The Diamond Chariot (57 page)

Suddenly, out of the corner of his eye, he noticed something strange, an odd, momentary glimmer that should not have been there in a moonless world. Intrigued, Fandorin glanced round at the dark windows of the house and quite clearly saw a spot of light flash across one of the windowpanes, between the curtains, which were not fully closed, and then disappear.

Erast Petrovich stopped. That stealthy ray was very much like the light of a dark lantern, the kind used by window men, housebreakers and other professionals of a similar ilk. There were housebreakers in Russia and in Europe, why should there not be housebreakers in Japan?

Or was it simply one of the servants who didn’t want to switch on the electricity, in order not to disturb his master’s nocturnal solitude?

The servants at the estate were trained to such a supreme level of competence that they were not even visible, and everything needful seemed to do itself. When Fandorin arrived at his beloved pavilion, everything had always been tidied, there were hors d’oeuvres and fresh candles on the low table, and a vase with an intricately arranged bouquet – different every time – standing in the shadowy niche. When he walked back to the gates at dawn, the titular counsellor saw that the pathways had been thoroughly swept, and the grass of the English lawn was freshly trimmed, although he had not heard a single sound from a broom or garden shears. Only once did he actually see one of the servants. On his way out, he realised that he had dropped his key somewhere. He stood there at the locked gates, rifling through his pockets, and was about to go back to the pavilion, when suddenly a figure in a black jacket and black trousers emerged silently from the pink-coloured mist, bowed, handed him the lost key and immediately dissolved into the haze – Fandorin didn’t even have time to thank him.

Well, if it’s a servant, I’ll just go on my way, the titular counsellor reasoned. But what if it is a thief after all or, even worse, a killer? To save his host from a fiendish criminal plot would be the best possible way to repay him for his hospitality.

He looked all around – naturally, there was not a soul in sight.

He walked over quickly to the window and reviewed the situation. The wall was faced with slabs of undressed, rough-textured granite. Erast Petrovich braced the toe of his shoe in a small hollow, grasped the protruding windowsill with one hand, pulled himself up nimbly and pressed his face to the glass – at the point where the curtains were not drawn close together.

At first he saw absolutely nothing at all – the room was pitch dark. But after about half a minute a trembling circle of light appeared in the far corner and started creeping slowly along the wall, first picking out a shelf with the golden spines of books, then the frame of a portrait, then a map. This was obviously a study or a library.

Erast Petrovich could not make out the person holding the lantern, but since it was obvious that no servant would behave in such a suspicious manner, the vice-consul readied himself for more decisive action. He pressed cautiously on the left frame of the window – it was locked. But when he pressed the right frame, it yielded slightly. Excellent! Possibly this was the very route the uninvited visitor had used to gain access, or perhaps the window had been left half open to air the room, but that was not important now. The important thing was that this nightbird could be nabbed.

If only the window frame didn’t creak.

Fandorin started opening the frame slowly, a quarter of an inch at a time, keeping his eyes fixed on the wandering beam of light.

It suddenly stopped, pointing at one of the shelves, which did not look remarkable in any way. There was a gentle thud and the beam stopped trembling.

He had put the lantern down on the floor, the titular counsellor guessed.

Someone standing on all fours appeared or, rather, crept into the circle of light. Narrow shoulders, gleaming black hair, the white stripe of a starched collar. A European?

The titular counsellor pulled himself up higher, so that he could put one knee on the windowsill. Just a little more, and the crack would be wide enough to get through.

But then the damned window frame did creak after all.

The light instantly went out. Abandoning caution, Fandorin pushed the window open and jumped down on to the floor, but could not move any farther than that, since he couldn’t see a thing. He held out his hand with the Herstal in it and strained his ears, listening in case his adversary was creeping up on him.

The man might be invisible now, but he was a mystery no longer. In the brief moment before the lantern went out, the hunched-over individual had looked round, and Erast Petrovich had clearly made out a brilliantined parting, a thin face with a hooked nose, and even a white flower in a buttonhole.

His Excellency Prince Onokoji, the high society spy, in person.

The titular counsellor’s precautions were apparently unnecessary. The Japanese dandy had no intention of attacking him. In fact, to judge from the absolute silence that filled the study, the prince’s trail was already cold. But that was not important now.

