by Boris Akunin
Sobolev brushed his objections aside like an annoying fly. 'Stop that, Captain. Don't be such a pain in the neck. It's all very well for you, in your operations section. You at least have some kind of work to do, but I'm rusting away from sheer idleness. I don't play myself, Count - I'm far too impetuous - but I will certainly watch.'
Varya saw Perepyolkin staring at the handsome general with the eyes of a beaten dog.
'Perhaps just for small stakes then?' Lukan drawled uncertainly. 'To reinforce the ties of soldierly comradeship.'
'To reinforce the ties, of course, and just for small stakes,' Zurov said with a nod, tipping several unopened decks of cards on to the table out of his sabretache. 'A hundred to be in. Who else, gentlemen?'
The bank was made up in a moment and soon the marquee rang to magical wordplay:
'There goes the old draggletail!'
'We'll beat her with our little sultan here, gentlemen!'
'L'as de carreau' - ace of diamonds. 'Ha-ha, that's beaten it!'
Varya moved closer to Erast Petrovich and asked: 'Why does he call you Erasmus?'
'It's just something that happened’ said the secretive Fandorin, avoiding the question.
'Hey-eh,' Sobolev sighed loudly. 'Kriedener's probably already advancing on Plevna, and I'm stuck in here like a low card in the discards.'
Perepyolkin stuck close to his idol, pretending that he was also interested in the game.
The angry McLaughlin, standing all alone with a chessboard under his arm, muttered something in English and then translated it into Russian himself: 'It used to be a press club, now it's a low gambling den.'
'Hey, my man, do you have any Shustov cognac? Bring it over!' cried the hussar, turning to the bartender. 'We might as well have some real fun while we're at it.'
The evening really was promising to turn out very cheerful.
The next day, however, the press club had changed beyond all recognition, with the Russians sitting there looking gloomy and depressed, while the correspondents were talking excitedly in low voices, and every now and then, when one of them learned some new details, he would go running to the telegraph office -what had happened was an absolutely huge sensation.
Already at lunchtime the dark rumours had begun to spread round the camp, and as Varya and Fandorin were walking back from the shooting range after five (the titular counsellor was teaching his assistant to use a Colt-system revolver), they had been met by a sullenly agitated Sobolev.
'A fine business,' he said, rubbing his hands together nervously. 'Have you heard?'
'Plevna?' Fandorin asked forlornly.
'A total rout. General Schilder-Schuldner went at it full pelt; he wanted to overtake Osman-pasha. We had seven thousand men, but the Turks had far more. Our columns attacked full on and were caught in a crossfire. Rosenbaum, the commander of the Arkhangelsk Regiment, was killed; Kleinhaus, the commander of the Kostroma Regiment, was fatally wounded and Major-General Knorring was brought back on a stretcher. A third of our men were killed. Absolute carnage. So much for three battalions. And the Turks were different too, not like before. They fought like devils.'
'What about Paladin?' Erast Petrovich asked rapidly.
'He's all right. He turned bright green and kept babbling excuses. Kazanzaki's taken him away for interrogation . . . Well, now the real thing will start. Perhaps now they'll give me an assignment. Pere-pyolkin hinted that there might be a chance' - and the general set off towards the staff building with a spring in his step.
Varya had spent the time until evening in the hospital, helping to sterilise surgical instruments. So many wounded had been brought in that they had been obliged to set up another two temporary tents. The nurses were run off their feet. The air was filled with the smell of blood and suffering, and the screams and prayers of the wounded.
It was almost night before she was able to escape to the correspondents' marquee where, as has already been mentioned, the atmosphere was strikingly different from the day before.
The only place where life continued in full swing was at the card table, where the game was now in its second uninterrupted day. Pale-faced Zurov puffed on a cigar as he rapidly dealt out the cards. He had not eaten a thing, but he had been drinking incessantly without getting even slightly drunk. A tall heap of banknotes, golden coins and promissory notes had sprung up beside his elbow. Sitting opposite him, tousling his hair in insane frenzy, was Colonel Lukan. Some officer or other was sleeping beside him with his light-brown head of hair slumped on to his folded arms. The bartender fluttered around them like a fat moth, plucking the lucky hussar's wishes out of the air on the wing.
