by Boris Akunin
‘Who’s there?’ asked a surprised voice.
‘Engineer Fandorin. Will you allow me to come in?’
‘What for?’
‘I’d like to t-talk to you.’
‘But I’m going to blow everything in here to pieces,’ said the voice, puzzled. ‘Didn’t you hear that? And then, how will you get in? I won’t open the door for anything.’
‘That’s all right, don’t worry. I’ll climb in through the window, just don’t shoot.’
Erast Petrovich nimbly hauled himself up and in through the window as far as his shoulders, then waited for a moment, so that the bomber could get a good look at his venerable grey hair, before creeping into the carriage slowly, very slowly.
Things looked bad: the young man in spectacles had thrust his revolver into his belt, and he was holding one of the black packages. In fact, he had already thrust his fingers inside it – Fandorin assumed he was clutching the glass detonator. One slight squeeze and the bomb would detonate, setting off the other seven. There they were, on the upper bunk, covered with sackcloth.
‘You don’t look like an engineer,’ said the youth, as pale as death, examining the dusty clothing of the false loader.
‘And you don’t look like a p-proletarian,’ Erast Petrovich parried.
The carriage had no compartments; it consisted of a long corridor with wooden benches on both sides. Unlike the people clamouring on the platform, the hostages were sitting quietly – they could sense the nearness of death. There was just a woman’s voice tearfully murmuring a prayer somewhere.
‘Quiet, you idiot, I’ll blow the whole place up!’ the youth shouted in a terrible deep voice, and the praying broke off.
He’s dangerous, extremely dangerous, Fandorin realised as he looked into the terrorist’s wide, staring eyes. He’s not playing for effect, not throwing a fit of hysterics – he really will blow us up.
‘Why the delay?’ asked Erast Petrovich.
‘Eh?’
‘I can see that you are not afraid of death. So why are you putting it off? Why don’t you crush the detonator? There is something stopping you. What?’
‘You’re strange,’ said the young man in glasses. ‘But you’re right … This is all wrong. It isn’t how it should all happen … I’m selling myself cheap. It’s frustrating. And she won’t get her ten thousand …’
‘Who, your mother? Who will she not get the money from, the Japanese?’
‘What mother!’ the youth cried, gesturing angrily. ‘Ah, what a wonderful plan it was! She would have racked her brains, wondered who did it, where it was from. Then she would have guessed and blessed my memory. Russia would have cursed me, but she would have blessed me!’
‘The one you love?’ Fandorin said with a nod, starting to understand. ‘She is unhappy, trapped, this money would save her, allow her to start a new life?’
‘Yes! You can’t imagine what a hideous abomination Samara is! And her parents and brothers! Brutes, absolute brutes! Never mind that she doesn’t love me, that’s all right! Who could love a living corpse, coughing up his own lungs? But I’ll reach out to her even from the next world, I’ll pull her out of the quagmire … That is, I would have done …’
The young man groaned and started shaking so violently that the black paper rustled in his hands.
‘She won’t get the money because you failed to blow up the bridge? Or the tunnel?’ Erast Petrovich asked quickly, keeping his eyes fixed on that deadly package.
‘A bridge, the Alexander Bridge. How do you know that? But what difference does it make? Yes, the samurai won’t pay. I shall die in vain.’
‘So you are doing all this because of her, for the ten thousand?’
The youth in glasses shook his head.
‘Not only that. I want to take revenge on Russia. It’s a vile, abominable country!’
Fandorin sat down on the bench, crossed his legs and shrugged.
‘You can’t do Russia any great harm now. Well, you’ll blow up the carriage. Kill and maim forty poor third-class passengers, and the lady of your heart will be left to languish in Samara.’ He paused to give the young man a chance to reflect on that, then said forcefully: ‘I have a better idea. You give me the explosive, and then the girl you love will get her ten thousand. And you can leave Russia to her fate.’
‘You’ll deceive me,’ the consumptive whispered.
