by Pavel Kornev
When I sat on the folding chair for clients, I stretched out my leg with relief. It had started hurting quite badly after the long walk. The artist, though, immediately reached for his pencil.
"It's been a long time, Leo," he said with unmistakable reproach sounding through in his voice.
The artist was missing his eyes, but wasn't at all blind. The illustrious gentleman's talent allowed him to see better than any sighted person, and beyond that, gave him the ability to look into another person's mind and transfer the images he saw there onto paper. Dreams or nightmares – it made no difference.
"Charles!" I smiled cordially in reply. "If your friends stop coming around, that must mean they are doing well!"
The artist frowned skeptically and rubbed his sunken cheeks.
"Am I correct in understanding this to mean that you have run into some troubles?" He wondered reasonably.
"I need your help," I admitted. "Could you draw a portrait for me?"
"Am I to understand that it will be free of charge?"
"The Viscount Cruce always pays his debts."
"You'll pay me back after you rob the bank?" snorted Charles Malacarre. "That's what you used to say, right?"
"Everything flows. Everything changes. Now, I catch people who rob banks."
"I hope you are aware that the pay for that is somewhat lower," the artist smiled with one corner of his lips, and turned to the easel with his pencil in hand. "Concentrate, Leo."
I clenched my eyelids shut and tried to restore to memory the face I had seen flash by. Just then, his slate pencil started scraping on the paper.
The Illustrious Charles saw others' dreams. Charles the illustrator put them to paper. A magnificent combination of talents.
"Quiet down, Leo!" the artist asked, wiping the sweat that had appeared on his forehead with his kerchief. "Not so fast! The only time it helps to rush is when you're catching fleas."
I nodded and tried to relax. Charles had never refused working with me due to my overly active imagination. I had even taken it on myself to learn the basics of drawing, but I didn't find any success in it. I was wretchedly bad at drawing. Just hopeless.
"Curses!" the artist suddenly exclaimed, ripping a sheet from the easel on which the pencil lines had started coming together, not into the oval of a face but into incomprehensible shadows. "Leo, don't get distracted!"
I let out a fateful sigh and stared up, but that didn't help and the next sheet of paper was spoiled just like the first.
"Leo!" The illustrator set a dulled pencil aside in annoyance and grabbed for another. "Do you even know what you want from me?"
"I do, just a second!" I turned the paper over and stared at a grainy photograph from the conductor's funeral. To be more accurate, at a figure with a washed-out pale face in that photograph. "Is that better?"
Charles didn't answer and set about making a portrait in a fast, confident motion. He took a full five minutes, then tossed a lock of hair from his forehead and said:
"That was everything I could drag out of you. You're surprisingly not put together today, Leo."
"I wouldn't say that," I objected, looking at the pencil sketch. "It's just surprising..."
"Does this look like the guy?" the illustrator grew surprised.
"It does," I reassured him. "But the eyes..."
There were no eyes. Instead there were very densely shaded black dots.
And it was even a bit frightening.
"That’s what was in your head," Charles reminded me.
I stood up from the little chair, grabbed the paper from the easel and, carefully folding it into a tube, asked:
"How are things going?"
"I can't complain," the artist answered, taking out a pen-knife with a worn-down blade and re-sharpening the now dulled pencils. "You wouldn't believe how many people wish to see their own dreams and amorous fantasies put to paper."
"Are you serious?" I actually had been planning on asking Charles to draw a portrait of Elizabeth-Maria, the daughter of the inspector general, naturally. But after those words, I decided against such a request.
"Some simply want to share their phobias," the artist announced poignantly. "Do you understand what I'm talking about?"
"I do."
People often feel they cannot handle their own fears. They eat away at the soul and burst out. Simpletons hope for help, but instead fall into the hands of cynical rapscallions, for whom others' phobias are bread and butter. The kind of people who, if they catch a whiff of weakness, will not stop until they suck a person dry.
I personally tried to stay a bit further from others' fears. It didn't always work, though.
