The Turkish Gambit

by Boris Akunin

  “Explain your meaning,” the tsar pressed him, “and do not mumble, Mizinov. Speak straight out, we are not playing forfeits.”

  “Yes, Your Majesty. McLaughlin is now either in Constantinople or, most likely, making his way to England, since his mission has been accomplished. In Constantinople we have an entire network of secret agents, and kidnapping the scoundrel will not be too difficult. In England it is a harder proposition, but with sensible organization—”

  “I do not wish to hear this!” Alexander exclaimed. “What sort of abominations are you talking?”

  “Sire, you did order me not to mumble,” said the general with a shrug.

  “Bringing McLaughlin back in a sack wouldn’t be such a bad thing,” the chancellor mused, “but it’s too bothersome and unreliable. We could find ourselves caught up in a scandal. Yes, that kind of thing is fine in Constantinople, but I wouldn’t recommend it in London.”

  “Very well,” said Mizinov with a vehement shake of his head. “If McLaughlin is found in London, we shall not touch him. But we will stir up a scandal in the English press about the British correspondent’s inappropriate behavior. The English public will not approve of McLaughlin’s exploits, because they do not fit their much-vaunted idea of fair play.”

  Korchakov was pleased: “Now that’s more to the point. In order to tie Beaconsfield’s and Derby’s hands, all we need is a good scandal in the newspapers.”

  While this conversation was going on, Varya had been imperceptibly edging closer to Erast Petrovich until now she finally found herself right beside the titular counselor.

  “Who is this Derby?” she asked in a whisper.

  “The foreign secretary,” Fandorin hissed, scarcely even moving his lips.

  Mizinov glanced round at the whisperers and knitted his brows in a threatening frown.

  “This McLaughlin of yours is clearly an old hand with no particular prejudices or sentiments,” said the chancellor, continuing with his deliberations. “If he is found in London, then, before there is any scandal, we could have a confidential chat with him. Present him with the evidence, threaten him with exposure . . . After all, if there is a scandal, he’s finished. I know how the British are about such things—no one in society will ever offer him their hand again, even if he is covered with medals from head to foot. And then again, two murders is no laughing matter. There is the prospect of criminal proceedings. He is an intelligent man. If we also offer him a good sum of money and present him with an estate somewhere beyond the Volga, he might give us the information we need, and Shuvalov could use it to put pressure on Lord Derby. If he threatened to expose them, the British cabinet would suddenly turn as meek as lambs. What do you think, General, would a combination of threats and bribery work on McLaughlin?”

  “They would be bound to,” the general promised confidently. “I have also considered this option, which is why I brought Erast Fandorin with me. I did not dare appoint a man to such a delicate mission without Your Majesty’s approval. There is far too much at stake. Fandorin is resourceful and determined, he has an original mind, and, most important of all, he has already worked on one highly complex secret mission in London and managed it quite brilliantly. He knows the language. He knows McLaughlin personally. If necessary, he will kidnap him. If that is not possible, he will come to terms with him. If he cannot come to terms, then he will assist Shuvalov to arrange a fine scandal. He can even testify against McLaughlin as a direct eyewitness. He possesses exceptional powers of persuasion.”

  “And who’s Shuvalov?” Varya whispered.

  “Our ambassador,” the titular counselor replied absentmindedly, thinking of something else. He didn’t really seem to be following what the general was saying.

  “Well, Fandorin, can you manage that?” the emperor asked. “Will you go to London?”

  “Yes, I will go, Your Majesty,” said Erast Petrovich. “Certainly I will go.”

  The autocrat eyed him keenly, having caught the echo of something left unsaid, but Fandorin did not add anything else.

  “Well, then, Mizinov, act along both lines,” said Alexander, summing up. “Look for him in Constantinople and in London. Only do not waste any time—we have very little left.”

  WHEN THEY CAME OUT into the aide-de-camp’s room, Varya asked the general: “But what if McLaughlin can’t be found at all?”