‘No. I give you my word of honour,’ said Erast Petrovich, and he said it in a voice that made it impossible not to believe.
Patches of ruddy colour bloomed on the bomber’s cheeks.
‘I don’t want to die in a prison hospital. Better here, now.’
‘Just as you wish,’ Fandorin said quietly.
‘Very well. I’ll write her a note …’
The youth pulled a notebook out of his pocket and scribbled in it feverishly with a pencil. The parcel with the bomb was lying on the bench and now Fandorin could easily have grabbed it. But the engineer didn’t budge.
‘Only, please, be brief,’ he said. ‘I feel sorry for the passengers. After all, every second is torment for them. God forbid, someone might have a stroke.’
‘Yes, yes, just a moment …’
He finished writing, folded the page neatly and handed it over.
‘It has the name and address on it …’
Only then did Fandorin take the bomb and hand it out through the window, after first calling the gendarmes. The other seven followed it: the youth in glasses took hold of them carefully and handed them to Erast Petrovich, who lowered them out through the window.
‘And now go out, please,’ said the doomed man, cocking the hammer of his revolver. ‘And remember: you gave your word of honour.’
Looking into the youth’s bright-blue eyes, Erast Petrovich realised that it was pointless to try to change his mind, and walked towards the door.
The shot rang out behind his back almost immediately.
The engineer arrived back at home, feeling weary and sad, as the day was ending. At the station in Moscow he was handed a telegram from Petersburg: ‘All’s well that ends well but we need the Japanese I hope the ten thousand is a joke’.
That meant he would have to pay the Belle Dame sans merci of Samara out of his own pocket, but that was not why he was feeling sad – he simply could not stop thinking about the young suicide, with all his love and hate. And Erast Petrovich’s thoughts also kept coming back again and again to the man who had thought of a way to make practical use of someone else’s misery.
They hadn’t learned much about this resourceful individual from the arrested postman. Nothing new at all, really. They still had no idea where to look for the man. And it was even more difficult to predict at which point he would strike his next blow.
Fandorin was met in the doorway of his government apartment by his valet. Observing neutrality had been particularly difficult for Masa today. All the time his master was away, the Japanese had muttered sutras and he had even tried to pray in front of an icon, but now he was the very image of dispassion. He ran a quick glance over Erast Petrovich to see whether he was unhurt. Seeing that he was, Masa screwed his eyes up in relief and immediately said indifferently in Japanese:
‘Another letter from the head of the municipal gendarmes.’
The engineer frowned as he unfolded the note, in which Lieutenant General Charme insistently invited him to come to dinner today at half past seven. The note ended with the words: ‘Otherwise, I really shall take offence’.
Yesterday there had been an identical invitation, left without a reply for lack of time.
It was awkward. An old, distinguished general. And in an adjacent government department – he couldn’t offend him.
‘Wash, shave, dinner jacket, white tie, top hat,’ the engineer told his servant in a sour voice.
The third syllable, in which Rybnikov gives free rein to his passion
On 25 May, Glyceria Romanovna drove along the boulevard in vain – Vasya did not come. Thi
s upset her, but not too badly. First, she knew where to find him now, and secondly, she had something to do.
Lidina drove straight from the boulevard to see Konstantin Fyodorovich Charme at his place of work. The old man was absolutely delighted. He threw some officers or other with documents out of his office, ordered hot chocolate to be served and was generally very sweet with his old-fashioned gallantry.
It was not at all difficult to turn the conversation to Fandorin. After idle chat about their common acquaintances in St Petersburg, Glyceria Romanovna told him how she had nearly been caught up in the appalling crash on the bridge, with graphic descriptions of what she had seen and what she had been through. She dwelt in detail on the mysterious gentleman with grey temples who was in charge of the investigation.
Just as Lidina had calculated, this emphatic epithet had its effect.
‘He may be mysterious to you, but not to me,’ the general said with a condescending smile. ‘That’s Fandorin from the Petersburg Railway Gendarmerie. Highly intelligent man, cosmopolitan, a great original. He’s handling a very important case in Moscow at present. I have been warned that my collaboration might be required at any moment.’
Glyceria Romanovna’s heart sank: ‘an important case’. Poor Vasya!
But she gave no sign of her dismay. Instead, she pretended to be curious:
‘Cosmopolitan? A great original? Ah, dear Konstantin Fyodorovich, introduce me to him! I know nothing is impossible for you!’
‘No, no, don’t even ask. Erast Petrovich has a reputation as a heartbreaker. Could it be that even you have not remained indifferent to his marble features? Take care, I shall become jealous and have you put under secret surveillance,’ the general threatened her jokingly.
But, of course, his stubbornness did not last long – he promised to invite the Petersburgian to dinner that very evening.
Glyceria Romanovna put on her silvery dress, the one which, in her own mind, she called ‘fatale’, scented herself with sensuous perfume and even made up her eyes a little, something that she usually did not do. She looked so fine that for five minutes she simply couldn’t go out on to the stairs – she carried on admiring herself in the mirror.
But the odious Fandorin did not come. Lidina sat there all evening, listening to the flowery compliments of her host and the conversations of his boring guests.
As they were saying goodnight, Konstantin Fyodorovich spread his hands and shrugged.
‘Your mystery man didn’t come. He didn’t even condescend to answer my note.’
She tried to persuade the general not to be angry – perhaps Fandorin was on an important investigation. And she said:
‘You have such a lovely home! And your guests are all so wonderful. I tell you what, arrange another dinner tomorrow, with the same set. And write a bit more determinedly to Fandorin, so that he will definitely come. Do you promise?’
‘For the pleasure of seeing you in my home again, I would do anything. But why are you so interested in Fandorin?’
‘It’s not a matter of him,’ said Lidina, lowering her voice confidentially. ‘It’s just idle curiosity. A caprice, if you like. It’s simply that I’m very solitary now, I need to be out in society more. I didn’t tell you. I’m leaving Georges.’
The general appreciated being taken into her confidence. Glancing round at his tedious wife, he immediately suggested lunch out of town the next day, but Glyceria Romanovna quickly scotched that. And in point of fact, the general was quite content with a little moderate flirtation with the attractive young woman; he had brought up the subject of lunch at the Yar restaurant only out of habit, like an old, retired hussar steed champing at the bit when he hears the distant sound of the bugle.
The next day Fandorin did come, although he was late. And in effect, nothing more was required of him – Lidina had no doubts about how charming she was. Today she looked every bit as fine as yesterday. Even finer, because she’d had the idea of putting on an embroidered Mauritanian cap and lowering a transparent, absolutely ethereal veil from it across her face.
The strategy she chose was the simplest, but it was certain.
At first she did not look at him at all, but she was amiable with the most handsome of the guests – a horse guardsman who was the governor-general’s adjutant.
Later she reluctantly acceded to her host’s repeated requests to perform Mr Poigin’s audacious romance ‘Do not go, stay a while with me’, accompanying herself on the piano. Glyceria Romanovna’s voice was not very strong, but it had a very pleasant timbre and its effect on men was infallible. As she sang the passionate promise to ‘quench languorous love with caresses of fire’, she looked by turn at all the men, apart from Fandorin.
When she calculated that the subject should be in the required state of readiness – that is, he should by now be sufficiently intrigued and piqued – Lidina gathered herself to strike the final blow and even set off towards the causeuse on which Fandorin was sitting, but their host spoiled her plan.
He walked over to the guest and struck up an idiotic conversation about work, praising some railway gendarmes captain called Lisitsky, who had come to him recently with a very interesting proposal – to set up a permanent station at the municipal telephone exchange.
