by Boris Akunin
He looked round defiantly at everyone with his inflamed eyes and walked out, still laughing triumphantly.
‘Stop! Come back immediately!’ Prospero shouted after him.
In vain.
‘What this Lermontov deserves is a good box on the ear,’ Horatio declared pensively, stroking his Van Dyke beard.
White with fury, Caliban brandished his clenched fist.
‘Impudent, cocky, puffed-up little polack! How dare he compare himself with Lermontov! The impostor!’
‘Lermontov was impudent and cocky too,’ Cyrano remarked. ‘It will be a pity if the boy does anything stupid. He really is exceptionally talented. Lermontov was killed by someone else, but this one wants to climb into the grave himself.’
They left feeling subdued, in fact almost crushed.
Columbine had an uneasy, wretched feeling now, not at all like the one she had had before the meeting as she walked slowly through the evening streets. The stupid, arrogant boy, she thought. Prospero is absolutely right. How can the ludicrous croakings of a hoarse tramp be taken for a Sign from the Eternal Bride? And he’s sure to kill himself, he won’t back down, if only out of pride. And what a loss that would be for Russian literature, which had already lost its most gifted poetess only a few days earlier!
Columbine stopped on the boulevard, feeling that she couldn’t simply walk home and go to bed as if nothing had happened
Gdlevsky had to be stopped. By any means, at any price!
But how? What could she do?
She knew his address. One day shortly after she became a member, Gdlevsky had told her that his parents lived in Kolomna, but he had transferred to a Moscow grammar school for the final year of study, and he rented a room in Kleinfeld’s apartments on Maslovka Street. The boy had been terribly proud of the fact that he lived on his own, like a grown-up.
Well what if she did go to his place, then what? Why would he listen to Columbine if Prospero himself had been unable to stop him? Now even the Doge carried no authority for him. Why, of course not, Gdlevsky was a ‘Chosen One’, a ‘genius’!
What should she do?
The answer came to mind quickly.
Among the ‘lovers’ there was only one man capable of stopping the crazed poet doing something foolhardy. Even by force, if necessary. Genji! Of course, he always knew what to do. How unfortunate that he had gone out and not heard the schoolboy’s monologue right to the end!
She had to go to see Genji immediately, without wasting a moment. She just hoped he would be at home. Gdlevsky would not kill himself until he had written his farewell poem, so she might be in time.
She knew the Japanese prince’s approximate address. Hadn’t Genji told her he had moved from Ascheulov Lane to the officers’ building at the Spassky Barracks?
The cabdriver delivered the agitated young lady to Spasskaya-Sadovaya Street and pointed to a long building painted official pale yellow. ‘That’s it, the officers’ block.’
But it proved difficult to find the right room, because she did not know the tenant’s name. Columbine described Genji in detail to the doorkeeper, not forgetting to mention the stammer and the grey temples. She said she’d put his card somewhere and couldn’t find it, that she had a terrible memory for names – she could remember addresses, but names eluded her. She needed to see the gentleman she had described on a matter of the utmost urgency. The black-bearded doorkeeper heard her out without saying a word and, of course, he didn’t believe her. He looked the agitated girl over from head to toe, chewed on his lips and declared.
‘How do we know, perhaps His Excellency will give us the rough side of his tongue for a visit like this. This is a barracks, young lady, strangers aren’t allowed.’
‘His Excellency!’ So there was no mistake, Genji hadn’t deceived her and he did live here. Columbine was so delighted that she wasn’t even offended by the insulting remark. Let Blackbeard think that she was some kind of impertinent admirer or demi-mondaine – what difference did that make?
Columbine had mastered very well the lesson in dealing with the tribe of yard keepers and doorkeepers that she had once learned from Genji.
‘No, he won’t,’ she said confidently. ‘He’ll reward you for it. And meanwhile, take this.’
And she handed the attendant a rouble.
