EF06 - The State Counsellor (38 page)

'What is it?' Needle asked in fright. 'Are you feeling unwell?'

Without answering, he grabbed a pencil and a sheet of paper from the table. He paused for about a minute, then quickly dashed off a few lines and wrote an address at the top.

'This is for the telegraph office. The extra urgent rate.'

CHAPTER 15

in which Fandorin learns to be flexible

Green was not as Erast Petrovich had imagined him to be. The State Counsellor could not see anything fiendish or especially bloodthirsty about the man sitting on the next bench. A severe face, its features stamped in metal, a face that was hard to imagine smiling. And quite young still, despite the clumsy masquerade with that grey moustache and those sideburns.

Apart from Fandorin himself and the terrorists, Briusov Square seemed to be completely empty. Pozharsky had chosen an excellent spot for the operation. There was a policeman, undoubtedly someone in disguise, strolling along on the other side of the railings. Two young yard-keepers with unnaturally long beards and remarkably cultured expressions on their faces were clumsily scraping away snow with plywood spades. A little further away another two young lads were playing stick-knife, but they didn't really seem very interested in the game - they kept looking round far too often.

It was after nine already, but Pozharsky was taking his time. He was obviously waiting for the youngest of the terrorists, the one playing the part of a grammar-school boy, to come back.

And there he was now. He whistled as he walked across the avenue, sat down only an arm's length away from Erast Petrovich, right beside the snowdrift with the pit, and greedily thrust a handful of snow into his mouth.
Would you believe it,
the State Counsellor thought,
no more than a child, and already a seasoned killer!
Unlike the fake general, the 'schoolboy' looked perfectly convincing. He must be Bullfinch.

Pozharsky appeared, and the stick-knife players began drifting towards the centre of the park. Erast Petrovich focused his inner energies for action.

The prince shouted his offer for the nihilists to surrender and Fandorin sprang nimbly to his feet, effortlessly grabbed the 'schoolboy' by the collar of his coat and dragged him down into the refuge of the snowdrift. It was too soon for the boy to die.

The snow received the State Counsellor softly, but did not admit him very far - barely much more than an
arshin,
in fact. Bullfinch fell on top of him and began floundering about, but it was not easy to break free of Erast Petrovich's strong hands.

Shots thundered out from every side. Fandorin knew that the marksmen of the Flying Squad, reinforced by Mylnikov's agents, were firing from the monastery walls and the surrounding roofs, and they would not cease firing as long as there was anything left alive and moving in the square.

Where was the pit that had been promised?

Erast Petrovich applied gentle pressure to one of the young terrorist's nerve points to stop him kicking and struggling, then struck the ground with his fist - once, twice, three times. If it had been plywood there, under the snow, it would have yielded and sprung back, but no, the solid ground remained solid.

The 'schoolboy* no longer attempted to break free, but from time to time he jerked, as if stung by an electric shock, although there was no real reason why he should - Fandorin had not pressed the nerve point hard, only just enough for ten minutes of total calm.

Several times bullets slammed into the snow, too close for comfort, with a furious hissing sound. Erast Petrovich hammered ever more furiously on the unyielding plywood and even tried to bounce up and down on it, as far as that was possible in a lying position, with a load to support. The pit stubbornly refused to open up. Either the plywood had hardened to oak overnight, or something else had gone wrong.

Meanwhile the shooting had started to thin out and soon it died away completely.

He heard voices in the avenue: 'This one's a goner. A regular tea-strainer.'

'This one too. Just look at the way his face is all twisted and torn, unidentifiable.'

To climb out of the snowdrift would have been imprudent -they would have put a dozen bullets in him instantly - and so Erast Petrovich called out without getting up: 'Gentlemen, I am Fandorin, do not shoot!'

And only then, having set aside the peacefully sleeping Bullfinch, did he stand up, thinking that he probably looked like a snowman.

The park was full of men in civilian clothes. There must have been fifty of them at least, and he could see more outside the railings.

'Wiped out the lot, Your Honour,' said one of the 'flyers', who had a youthful air despite his grey moustache. 'No one left to arrest.'

'There is one still alive,' Erast Petrovich replied, dusting himself off. 'T-Take him and lay him out on a bench.'

The agents took hold of the 'schoolboy', but dropped him again immediately. The snow on his coat was stained red with blood in several places, and there was a black hole in his forehead, just below the hair line. It was clear now what had made the poor boy twitch so violently.

Erast Petrovich gazed in bewilderment at the lifeless body that had shielded him from the bullets, and failed to notice Pozharsky swooping down on him from behind.

'Alive? Thank God!' Pozharsky shouted, putting his arms round Fandorin's shoulders. 'I'd given up hope! Now for God's sake tell me what on earth made you jump into the snowdrift on the left? I told you a hundred times: jump into the one on the right, on the right! It's an absolute miracle you weren't hit!'

'That is the snowdrift on the right, there!' the State Counsellor exclaimed indignandy, recalling his vain attempts to jump up and down in a lying position. And that's the one I j-jumped into!'

The prince began batting his eyelids, his gaze shifted from Fandorin to the bench, to the snowdrift, then back to Fandorin, and he started chuckling uncertainly.

'Why yes, of course. I never sat on the bench, I only looked at it from here. Here I am, and there's the snowdrift, on the right of the bench. But if you sit down, then of course it's on your left ... Oh, it's too much! Two wise men ... two great strategists

And the deputy director of police folded over in a paroxysm of irresistible, choking laughter - no doubt the result, in part at least, of nervous strain.

Erast Petrovich smiled, because Gleb Georgievich's laughter was infectious, but his gaze was caught once again by the slim figure in the school coat and he suddenly became serious.

'Where's G-Green?' he asked. 'He was sitting right there, dressed up as a retired general.'

