The Turkish Gambit

by Boris Akunin

  Lukan shook his head, straightened up, and rubbed his temple. He looked from one of them to the other. What astounded Varya most of all was that all three of them seemed to have completely forgotten that she even existed.

  “Am I being challenged to a duel?” The Romanian forced the French words out hoarsely, as though with a great effort. “Both of you at once? Or one at a time?”

  “Choose whichever you like the look of,” Paladin replied coolly. “And if you’re lucky with the first, you’ll have the second to deal with.”

  “O-oh no,” the count objected. “That won’t do. I was the first to bring up the subject of his hide, and I’m the one he’ll go shooting with.”

  “Shooting?” Lukan exclaimed with an unpleasant laugh. “Oh no, Mister Cardsharp, the choice of weapons is mine. I know perfectly well that you and Monsieur Scribbler here are crack shots. But this is Romania, and we’ll fight our way, the Wallachian way.”

  He turned toward the watching crowd and shouted something, at which several Romanian officers promptly drew their sabers from their scabbards and held them out hilt-first.

  “I choose Monsieur Journalist,” said the colonel, cracking his knuckles and laying a hand on the handle of his saber. He was growing more sober and more elated even as they watched. “Choose any of these swords you like and be so kind as to follow me out into the yard. First I’ll skewer you, and then I’ll slice off this brawler’s ears.”

  There was a murmur of approval in the crowd and someone even shouted, “Bravo!”

  Paladin shrugged and took hold of the nearest saber.

  McLaughlin pushed his way through the idle onlookers.

  “Stop this! Charles, you must be insane! This is barbarous! He’ll kill you! Fighting with sabers is the Balkan national sport—you don’t have the skill.”

  “I was taught to fence with a spadroon, and that’s almost the same thing,” the Frenchman replied imperturbably, weighing the blade in his hand.

  “Gentlemen, don’t!” said Varya, at last recovering her voice. “This is all because of me. The colonel had taken a little drink, but he did not mean to offend me, I am sure. Stop this immediately, it’s absolutely absurd! Think of the position you are putting me in!” Her voice trembled piteously, but her entreaty fell on deaf ears.

  Without even glancing at the lady whose honor was the reason for all the commotion, the knot of men trooped off down the corridor, talking excitedly, in the direction of the small inner courtyard. Varya was left alone with McLaughlin.

  “This is stupid,” he said angrily. “Spadroons, he says! I’ve seen the way the Romanians handle a saber. They don’t assume the third position and say ‘en garde.’ They slice you up like blood sausage. Oh, what a writer will be lost—because of that idiotic French conceit. And it won’t do that turkey-cock Lukan’s prospects any good, either. They’ll stick him in jail and there he’ll stay until the victory’s won and an amnesty’s signed. Back in Britain—”

  “My God, my God, what can I do,” Varya muttered in dismay, not listening to him. “I’m the one to blame for everything.”

  “Flirting, madam, is certainly a great sin,” the Irishman unexpectedly agreed. “Ever since the Trojan war—”

  She heard a throng of male voices howl in the courtyard.

  “What’s happening? Surely it can’t be over already?” Varya cried, clutching at her heart. “So quickly! Go and take a look, Seamus. I beg you!”

  The correspondent said nothing. He was listening, his genial features set in a mask of alarm. McLaughlin clearly did not wish to go out into the yard.

  “What are you waiting for?” said Varya, trying to stir him into action. “Maybe he needs medical assistance. Oh, you’re useless!”

  She darted into the corridor and saw Zurov coming toward her, his spurs jangling.

  “Oh, what a terrible shame, Varvara Andreevna,” he shouted out to her from a distance. “What an irreparable loss!”

  She slumped against the wall in black despair and her chin began to tremble.

  “How on earth could we Russians have allowed ourselves to abandon the tradition of dueling with sabers,” Hippolyte continued with his lament. “Such brilliance and pageantry, such elegance! Not just a bang and a puff of smoke and that’s the end of it. Why it’s a ballet, a poem, the Fountain of Bakhchisarai!”

  “Stop babbling, Zurov!” Varya sobbed. “Tell us what’s happened!”