Fandorin put his revolver back in its holster and went to find the stairway to the first floor.

Tsurumaki listened to what the vice-consul told him and scratched the bridge of his nose. The grimace that he made suggested that the news was perplexing rather than surprising. He cursed in Japanese and started complaining:

‘Oh, these aristocrats … he lives under my roof, occupies an entire wing, I pay him a pension of five thousand a month, and it’s still not enough. And I know, I know that he deals in secrets and rumours on the side. I use him myself sometimes, for a separate fee. But this is just too much. Our little prince must be completely mired in debt. Ah!’ The fat man sighed mournfully. ‘If his late father were not my
onjin
, I’d tell him to go to hell. He’s trying to get to my safe.’

Erast Petrovich was astounded by such a phlegmatic response.

‘I truly admire the Japanese attitude to a debt of gratitude, but it seems to m-me that everything has its limits.’

‘Never mind,’ said the Don, with a flourish of his briar pipe. ‘He can’t open the safe in any case. He needs the key for that, and the key is here, I always keep it with me.’

He pulled a little chain up from behind his shirt collar. There was a little gold rose with a thorny stem hanging on it.

‘A beautiful trinket, eh? You hold the bud, put it in, the thorns slip into the slots … There you have it, the “Open sesame” to my magical Aladdin’s cave.’

Tsurumaki kissed the little key and put it away again.

‘Don’t they scratch?’ asked Fandorin. ‘I mean the thorns.’

‘Of course they scratch, and quite painfully too. But it’s the kind of pain that only makes life seem sweeter,’ the millionaire said with a wink. ‘It reminds me of the glittering little stones and the gold ingots. I can bear it.’

‘You keep gold and precious stones at home? But why? There are b-bank vaults for that.’

‘I know. I have a bank of my own. With strong, armour-plated vaults. But we blood-sucking spiders prefer to keep our booty in our own web. All the best to you, Fandorin-san. Thank you for the curious information.’

The titular counsellor took his leave, feeling rather piqued: he had wanted to be a rescuer, and instead he had ended up as an informer. But he went outside, looked in the direction of the pavilion hovering over the smooth black surface of the pond, and felt such a keen, overwhelming rush of happiness that his paltry disappointment was instantly forgotten.

However, the ‘taut bowstring’ reverberated not only in bliss, and not all the arrows that it fired went darting up into the starry sky. A certain poignantly distressful note, some kind of poisoned needle, blighted Erast Petrovich’s happiness. At night he had no time for suffering, because love lives only in the here and now, but when he was far from O-Yumi, in his solitude, Fandorin thought of only one thing.

At their first lover’s tryst, as he kissed O-Yumi on her delightfully protruding little ear, he had suddenly caught a very faint whiff of tobacco smoke – English pipe tobacco. He had pulled away, about to ask the question – but he didn’t ask it. What for? So that she would lie? So that she would answer: ‘No, no, it’s all over between him and me’? Or so that she would tell the truth and make it impossible for them to carry on meeting?

Afterwards he had been tormented by his own cowardice. During the day he prepared an entire speech, made ready to tell her that things couldn’t go on like this, that it was stupid, cruel, unnatural and, in the final analysis, humiliating! She had to leave Bullcox once and for all. He tried a couple of times to start this conversation, but she simply repeated: ‘You don’t understand. Don’t ask me about anything. I can’t tell you the truth, and I don’t want to lie.’ And then she set her hands and lips to work, and he surrendered, and forgot everything else in the world, only to suffer the same resentment and jealousy the next day.

Consul Doronin could undoubtedly see that something out of the ordinary was happening to his assistant, but he didn’t ask any questions. Poor Vsevolod Vitalievich was certain that Fandorin was conducting the investigation at night, and he kept his word, he didn’t interfere. Sometimes the titular counsellor’s conscience bothered him because of this, but it bothered him far less than the smell of English tobacco.

On the sixth night (which was also the second one spent in the pavilion without his beloved) the vice-consul’s suffering reached its highest point. Strictly forbidding himself to think about the reason why O-Yumi had not been able to come this time, Erast Petrovich called on logic to help: if there is a difficult problem, a solution has to be found – what could possibly be easier for a devotee of analytical theory?

