by Pavel Kornev
"The tattoo was done by a malefic?" I inquired.
"Just the initial symbol," the old man answered. "That's how it is normally done. A malefic makes the anchor, and the other drawings just have to be attached to it."
"Do you know what's written here?"
"Some Egyptian filth," Kravets grumbled, pushing the package away from himself and starting to wipe his hands on a towel. "If you want to know more, find an Egyptologist."
"I want to know which of your colleagues made the last symbols."
"Do you think we all work together in a shop or something?" snorted the boot-maker.
"No, but the young learn from the old, and cannot hold their tongues. Also, these tattoo artists are true craftsmen. The previous style was maintained ideally. It's almost totally perfect."
"One might start thinking you know your way around this stuff."
"I do," I told him.
"What will happen to him? What will happen to the artist?"
"You're asking me? Maybe he'll live to a ripe old age and die surrounded by relatives and good friends, and maybe he'll drink himself to death or break his neck when he's up trying to clean the chimney. How should I know?"
"You mean to say you won't arrest him?"
"Not if he answers my questions."
I don't know if the old boot-maker believed me or not, but he didn't get stubborn, just told me:
"Tomasz Górski, goes by the nickname Razor. He's got a private practice on Nobel Road."
"Doctor?"
"Veterinarian."
I figured out how to find the man, took the rag bundle and waved my hand to Ramon as I walked outside:
"Let's go!"
7
NOBEL ROAD was five minutes away by car, but it took us at least that long afterward weaving about looking among the private homes of the area for a secluded spot to park. In the end, we drove the self-propelled carriage down a narrow alleyway and left it there, completely blocking off passage, then walked to the veterinarian's on foot.
Ramon was armed this time with his Winchester. I grabbed the semi-automatic carbine and a couple hand grenades. It was clearly not unnecessary precaution, if you consider the fact that we might meet one of the stranglers here, or even their master.
We walked in from the back yard, simply jumping over the fence, as the guard dog was thankfully held back by a strong chain. We barely managed to tie our neckerchiefs on our faces before some boy came out to see what the commotion was; Ramon simply poked his butt-stock into the boy's stomach, pushing him back inside. I ran off after him, and we dashed through the rooms, rounding up the veterinarian's whole household. The vigilant boy, a plump girl, a fat aunt and a stammering helper were all driven into a closet with no windows or doors. Paying no mind to the crying and lamenting of the ladies, we locked them in and took Tomasz Górski to task. He was a tough old man, wrinkled and totally bald.
"Take the money and leave," he suggested, having taken us for robbers.
"My dear old man," I smiled, adjusting my dark glasses, "you won't be rid of us that easily."
The veterinarian grew pale, but was undaunted, making another suggestion:
"If you let the boy go, he can go withdraw more money from the bank. You don't want this on your conscious. Money isn't worth all this."
"Mr. Górski," Ramon then frowned, standing at the window and watching the gates, "your words could be taken as an attempt to bribe government officials in pursuit of their duty."
The dry official language of the affirmation made a mixed impression on the man: having stopped worrying about his property, he started turning his head in confusion, looking from me to Ramon and back again.
"But you're not in uniform, sirs," Tomasz babbled.
"This work cannot bear publicity," my hulking partner chuckled significantly.
And I smiled:
"Are you so burning with desire to visit the Newton-Markt, Mr. Górski?"
"No!" the veterinarian shuddered, then grew a bit calmer and declared: "Why are you here? I didn't do anything reprehensible!"
I simply unfolded my rag bundle and threw it on his knees. The old man started seizing up like an epileptic when he saw the black skin. He opened his mouth, but couldn't produce a single sound. He tried to stand, but reeled and we had to set him back in his chair.
"Do you understand what this could mean for you?" I asked compassionately after a truly theatrical pause.