Fandorin was not in the club, nor was Paladin. McLaughlin was playing chess, while Sobolev, surrounded by officers, was poring over a three-vyerst map and had not even glanced at Varya.
Already regretting that she had come, she said: 'Count, are you not ashamed? So many people have been killed.'
'But we are still alive, mademoiselle,' Zurov replied absent-mindedly, tapping on a deck of cards with his finger. 'What's the point in burying yourself before your time has come? Oh, you're bluffing, Luke. I raise you two.'
Lukan tugged the diamond ring off his finger: 'I'll see you.' He reached out a trembling hand towards Zurov's cards lying casually face down on the table.
At that instant Varya saw Lieutenant-Colonel Kazanzaki glide soundlessly into the tent, looking hideously like a black raven that has caught the sweet smell of a putrid corpse. Remembering how the gendarme's previous appearance had ended, she shuddered.
'Mr Kazanzaki,' said McLaughlin, turning towards the new arrival, 'where is Paladin?'
The lieutenant-colonel paused portentously, waiting for the club to become quiet. He answered curtly: 'I have him. He is writing a statement.' He cleared his throat and added ominously. 'And then we'll make our minds up.'
The awkward silence that ensued was broken by Zurov's nonchalant light bass: 'So this is the famous gendarme Kozinikinaki? Greetings to you, Mister Split-Lip.' He waited, his eyes gleaming insolently as he stared expectantly at the lieutenant-colonel's flushed face.
'And I have heard about you, Mister Brawler,' Kazan-zaki replied unhurriedly, also staring hard at the hussar. 'A notorious character. Pray be so good as to hold your tongue, or I shall call the sentry and have you taken to the guardhouse for gambling in camp. And I shall arrest the bank.'
'There's no mistaking a serious man,' chuckled the count. 'Understood, I'll be as silent as the grave.'
Lukan finally turned over Zurov's cards, gave a protracted groan and clutched his head in his hands. The count inspected the ring he had won with a sceptical eye.
'No, Lieutenant-Colonel, no, there is no damned treason here!' Varya heard Sobolev say irritably. 'Perepyolkin's right. He's the brains on the staff. Osman simply covered the ground at a forced march, and our blustering sabre-rattlers weren't expecting that kind of vim from the Turks. We have a formidable enemy to fight now, and this war is going to be fought in earnest.'
Chapter Six
IN WHICH PLEVNA AND VARYA EACH WITHSTAND A SIEGE
Die Wiener Zeitung (Vienna) 30(18) July 1877
Our correspondent reports from Shumen, where the headquarters of the Turkish Army of the Balkans is located. The fiasco at Plevna has left the Russians in an extremely stupid position. Their columns extend for tens and even hundreds of kilometres from the south to the north, their lines of communication are defenceless, their rear lines exposed. Osman-pasha's brilliant flanking manoeuvre has won the Turks time to regroup, and a little Bulgarian town has become a serious thorn in the shaggy side of the Russian bear. The atmosphere in circles close to the court in Constantinople is one of cautious optimism.
On the one hand, things were going very badly; you might even say they could not possibly be any worse. Poor Petya was still languishing under lock and key -after the Plevna bloodbath the noxious Kazanzaki had lost interest in the cryptographer, but the threat of a court martial remained as real as
ever. And the fortunes of war had proved fickle: the golden fish that granted wishes had turned into a prickly sea scorpion and disappeared into the abyss, leaving their hands scratched and bleeding.
But on the other hand (this was something that Varya was ashamed to admit even to herself), her life had never been so . . . interesting. That was the word: 'interesting'. That was it exactly.
And the reason, in all honesty, was obscenely simple: it was the first time in Varya's life that she had been courted at the same time by so many admirers - and such admirers too! Her recent travelling companions on the railway or the scrofulous students of St Petersburg could not possibly compare. No matter how hard she tried to suppress it, these banal, womanish feelings still sprang up like weeds in her vain, foolish heart. It was terrible.
