by Boris Akunin
Take O-Yumi from the scoundrel, and have done with it. Not listen to her, give her no time to collect her wits. Simply put her in the carriage and drive her away.
That would be honest and manly, the Russian way.
This was what he should have done at the very beginning, even before Bullcox had been transformed into an arch-villain. What did political conspiracies have to do with love? Nothing. O-Yumi must have been waiting for her beloved to do precisely this. But he had turned flabby, allowed his willpower to flag, got bogged down in despondency and self-pity.
To really do things right, he ought to have dressed up in ceremonial style – tails, top hat. starched shirt, as the importance of the occasion required – but he hadn’t wanted to waste a single minute.
The carriage hurtled along the cobbled streets of the Bluff and came to a dashing halt at property number 129. The coach driver removed his hat and opened the door, and the vice-consul descended slowly to the ground. He smoothed down his hair, and twisted up the ends of his moustache with a little brush – they were drooping slightly after his nocturnal adventures – and adjusted his tailcoat.
Well, God speed!
Once inside the wicket gate, he recalled Bullcox’s dogs. But the ferocious confrères of Cerberus were nowhere to be seen. They were probably chained up during the day.
Fandorin crossed the lawn with a firm tread. What about O-Yumi? She was probably still sleeping; after all, she didn’t go to bed until after dawn …
Before he could even touch the bell, the door swung open of its own accord. A haughty footman in livery was standing in the doorway. The titular counsellor handed him a card with a double-headed eagle on it:
* * *
Consulat de l’empire de la Russe
Eraste Pétrovich Fandorine
Vice-consul, Conseiller Titulaire
Yokohama, Bund, 6
* * *
Only the day before, Shirota had handed him an entire stack of these cards – freshly printed and still smelling of the press.
‘I require to see the Right Honourable Algernon Bullcox on urgent business.’
He knew perfectly well that Bullcox could not possibly be home. The Englishman must certainly have been informed already of the mysterious ‘suicide’ of his accomplice and, of course, he had gone dashing to Tokyo.
Erast Petrovich had even prepared the following respnse:
‘Ah, he is not here? Then please inform Miss O-Yumi that I am here. She is sleeping? She will have to be woken. This is a most pressing matter.’
But there was a surprise in store for Fandorin. The doorkeeper bowed as if everything was perfectly in order, asked him to come in and disappeared though a door leading out of the hallway to the left – from his previous, unofficial visit the vice-consul knew that was the location of the study.
Before Erast Petrovich had time to consider the possible implications, the Right Honourable in person came out of the study, wearing a smoking jacket and soft slippers and looking most serene altogether.
‘To what do I owe the pleasure, Mr … Fendorain?’ he asked, with a glance at the card. ‘Ah yes, I believe we are acquainted.’
What on earth was happening here? Midday already, and Suga’s body had not yet been discovered? Impossible!
Or it had been discovered, but Bullcox, a senior governmental adviser, had not been informed? Out of the question!
Or it had been discovered, but he had not been alarmed by the news? Absurd!
But a fact was a fact: Bullcox had preferred to stay at home. But why?
Erast Petrovich squinted through the half-open door of the study and saw a fire blazing in the hearth. So that was it! He was burning compromising documents! That meant he was really and truly alarmed! He really was an intelligent man. And far-sighted. He had caught the scent of danger!
‘Why do you not say anything?’ the Briton asked, frowning in annoyance. ‘What do you want?’
Fandorin moved the Right Honourable aside and walked into the study.
But there were no papers beside the fireplace, only a pile of dry branches.
‘What in damnation is the meaning of this?’ asked Bullcox, following him.
Erast Petrovich impolitely answered a question with a question:
‘Why have you lit a fire? It’s summer now?’
‘I heat the fireplace every morning with tamarisk branches. This is a new house, it’s damp. And I like the smell of smoke … Listen here, sir, you are behaving very strangely. We are hardly even acquainted! Explain to me immediately what is going on! What was your purpose in coming here?’
There was absolutely nothing to lose now, and Fandorin took the plunge, head first into the whirlpool.