"I don't know what this is!" the veterinarian yelped out. His voice was trembling so severely that any common jury would declare him guilty without even five minutes' discussion. "Take this filthy thing away!" he shouted, trying to throw the package on the floor. "I do not know, I do not know anything!"
I took a chair, sat opposite him and asked:
"Mr. Górski, just tell us everything."
"But I don't know anything!" the old man exclaimed, throwing the wrapped piece of Moor's skin from his knees, this time successfully.
I sighed and warned him:
"Do you really want to end up behind bars, Mr. Górski? Do you know what kind of sentence they normally give people involved in anti-scientific activity? You'll die in prison and never see your family again."
The veterinarian clasped his hands and cut me off:
"I don't know anything!"
"Who are you protecting, your family?" I clarified. "Do you think they’ll be safe if you go to prison? Well think again, my kind sir! Anti-scientific activity! Espionage! Treason! Do you think this will not touch them? You are mistaken!"
"E-e-e-espionage?" bleated out the hiccupping veterinarian, seemingly about to go into a fit. "Treason? I know nothing about this! I never committed any treason!"
"That’s not what we’ve been hearing," I assured him, standing to my feet and looming over the old man. I stared at him gloomily from my high height. "Having dealings with Egyptian spies, in current times, threatens the noose, nothing less. If you're lucky, your family will be sent off to a work colony, but whether you're lucky or not depends on you alone."
"I don't know anything!" the old man repeated his routine once again.
I felt his pockets, pulled out a keyring and walked over to the iron cash register.
"What are you doing?" the veterinarian gasped. "You have no right!"
Paying his pitiful babble no mind, I opened the lock, rifled through the cash and, to very little surprise, I pulled out from under the ledger a stack of Egyptian guineas. I counted the brand-new bank notes and declared:
"A hundred guineas. One hundred!" Then I gave a weary wince and shook my head. "The fact that you are working with foreign spies has been established. Now, the only thing that could make this easier on you is coming clean."
"Either you work with us," Ramon said from the window, "or you'll disappear in the work camps. It's up to you."
The veterinarian drooped down and said indistinctly:
"I'd hardly be of any use to you. I was only paid to keep quiet."
"Tell us!"
"At night, it was the night before last, I heard my horses get spooked. I came out to check them and lost consciousness," Tomasz Górski told us. "I woke up in some kind of basement, or cellar. I was given the choice of working with them or death."
"Who?"
"Moors. I didn't see their faces."
"How many were there?"
"Four. I saw four."
"Did you give them tattoos?"
"Yes."
"All of them?"
"Yes."
"With what?"
"They had their own needles and ink."
After that, I asked him to describe the room he had to work in, but the veterinarian just kept saying that it was in some kind of basement, dusty and dirty with a sagging ceiling, stone columns and bare walls. There were no electrical wires there, just candles for light.
"On the way back, they blindfolded me. It seems it was some kind of catacombs. Three stairwells I remember for sure."
"Great!" I bolstered the vete
rinarian. "How long did it take you to get back to town?"
"An hour or two," Tomasz hazarded. "At first, it was a very bumpy ride, but then the road got better. They might have driven in a circle for a while, but I have no doubts that they brought me out of town."
"What happened next?"
"They let me out near home. When I took the blindfold off, there was no one around."
"Alas."
I walked up to the veterinarian and tore off a smart kerchief that just could never have gone with the rest of his severely-shaded outfit. On his slack skin, I could clearly make out a set of pale hand marks.
"Go about your life as usual," I then warned the tattoo artist. "Tell your family that we were robbers and got scared off by a random passerby. If you're asked to do more tattoos for these gentlemen, try to remember every word and every sound. You must figure out where you're being taken. Is that clear?"
"Yes."
"We'll get in touch with you," said Ramon, joining the conversation. "But if you go flapping your lips, you can be gotten rid of."
The veterinarian looked at us from under his eyebrows and said nothing.
