by Boris Akunin
She jumped to her feet impetuously and walked over to Prospero, but he didn’t even glance at her – he was looking at Ophelia and slowly shaking his head, as if he couldn’t believe what he saw.
The aspirants started to leave, talking among themselves in low voices.
Columbine waited for them all to go. Then she would be left alone with the Doge and she would show him that there were such things as true devotion and love in the world. Today she would not be his submissive puppet, but his genuine lover. Their relationship would be changed once and for all! Never again would he feel betrayed and alone!
Then Prospero spoke those cherished words, but they were not addressed to Columbine.
He beckoned to Ophelia with one finger and said in a quiet voice: ‘Stay. I’m worried about you.’
Then he took her by the hand and led her after him into the depths of the house.
She trotted along behind submissively – small, pale and exhausted after associating with the spirits. But her little face was aglow with joyful surprise. Well, she might be half-witted, but she was still a woman! Unable to bear the sight of that idiotic smile, Columbine stamped her foot, dashed headlong out of the house, and then strode backwards and forwards in front of the porch, not really sure what to do or where to go.
Just then Genji came out, glanced thoughtfully at the distressed young lady and bowed.
‘The hour is late. Will you allow m-me to see you home, Mademoiselle Columbine?’
‘I’m not afraid of wandering through the night alone,’ she answered in a faltering voice and then couldn’t go on as the sobs rose in her throat.
‘Nonetheless, I will escort you,’ Genji said resolutely.
He took her by the arm and led her away from that cursed house. She didn’t have the strength to argue or refuse.
‘Strange,’ Genji said pensively, seeming not to notice the state his companion was in. ‘I always used to think that spiritualism was a f-fraud or, at best, self-deception. But Made-moiselle Ophelia does not seem like a liar or a hysterical girl. She’s an interesting specimen. And what she t-told us is also extremely interesting.’
‘Really?’ Columbine asked, squinting sideways at the Japanese prince and sniffing inelegantly.
A melancholy thought came to her: Even this one finds Ophelia more interesting than me.
She was found by a boatman
She was found by a boatman. The hem of her dress had caught on one of the piers of the Ustinsky Bridge, where the Yauza joins the River Moscow. She was swaying there, in the murky green water, her loose hair rippling like waterweed in the current. It was Genji who told me, he knows everything and he has connections everywhere. He even has informers in the police.
First she disappeared, and Prospero didn’t gather us together for two days, because the seances were impossible without her in any case.
During those days, I didn’t know what to do with myself. I went to the general shop once and bought half a pound of tea and two baumkuchen pastries for four kopecks each. I nibbled on one, but didn’t even touch the other. I went out to have lunch at the small local restaurant, read the entire menu and only ordered Seltzer water. The rest of the time I simply sat on the bed and looked at the wall. I wasn’t there. I didn’t feel hungry at all. Or sleepy.
It was as if the doll had been put back in her dusty box, and she just lay there, staring at the ceiling with her glass eyes. There was no reason to go anywhere. I tried writing a poem, but I couldn’t. Apparently I can’t manage any longer without our meetings, without Prospero. I can’t manage at all.
Pierrot came and talked about some nonsense or other, I hardly even listened. He took my hand and squeezed it and kissed it for a long time. It tickled, and then I got fed up of it, and I pulled my hand away.
Yesterday the Lioness of Ecstasy unexpectedly came to call and stayed for a long time. I was flattered by this visit. She’s talkative, with broad, sweeping gestures, and she smokes papirosas all the time. She’s amusing to be with, only she seems unhappy somehow, although she claims that she lives a full life. She thinks of herself as a great connoisseur of men. She said that Prospero was probably once badly hurt or humiliated by a woman and so he’s afraid of them, he doesn’t let them get close to him and prefers to torment them. Then she looked at me expectantly, waiting to see if I would offer any revelations. But I didn’t. Then the Lioness started making confessions of her own. She has two lovers, both well-known men (she said it with the meaning of ‘too well-known’) – the editor of a newspaper and a certain Great Poet. They adore her immeasurably, but she toys with them as if they were pet dogs. ‘The secret of handling men is simple,’ the Lioness lectured me. ‘If you don’t know this secret, they become dangerous and unpredictable. But they’re basically primitive and easy to manage. No matter how old he might be or what high position he might hold, deep in his heart every one of them is a boy, an adolescent. You have to treat a man like a one-year-old bulldog – the foolish creature’s teeth have already grown, so it’s best not to tease him, but you must not be afraid of him. Flatter them a little, intrigue them a little, scratch them behind the ear every now and then, do not torment them too long, otherwise their attention will be caught by another bone that is more accessible. Deal with them like this, my child, and you will see that a man is the very dearest of creatures: undemanding, useful and very, very grateful.’
Lorelei lectured me in this way for a long time, but I sensed this was not what she had come for. And then, evidently having taken a decision, she said something that set me quivering with excitement.
Here are her precise words: ‘I have to share this with someone,’ the Lioness murmured, interrupting her own peroration in mid-word. ‘With one of us, and it has to be a woman. But not with Ophelia! And anyway, no one knows where she’s got to. That only leaves you, dear Columbine . . . Of course, I ought to keep quiet about it, but I’m absolutely bursting. Here I’ve been telling you all sorts of nonsense about my lovers. They’re just baubles, pitiful surrogates who help to fill at least a part of the hole in my soul. I don’t need them any longer.’ She lowered her voice and clutched the mother-of-pearl watch hanging round her neck in a plump hand spangled with rings. ‘I think I have been chosen,’ she told me in a terrible whisper. ‘And without any seances. The Tsarevich Death has sent me a sign. “But in the sacred darkness his eye will not descry the lone black rose”, that’s what I wrote. But he did notice it and he has made it clear to me in no uncertain terms. The Sign has already been given twice! There can hardly be any more doubt!’
Of course, I started showering her with questions, but she suddenly fell silent and her plump face contorted in fright.
‘Oh Lord, what if he’s offended with me because I gossip about it? What if there won’t be a third Sign now?’
And she ran out, all flustered, leaving me to be devoured by envy – which has been my entire lot just recently.
How I had envied Ophelia! How I had hated her. How I had wanted to be in her place!
But it had turned out that her place was the murky water under the Ustinsky Bridge, where rubbish floats on the surface and fat leeches wriggle in the silt.
Genji rang the doorbell at four minutes to five – I was lying on the bed and watching the face of the clock for want of anything better to do.
‘She’s b-been found,’ he said when I opened the door.
‘Who?’ I asked.
‘Who?’ he repeated in surprise. ‘Ophelia!’
One of his acquaintances in the police had told him about a drowned woman found in the Yauza whose description matched the missing girl. Genji had already been to the morgue, but he hadn’t been able to provide a positive identification; after all, he had only seen her in a dark room, and her face had changed.
‘I went to Prospero’s house, but he wasn’t at home,’ said Genji. ‘You’re the only aspirant whose address I know, and that’s only b-because I happened to walk you home once. Let’s go, Columbine . . .’
&nb
sp; And so we went . . .
Yes, it was Ophelia, without the slightest doubt. The attendant jerked back the dirty grey sheet with its sickening blotches and I saw the skinny little body stretched out on a narrow zinc-covered table, the sharp features of the little face, the familiar half-smile frozen on her bloodless lips. Ophelia was lying there completely naked: I could see her thin collarbones and ribs and her sharp hips through her bluish skin; her hands were clenched into tiny little fists. For a moment I thought the body looked like a plucked chicken.
If the Eternal Bridegroom chooses me, will I lie there like that too – naked, with glassy eyes, and will the drunk attendant hang an oilcloth number on my foot?
I had a fit of genuine hysterics.