‘To take away the lady whom you are holding here by force!’
Bullcox’s jaw dropped and he started batting his eyelashes, as ginger as his curly locks.
But the titular counsellor, who, in the French expression, avait déjà jeté son bonnet par-dessus le Moulin, that is, effectively, he had thrown caution to the wind, proceeded to attack, which, as everyone knows, is the best form of defence in a poor position.
‘Intimidating a woman is ignoble and unworthy of a gentleman! But then, what kind of gentleman are you? Out of my way, I’m going to her!’
He tried to walk past, but Bullcox blocked his way and grabbed him by the lapels.
‘I’ll kill you like a mad dog,’ hissed the Englishman, whose own eyes had turned quite rabid.
Erast Petrovich replied in an equally predatory hiss:
‘Kill me? Yourself? Oh, hardly. You wouldn’t have the courage. You’re more likely to send the “Stealthy Ones”.’
And he pushed his rival with his uncommonly well-trained arms – so hard that the Right Honourable went flying away and knocked over a chair.
The footman looked in at the crash, and his long English features stretched out even longer.
‘What “Stealthy Ones”?’ the Briton exclaimed, stunned. ‘You’re a raving lunatic! I’ll file a note of complaint with your government!’
‘Go right ahead!’ Fandorin growled in Russian.
He tried to run up the stairs, but Bullcox darted after him. He grabbed the Russian by his coat-tail and pulled him back down.
The vice-consul swung round and saw that the senior governmental adviser had assumed a boxer’s stance.
Well, boxing was not jujitsu, Erast Petrovich had no cause to be shy here.
He readied himself too: left fist forward, right fist covering the chin.
The first skirmish ended in a draw, with all the blows struck being parried.
In the second clash the vice-consul took a strong poke to the body, but replied with a rather good left hook.
Here the fight was interrupted by a female voice that exclaimed:
‘Algie? What’s going on?’
O-Yumi was standing on the landing of the staircase in her nightshirt, with a silk shawl on top. Her loose hair was scattered across her shoulders and the sunlight was shining through it.
Erast Petrovich choked.
‘It’s the Russian!’ Bullcoxs exclaimed excitedly. ‘He’s gone insane! He claims that I’m keeping you here by force. I decided to bring the blockhead to his senses.’
O-Yumi started moving down the steps.
‘What’s wrong with your ear, Algie? It’s all puffy and red. You need to put some ice on it.’
The familial, domestic tone in which these words were spoken, the name ‘Algie’, spoken twice, and – above all – the fact that she hadn’t even looked at him, made Erast Petrovich feel as if he had tumbled impetuously over a precipice.
It was hard to breathe, let alone to speak, but Fandorin turned to O-Yumi and forced out a few hoarse words:
‘Just one word. Only one. Me – or – him?’
Bullcox apparently also wanted to say something, but his voice failed him.
Both boxers stood and watched as the black-haired woman walked down the stairs in her light outfit with
the sun shining through it.
She reached the bottom and glanced upwards reproachfully at Erast Petrovich. And said with a sigh:
‘What a question. You, of course … Forgive me, Algie. I was hoping everything would end differently for us, but clearly it was not to be.’
The Briton was absolutely crushed. He started blinking, looking from O-Yumi to Fandorin and back again. The Right Honourable’s lips trembled, but he still couldn’t find any words.
Suddenly Bullcox shouted something inarticulate and went dashing up the steps.
‘Let’s run!’ said O-Yumi, grabbing the titular counsellor by the hand and pulling him after her towards the door.
‘What f-for?’
‘His armoury room is upstairs!’
‘I’m not afraid!’ Erast Petrovich declared, but the slim hand jerked him with such surprising strength that he barely managed to stay on his feet.
‘Let’s run!’
She dragged the titular counsellor along, and he kept looking back, across the lawn. The beautiful woman’s hair fluttered in the wind, the hem of her nightdress flapped and ballooned, the backs of her velvet slippers slapped loudly.
‘Yumi! For God’s sake!’ a voice called from somewhere high up.
Bullcox leaned out of a first-floor window, waving a hunting carbine.
Fandorin tried, as far as he could, to cover the woman running in front of him with his own body. A shot rang out, but the bullet missed by a wide margin, he didn’t hear it whine.
Looking back again, the titular counsellor saw the Englishman settling his eye to the carbine again, but even at this distance he could see the barrel wobbling – the gunman’s hands were shaking wildly.
He didn’t need to shout to the driver to set off. He had already set off, in fact, immediately after the first shot – without bothering to wait for his passengers. He just lashed the horses, pulled his head down into his shoulders and didn’t look back.
Erast Petrovich opened the door on the run, grabbed his companion round the waist and threw her inside. Then he jumped up on to the seat himself.
‘I dropped my shawl and lost one slipper!’ O-Yumi exclaimed. ‘Ah, how interesting!’ Her eyes were wide open and glittering brightly. ‘Where are we going, my darling?’
‘To my place at the consulate!’
She whispered:
‘That means we have an entire ten minutes. Close the blind.’
Fandorin did not notice how they reached the Bund. He was brought round by a knock at the window. Apparently someone had been knocking for a while, but he hadn’t heard them straight away.
‘Sir, sir,’ said a voice outside, ‘we’re here … You might add on a bit, for a fright like that.’
The titular counsellor opened the door slightly and thrust a silver dollar out through the crack.
‘Here you are. And wait.’
He managed more or less to tidy up his suit.
‘Poor Algie,’ O-Yumi said with a sigh. ‘I wanted so much to leave him according to all the rules. You’ve gone and spoilt the whole thing. Now his heart will be filled with bitterness and hate. But never mind. I swear that for us everything will end beautifully, in proper jojutsu fashion. You’ll have very, very good memories of me, we’ll separate in the “Autumn Leaf” style.’
The loveliest gift.
A tree gives is its last one –
A gold autumn leaf
INSANE HAPPINESS
‘So, that night you rejected me only because you wanted to separate from “poor Algie” according to all the r-rules?’ asked Erast Petrovich, looking at her mistrustfully. ‘That was the only reason?’
‘Not the only one. I really am afraid of him. Did you notice his left earlobe?’
‘What?’ Fandorin thought he must have misheard.
‘From the shape, length and colour of his earlobe, it’s clear that he is a very dangerous man.’
‘There you go with your ninso again! You’re just laughing at me!’
‘I counted ten dead bodies on his face,’ she said quietly. ‘And those are only the ones he killed with his own hands.’
Fandorin didn’t know whether she was being serious or playing the fool. Or rather, he wasn’t absolutely certain that she was playing the fool. And so he asked with a laugh:
‘Can you see dead bodies on my face?’
‘Of course. Every time one man takes the life of another, it leaves a scar on his soul. And everything that happens in the soul is reflected on the face. You have those traces as well. Do you want me to tell you how many people you have killed?’ She held out her hand and touched his cheekbones with her fingers. ‘One, two, three …’
‘St-stop it!’ he said, pulling away. ‘Better tell me more about Bullcox instead.’
‘He doesn’t know how to forgive. Apart from the ten that he killed himself, I saw other traces, people for whose deaths he was responsible. There are a lot of them. Far more than there are of the first kind.’
The titular counsellor leaned forward despite himself.
‘You mean you can see that too?’
‘Yes, it’s not hard to read a killer’s face, it’s moulded so starkly, with sharp contrasts of colour.’
‘Positively Lombroso,’ murmured Erast Petrovich, touching himself on the cheekbone. ‘No, no, it’s nothing, go on.’
‘The people with the most marks on their faces are front-line generals, artillery officers and, of course, executioners. But the most terrible scars I have ever seen, quite invisible to ordinary people, were on a very peaceable, wonderful man, the doctor in a brothel where I used to work.’
O-Yumi said it as calmly as if she were talking about a perfectly ordinary job – as a seamstress or milliner.
Fandorin felt his insides cringe and he went on hastily, so that she wouldn’t notice anything.
‘A doctor? How strange.’
‘It’s not strange at all. Over the years he had helped thousands of girls get rid of their fetuses. Only the doctor had fine, light marks, like ripples on water, but Algie’s are deep and bloody. How could I not be afraid of him?’
‘He won’t do anything to you,’ the titular counsellor said sombrely but firmly. ‘He won’t have time. Bullcox is finished.’
She looked at him in fearful admiration.
‘You’re going to kill him first, are you?’
‘No,’ replied Erast Petrovich, opening the blind and peering cautiously at Doronin’s windows. ‘Any day now Bullcox will be expelled from Japan. In disgrace. Or perhaps even put in prison.’
In was lunchtime. Shirota, as usual, must have taken his ‘captain’s daughter’ to the table d’hôte at the Grand Hotel, but – dammit! – there was a familiar figure hovering in the window of the consul’s apartment. Vsevolod Vitalievich was standing there with his arms folded, looking straight at the carriage stuck there at the gates.
The very idea of leading O-Yumi across the yard, in a state of undress, and with only one shoe, was quite unthinkable.
‘What are we waiting for?’ she asked. ‘Let’s go! I want to settle into my new home as quickly as possible. Your place is so uncomfortable as it is!’
But they couldn’t sneak in like thieves either. O-Yumi was a proud woman, she would feel insulted. And wouldn’t he cut a fine figure, embarrassed of the woman he loved!
I’m not embarrassed, Erast Petrovich told himself. It’s just that I need to prepare myself. That is one. And she is not dressed. That is two.
‘Wait here for now,’ he told her. ‘I’ll be back in a moment.’
He walked across the yard with a brisk, businesslike stride, but he squinted sideways at Doronin’s window anyway. He saw Vsevolod Vitalievich turn away with a certain deliberate emphasis. What could that mean?
Clearly he must already know about Suga, and he realised that Fandorin had been involved in some way; waiting at the window was a way of reminding the vice-consul about himself and showing how impatient he was to hear a few explanations; his demonstrativ
e indifference made it clear that he did not intend to demand these explanations – the titular counsellor would decide when the time was right.
Very subtle, very noble and most apposite.
Masa was standing outside the cupboard, as motionless as a Chinese stone idol.
‘Well, what has he been like?’ Erast Petrovich asked, gesturing to clarify the meaning of the gesture.
His servant reported with the help of mime and gesture: first he cried, then he sang, then he fell asleep, he had to be given the chamber pot once.
‘Well done,’ the vice-consul said approvingly. ‘Kansisuru. Itte kuru.’
That meant: ‘Guard. I go away.’
He looked into his room for a second and went back quickly to the carriage. He opened the door slightly.
‘You are not dressed and have no shoes,’ he said to the charming passenger, setting down a sack of Mexican silver on the seat beside her. ‘Buy yourself some clothes. And, in general, everything that you think you need. And these are my cards with the address. If you need to have something taken in or whatever, I don’t know, leave one with the shop assistant, they’ll deliver it. When you get back, you can settle in. You are the mistress of the house.’
O-Yumi touched the jingling sack with a smile, but without any great interest, thrust out a little bare foot and stroked Erast Petrovich on the chest with it.
‘Ah, what a dunce I am!’ he exclaimed. ‘You can’t even go into a shop in that state!’
He glanced furtively over his shoulder at the consulate and squeezed her slim ankle.
‘Why would I go inside?’ O-Yumi laughed. ‘They’ll bring everything I need to the carriage.’
The anti-Bullcox coalition, assembled at full strength, held its meeting in the office of the head of the municipal police. Somehow it turned out that the role of chairman had passed to Asagawa, although he had not been appointed by anyone. The Russian vice-consul, previously acknowledged by all as the leader, ceded his primacy quite willingly. First, having abandoned his brothers-in-arms for the sake of a private matter, Erast Petrovich had, as it were, forfeited his moral right to lead them. And secondly, he knew that his mind and heart were preoccupied with a quite different matter just at the moment. And that matter happened to be a most serious one, which could not be dealt with half-heartedly.