"Thank you for the help," I clapped the artist on the shoulders.
"Don't be a stranger," Charles threw out, not stopping his pencil sharpening.
"Of course."
Having tucked the rolled-up portrait under my armpit, I walked off the bridge and almost immediately ran into a bearded old man turning a trdelnik over a fire. I couldn't resist, so I bought a couple of the spiral rings of sweet hot dough, coated in powdered sugar and cinnamon then returned to the statue of Michelangelo and handed one to the blind illustrator.
"Still crazy about sweets, huh?" the artist chuckled, accepting the treat.
"I suppose," I replied and headed to interrogate potential witnesses.
A POLICEMAN'S BADGE is a universal skeleton key; this simple document was can open practically any door. And at the same time, a policeman’s badge is a frightening scarecrow to the wicked, completely beating the memory out of people, as well as their desire to talk.
If you want to find out something useful from a witness, either scare them half to death or ask them the right questions.
And asking precisely the right questions was also something that must be done in the proper manner. It was dumb to ask a person if they ever met a particular individual at the home of a now dead acquaintance. If it happened a few months ago, either they would say they've never met the person, or their description would be limited to a couple of cookie-cutter sentences.
Having a portrait of your suspect, though, was a different story. People were often somewhat more observant than even they realized. Many find that, after meeting a person just once, they can recognize them several decades later, and the vast majority have a fairly good memory of people they find attractive.
The face in my portrait was attractive. What was more, it was frankly beautiful, even despite having black holes for eyes but, all the same, none of my potential witnesses was able to remember the person it belonged to. And only when I had totally run out of hope that I would turn up anything, the concierge in the building where the dancer who jumped out a window had once lived suddenly gave a weak-sighted squint, staring at the pencil sketch, nodding very frequently.
"I remember this whelp!" He announced and hurriedly took a bulbous flask from his pocket. His hand shivering, he raised it to his lips and started sucking it down so greedily that his huge Adam's apple was jumping up and down. "I dream about those eyes," He whined after wiping his lips with the cuff of his uniform. "The horror!"
"These eyes?" I asked, confused after looking at the hatched eye sockets in the portrait.
"The very same!" The concierge confirmed and again started sucking away at the flask, which based on the smell, contained absinthe. "Cursed shadows!"
Lovers of the "green fairy" were nowhere near always in a good state of mind, and quite often confused hallucinations brought on by the drink with reality, but I believed this old man.
Shadows and eyes. Eyes and shadows.
I also remembered seeing something like that.
So, having decided not to waste any more time on nothing, I set off for the Charming Bacchante.
8
ALBERT BRANDT HAD SETTLED into a state of the greatest despondency. He finished all the wine, and now, with a pensive look was waving a glass of calvados, which had left oily traces down the wall of his glass.
"Are you drinking?"
I asked, simply to start the conversation.
"I am," the poet answered curtly.
"Your inspiration isn't back?"
"Not a gram of it. I feel full of mediocrity. I cannot write, and am not in the mood to read. I don't want to see anyone. Even you, Leo. Forgive me."
"You've gotta get the hell out of here!" I demanded, pulling the curtain aside. "Go out, blow off the cobwebs. I'll keep looking for your ring."
"And where do you suggest I go?" the poet asked in surprise, lying about with his legs on the couch.
"Wherever you normally go."
"Leo! I cannot bring Kira to a bordello!"
"And you shouldn't. I’m sure you’ve tormented her dreadfully with your... affection. Let her catch her breath."
Albert shook his head.
"She gets mad if I go on a walk and don't ask her."
"Go out the back door," I suggested and began lighting the gas fixtures, as it had already grown dark outside. "I'll deal with Kira."
"That sounded... like a double meaning. Don't you think?"
"Albert, you're not helping! Do you want me to look for your ring or not?" I flared up, rolling a dense Persian rug to the wall. "Look at yourself in the mirror. You look mangy, old friend. You need to get out of the house!"