For instance, on the morning of the 18th of June (a most important and memorable day, concerning which more below) Varya woke with a smile on her face. Before she was even awake and had barely even sensed the sunlight through her tightly shut eyelids, even as she was still stretching sweetly, she was already in a cheerful, happy, festive mood. It was only afterwards, when her mind had woken up as well as her body, that she remembered about Petya and the war. With an effort of will Varya forced herself to frown and think about sad realities, but something quite different kept creeping into her stubborn, drowsy head, in the manner of Agafya Tikhonovna: if she could supplement Petya's devotion with Sobolev's fame, and Zurov's daredevil panache, and Charles's talent, and Fandorin's piercing glance . . . But no - Erast Petrovich did not suit the case, for not by any stretch of the imagination could she number him among her admirers.
Nothing really seemed clear as far as the titular counsellor was concerned. Varya's position as his assistant remained, as ever, purely nominal. Fandorin did not initiate her into his secrets, although he was apparently dealing with real business of some kind, not just trivialities. He either disappeared for long periods or, on the contrary, simply sat in his tent receiving visits from Bulgarian peasants wearing smelly sheepskin hats. Varya guessed that they must be from Plevna, but her pride would not allow her to ask any questions. What was so remarkable about that anyway? It was not as if people from Plevna were rare visitors to the Russian camp. Even McLaughlin had his own informant, who provided him with exclusive intelligence on the life of the Turkish garrison. Of course, the Irishman did not share this knowledge with the Russian command, stubbornly citing his 'journalistic ethics', but the readers of the Daily News knew all about Osman-pasha's order of the day and the massive redoubts that were springing up around the besieged town, growing mightier by the hour.
This time, however, the Western Division of the Russian army was making thorough preparations for battle. The storming of Plevna was set for today, and everybody was saying that the 'misunderstanding over Plevna' would certainly be set to rights. Yesterday Erast Petrovich had traced out a diagram of all the Turkish fortifications for Varya on the ground with a stick and explained that, according to absolutely reliable information in his possession, Osman-pasha had 20,000 askers and 58 artillery pieces, while Lieutenant-General Kriedener had moved up 32,000 soldiers and 176 field-guns to the town, and the Roumanians were due to arrive at any time. A cunning and strictly secret disposition of forces had been devised, involving a concealed outflanking manoeuvre and a diversionary attack. Fandorin had explained it all so well that Varya had immediately believed in the imminent victory of Russian arms and stopped paying much attention - she was more interested in watching the titular counsellor and trying to guess how he was connected with the blonde girl in his locket. Kazanzaki had said something strange about a marriage. Could she really be his better half? But she was too young to be his wife - no more than a little girl!
Varya knew about her because three days earlier, when she looked into Erast Petrovich's tent after breakfast, she had seen him lying sound asleep on his bed fully dressed, even in his dirty boots. He had been missing for the whole of the previous day, which meant he had probably only returned shortly before dawn. Just as she was about to creep quietly away she had suddenly noticed the silver locket dangling out of the sleeping man's collar on to his chest. The temptation had been too great. Varya had tiptoed across to the bed, keeping her eyes fixed on Fandorin's face. Lying there breathing regularly with his mouth slightly open, the titular counsellor looked like a mischievous little boy who had smeared powder on his temples as a prank.
Varya had gingerly picked up the locket with her finger and thumb, clicked open the lid and seen the tiny portrait. A pretty little china doll, a real Madchen-Gretchen: golden curls, little eyes and little mouth, tiny cheeks. Really nothing special. Varya had cast a glance of disapproval at the sleeper and blushed bright red: the bright-blue eyes with the pitch-black pupils were peering gravely at her from under their long lashes.
Trying to explain would have been stupid. Varya had simply fled, which was not so very clever either, but at least an unpleasant scene had been avoided. Strangely enough, afterwards Fandorin had behaved as though the episode had never happened.
He was a cold, disagreeable man, he rarely joined in other people's conversations, and when he did he was bound to say something that made Varya's hackles rise. Take, for instance, that argument about parliament and the sovereignty of the people that had blown up during the picnic (a large party of them had gone off into the hills and dragged Fandorin along with them, although he had been dying to go back and skulk in his lair).