I took yesterday's edition of the Capital Times from the table, knocking a pack of papirosa cigarettes and a box of matches on the floor. I walked over to the fireplace and threw the paper on the coals. When the paper started smoking and caught fire, I ordered the house owner:
"The skin!"
Tomasz Górski did as I commanded and even poked it into the fire with the poker, pushing the rag bundle further into the coals. The flame quickly grew a dirty reddish color. The unpleasant scent of scorching flesh dispersed throughout the room.
"Let your family out in five minutes. For now, just sit calmly," I warned him, sticking a stack of guineas in the breast pocket of the veterinarian's jacket. "Consider this your payment for good sense."
Then, I pointed Ramon to the back door. He jumped out after me and dashed through the back yard. This time, we didn't climb over the fence. Instead we undid the latch, calmly went out and hurried to the armored car.
The barking of the chained dog followed after us for quite some time.
"So, you said you filled the trotyl?" I asked my partner, getting behind the wheel of the self-propelled carriage.
"I did," he confirmed and, in his turn, wondered: "Do you trust him?"
"Tomasz? Yeah, I do. I don't think he works for the Egyptians. It just happened to come together like that."
"And you think he was totally open?"
"More or less."
I personally was convinced less by the veterinarian’s words than by the marks left by the Moor's hands on his neck. No one would give a co-conspirator such an obvious brand. But as a reminder to a random person that they need to hold their tongue, such a mark seemed quite reasonable. Money and threats, the carrot and the stick. Nothing new.
"A hundred guineas is how much?" Ramon suddenly asked. "One thousand francs? More?"
"One thousand two hundred," I calculated mentally, steering the car to the exit from the alley as I joked: "It's actually a shame we're not robbers."
Ramon gave a nervous laugh; I think that thought managed to visit him as well.
"If they didn't do away with the tattoo artist," he said thoughtfully, "that must mean they plan on using his services again in the future."
"I think you're right," I nodded and revved the engine around a slowly moving cart.
"Shall we set up an ambush?" Ramon suggested.
I looked sidelong at my friend and snorted:
"Are you really prepared to watch for them at night?"
My hulking partner gave a shiver.
"What other option do we have?"
"Ramon," I sighed, "our only chance is burning out the vampire nest during the day when he and his servants cannot offer serious resistance. Otherwise, even the flamethrower wouldn't be of any use, and don't you doubt it."
Hearing me mention the vampire, my partner finally tired of the topic and turned away to the side window.
"We don't know where the lair is," he said some time later.
"I have some guesses," I assured my friend, parking the armored car in a hidden yard not far from the Golden Bullet weapon store. "Wait here," I told him, getting out from behind the wheel. "I'll be back in twenty minutes. If I take longer, don't worry."
"It’s your money," Ramon called back blithely, prepared to sit in the cabin all day if it meant five hundred francs.
THE POMPOUSLY NAMED Golden Bullet opened early in the morning; there, I obtained ten ten-caliber bullets and just as many buckshot shells, then headed for the shop Mechanisms and Rarities. And though there wasn't a particular need for an improvised flamethrower for this little trip out of town, I didn't want to put all my eggs in one basket, relying exclusively on a salvaged piece of equipment that I hadn't even yet managed to test out.
Alexander Dyak had already opened his business by that time. What was more, early-bird shoppers had already showed up: a trio of students and a gray-bearded teacher, practically ripped from a caricature of an absent-minded professor. I didn't even go inside. I just looked through the glass and immediately continued to the neighboring coffee shop. There was an intoxicating aroma of fresh baked goods and ground coffee wafting out.
I drank a coffee at the bar. When I was finished, I asked them to pack me up some crumpets and poppy rolls in a paper sack and went back to Mechanisms and Rarities as the owner was already serving his last customer, the "professor" I'd seen earlier.
"Good morning, Alexander!" I greeted him as I walked in.