‘She didn’t want to die! She shouldn’t have died!’ I shouted, sobbing on Genji’s chest in an absolutely pitiful fashion. ‘She wasn’t even a real aspirant! He couldn’t have chosen her!’
‘Who is he?’
‘Death!’
‘Then why say “he”, instead of “she”?’
I didn’t explain to the slow-witted dunce about der Tod: instead I surprised even myself by showering him with reproaches.
‘Why did you bring me to this dreadful place? You’re lying when you say you couldn’t identify her! She hasn’t changed all that much! You deliberately wanted to make me suffer!’
And then he said quietly, but very clearly: ‘You’re right. I wanted you t-to see her like this.’
‘But . . . but why?’ I asked, choking on my indignation.
‘To wake you up. To make you realise that this insanity has to be stopped,’ said Genji, nodding towards the blue body of the drowned woman. ‘No m-more deaths. That’s why I joined your society.’
‘So you don’t want to be Death’s Bridegroom, then?’ I asked stupidly.
‘I have already played that p-part once, many years ago,’ he replied with a sombre air. ‘I thought I was marrying a beautiful young woman, but instead I married death. Once is enough.’
I didn’t understand this allegory. In fact, I couldn’t understand anything at all.
‘But you fired the revolver!’ I exclaimed, remembering. ‘And twice! Prospero told us. Or was that some kind of trick?’
He shrugged one shoulder, seeming slightly embarrassed.
‘Something of the kind. You see, Mademoiselle Columbine, in some ways, I’m quite a rare phenomenon: I always win at any game of chance. I don’t know how to explain this anomaly, but I came to terms with it a long time ago and sometimes make use of it for practical purposes, as I did during my meeting with Mr Prospero. Even if there had been b-bullets in four out of the five chambers, I would quite certainly have got the empty one. But one chance of death against four of life is simply a joke.’
I didn’t know how to take this bizarre explanation. Was it plain ordinary bragging or did he really have some special relationship with fate?
Genji said: ‘Do not forget what you have seen here. And for God’s sake, don’t do anything stupid, no matter what miraculous signs may be manifested to you. I shall destroy this loathsome temple of corpse worship. Oh yes, I haven’t told you yet – a messenger brought me a note from Prospero. You’re certain to get one t-today as well. The meetings are to recommence. We are expected tomorrow at nine, as usual.’
I immediately forgot about Genji and his plans for destruction, and even about the cold mortuary, with its stench of decay.
Tomorrow! Tomorrow evening I shall see him again!
I shall awake and start to live again.
She thought him magically handsome
Today I shall present to you the very finest of my inventions!’ the Doge declared, as he swept into the dimly lit drawing room.
Columbine thought him magically handsome in his crimson velvet blouse with a cambric frill, a beret tilted on one side of his head and short suede boots. A genuine Mephistopheles! The resemblance was emphasised by the dagger glittering with precious stones hanging at his side.
A brief gust of air followed him in through the door and the candles on the table fluttered and went out, leaving only the uncertain light of the brazier.
The Doge drew his dagger from its sheath, touched each candle with it in turn and – wonder of wonders – they lit up again, one after another.
Then Prospero glanced round at the assembled company, and everyone’s eyes lit up just as the candles had done a moment earlier. Columbine felt the usual effect of that hypnotic glance. She was suddenly feverish and found it hard to breathe; she felt that she was finally waking up at last, emerging from a hibernation that had lasted for three whole days while there had not been any evening meetings.
Columbine and also, she assumed, all the others, were swept away by the most magical and wonderful feeling that anyone can experience – the anticipation of a miracle.
The sorcerer halted by the table, and it was only then that most of those present noticed that all the chairs except one, the chairman’s, had disappeared, and there was something covered with a patterned shawl lying in the middle of the table: something large, high and round, like a wedding cake.