Paladin had started telling them about the constitution that had been introduced in Turkey the year before by the former grand vizier Midhat-pasha. It was very interesting. Would you believe it - an uncivilised Asiatic country like that, but it actually had a parliament, not like Russia.
Then they had started arguing about which parliamentary system was the best. McLaughlin was for the British system and Paladin, even though he was a Frenchman, was for the American, while Sobolev campaigned for some indigenous Russian system of the nobility and peasantry.
When Varya had demanded the franchise for women, they had all made fun of her and that crude soldier Sobolev had started scoffing: 'Oh, Varvara Andreevna, once you women are given the vote, you'll elect a parliament full of nothing but your own handsome little darlings and sweethearts. If you women had to choose between Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky and our Captain Zurov, who would you cast your vote for? You see?'
'Gentlemen, can people be elected to parliament compulsorily?' the hussar had asked in alarm, and the general mood had become even merrier.
Varya had struggled in vain to explain about equal rights, citing the American territory of Wyoming, where women had been allowed to vote and nothing terrible had happened to Wyoming as a result. No one had taken anything she said seriously.
'Why don't you say anything?' Varya had appealed to Fandorin, who had promptly distinguished himself by saying something that would have been better left unsaid altogether.
'Varvara Andreevna, I am opposed to democracy in general.' (He had blushed even as he said it.) 'One man is unequal to another from the very beginning, and there is nothing you can do about it. The democratic principle infringes the rights of those who are more intelligent, more talented and harder-working; it places them in a position of dependence on the foolish will of the stupid, talentless and lazy, because society always contains more of the latter. Let our compatriots first learn to rid themselves of their swinish ways and earn the right to bear the title of citizen, and then we can start thinking about a parliament.'
This absolutely outlandish declaration had left Varya completely flummoxed, but Paladin had come to the rescue.
'Nonetheless, if a country has already introduced voting rights,' he had said gently (the conversation, of course, was conducted in French), 'it is surely unjust to disenfranchise half of mankind, and the better half at that.'
Remembering those remarkable words, Varya smiled, turned on to her side and began thinking about Paladin. Thank God that Kazanzaki had finally left the man i
n peace. It had been General Kriedener's decision to base his strategy on the contents of some interview! Poor Paladin had been eating his heart out and pestering absolutely everyone he met with his explanations and excuses. Varya liked him even more when he was feeling guilty and miserable like that. Previously she had thought him just a little too conceited, too accustomed to general admiration, and she had deliberately kept her distance, but now the need for that had fallen away, and Varya had begun to behave quite naturally and affectionately with the Frenchman. He was cheerful and easy to be with, not like Erast Petrovich, and he knew such a terrible lot - about Turkey and the ancient history of the East, and French history. All those places he had seen, driven by his thirst for adventure! And how charmingly he narrated his little recits drolesl - so witty, so lively, without any false posturing at all. How Varya adored it when Paladin responded to one of her questions with a significant pause and an intriguing smile and then said: 'Oh, c'est toute une histoire, mademoiselle.' And then, unlike that tight-lipped Fandorin, he would immediately tell her the story.
Most of the time the stories were funny, but sometimes they were frightening. Varya remembered one of them particularly well.
'Mademoiselle Barbara, you berate Orientals for their lack of respect for human life, and you are quite right to do so.' (They had been discussing the atrocities committed by the Bashi-Bazouks.) 'But after all, these are savages, barbarians, who have not yet developed far beyond the level of tigers or crocodiles. Let me describe to you a scene that I observed in that most civilised of countries, England. Oh, c'est toute une histoire . . . The British place such a high value on human life that they regard suicide as the most heinous of sins - and the penalty they apply for an attempt to do away with oneself is capital punishment. They have not yet gone that far in the East. Several years ago, when I was in London, a prisoner in the jail was due to be hanged. He had committed a terrible crime - somehow he had obtained a razor and attempted to cut his own throat. He had even been partly successful, but he was saved by the timely intervention of the prison doctor. Since I found the judge's logic in this case quite astounding, I decided that I must watch the execution with my own eyes. And after using my connections to obtain a pass for the execution, I was not disappointed.