‘An excellent idea your subordinate had,’ the general rumbled. ‘That’s the gendarme spirit for you. It wasn’t the civilians in the Department who came up with it, but one of our own! I’ve already given instructions to allocate the apparatus required and a special room. Lisitsky said that the idea of eavesdropping on conversations was yours.’
‘Not “eavesdropping”, but “listening in”. And the staff captain is also being too modest. I had nothing to do with it.’
‘Perhaps you could lend him to me to get things started? A competent officer.’
Lidina sighed, realising that the assault would have to be postponed to a more convenient moment.
That moment arrived when the gentlemen followed the new-fangled custom of withdrawing to the smoking room before the meal. By that time Glyceria Romanovna had conclusively established herself as the queen of the evening, and the subject, of course, was not in the slightest doubt that he was the least attractive of all the squires in the present company. The fact that Fandorin kept glancing stealthily at his watch suggested that he was no longer anticipating any pleasure from the soirée, but was calculating when it would be acceptable for him to beat a retreat.
It was time!
She walked briskly (there was no point in delaying any further) up to the man with the greying dark hair, who was puffing on a small, aromatic cigar, and declared:
‘I remember! I remember where I’ve seen you before! At the bridge that was blown up. It’s not easy to forget such an unusual face.’
The investigator (or whatever it was he was called in his own department) started and fixed Lidina with the gaze of his slightly narrowed blue eyes – she had to confess that they went very well with his silver-shot hair. Anybody would have started at a compliment like that, especially when it was entirely unexpected.
‘Yes indeed,’ he said slowly, getting to his feet. ‘I recall that t-too. I think you were not alone, but with some army man …’
Glyceria Romanovna gestured carelessly.
‘He’s a friend of mine.’
It was too soon to start talking about Vasya. Not that she had any plan of action worked out in advance – she followed only her inspiration – but you should never, under any circumstances, let a man see that you wanted something from him. He should remain convinced that he was the one who wanted something and it lay in your will to give that precious something or not give it. You first had to arouse the hope, then take it away, then titillate his nostrils once again with that magical fragrance.
A clever woman who wished to bind a man to her could always sense to which type he belonged: those who sooner or later will have to be fed, or those who should remain eternally hungry – so that they will be more tractable.
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br /> On examining Fandorin more closely, Lidina immediately realised that he was not the Platonic admirer type. If he was led a dance for too long, he would simply shrug his shoulders and walk away.
Which meant that the problem shifted automatically from the tactical phase to the moral or, in unequivocal terms (and Lidina always tried to be supremely honest with herself), it could be formulated thus: could she carry her flirtation with this man all the way through – in order to save Vasya?
Yes, she was prepared for this sacrifice. Having realised that, Glyceria Romanovna experienced a strangely tender feeling and immediately set about justifying such a step.
First, it would not be debauchery, but the very purest self-sacrifice – and not even out of passionate infatuation, but out of selfless, sublimely exalted friendship.
Secondly, it would serve Astralov right – he deserved it.
Of course, if Fandorin had been fat, with warts and bad breath, there could have been no question of any such sacrifice, but although the anglicised investigator was no longer young, he was perfectly good-looking. In fact, more than merely good-looking …
This entire maelstrom of thoughts swept through Lidina’s mind in a single second, so there was no perceptible pause in the conversation.
‘I noticed that you haven’t taken your eyes off me all evening,’ she said in a low, vibrant voice, and touched his arm.
Of course he hadn’t! She had done everything to make sure that the guests could not forget her for a single moment.
The dark-haired man did not protest, but inclined his head honestly.
‘But I didn’t look at you. Not at all.’
‘So I n-noticed.’
‘Because I was afraid … I had the feeling that you didn’t turn up here purely by chance. That fate had brought us together. And that made me feel afraid.’
‘F-fate?’ he asked, with that barely perceptible stammer of his.
He had the right expression in his eyes – attentive and also, she thought, bewildered.
Lidina decided not to waste any time on pointless talk. There was no avoiding what had to be. And she plunged recklessly, head first, into the whirlpool.