‘I used to be an engineer and, so they say, quite a good one,’ said the Doge, smiling slyly into his grey moustache. ‘But I assure you, none of my inventions can compare with the brilliant simplicity of this one. Ophelia has been united with the Eternal Bridegroom. We are glad for her, but now who will help us to maintain contact with the World Beyond? I have racked my brains over this problem and found an answer. What informs a man most clearly and unambiguously of the attitude that fate takes toward him?’
He waited a moment for an answer, but none of the eleven seekers spoke.
‘Come now!’ Prospero encouraged them. ‘It was one of you who gave me the idea of the solution – Prince Genji.’
Everybody looked at Genji. He was frowning at the Doge, as if suspecting some cunning trick.
‘Blind chance,’ Prospero declared triumphantly. ‘Nothing has keener sight than blind chance! It is the will of the Supreme Judge. A spiritualist seance is an unnecessary affectation, an entertainment for bored, hysterical ladies. But here everything will be simple and clear, without words.’
And, so saying, he jerked the shawl off the table. Something brightly coloured and round glinted with a hundred brilliant points of light. A roulette wheel! An ordinary roulette wheel, the kind to be seen in any casino.
However, when the seekers crowded round the table and examined the wheel more closely, it transpired that this wheel of fortune had one unusual feature: where the double zero ought to have been, there was a white skull and crossbones.
‘This invention is called the “Wheel of Death”. Now everyone will be able to ascertain his own relationship with the Eternal Bride,’ said Prospero. ‘And here is your new medium.’ He opened his hand, and there, glittering on his palm, was a small golden ball. ‘This whimsical piece of metal, which at first glance would not appear to be subject to anybody’s will, will become the messenger of love.’
‘But surely messages can be sent by other means too?’ the Lioness of Ecstasy asked in anxious alarm. ‘Or can it now only be through the roulette wheel?’
She’s worried about her Signs, Columbine guessed. After all, the Lioness and the Tsarevich have established their own secret relationship. I wonder what it is. What kind of Signs does he send her?
‘I am not Death’s personal interpreter,’ the Doge said in a stern, sad voice. ‘I do not have absolute mastery of her language. How would I know what means she might choose to inform her Chosen Ones that their feelings are reciprocated? But this means of communicating with fate appears irrefutable to me. It is similar to the means used by the ancients to elicit from the oracle the will of Morta, the Goddess of Death.’
The Lioness of Ecstasy seemed completely satisfied with this answer, and she walked away from the table with an air of superiority.
‘Every one of you will have an equal chance,’ Prospero continued. ‘Anyone who feels rea
dy, whose spirit is sufficiently strong, may try his or her luck today. The lucky player who throws the ball so that it lands on the death’s head is the Chosen One.’
Cyrano asked: ‘What if everyone tries their luck and no one wins? Do we carry on spinning the wheel all night long?’
‘Indeed, the probability of success is not very high.’ Prospero agreed. ‘One chance out of thirty-eight. If no one is lucky, then Death has not yet made her choice and the game will be continued the next time. Agreed?’
The first to respond was Caliban.
‘An excellent idea, Teacher! At least everything will be fair, with no favourites. That Ophelia of yours couldn’t stand me. I’d have been waiting till the end of the century with her seances. And by the way, some people who arrived after me have already scooped the prize. But now everything will be fair. Fortune can’t be duped! Only you ought to let us keep on trying our luck until we get a result.’
‘It will be as I have said,’ the Doge interrupted him sternly. ‘Death is not a bride who can be dragged to the altar by force.’
‘But surely only someone who is morally prepared can throw the ball? Participation in the game is not compulsory?’ Kriton asked in a quiet voice. When the Doge nodded in agreement, he declared in relief: ‘I’d really had quite enough of all that spiritualist wailing. The roulette is quicker, and there are no doubts.’
‘I think the idea of this game of chance is vulgar,’ Gdlevsky said with a shrug. ‘Death is not a croupier in a white shirt-front. Her Signs must be more poetic and exalted. But we can spin the little ball round and round to titillate our nerves. Why not?’