  “You can rely on my instinct, my dear,” the general sighed. “We will definitely be seeing that gentleman again.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  In which events take

  an unexpected turn

  THE ST. PETERSBURG GAZETTE

  8 (20) January 1878

  TURKS SUE

  FOR PEACE!

  * * *

  After the capitulation of Vessel Pasha, the capture of Philippopol, and the surrender of ancient Adrianople, which yesterday flung open its gates to admit the Cossacks of the White General, the outcome of the war has finally been settled, and this morning a train carrying the Turkish truce envoys arrived at the positions of our valiant forces. The train was detained at Adrianople and the pashas were transferred from there to the headquarters of the Commander in Chief, currently quartered in the village of Germanly. When the head of the Turkish delegation, 76-year-old Namyk Pasha, learned the provisional terms of the peace settlement, he exclaimed in despair: “Votre armée est victorieuse, votre ambition est satisfaite et la Turkie est détruite!”

  Well, now, say we, that is no more than Turkey deserves.

  THEY HADN’T SAID GOOD-BYE PROPERLY. Sobolev had collected Varya from the porch of the “field palace,” enveloped her in his magnetic aura of success and glory, and whisked her away to his headquarters to celebrate the victory. She had barely even had time to nod to Erast Petrovich, and in the morning he was no longer in the camp. His orderly Trifon said: “His honor has gone away. Call back in a month.”

  But a month had passed, and the titular counselor had still not returned. Evidently it was not proving so easy to find McLaughlin in England.

  It wasn’t that Varya actually missed him. On the contrary: Once they decamped from Plevna, life had become quite fascinating. Every day there were moves to new places, new cities, stupendous mountain landscapes, and endless celebrations of almost daily military victories. The commander in chief’s headquarters first moved to Kazanlyk, beyond the Balkan range, and then still further south, to Germanly. Here there was no winter at all. The trees were all green and the only snow to be seen was on the summits of the distant mountains.

  Without Fandorin there was nothing that Varya had to do. She was still, however, officially attached to the headquarters staff and she received her salary punctually for December and January, plus traveling expenses, plus a bonus for Christmas. She had accumulated quite a tidy sum, but she had nothing to spend it on. Once, in Sofia, she had wanted to buy a charming copper lamp (it was exactly like Aladdin’s), but Paladin and Gridnev hadn’t allowed her. In fact, they had almost come to blows over who would present Varya with the trinket, and she had been obliged to give way.

  Concerning Gridnev. The eighteen-year-old ensign had been attached to Varya by Sobolev. The hero of Plevna and Sheinov was kept busy day and night with army affairs, but he had not forgotten about Varya. Whenever he could find a free moment to visit headquarters, he always called in to see her, sent her gigantic bouquets of flowers, and invited her to celebrations (they saw in the New Year twice, once according to the Western calendar and once according to the Russian calendar). But this was still not enough for the tenacious Michel, so he had placed one of his orderlies at Varya’s disposal—“for assistance on the road and for protection.” At first the ensign had sulked and glared hostilely at his superior in a skirt, but quite soon he had grown tame, and even seemed to have developed certain romantic feelings for her. It was funny, of course, but flattering. Gridnev wasn’t handsome. That strategist Sobolev would not have sent anyone handsome, but he was as lovable and eager to please as a puppy. In his company, tw
enty-two-year-old Varya felt like a very grown-up and worldly-wise woman.

  She was in a rather strange position now. At headquarters they apparently assumed that she was Sobolev’s mistress, but since everyone regarded the White General with indulgent adoration, no one condemned her for it. On the contrary, some small portion of Sobolev’s halo seemed to extend to her as well. Many of the officers would probably have been quite indignant if they had discovered that she dared to refuse to enter into intimate relations with the glorious Russian Achilles and was remaining faithful to some lowly cryptographer.