  “Oh, you should have seen it!” said the captain, gazing excitedly at Varya and McLaughlin. “It was all over in ten seconds. Just imagine the scene. A dark, gloomy courtyard. The broad flagstones lit by lanterns. We spectators are up on the gallery with only Paladin and Luke down below. The Romanian vaults to and fro, brandishing his saber and tracing out a figure eight in the air, tosses up an oak leaf and slices it in half. The audience applauds in delight. The Frenchman simply stands there, waiting for our peacock to stop his strutting. Then Luke bounded forward, embellishing the atmosphere with a treble clef, but without even moving from the spot Paladin leaned backward to dodge the blow and then, with such lightning speed that I couldn’t even see how he did it, he flicked the cutting edge of his sword right across the Romanian’s throat. Luke gurgled a little, fell flat on his face, jerked his legs a couple of times, and that was it. Retired without a pension. End of the duel.”

  “Did they check? Is he dead?” the Irishman asked quickly.

  “Dead as dead can be,” the hussar assured him. “The blood would have filled Lake Ladoga. Why, Varvara Andreevna, you’re upset! You look as pale as a ghost! Here, come lean against me.” And he promptly slipped his arm round Varya’s waist, which in the circumstances was entirely appropriate.

  “What about Paladin?” she murmured.

  Zurov edged his hand a little higher, as though inadvertently, and said with a casual air: “What about him? He’s gone to the commandant’s office to hand himself in. That’s the way it goes, you know; nobody’s going to give him a pat on the back for this. That was no junior cadet he killed, it was a colonel. They’ll pack him off back to France at the very least. Why don’t I unfasten one of your buttons so you can breathe more easily?”

  Varya couldn’t see or hear a thing. I’m disgraced, she thought. She had forfeited the name of a respectable woman forever. She had bungled her spying, played with fire, and now look where it had got her. She was far too frivolous—and men were all beasts. Someone had been killed because of her. And she would never see Paladin again. But the worst thing of all was that the thread leading into the enemy’s web had been snapped.

  What would Erast Petrovich say?

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  In which Varya

  sees the angel of death

  THE GOVERNMENT HERALD (St. Petersburg)

  30 July (11 August) 1877

  Defying excruciating bouts of epidemic gastritis and bloody diarrhea, our Sovereign has spent the last few days visiting hospitals that are filled to overflowing with typhus victims and the wounded. His Imperial Majesty’s heartfelt sympathy for their suffering is so sincere that these scenes bring an involuntary glow to the heart. The soldiers throw themselves on their gifts with all the naive joy of little children, and the author of these lines has on several occasions witnessed the Emperor’s wonderful blue eyes moistened with a tear. It is impossible to observe such occasions without experiencing a peculiarly tender reverence.

  WHAT ERAST PETROVICH SAID WAS THIS:

  “You took quite a long time getting back, Varvara Andreevna, and you have missed some very interesting developments. The moment I received your telegram, I gave orders for a thorough search to be made of the dead man’s tent and personal belongings, but nothing of any particular interest was found. The day before yesterday, however, the papers found on Lukan were delivered from Bucharest. And what d-do you think?”

  Varya apprehensively raised her eyes to look the titular counselor in the face for the first time. But she detected no pity or—which would have been even worse—scorn i
n Fandorin’s expression, only concentration and something very like excitement. Her initial relief was immediately succeeded by a sense of shame: She had taken her time because she dreaded coming back to the camp. She had sniveled and moped about her precious reputation and not given a single thought to the cause. What an appalling egotist!

  “Tell me, then!” she urged Fandorin, who was observing with interest the tear slowly sliding down Varya’s cheek.

  “I beg your gracious forgiveness for involving you in such an unpleasant business,” Erast Petrovich said contritely. “I expected almost anything, b-but not—”

  “What have you discovered in Lukan’s papers?” Varya interrupted him angrily, feeling that if the conversation didn’t change direction immediately she was certain to burst into tears.

  Fandorin either guessed what might happen or simply decided that the subject was closed, but in any case he made no attempt to delve any further into the Bucharest episode.

  “Some extremely interesting entries in his notebook. Here, take a look.”

  He took a fancy little book bound in brocade out of his pocket and opened it at a page with a bookmark. Varya ran her eyes down the column of numbers and letters:

  19—Z – 1500

  20—Z – 3400 – i

  21—J + 5000 Z – 800

  22—Z – 2900

  23—J + 5000 Z – 700

  24—Z – 1100

  25—J + 5000 Z – 1000

  26—Z – 300

  27—J + 5000 Z – 2200

  28—Z – 1900

  29—J + 15000 Z + i

  She read it through again more slowly, and then again. She wanted desperately to demonstrate her keen acumen.

  “Is it a cipher? No, the numbers run consecutively . . . A list? The numbers of regiments? Numbers of troops? Perhaps casualties and reinforcements?” Varya chattered, wrinkling her forehead. “So Lukan was a spy after all? But what do the letters mean—Z, J, i? Or perhaps they are formulas or equations?”

  “You flatter the departed, Varvara Andreevna. It is all much simpler than that. If these are equations, then they are extremely simple. But with one unknown.”

  “Only one?” Varya asked, astonished.

  “Take a closer look. The first c-column, of course, consists of dates. Lukan follows them with a long dash. From the nineteenth to the twenty-ninth of July in the Western style. How was the colonel occupied on those days?”

  “How should I know? I didn’t follow him around.” Varya thought for a moment. “Well, he was probably in the staff building, and perhaps he visited the forward positions.”

  “I never once saw Lukan visit the forward positions. In fact, I really only ever came across him in one place.”

  “In the club?”

  “Precisely. And what did he do there?”

  “Nothing—he played cards.”

  “B-bravo, Varvara Andreevna.”

  She glanced at the page again.

  “So he kept notes of his gambling accounts! Z is always followed by a minus sign, and J always by a plus sign. So he marked his losses with the letter Z and his winnings with the letter J? Is that all?” Varya shrugged in disillusionment. “What has that got to do with espionage?”

  “There was no espionage. Espionage is a high art, but here we are dealing with elementary bribery and treason. The swashbuckling Zurov appeared in the club on the nineteenth of July, the day before the first assault on Plevna, and Lukan was drawn into the game.”

  “That means Z is Zurov!” Varya exclaimed. “Wait a moment . . .” She began whispering to herself, gazing at the figures. “Forty-nine . . . carry seven . . . A hundred and four . . .” She summed up: “In all, he lost 15,800 rubles to Zurov. That seems about right—Hippolyte also said something about fifteen thousand. But then what is the ‘i’?”

  “I p-presume that is the infamous diamond ring—’inel’ in Romanian. Lukan lost it on the twentieth of July and on the twenty-ninth he won it back again.”

  “But then who is ‘J’?” Varya asked, rubbing her forehead. “I don’t think there was any J among the card players. And Lukan won . . . mmm . . . Oho!—thirty-five thousand rubles from this man. I don’t recall the colonel ever having such large winnings. He would have been certain to brag about it.”

  “This was nothing to brag about. Those are not his winnings, they are his fee for treason. The first time the m-mysterious J paid the colonel was on the twenty-first of July, when Zurov completely cleaned Lukan out. After that the deceased received sums of f-five thousand from his unknown patron on the twenty-third, twenty-fifth, and twenty-seventh, that is, every second day. That was how he was able to carry on playing with Hippolyte. On the twenty-ninth of July Lukan received fifteen thousand all at once. The question is, why so much, and why precisely on the twenty-ninth?”

  “He sold the plan of battle for the second assault on Plevna!” Varya gasped. “The disastrous assault took place the next day, on the thirtieth.”

  “Bravo yet again. And there you have the secret of Lukan’s much-vaunted perspicacity, and the incredible accuracy of the Turkish gunners, who shelled our columns by map coordinates while they were still making their approach.”

  “But who is J? You must have some suspect in mind, surely?”

  “Well, of course,” Fandorin muttered indistinctly. “I er . . . have my suspicions. But the pieces don’t all fit together yet.”

  “But it means that all we have to do is find this J and then they’ll let Petya go, take Plevna, and the war will be over?”

  Erast Petrovich thought for a moment, wrinkling his smooth forehead, and said quite seriously: “The sequence of your logic is not entirely beyond reproach, but in principle it is quite correct.”

  VARYA DID NOT DARE show up at the press club that evening. She was sure everyone there must blame her for Lukan’s death (after all, they didn’t know about his treason) and the banishment of the universal favorite, Paladin, who had not returned from Bucharest. According to Erast Petrovich, the duelist had been arrested and ordered to leave the territory of the principality of Romania within twenty-four hours.

