into freedom and be not afraid
.

Will they realise that the falling water is the sound of the tap filling the bath? Ah, never mind if it’s not clear! I’ve wasted enough paper already. Whoever said that a farewell poem has to be long? Columbine’s will be short, absurd and break off when it has hardly begun, just like her short and absurd (but nonetheless beautiful, very beautiful) li . . .

Before Columbine could finish writing the word, the silence of the night was broken by the ringing of her doorbell.

Who could it be at this hour, after two in the morning?

At any other time she would have been afraid. Everyone knew that a doorbell rung in the middle of the night boded no good. But what should she be afraid of, when she had already settled her final account with life?

Maybe she shouldn’t answer? Let them ring away.

Lucifer was warming himself on her bosom: she settled his little head more comfortably in the hollow over her collarbone and tried to concentrate on her diary, but the continuous ringing would not let her.

All right, she would have to go and see what surprise life had in store for her just before it came to an end.

Columbine didn’t bother to turn on the gas lamp in the hallway. She had already guessed who had come to visit her so late – Genji, it couldn’t be anyone else. He had sensed something. Now he would start remonstrating with her again, trying to convince her. She would have to pretend that she agreed with everything, wait for him to go and then . . .

She opened the door.

It was dark on the stairway too. Someone had turned off the light. She could make out a vague silhouette. Tall and massive – no, it wasn’t Genji.

Her visitor didn’t say anything, all she could hear was loud, fitful breathing.

‘Did you want to see me?’ Columbine asked, peering into the darkness.

‘Yes, you!’ a hoarse voice rasped – it sounded so savage and malevolent that she took a sharp step back.

‘Who are you?’ she cried out.

‘Your death! With a small letter.’

Columbine heard gruff, throaty laughter. She thought she recognised the voice, but she was so frightened that she couldn’t understand a thing, and before she could gather her wits the shadow stepped into the hallway and seized her round the neck with fingers of iron.

The voice hissed: ‘You’ll be black and blue, with your tongue hanging out. A fine Chosen One!’

The terrible visitor laughed again, wheezing like a decrepit old dog barking.

The reply to his laughter was an angry hiss from Lucifer, who had woken up. The bold little snake had grown a lot in the last few weeks of feeding on milk and minced meat. He sank his fangs into the attacker’s hand.

The attacker growled, grabbed the grass snake by the tail and smashed it against the wall. It only took a second, but that was enough for Columbine to dart away. She didn’t make a decision or choose her moment, she simply went away, following her instinct like an animal.

She ran down the corridor with her mouth wide open, but not uttering a sound. She ran blindly, with no idea of where she was going or why, urged on by the most effective goad of all – the fear of death, vile and loathsome. It was not Death lumbering along after her, but death – filthy, foul-smelling and terrifying. The death from her childhood. With the rich, thick soil of the graveyard. The white death-worms. The grinning skull with holes instead of eyes.

A sudden thought occurred to her: she should run into the bathroom, bolt the door and then shout and hammer on the steel pipe so that the neighbours would hear. The bathroom door opened outwards, the handle was flimsy, if he tugged hard, it would break off, and the door would stay locked.

It was a wonderful idea, good enough to save her. But it would take three seconds, or at least two, for her to do it, and she didn’t have them.

In the doorway of the room a hand grabbed her sleeve from behind. Columbine jerked away as hard as she could, sending buttons flying. But she recovered her voice.

‘Help!’ she shouted at the top of her lungs. And then she carried on shouting. As loud as she could manage.

She darted out of the room to the left, into the kitchen. There was the door of the bathroom, she could hear the water splashing out of the tap. No, not enough time.

Left again out of the kitchen, into the corridor. The circle was completed. Where to now? Back into the room or out on to the stairs? The front door was still open.

Better on to the stairs. Maybe someone would look out of their door?

She flew out on to the dark landing with a scream and went dashing down the steps. If only she didn’t stumble!

Columbine’s long skirt hampered her. She tugged it up above her knees with a jerk.

‘Stop, thief! Stop!’ the hoarse voice roared behind her.

Why ‘thief’? Columbine wondered, and at that very moment, just before the final flight of steps, the heel of her shoe slipped sideways with a crunch.

The fugitive screeched and fell, landing with her chest and stomach on the steps, and slid downwards. She hit her elbows against the stairs, but she didn’t feel any pain, she was just very afraid.

Realising she wouldn’t have time to get up, she pressed her forehead against the floor. It was cold and smelled of dust. She squeezed her eyes shut.

The door of the entranceway banged loudly and someone shouted out: ‘Don’t move! I’ll fire!’

The hoarse voice answered: ‘Here, take this!’

There was a deafening crash and Columbine’s ears were suddenly blocked. She hadn’t been able to see anything in the dark, and now she couldn’t hear anything either.

As well as the dust, there was another smell now. An acrid smell, vaguely familiar. She remembered what it was – gunpowder. When her brother Misha used to shoot crows in the garden it had smelled like that.

She heard a faint voice in the distance.

‘Columbine! Are you alive?’

Genji’s voice.

Hands that were strong but gentle, not rough like those others, turned her over on to her back. She opened her eyes and then squeezed them shut again.

There was an electric torch shining straight into them.

‘That’s blinding,’ Columbine said.

Then Genji put the torch down on a step and she could see that he was leaning against the banisters with a smoking revolver in his hand; his top hat had slipped to one side and his coat was unbuttoned.

Columbine asked in a whisper: ‘What was all that?’

He picked up the torch again and pointed the beam to one side. Caliban was sitting by the wall, with his dead eyes staring down at the floor. There was a trickle of something dark running from his half-open mouth and another trickle, absolutely black, running from the round hole in his forehead.

He’s dead, Columbine guessed. The bookkeeper was still clutching a knife in his hand, holding it by the blade instead of the handle.

‘He was about to throw it,’ Genji explained. ‘He must have learned that from his shipmates while he was still sailing the seas. But I fired first.’

Even though her teeth were chattering and she had hic-cups, Columbine asked: ‘W-why? What f-for? I was g-going to do it anyway, myself . . .’

How strange, she thought, now I’m stammering, but he isn’t.

‘Later, later,’ Genji said to her.

He carefully picked the young lady up in his arms and carried her up the stairs. Columbine pressed her head against his chest. She felt very content just then. He was holding her so comfortably, just right. As if he had made a special study of how to carry enervated and exhausted young women.

She whispered: ‘I’m a doll, I’m a doll.’

Genji leaned his head down and asked: ‘What?’

‘You’re carrying me like a broken doll,’ she explained.

A quarter of an hour later Columbine was alone in her flat, sitting with her feet pulled up on to the armchair, wrapped in a rug and crying.

Alone because, after wrapping her in the rug, Genji had gone to get a doctor and the police.

With her feet pulled up because the entire floor was wet – the bath had overflowed.

But she was not crying because she was afraid (Genji had told her there would be nothing more to be afraid of). She was crying in grief: brave Lucifer was lying on her knees still and lifeless, like a patterned ribbon.