  But, to be honest, things were not going all that well with Petya. No, he didn’t get jealous and he didn’t make scenes, but since his failed suicide Varya found it hard to be with him. In the first place, she hardly ever saw him—Petya was atoning for his guilt with work, since it was impossible to atone for it with blood in the cryptography section. He worked two consecutive shifts each day, slept at his post on a folding bed, no longer visited the journalists in their club, and took no part in the general carousing. She had been obliged to celebrate Christmas and Epiphany without him. At the sight of Varya, his face lit up with a gentle, quiet joy. And he spoke to her as if she were an icon of the Virgin of Vladimir: She was the light of his life, and his only hope, and without her he would never have survived.

  She felt terribly sorry for him. Only more and more often now she found herself pondering the troublesome question of whether it was possible to marry out of pity, and the answer was always that it wasn’t. But it was even more unthinkable to say: “You know, Petya, I’ve changed my mind and decided not to be your wife.” It would be just like putting down a wounded animal. She was caught on the horns of a dilemma.

  A substantial gathering still convened as before in the press club as it migrated from place to place, but it was not as boisterous as in Zurov’s unforgettable time. They gambled with restraint, for small stakes, and the chess sessions had ceased with McLaughlin’s disappearance. The journalists did not mention the Irishman, at least in the company of Russians, but the two other British correspondents had been made the object of a demonstrative boycott and stopped coming to the club altogether.

  Of course, there had been drinking sprees and scandals. Twice matters had almost reached the point of bloodshed, and both times, alas, because of Varya.

  The first time, when they were still at Kazanlyk, a newly arrived adjutant, who had not fully grasped Varya’s status, made an unfortunate attempt to joke by calling her “the duchess of Marlborough,” with the obvious implication that Marlborough himself was Sobolev. Paladin demanded an apology from the insolent fellow, who proved stubborn in his drunken stupor, and they had stepped out to fight a duel with pistols. Varya was not in the marquee at the time, or else she would, of course, have put a stop to this idiotic conflict straightaway. Fortunately, no harm was done: The adjutant shot wide, and when Paladin fired in reply he shot the adjutant’s forage cap neatly off his head, after which the offending party sobered up and admitted his error.

  On the second occasion it was the Frenchman who was challenged, and once again for a joke, only this time it was quite a funny one, or at least Varya thought so. It happened after the youthful Gridnev had begun to accompany her everywhere. Paladin rashly remarked aloud that “Mademoiselle Barbara” was like the empress Anna Ioannovna with her famous statue of a little black boy, and the cornet, uncowed by the correspondent’s fearsome reputation, demanded immediate satisfaction from him. Since the scene took place in Varya’s presence, no shots were ever fired. She ordered Gridnev to be silent and Paladin to take back what he had said. The correspondent immediately repented, acknowledging that the comparison had been an unhappy one and that “monsieur sous-lieutenant” bore a closer resemblance to Hercules capturing the hind of Arcadia. On that basis they had made up.

  At times it seemed to Varya that Paladin was casting glances at her for which there could be only one possible interpretation, and yet outwardly the Frenchman behaved like a genuine Bayard. Like the other journalists, he would spend days at a time away at the front line, and they saw each other less often than in the camp near Plevna. But one day the two of them had a private conversation that Varya subsequently called and noted down word for word in her diary (after Erast Petrovich’s departure, she had felt the urge to keep a diary, no doubt for lack of anything to occupy her time).

  They were sitting in a roadside korchma in a mountain pass, warming themselves at the fire and drinking hot wine, and after the frost the journalist seemed to get a little tipsy.

  “Ah, Mademoiselle Barbara, if only I were not who I am,” Paladin said with a bitter laugh, unaware that he was repeating Varya’s beloved Pierre Bezukhov almost word for word. “If only my circumstances were different, if my character were different, and my fate . . .” He looked at Varya in a way that made her heart leap in her breast as if it were skipping a rope. “Then I would certainly vie in the lists with the brilliant Michel. Tell me, would I have at least some small chance against him?”

  “Of course you would,” Varya answered honestly, and then realized that her words sounded as if she were inviting him to flirt. “By which I mean, Charles, that you would have the same chance as Mikhail Dmitrievich, no more and no less. That is, no chance at all. Almost.”