Cerberus immediately stopped growling and started wagging his tail. He put the banknote away in his peaked cap and told her: ‘All sorts come to see His Excellency. Even Khitrovka bandit types – not up to Your Grace’s standard. His Excellency is staying in the apartment of his friend Lieutenant-Colonel Smolyaninov. On a temporary basis. His Honour Mr Lieutenant-Colonel is in China at present, but we have orders always to let his friend stay for as long as he likes. And his name is Mr Neimless. Erast Petrovich. That’s him.’
‘Erast Petrovich Neimless?’ Columbine repeated the strange name and then could not resist asking: ‘But why do you call him “His Excellency”?’
‘We have a well-practised eye for a real gentlemen, even if he calls himself Ragamuffinov. Only you’ve wasted your time in coming, young lady, Mr Neimless is out, he hasn’t come back home yet. His valet is home though.’
‘The Japanese?’ Columbine asked, to make sure. ‘Masa?’
‘Masail Mitsuevich,’ the attendant corrected her sternly. ‘A most particular gentleman. Would you like to see him?’
‘I would, Since Erast . . . e-e-er . . . Petrovich is not here.’
‘By all means. My wife will show you how to get there. Fenya! Fenya! Show this young lady the way!’ the doorman shouted, turning towards the open door of the porter’s lodge. There was no answer.
‘She must have gone out. And I didn’t even notice,’ Blackbeard said in surprise. ‘Well, never mind, you won’t go astray. Walk along the wall, and when you turn the corner, the steps and porch are right there.’
The porch was quickly found, but when she knocked no one answered. Eventually Columbine’s patience ran out – after all, every minute was vital – and she angrily smashed her open palm against the door, which opened with a creak; it hadn’t been locked after all. A moment later the visitor was already in the small, spartan hallway, where the coat stand was hung with military greatcoats and civilian coats, as well as various belts, whips, bridles and other assorted horse tackle.
‘Masa, where are you?’ Columbine called. ‘I’ve come on urgent business. Will Mr Neimless be back soon?’
She heard rustling sounds and whispering behind a door decorated with a poster of French cancan dancers. Angry now, Columbine moved resolutely towards the sound, jerked the door open and froze.
The Japanese was standing there in his shirt front and cuffs, but with no trousers, helping a lady of ample dimensions who was much taller than him squeeze into a calico skirt. The effect produced by the unexpected visitor’s appearance was dramatic. The well-endowed lady squealed and squatted down, covering her impressive breasts with her hands, but Mr Neimless’s amazing valet set his plump hands against his thighs and bowed in ceremonial fashion.
‘What business, Corumbine-san?’ he asked on straightening up. ‘Urgen’-urgen’ or simpry urgen’?’
‘Urgent-urgent,’ she replied, trying not to look at the fat woman with no clothes on or the hairless legs of the Japanese, although this was not the moment for conventional propriety. ‘We need to go and rescue someone immediately, or something dreadful will happen. Where is your master?’
Masa knitted his sparse eyebrows, thought for a moment and declared decisively: ‘Masta not here. And terephone not ring. I rescue zis someone.’ He bowed to his lady love, who had not yet recovered from her state of shock, and pushed her towards the door. ‘Vewy gratefuw, Fenya-san, prease remember us kindry.’
Fenya (evidently the same woman who had not responded to the doorman’s call) grabbed her shoes, blouse and stockings and shot out of the door. Columbine turned away so that the Oriental could finish getting dressed.
A minute later they were already
hurrying towards the gates, with Masa working his short legs so briskly that his companion could hardly keep up with him.
They rode in a cab for a long time, then they had to search for the Kleinfeld apartments in the dark, until eventually they found the grey, three-storey house opposite the Petrovsky Park. As befitted a poet, Gdlevsky rented a room on the attic floor.
As they walked up the stairs (the Japanese leading and Columbine following) she kept repeating: ‘If only we’re in time, if only we’re in time.’
The door was locked and no one opened it when they knocked.
‘Shall I go down to get the yard keeper?’ Columbine asked in a trembling voice.
‘No need. Stand aside a rittur, Corumbine-san.’
She stepped back. The Japanese uttered a peculiar abdominal sound, leapt up in the air and struck the door a terrifyingly powerful blow with his foot, sending it flying off its hinges with a crash.
They dashed to the room, their shoulders colliding in the narrow corridor.
The first thing that Columbine noticed in the twilight was the rectangle of the wide-open window. And she caught a pungent, strangely familiar smell. It was the smell the butchers’ stalls had when she was still a child and the cook Frosya used to take her to the market to buy offal and intestines for the home-made sausage.
‘Yes, was very urgen’, absorutery urgen’,’ Masa sighed. He struck a match and lit a kerosene lamp.
Columbine cried out.
The poet was lying on his front, with his face in a large, gleaming puddle. She saw the light-brown hair on the back of his head, soaked in blood, the arms flung out impotently.
They were too late!
What a terrible hurry he was in, Columbine thought.
She turned away with a shudder and saw a sheet of paper on the table, beside the lamp. Walking across to it on leaden legs, she read the lines of regular, even writing, without a single slip of the pen.
The curtains swayed to and fro,
Brocade whispering my name.
The candle on the bureau
Choked out its own dim flame.
The fingers of some dark shades
Have plucked some invisible string.
Could she really have espied
My icon lamp’s flickering?
Will this morbid dream of strife
Surrender in joy to Death?
Will the candle flame of life
Be snuffed by her virginal breath?
Not the death of whom we write,
In the daily prose of our time,
But the Other, in whom we delight
As the Mistress of our rhyme.
‘Oh God,’ she groaned. ‘Why was he in such a great hurry?’
‘To get away quickry, before he noticed,’ Masa replied, with his face almost touching the dead man. Then he stuck his head out of the window. ‘He did job and wen back ou’.’
‘Who went?’ Columbine sobbed. ‘Where did he go? What are you talking about?’
Masa’s answer came as a shock.
‘Ze kirrer. Came in by fire radder, broke his skull and crimb back ou’.’
‘What killer? Gdlevsky killed himself! Ah yes, you don’t know anything about it!’
‘Himself ?’ Masa picked up the piece of iron pipe. ‘Rike zat?’ He took off his bowler hat and pretended to hit himself on the back of the head. ‘Rike zat very difficur’, Columbinesan. No, young man was sitting at tabur. Someone crimbed in window. Young man frightened, ran towards door. Kirrer catch him and hit him on back of head with pipe.’
He squatted down beside the body and poked about in the bloody mess with his fingers. Columbine grabbed hold of the edge of the table as the room suddenly swam before her eyes.
‘Skurr smashed to smi-the-reens,’ said the Japanese, clearly savouring the impressive word. ‘Very, very strong kirrer. No many so strong. That good. Wirr be easier for masta to find him.’
Columbine was still struggling to recover from this new shock. Gdlevsky hadn’t committed suicide? Someone had killed him? But who? What for? It was ludicrous, insane!
‘We have to send for the police!’ she muttered.
The only thing she wanted was to get out of that room with its fresh smell of slaughter as soon as possible.
‘I’ll do it. I’ll go down to the yard keeper!’
Masa shook his head.
‘No, Corumbine-san. First ze masta. Ret him rook. Porice rater. Wait here. I go rook for terephone.’
He was gone for about twenty minutes, and those were the worst twenty minutes of Columbine’s life. That was what she thought as she stood at the window, looking out at the lights shining beyond the black bulk of the Petrovsky Park. She was afraid to turn round.
When she heard a light rustling sound behind her, she squeezed her eyes shut and cringed, pulling her head down into her shoulders. She imagined Gdlevsky’s corpse getting up off the floor, turning its shattered head and walking towards the window with its hands reaching out. There is nothing worse than standing with your back to an unknown danger. Columbine squealed and swung round.