The poet looked obediently at his reflection, thoughtfully rubbed his mangled pinkie finger and sighed.
"No, I don't want to. I don't want to do anything. Call Kira in, would you?"
"Don't you think you're becoming a bit too attached?"
"It's love!"
"You're right, it's love, not a marriage! She needs to take a break from you, and you simply need to take a break."
"I'm not tired."
"Drop the act!" I grew angry. "Go suffer and complain about your life in some shitty old tavern! You'll have a bigger audience!"
"I don't want to see anyone, Leo, listen to me! My inspiration has left me, and who am I without inspiration? Just more typical mediocrity!"
I took the bottle and tipped it over threateningly, preparing to pour the calvados onto the floor.
"You won't be drinking here."
The poet looked at me with disapproval.
"You asked me to find the class ring yourself," I reminded him. "Just let me help you, Albert."
"I cannot leave Kira."
"Just stop it! If you want, I could tell her that you went out to look for the class ring in all the pawn shops. After all, Kira knows how important it is to you."
"She does..."
"So, you see! You won't even have to lie. I'll do it for you. Or you could decide not to count on me and keep suffering in loneliness."
"You've convinced me!" Albert gave in. Without changing his old shirt, he donned his jacket, and grabbed his cane and top hat. But as soon as he went out the door, he looked back. "Tell Kira about the ring! Tell her I'll be back soon!" he said. "Will you?"
"I'll tell her your hemorrhoids are acting up," I snorted.
"That would be at your own risk! I couldn't even put two words together today, but when I sober up..."
"Scram!"
"Nice little suit, by the way," Albert suddenly noted and slunk out into the corridor.
I immediately set the rug aside, looked at my watch and stood in the doorway, leaning my shoulder against the jamb. I tossed a sugar-coated drop into my mouth, waited the five minutes I guessed it would take, then went down to the first floor.
The musicians, their clothes wrinkled, had just taken their seats. The stage was vacant, and the cabaret room had yet to fill up with people who'd come to party, so it was not difficult to find Kira. She was smoking by an open window.
"I'm coming, I'm coming!" the girl smiled when I appeared and pushed her cigarette out in the bottom of a porcelain dish. "Albert sent you, didn't he?"
"No," I shook my head. "Albert asked me not to tell you... and I wasn't going to, but I'm worried about him. Really worried."
"What has happened to him?" Kira grew alarmed.
"You see, he was struck with the idea that he knows where his ring is hidden and set off to get it. He didn't want to upset you, and even made me give my word that I wouldn't say anything, but I'm not feeling right about it for some reason..."
"To get the ring?" Kira was taken aback. "It was just lying around somewhere?!"
"I don't even know what fly bit him," I shrugged my shoulders, lost. "He let slip some mention of his connection with the bauble. I'm not sure it's just the drinking; he didn't seem like himself today!"
"You shouldn't have let him out," the girl grew gloomy. "You should have called me right away!
All I can do now is gesture helplessly."
"Am I my brother's keeper?" I quoted a book as old as it was forbidden, but Kira didn't pay my seditious turn of phrase any mind.
"You shouldn't have let him go," she repeated and bit her lip.
I turned to the stage where the presentation was supposed to be starting very soon and asked:
"I hope you don't need to reserve a table in advance?"
"What?" the girl shuddered. "No, you don't," she reassured me and hurried to disappear down the service corridor.
Without following her, I sat calmly at the nearest table and glanced at my time-piece. I waited for one minute more to give a break to my constantly hurting leg, and limped outside, where the darkness of evening was already growing denser. I did not stay long near the tables before the entry into the cabaret. I quickly walked past them and stood at the corner.
Soon, a figure enshrouded in a dark cloak appeared from the back door of the amusement facility and I secretly went after it.