'There isn't one like that, Your Honour,' the man with the grey moustache said with a frown, turning towards the bodies laid out along the avenue. 'One, two, three, four, five, and the schoolboy makes six. No more. Ah, damnation, where's number seven? There were seven of them!'

The prince was no longer laughing. He looked around despairingly, gritted his teeth and groaned. 'He got away! Got away through the trench. So much for our victory. And in my mind I'd already composed the report: "No losses. Combat Group completely annihilated".'

He grabbed hold of Fandorin's arm and squeezed it tight. 'Disaster, Erast Petrovich, disaster. We're left holding the lizard's tail, but the lizard has fled. And it will grow a new tail - it wouldn't be the first time.'

'What are we g-going to do?' asked the State Counsellor, his anxious blue eyes gazing into the prince's equally anxious black ones.

'You
are not going to do anything,' Gleb Georgievich replied listlessly. His triumphant air was gone; he seemed somehow faded and very tired now. 'You go and light a candle in a church, because today the Lord has granted you a miracle, and then rest. I'm no good for anything much at the moment, and you're even worse. The only hope is that our agents will pick him up somewhere. He won't go back to the apartment, of course -he's no fool. We'll have everyone who's red, pink, or even light magenta under secret surveillance. All the hotels too. But I'm going back to mine, to sleep. If anything comes up, they'll wake me, and I'll let you know. Only it's not very likely...' He gestured hopelessly. "We'll start scheming again tomorrow morning. But for today, that's it
:
je passe.'

Erast Petrovich did not go to light a candle in a church, because that was superstition, nor did he feel that he had any right to rest. Duty required that he take himself off to the Governor General's residence: for various reasons beyond his control, it was four days since he had last shown his face there, and he needed to present a detailed report on progress made in the search and the investigation.

However, it was unthinkable to appear in His Excellency's residence smothered in snow, with a torn collar and a crumpled top hat, so first he had to go back home, but only for half an hour at the most. At a quarter past eleven Fandorin entered His Excellency's reception room, wearing a fresh frock coat and an immaculate shirt with a white tie.

There was no one in the spacious room apart from the prince's secretary, and the State Counsellor was on the point of following his usual habit and entering unannounced when Innokentii Andreevich cleared his throat in an emphatically discreet manner and warned him: 'Erast Petrovich, His Excellency has a lady visitor.'

Fandorin leaned down over the table and wrote a note on a piece of paper:

Vladimir Andreevitch, I am ready to report on today’s operation and all the events that preceded it.

E.F
.

'Please g-give him this immediately,' he said to the bespectacled pen-pusher, who bowed as he took the note and slipped in through the door of the study.

Fandorin took up a position right in front of the door, certain that he would be admitted immediately, but the secretary slipped back out and returned to his seat without saying a word to him.

'Did Vladimir Andreevich read it?' the State Counsellor enquired in annoyance.

"That I don't know, although I did whisper to His Excellency that the note was from you.'

Erast Petrovich nodded and began striding impatiently across the carpet - once, twice. The door remained closed.

'Who is it in there with him?' Fandorin asked, unable to contain himself.

'A lady. Young and very beautiful,' said Innokentii Andreevich, gladly setting aside his pen and seeming quite intrigued himself. 'I don't know her name, she went through without being announced; Frol Grigorievich showed her in.'

'So Vedishchev is in there too?'

The secretary did not have to answer, because the tall white doors opened with a quiet creak and Vedishschev himself came out into the reception room.

'Frol Vedishchev, I have urgent business for His Excellency, business of extreme importance!' Fandorin declared irritably. Prince Dogorukoi's valet responded in mysterious fashion: first he put one finger to his lips and then, using the same finger, he beckoned to Erast Petrovich to follow him, and hobbled off nimbly along the corridor in his low felt boots.

The State Counsellor shrugged and followed the old man, thinking to himself:
Perhaps they are right in St Petersburg when they complain that the Moscow administration is turning senile in its old age.

Vedishchev opened five doors one after another and made several turns to the right and the left, until he finally emerged into a narrow little corridor, which Fandorin knew connected the Governor General's study with the inner apartments.

Here Frol Grigorievich stopped, put his finger to his lips once again and gave a low door a gentle push. It opened slightly without making a sound, and Fandorin discovered that the narrow crack allowed him an excellent view of everything that was happening in the room.

Dolgorukoi was seated with his back towards Erast Petrovich, and sitting in front of him, quite remarkably close, was a lady. Strictly speaking, there was no distance between them at all -the female visitor had her face buried in His Excellency's chest, and from behind the shoulder, with its gold epaulette, all that could be seen was the top of her head. The only sound breaking the silence was a miserable sobbing, mingled with equally pitiful sniffing.

Fandorin glanced round at Vedishchev in puzzlement, and the valet suddenly did something very odd: he winked at the State Counsellor with his wrinkled eye. Totally bewildered now, Erast Petrovich took another look through the narrow crack of the door. He saw the prince raise his hand and gingerly stroke the crying woman's black hair.

'Come now, my darling, that's enough,' His Excellency said affectionately. 'You were right to come to this old man and unburden your soul. And right to have a little cry too. I'll tell you what to do about him. Put him out of your heart completely. He's no match for you. Or anyone else, for that matter. You're a forthright girl, passionate - you don't know how to live by halves. But he - although I truly am very fond of him - he is not really alive somehow, as if he had been touched by hoar frost. Or sprinkled with ashes. You'll never thaw him out or bring him to life. Many have tried already. Take my advice, don't throw your heart away on him. Find yourself someone young and uncomplicated, straightforward. There's more happiness with someone like that. Believe what an old man tells you.'

Erast Petrovich listened to what the prince was saying, and his finely formed eyebrows shifted uncertainly towards the bridge of his nose.