It would have been better if she hadn’t.
Gdlevsky had not got up off the floor, he was still lying there, face down, but his hair was moving in a strange manner. Columbine looked closer and saw two mice crawling about in the wound and sniffing at it.
Choking on her own scream, she dashed to the door, flew out on to the stairs and ran into Masa on his way back up.
‘I rang from night chemist’s,’ he reported. ‘Masta at home. He come now. He very gratefuw to you, Corumbine-san. You can go home. I must be here, cannot see you to cab. Zis is unforgivabur.’ And the Japanese bowed guiltily.
God, how she ran to get away from those cursed Kleinfeld apartments! She ran all the way to Triumphal Square before she found a night cab.
When she had caught her breath and gathered her thoughts a little, she started pondering on the meaning of what had happened. The meaning proved to be simple, clear and frightening.
Since Gdlevsky had not killed himself but been killed (Masa had proved that irrefutably), there was only one creature that could have done it – if, of course, you could call this force a creature. No one had climbed into the attic window from the fire ladder. It was not someone, but Something that had entered the room. That was the explanation for a blow of such monstrous, superhuman power.
‘Death is alive,’ Columbine repeated to herself, gazing with wide-open eyes at the cabdriver’s stooped back.
The creature that went by the name of Death could walk round the city, look into windows, strike blows of fearsome power. It could love and hate, it could feel insulted.
How Gdlevsky had insulted Death was clear. The arrogant boy had declared himself her Chosen One, when he had no right to that title, he had arbitrarily invented Signs that did not really exist. He was a genuine impostor, and for that he had suffered the fate of impostors.
The sheer grandeur of what had happened set her trembling.
Columbine meekly handed the driver the extortionate sum of two roubles, although the journey should have cost seventy-five kopecks at the most.
She didn’t remember walking upstairs to the fifth floor, but as she was taking off her lilac mourning apron, a small rectangle of thick white paper fell out of the pocket. She picked it up absentmindedly and read the single word written on it in beautiful Gothic letters: ‘Liebste’4.
At first she smiled, imagining that shy Rosencrantz had finally plucked up the courage to take decisive action. But then she remembered that the German had not come near her even once during the whole evening, so he couldn’t possibly have slipped the note into her pocket.
But who had written it? And why in German?
In German, Death was a male noun – der Tod.
‘So now my turn has come,’ Columbine said to her reflection in the mirror.
The reflection’s lips smiled, its eyes staring in wild fright.
Columbine opened her diary and tried to des
cribe her feelings. With a trembling hand she traced out the words: ‘Have I really been chosen? How jolly and how frightening!’
III. From the ‘Agents’ Reports’ File
To His Honour Lieutenant-Colonel Besikov (Private and confidential)
Dear Lieutenant-Colonel,
I must confess that your note, delivered this morning by courier, came as a great shock to me. I already knew about the murder of Gdlevsky, because even before your messenger arrived I had a visit from one of the ‘lovers’ who was absolutely shattered by the incredible news. My initial response to your request to provide the detective police with every possible assistance was intense indignation. I decided that you had lost all sense of proportion and wished to reduce me to the status of a petty informer from Khitrovka.
However, after I had calmed down a little, I took a slightly different point of view of the matter. A genuine tragedy had occurred. A young man with an immense talent that promised great things – perhaps as great as Lermontov or Pushkin – had been killed at the age of eighteen, before he could make any substantial contribution to Russian literature. A few brilliant poems will find their way into anthologies and collections, but that will be the poor youth’s entire legacy. What a bitter, senseless loss! If Gdlevsky had laid hands on himself, as he was planning to do, that would have been a tragedy, but his murder is worse than tragic. It is a national disgrace. It is the duty of every patriot who holds dear the honour of Russia to do everything in his power to assist in clarifying this shameful affair. Yes, yes, I regard myself as a true Russian patriot, it is well known that the most sincere and passionate patriots are always drawn from the national minorities (to which you and I belong).