And what was the result? A solution was found immediately, and it was so simple, so obvious, that Fandorin was amazed at his own blindness.

He waited for the evening, arrived at the pavilion earlier than usual and, as soon as he heard O-Yumi’s footsteps approaching, he ran out to meet her.

‘What a b-blockhead I am!’ Erast Petrovich declared, taking hold of her hand. ‘You don’t have to be afraid of Bullcox. We’ll get married. You’ll be the wife of a Russian subject, and that man won’t be able to do anything to you!’

The offer of his heart and his hand was greeted in a most surprising fashion.

O-Yumi burst into laughter, as if she had heard a not very clever but terribly funny joke. She kissed the titular counsellor on the nose.

‘Don’t be silly. We can’t be husband and wife.’

‘But why n-not? Because I’m a diplomat? Then I’ll resign! Because you’re afraid of Bullcox? I’ll challenge him to a duel and kill him! Or, if … if you feel sorry for him, we’ll just go away from here!’

‘That’s not the problem,’ she said patiently, as if she were talking to a child. ‘That’s not it at all.’

‘Then what is?’

‘Look at that left eyebrow of yours. It runs in a semicircle, like that … And higher up, right here, there’s the start of a little wrinkle. You can’t see it yet, but it will show through in five years or so.’

‘What has a wrinkle got to do with anything?’ asked Erast Petrovich, melting at her touch.

‘It tells me that you will be loved by very many women, and I probably wouldn’t like that … And then this slightly lowered corner of the mouth, it testifies that you will not get married again before the age of sixty.’

‘Don’t make fun of me, I’m really serious! We’ll get married and go away. Would you like to go to America? Or New Zealand? Lockston has been there, he says it’s the most beautiful place on earth.’

‘I’m serious too,’ said O-Yumi, taking his hand and running it over her temple. ‘Can you feel where the vein is? A
soon
and a quarter from the edge of the eye. That means I shall never marry. And then I have a mole, here …’

She parted the edges of her kimono to expose her breasts.

‘Yes, I know. And what does that signify, according to the science of
ninso
?’ Fandorin asked and, unable to resist, he leaned down and kissed the mole under her collarbone.

‘I can’t tell you that. But please, don’t talk to me again about marriage, or about Algie.’

There was no smile in her eyes any more – a stark, sad shadow flitted though them.

Erast Petrovich could not tell what hurt the most: that name ‘Algie’, the firmness of the refusal, or the absolutely ludicrous nature of the reasons cited.

‘She has turned me into a halfwitted infant …’ – the thought flashed briefly through Fandorin’s mind. He remembered how Doronin had recently said to him: ‘What’s happening to you, my dear boy? You grow fresher and younger before my very eyes. When you arrived, you looked about thirty, but now you look your real age of twenty-two, even with those grey temples. The Japanese climate and dangerous adventures clearly agree with you.’

Speaking quickly, almost babbling in order not to give himself time to come to his senses, he blurted out:

‘If that is how things are, we shan’t meet any more. Not until you leave him.’

He said it – and bit his lip, so that he couldn’t take back what he had said straight away.

She looked into his eyes without speaking. Realising that he wouldn’t hear anything else, she dropped her head. She pulled the lowered kimono back up on to her shoulders and slowly walked out of the pavilion.

Fandorin did not stop her, he did not call out, he did not even watch her go.

He was brought round by a pain in the palms of his hands. He raised his hands to his eyes and stared in bewilderment at the drops of blood, not realising straight away that the marks were made by his fingernails.

‘So that’s all,’ the titular counsellor told himself. ‘Better this than become a complete nobody. Farewell, my golden dreams.’

He jinxed himself: there really were no more dreams, because there was no sleep. On arriving home, Erast Petrovich undressed and got into bed, but he couldn’t fall asleep. He lay on his side, looking at the wall. He could hardly even see it at first – just a vague greyness in the gloom; and then, as dawn approached, the wall started turning white and faint blotches appeared on it; and then they condensed into rosebuds; and then, after everything else, the sun glanced in at the window, kindling the gilded lines of the painted roses into life.