"Good morning, Leopold Borisovich!" the inventor called back, counting out change. He bid farewell to the silver-bearded old man, then set a sheet of paper torn from his notebook on the counter and slid it to me. "Your bill!"
"Help yourself!" I offered, pushing over the bag of pastries with its stupefying aroma.
"White flour is bad for me at this age," the man refused.
I set the sack on the counter and took the sheet covered in indecipherable handwriting.
"I had to buy some of the components in," Alexander Dyak explained.
I studied the list and rubbed the back of my head in perplexity. The list included a rubber disk, a galvanized tube, sockets, a five-liter canister of kerosene, a flare, a garden-hose nozzle, back straps and a compressed air tank.
In total, it was thirty francs and forty-five centimes.
"I don't see a 'work' entry," I smiled, getting out my wallet.
"Come now, Leopold Borisovich," the inventor said with a wave. "For me this was, if you please, a little puzzle. A way to keep the boredom at bay."
"And did you find any success?"
Alexander Dyak sighed bitterly:
"To be honest, I was hoping for a difficult task, but this was all quite elementary."
"The simpler, the safer, right?" I joked, setting three tenners on the counter and holding them down with a one-franc coin.
"Not exactly," the store owner corrected me. "By the way, while I was preparing your device, I got another idea. And it could be much more interesting to create."
I asked him to bring me up to speed, but the inventor just waved it off.
"No need for that now. Let’s go take a look at your miracle weapon," he suggested.
We locked the front door and went into the back room.
The inventor walked up to the workbench and shook open a rag bundle containing a compressed air tank, gas burner and shooting tip all connected together. The top of the tank was ringed with an uneven weld seam as if it had been opened. In place of the stop valve, a nozzle was sticking out. A bit lower, under the corner on the bolted down socket, there was a pipe attached with an incendiary charge. Also attached was a handle with a trigger.
"It's all elementary!" Alexander Dyak declared and, the tank under his armpit, pulled the handle with his right hand. "Point it at your target, pull down on the trigger. The estimated range is up to fifteen meters. There should be enough to last a
round twenty seconds."
"Estimated?" I clarified.
"Well, Leopold Borisovich, testing the object under field conditions was unfortunately not possible."
"But it does work?"
"I guarantee it! The construction is elementary! When the incendiary charge is lit, the gases in the internal tube enter the tank and push out a rubber disk, which creates the excess pressure needed to release the gelled kerosene."
The unfamiliar word cut into my hearing and I asked:
"Gelled?"
"Let's skip the technical details," said the inventor, refusing to share this information. "Then, the flame of the incendiary projectile ignites the stream of kerosene and, though it happens at about forty centimeters from the nozzle, I recommend you hold the device with your arms extended."
The shop owner handed me the single-use flamethrower. I weighed it in my hand, evaluated its dimensions and decided a backpack would make a great addition to the kit. Otherwise, transporting it was sure to be a headache.
Alexander Dyak got out a backpack from under the worktable, and without particular problems, put the flamethrower inside.
"Thank you!" I said, squeezing the inventor's hand. "I'll be sure to give you a report on how it works!"
"That's up to you, Leopold Borisovich!" the shop owner said with a skeptical frown. "This is a pretty outmoded design. To be honest, I feel bad offering you such an imperfect solution. Coming clean, there simply wasn't time to work out a better idea I had."
"What was that?" I wondered.
"Compact incendiary charges with a very interesting formulation."
"Interesting, you say? And how much would it run me?"
"A hundred francs’ advance. The rest will depend on the final size of the order," answered Alexander Dyak, not wanting to bore me with the details.
I handed him two bank notes of fifty francs each and asked:
"When can I expect the finished product?"
"Come by tomorrow," the inventor suggested, stroking his gray beard. "I'll think it over this evening, and tomorrow, I'll try to make a prototype. But it will depend on your requirements. Perhaps it is of no interest to you at all."
"Not at all," I assured the man. "I'm intrigued beyond all measure!"