  She had added that “almost.” Oh that hateful, ineradicable womanly weakness!

  Since Paladin seemed more relaxed than he had ever been, Varya asked him the question that had been on her mind for a long time.

  “Charles, do you have a family?”

  “What really interests you, I suppose, is whether I have a wife?” the journalist said with a smile.

  Varya was embarrassed.

  “Well, not only that. Parents, brothers, sisters . . .”

  But actually, why be hypocritical, she reproached herself. It was a perfectly normal question. She continued resolutely: “I would like to know if you have a wife as well, of course. Sobolev, for instance, does not hide the fact that he is married.”

  “Alas, Mademoiselle Barbara. No wife. No fiancée. I have never had either one or the other. I lead the wrong kind of life. There have been a few affairs, of course—I tell you that quite openly, because you are a modern woman free of foolish affectation.” (Varya smiled, flattered). “As for a family . . . only a father, whom I love dearly and miss greatly. He is in France at present. Someday I will tell you about him. After the war, perhaps? C’est toute une histoire.”

  And so it had turned out that he wasn’t indifferent, but didn’t wish to set himself up as a rival to Sobolev. Out of pride, no doubt.

  This circumstance, however, had not prevented the Frenchman from remaining on friendly terms with Michel. Most of the time when Paladin disappeared he was with the White General’s unit, since Michel was always in the very vanguard of the advancing army, where the pickings were good for correspondents.

  AT MIDDAY ON the eighth of January Sobolev sent a captured carriage and a Cossack escort for Varya—he had invited her to visit the newly conquered city of Adrianople. There was an armful of hothouse roses lying on the soft leather seat. Mitya Gridnev became very upset because he tore his brand-new gloves as he was gathering the flowers into a bouquet. Varya tried to console him as they rode along and mischievously promised to give him her own gloves (the ensign had small hands, almost like a girl’s). Mitya frowned, knitting his white eyebrows, sniffed offendedly, and sulked for about half an hour, fluttering his long, fluffy eyelashes. Those eyelashes were perhaps the only point of his appearance in which nature had been kind to him, thought Varya. Just like Erast Petrovich’s, only lighter. Her thoughts moved on in a perfectly natural manner to Fandorin, and she wondered where his wanderings had taken him. If only he would come back soon! When he was there things were . . . calmer? More interesting? She couldn’t quite put her finger on the right word, but she definitely felt better when he was there.

  It was already getting dark when they arrived. The town was quiet, with not a soul out o
n the streets, only the echoing clip-clop of horses’ hooves as mounted patrols rode by and the rumbling of artillery being moved up along the highway.

  The temporary headquarters was located in the railway station building. Varya heard the bravura music from a distance—a brass band playing the anthem “Rejoice.” All the windows in the new, European-style station building were lit up, and in the square in front of it there were bonfires burning and field kitchens with their chimneys smoking efficiently. What surprised Varya most of all was the perfectly ordinary passenger train standing at the platform—neat little carriages and a gently panting locomotive—as if there were no war going on at all.

  In the waiting room they were celebrating, of course. A number of tables of various sizes had been hastily pushed together and the officers were sitting around them banqueting on simple fare augmented by a substantial number of bottles. Just as Varya and Gridnev entered, they all roared out “Hurrah,” raised their tankards, and turned toward the table at which their commander was sitting. The general’s famous white tunic contrasted sharply with the black army and gray Cossack uniforms. Sitting with Sobolev at the table of honor were the senior officers (the only one Varya recognized was Perepyolkin) and Paladin. They all had red, happy faces—they must have been celebrating for some time already.

  “Varvara Andreevna,” Achilles shouted, jumping to his feet. “I’m so glad you decided to come! ‘Hurrah,’ gentlemen, in honor of our only lady!”

  Everybody stood up and roared so deafeningly that Varya felt frightened. She had never been greeted in such an energetic manner before. Perhaps she ought not to have accepted the invitation after all? She recalled the good advice given by Baroness Vreiskaya, the head of the field infirmary (with whose employees Varya was quartered), to her female wards: