The Diamond Chariot (68 page)

The town is really very small,

No need to take a cab at all.

But the little town of Yokohama was even smaller than Fandorin had imagined – as he was soon to discover.

No sooner had Erast Petrovich set foot in the yard of the consulate than someone called his name.

Doronin was loitering in the same window as on the recent previous occasion, but this time he did not turn away or show any signs of tact.

‘Mr Vice-Consul!’ he shouted in a menacing voice. ‘Please be so kind as to call into my office. Immediately, without going round to your apartment!’

And he disappeared, no doubt on his way to the office area.

Fandorin had never seen the highly cultured and restrained Vsevolod Vitalievich in such a fury.

‘I didn’t ask you about anything! I didn’t oblige you to attend the office! I put my trust in you!’ the consul seethed rather than shouted, goggling over his blue lenses with his inflamed eyes. ‘I assumed that you were occupied with state business, but it appears that you … you were engaged in amorous adventures! You burst into the house of the official representative of the British Empire! You abducted his mistress! You provoked an affray! Why are you so surprised? Yokohama is a small town. News, especially the spicy kind, spreads instantaneously here!’

The driver, thought Erast Petrovich. He blabbed to his comrades from ‘Archibald Griffin’ and they spread it round the town in no time at all. And Bullcox’s own servants, too. The kitchen telegraph was the fastest medium of communication.

‘Are you at least aware that Intendant Suga has committed suicide? How could you be! And I thought that … Ah, you heroic lover!’ The consul waved his hand despairingly. ‘All sorts of rumours are circulating. Suga didn’t shoot himself, he didn’t even commit hara-kiri. He chose an ancient, monstrously savage way of leaving this life, one that samurai used if they were captured or suffering severe guilt. Everyone is convinced that the intendant could not forgive himself for Okubo’s death, and his undeserved promotion was the final blow. He did not dare to disobey his monarch’s will, but felt that he had to expiate his guilt by accepting a martyr’s death … Well, why don’t you say something, Fandorin? Explain yourself, damn you! Say something!’

‘I shall speak tomorrow. But for now, please permit me to remind you of the promise that you made me, not to interfere in anything and not to ask any questions. If I fail, I shall answer for everything at once. I have no time to explain now.’

It was well said, with restraint and dignity, but it failed to produce the desired effect.

‘That is quite obvious,’ the consul hissed, looking not into the other man’s eyes, but down and to one side. He waved his hand, this time in disgust, and walked out.

Erast Petrovich also looked down. And there, dangling from the pink paper bag decorated with a ribbon, which he had been handed in the shop, he saw a ‘Sunrise over the Sea’ fishnet stocking.

The vice-consul returned to his quarters feeling dismal. He opened the door and froze on the spot, barely able to recognise his own hallway.

Hanging on the wall was a large mirror in a lacquered and painted mother-of-pearl frame. There were white and purple irises standing in a vase on a flirtatious little chest and perfuming the air with their scent. The coat stand on which Masa used to keep his master’s hats and outer garments was gone – standing in its place was a closed cupboard with doors of woven straw. Above it a large kerosene lamp in a paper shade radiated a soft pink light.

Astounded, Fandorin glanced into the drawing room. There were even more changes there – it was quite impossible to make out all the details, he just got a general impression of something bright, colourful and festive.

In the dining room the titular counsellor saw a table laid in a way that immediately made him feel terribly hungry (something that had not happened to Erast Petrovich at all in the last few days). There were fruits, cheeses, rice balls with red and white fish, pies and cakes, sweets, champagne in an ice bucket.

The vice-consul discovered the fairy who had cast such a miraculous spell on the official government residence in the bedroom. But no, this room could no longer be referred to in such a prosaic, everyday fashion. The broad but simple bed that had been quite adequate for Erast Petrovich was now decorated with a muslin canopy, curtains had appeared at the windows and there was a bright-coloured, fluffy rug on the floor. O-Yumi herself, clad only in her nightshirt (the same one in which she had fled from Bullcox’s lair), was standing on a chair, fastening a long scroll with some kind of hieroglyphic inscription to the wall.

‘Darling, are you back?’ she said, tossing a lock of hair off her forehead. ‘I’m so tired! You have a very strange servant. He refused to help me. I had to do everything myself. It’s a good thing I learned so much at the tea house. In that place, until you win respect, you do everything yourself – wash, iron, mend … But he really is strange! He stands in the corridor all the time and he wouldn’t let me look into the cupboard. What have you got in there? I heard some very odd sounds.’

‘That’s a secret room. Nothing very interesting, just all sorts of boring diplomatic d-documents,’ Fandorin lied. ‘I’ll order them to be removed tomorrow. But why didn’t you buy yourself any clothes?’

She jumped down off the chair without a sound.

‘I did. I just took them off so I wouldn’t get them dirty. Look, this will be enough for a start.’

She opened the door of the wardrobe, and Erast Petrovich saw that his frock coats and trousers had been squeezed right into the very corner, and four-fifths of the space was occupied by brightly coloured silk, velvet and satin. There were hatboxes on the upper shelf and shoeboxes down below.

‘What’s that you’ve got there?’ asked O-Yumi, reaching for the pink bag. ‘From Madame Bêtise? For me?’

She took out the stockings, turned them over in her hands and wrinkled up her nose.

‘
Shumiwarui
.’

‘What?’

‘How vulgar! You haven’t got a clue about ladies’ outfits. I’ll probably keep the black ones. But I’ll give the others to Sophie. She’s certain to like them.’

‘T-to whom?’ asked poor Erast Petrovich, unable to keep up with the news.

‘The yellow-haired fool who taps on that big iron machine.’

‘Have you already m-made her acquaintance?’

‘Yes, I made friends with her. I gave her a hat, and she gave me a shawl with big red flowers. And I got to know Obayasi-san, your boss’s mistress, even better. A sweet woman. I made friends with her too.’

‘What else have you managed to do in the three hours since we last saw each other?’

‘Nothing else. I bought a few things, started putting the apartment in order and met the neighbours.’

It could not be said that Fandorin was particularly good at counting money, but it seemed to him that there were an awful lot of purchases.

‘How did you stretch the money to all this?’ he asked admiringly when he spotted a little suede box with a delightful pearl brooch on a small table.

‘The money? I spent that in the first two shops.’

‘And … and how did you pay after that?’

O-Yumi shrugged one bare shoulder.

‘The same way as before, when I lived with Algie. I left your cards everywhere.’

‘And they gave you c-credit?’

‘Of course. By the time I reached the third shop, everybody knew that I was living with you now. Madame Bêtise (I was in her shop too, only I didn’t buy these terrible stockings) congratulated me, she said you were very handsome, far more handsome than Bullcox. He’s richer, of course, but that’s not very important if a man’s as handsome as you. I rode back with the blinds open. How everyone stared at me!’

And at me too, thought Erast Petrovich, recalling how people on the street had looked round at him.

Lord, oh Lord …

Late in the evening the two of them sat together, drinking tea. Erast Petrovich was teaching her to drink like a Russian cab driver: from the saucer, through a lump of sugar clutched in the teeth, blowing and puffing noisily. O-Yumi, wearing the Russian shawl, with her face glowing red, puffed out her cheeks, gnawed at the sugar with her white teeth and laughed. There was nothing exotic or Japanese about her at that moment, and it seemed to Fandorin that they had lived together in perfect harmony for many years; God grant that they would be together for as many again.

‘What is your
jojutsu
good for?’ he asked. ‘Why did you take it into your head to study that filth that turns something living, passionate and natural into m-mathematics?’

‘But isn’t that the essence of any art? To break down the natural into its component parts and reassemble them in a new way? I have studied the art of love since I was fourteen.’

‘Since you were f-fourteen? Surely that wasn’t your own decision?’

‘No. My father ordered me to study
jojutsu
. He said: “If you were my son, I would send you to develop your ability to think, your strength and cunning, because these are a man’s greatest weapons. But you are a woman, and your greatest weapon is love. If you can completely master this difficult art, the most intelligent, strongest and most cunning men will be like putty in your hands.” My father knew what he was talking about. He is the cleverest, strongest and most cunning man I know. I was fourteen years old, I was stupid and I really didn’t want to go to study with a mistress of
jojutsu
, but I loved my father, so I obeyed him. And of course, as always, he was right.’

Erast Petrovich frowned, thinking that in any civilised country a loving father who sold his juvenile daughter into a brothel would be packed off to serve hard labour.

‘Where is he now, your father? Do you see each other often?’

O-Yumi’s face suddenly darkened and her lips clamped firmly together, as if from suppressed pain.

He’s dead, the titular counsellor guessed, and, regretting that he had made his beloved suffer, he hastened to make amends for his blunder by gently stroking the hollow at the base of her neck (he had been wanting to do that for a long time anyway).

Much later, lying in bed and staring up at the ceiling, O-Yumi said with a sigh:

‘
Jojutsu
is a wonderful science. It is the only thing capable of making a woman stronger than a man. But only until the woman loses her head. I’m afraid that is exactly what is happening to me. How shameful!’

Fandorin closed his eyes tight, feeling himself brimming over with an unbearable, insane happiness.

A stupid question,
This ‘to be or not to be’,
Once you’ve been happy

TICKLISH

It was by no means the first time Walter Lockston had spent the night in the office. Under the terms of his contract with the city of Yokohama, the head of the municipal police was provided with an official house, and even furniture, but the sergeant had never got used to those palatial halls. The sofas and chairs stood in their dust covers, the large glass chandelier was never lit up even once, the family bed gathered dust for lack of use – the former inhabitant of the prairies felt more at home on a canvas campbed. It was dreary and depressing to be all alone in a two-storey house, the walls and the ceiling oppressed him. The office was a better place. The familiar cramped space there was all his own, every inch of it: the desk, the safe, the gun shelf. It didn’t smell of the emptiness that filled the house. And he slept better here. Walter was always glad to spend the night in the office, and today’s excuse couldn’t possibly have been more legitimate.

He let the duty constable go home – he was a family man. It was so quiet and peaceful in the station. The lock-up was empty – no sailors on a spree, no drunk clients from ‘Number Nine’. Bliss!

He hummed a song about the glorious year of sixty-five as he washed out his shirt. He sniffed his socks and put them back on – he could wear them for one more day. He brewed some strong coffee and smoked a cigar, and then it was time to settle down for the night.

He made himself comfortable on the armchair, took his boots off and put his feet up on a chair. There was a blanket in the office, worn into holes here and there, but it was his favourite blanket, he always had splendid dreams under it.

The sergeant yawned and looked round the room, just to make sure everything was right. Of course, it was hard to imagine English spies or slanty-eyed Jappos trying to creep in and poke around in a police station, but it never hurt to be careful.

The door of the office was locked. So were the window frame and the bars on the window. Only the small windowpane was slightly open, otherwise you could suffocate in here. The distance between the bars was so narrow, a cat could barely get through it.

The rain that had been falling since midday stopped and the moon started shining in the sky, so bright that he had to pull the peak of his cap down over his eyes.

Walter squirmed about, settling down. The sheets of paper with the oaths written in blood crackled inside his shirt. All the weird freaks who live in this world, he thought with a shake of his head.

Lockston always fell asleep quickly, but first (and this was the part he always liked best), coloured pictures of the past flickered through his head, or maybe pictures of things that had never really happened at all. They swirled around, jostling each other for a place in the queue and gradually merged into his first dream, which was the sweetest.

All of this happened now. He saw a horse’s head with its pointed ears quivering, dashing hell-for-leather towards a stretch of land overgrown with brownish grass; then a great, high sky with white clouds, the kind you only get over huge open spaces; then a woman who had loved him (or maybe she was pretending) in Lucyville back in sixty-nine; then from somewhere or other a dwarf in a bright-coloured body stocking, whirling around and jumping through a hoop. And this, the final vision to surface out of the depths of his totally forgotten past, maybe even out of his childhood, merged imperceptibly into a dream.

The sergeant murmured wordlessly as he marvelled at the little circus artist, who turned out to be able to fly and blow tongues of flame out of his mouth.