  Hoping to run into Zurov or at least McLaughlin and find out from them just how censoriously public opinion was inclined to regard her criminal self, poor Varya strolled in circles around the marquee with its brightly colored pennants, maintaining a distance of a hundred paces from it. She had absolutely nowhere else to go, and she certainly didn’t want to go back to her own tent. Those wonderful but limited creatures, the sisters of mercy, would start up their interminable discussions about which of the doctors was a sweetheart and which was an ogre, and whether the one-armed Lieutenant Strumpf from Ward Sixteen was serious when he proposed to Nastya Pryanishnikova.

  The flap of the marquee fluttered and Varya glimpsed a stocky figure in a blue gendarme’s uniform. She hastily turned away, pretending to admire the quite wretched view of the village of Bogot, home to the commander in chief’s headquarters. Where, she wondered, was the justice in it all? That base schemer and thug Kazanzaki could visit the club without the slightest fuss, while she—essentially an innocent victim of circumstances—was left loitering outside in the dust like some kind of homeless dog! Varya shook her head in violent indignation and had just made her mind up to drop the whole business and go home when she heard the odious Greek’s ingratiating voice call out behind her: “Miss Suvorova! What a pleasant surprise.”

  Varya swung around and assumed a sour look, certain the lieutenant colonel’s unusual politeness was merely the prelude to the venomous strike of a serpent.

  Kazanzaki looked at her, stretching his thick lips into a smiling expression that was almost ingratiating.

  “All the talk in the club is of nothing but you. Everyone is impatient to see you. After all, it’s not every day that swords are crossed over a beautiful lady, and with a fatal outcome, too.”

  Varya frowned suspiciously, anticipating some trick, but the gendarme only smiled all the more sweetly.

&
nbsp; “Only yesterday Count Zurov gave us a quite brilliantly colorful account of the entire escapade, and now this article today—”

  “What article?” Varya asked, seriously alarmed.

  “Haven’t you heard? Our disgraced Paladin has excelled himself, filling an entire page in the Revue Parisienne with a description of the duel. Very romantic it is, too. You are referred to exclusively as ’la belle mademoiselle S.’ ”

  “Do you mean to say,” Varya asked in a voice that trembled slightly, “that no one blames me?”

  Kazanzaki raised his immensely thick eyebrows.

  “No, apart, perhaps, from McLaughlin and Eremei Perepyolkin. But everybody knows McLaughlin is an old grouch, and Perepyolkin rarely comes unless he’s with Sobolev. By the way, Perepyolkin was awarded the medal of St. George for the last action. Now, what on earth did he do to deserve that? It just goes to show how important it is to be in the right place at the right time.”

  The lieutenant colonel smacked his lips enviously and cautiously broached the subject that interested him most: “Everybody’s wondering where the heroine of the episode could have disappeared to, but it appears that our heroine is occupied with important state business. Well, now, what does the subtle Mr. Fandorin have in mind? What hypotheses does he entertain concerning Lukan’s mysterious notes? Don’t be surprised, Varvara Andreevna. After all, I am the head of the special section.”

  So that’s it, Varya thought to herself, looking at the lieutenant colonel sullenly. I told you so. He likes to have his work done for him.

  “Erast Petrovich tried to explain something to me, but I didn’t really understand it,” she told him with a naive flutter of her eyelashes. “Something to do with a ‘Z’ and a ‘J.’ You really ought to ask the titular counselor yourself. In any case, Pyotr Afanasievich is not guilty of anything, at least that much is now clear.”

  “He may not be guilty of treason, but he is most certainly guilty of criminal negligence.” The gendarme’s voice had assumed its familiar steely ring. “It’s best that your fiancé stays in jail for the time being—no harm will come to him there.” But then Kazanzaki immediately changed his tone, evidently recalling that today he was playing a very different role. “Everything will be all right, Varvara Andreevna. I’m not proud and I’m always willing to admit my mistakes. Take, for instance, the peerless Monsieur Paladin. I admit I interrogated him and I suspected him—there were good grounds for it. Because of his famous interview with the Turkish colonel, our command made a mistake and people died. My hypothesis was that Colonel Ali-bei was a mythical character invented by the Frenchman, out of either journalistic vanity or other, less innocent, considerations. Now I see that I was unfair to him.” He lowered his voice confidentially. “We have received information from agents in Plevna. Osman Pasha really does have a certain Ali-bei as either his deputy or his adviser. He almost never appears in public. Our man only saw him from a distance; all he could make out was a bushy black beard and dark glasses. Paladin mentioned the beard, too, by the way.”