On the narrow little streets, it was impossible to get through the revelers walking about in search of fun. Meanwhile, the kerosene lamps over the doors of the drinking establishments and the lamps behind the store windows practically did nothing to chase off the darkness, so I didn't have to try too hard to sneak. It was enough to simply move at the general rhythm of the street, keep my distance at a few dozen meters back and avoid well-lit places as much as possible. The only thing stopping me were the touts. Their job was to pick out carefree passers-by from the human stream and drag them into their den of sin.
But at least at first, the pursuit was reminiscent of a carefree night out. Further on, when the lively corners were behind us, I had to prowl, trying hard not to give myself away in the silence of the darkness-enshrouded skid row. The local inhabitants here had the custom of going to sleep with the coming of darkness, and only sometimes did you hear the noise of a late-night squabble or see a cloud of tobacco smoke rising up from a courtyard.
The neighborhood was changing gradually. The houses were becoming less and less well cared-for. The quality blinds were replaced with crisscrossing boards nailed onto window frames. The figure in the cloak was weaving confidently through the narrow alleys. It didn't stop even once in hesitation or turn back. All the same, I was in no rush to close the distance between us, even if that meant I was at risk of lagging behind and letting the gray dot melt into the impenetrable darkness.
I considered the risk justified. Just then, though, a rat jumped out from under my legs with an enraged squeak and I had to take shelter in a concealed pigeon-hole. When I decided to look back out a few seconds later, the street was already empty; I ran out to the intersection, but there was no one there.
Curses!
My hand involuntarily reached for my pistol, but it didn’t seem like an ambush. I had the sense that bad luck had waylaid me at the very end of my journey. Which meant...
I looked at the neighboring buildings and excluded out of hand the ones on the other side of the street, blackening the sky with their empty window frames and the holes in their leaky roofs. The nearest manors here were a bit better cared-for; I decided to check them first of all.
After noticing a broken board in a fence, I grabbed the one next to it, I put all my weight into it, and broke the rotten piece of wood with ease. A dull crack dissipated in the darkness of
the alley. The only one who would have been able to hear it was a guard dog, but I didn't hear any barks or chains. Just a lone cricket chirping not far away mixed with the far-off clanking of a steam tram's wheels on the rails.
I easily slipped into the hole I created and got behind the fence without even dirtying my jacket. With the board still in my hands, I walked up to the corner of the building, looked at the small, cluttered courtyard and carefully walked over to a window with broken blinds. I stood on my tip-toes and took a look inside, but the abandoned apartment was dominated by an impenetrable gloom.
Abandoned? It was indeed!
It's hard to miss the fact that a residence has been left by its inhabitants. It even starts to smell different. And here too, it was very easy to smell either some kind of damp or simply the after-smell of the despair that had once filled the home.
That's how it was here. No people. Even the omnipresent stray dogs didn't look into this building. One thing was for sure, too – not even a terrible head cold could save you from the stench that accompanied it.
A dud.
Without going inside, I went back out the fence and walked up to the next building. I tried to get near it from one side, but almost immediately hit upon a locked gate. I walked to the other corner and also found no success there. The stone fence merged into the wall of the neighboring manor, a fairly classy building.
A wildly successful artisan must have once lived here. But when the area started going into decline, and the trash on the streets piled up to the point it was hard to navigate, the whole family tree must have had to be moved to another neighborhood. Or maybe not. Maybe they latched onto this old place and stayed here until they realized that they themselves were no longer the same as they once were.
Squalor is not some infectious disease that strikes suddenly; squalor starts in the human heart.
Returning to the gate, I got down on my haunches and stuck my pinkie finger into the key-hole and turned it a bit. I pulled it out and, without particular surprise, noted an oil stain on the clean leather of my glove. Then I leaned a piece of board against the stone fence, slammed the toe of my shoe into it and lifted myself sharply upward. The piece of wood creaked, but it held out. Sometimes, it was good to be a lightweight! From there, I was able to climb onto the fence. I didn't stay up top for long, carefully jumping down into the courtyard. From there, I limped to the back door of the dilapidated manor, hissing from the pain in my leg.
