Special Assignments (19 page)

'Why are you made up as a gypsy?' he asked the Chief in a whisper.

And who else do you think I can make myself up as with that Brazil-nut infusion still on my fizzog? A Moor, perhaps? A Moor has no business with the Mother of God of Smolensk.'

Erast Petrovich looked at Anisii reproachfully and suddenly, without the slightest stammer, he said something that made poor Tulipov's jaw drop: 'I forgot one substantial failing that is hard to transform into a virtue. You have a weak visual memory. Don't you see that the holy fool is a close, one might even say intimate, acquaintance of yours?'

'No!' exclaimed Anisii, clutching at his heart. 'It can't be!'

'Just look at her ear. I told you that every person's ears are unique. You see that short pink lobe, and the general outline -a perfect oval: that's rare, and the most distinctive detail - the slightly protruding antitragus. It's her, Tulipov, it is: the Georgian Princess. That means the Jack really is more impudent than I thought.'

The Court Counsellor shook his head as if in amazement at the mysteries of human nature. Then he began speaking curtly, in brief fragments: 'The very best agents. Definitely Mikheev, Subbotin, Seifullin and another seven. Six sleighs and horses good enough not to fall behind Eropkin's sleigh again. The strictest secrecy, following the "enemies all around" system, so that the pursuit will not be evident to the mark, or even to the public. It's quite possible that the Jack himself is hanging about somewhere near here. We don't know what his face looks like, and he hasn't shown us his ears. Quick march to Nikitskaya Street. Look lively!'

Anisii gazed like a man enchanted at the 'boy's' slim neck, and the ideal oval ear with that antitragus, and the thoughts that crept into the mind of the candidate for a state title were entirely inappropriate for a church, especially during the Lenten Fast.

He started, crossed himself and began making his way through to the exit.

Eropkin remained praying and fasting in the church until late and only arrived home after ten. From where the agent Latzis was freezing on the roof of the next house, people could be seen starting to harness horses into a closed sleigh. It seemed that, despite the late night hour, Samson Kharitonovich was not intending to take to his bed.

But Fandorin and Anisii had everything ready. There were three ways to drive away from Eropkin's house in Mertvy Lane: towards the Church of the Asssumption on the Graves, towards Starokoniushenny Lane, and on to Prechistenka Street, and there were sleighs standing unobtrusively at each crossroads.

The Full State Counsellor's sleigh - squat and covered with dark fabric - drove out of the oak gates at a quarter past eleven and set off towards Prechistenka Street. There were two strong-looking fellows in sheepskin jackets sitting on the coachbox, and the black-bearded mute was at the back, on the footboard.

The first of the two sleighs on duty at the entrance to Prechistenka Street set off in unhurried pursuit. The other five lined up behind and set off, keeping a respectful distance behind 'number one' - that was what the front echelon of the surveillance team was called in the jargon. At the back of number one there was a lighted red lantern that the sleighs behind could see from a long distance away.

Erast Petrovich and Anisii rode in a light sleigh, hanging back about a hundred and fifty yards behind the red lantern. The other numbers stretched out in a string behind them. There were peasant sleighs, and a coachman's troika, and a priest's twosome, but even the most unkempt-looking wooden sledges were solidly put together, on steel runners, and the horses had been specially selected to match - they might not be much to look at, but they had speed and stamina.

After the first turning (on to the embankment of the River Moscow), following instructions, number one fell back and, at Fandorin's signal, number two moved up, while number one fell in at the very end of the tail. Number two trailed the mark for exacdy ten minutes by the clock, and then turned off to the left, making way for number three.

In this case the strict observance of instructions proved far from excessive, because the black-bearded bandit on the footboard was wide awake; he was smoking a cigar and the thick-skinned brute wasn't bothered at all by the weather - he hadn't even covered his shaggy head with a cap, although a wind had come up and there were large wet flakes of snow fluttering down from the heavens.

Beyond the Yauza the sleigh turned left, but number three went straight on, giving way to number four. The Court Counsellor's sleigh was not included in the sequence of numbers, constantly maintaining second position.

And so they trailed the mark to his destination: the walls of the Novopimenovsky Monastery, with its squat towers glowing white in the night.

From a distance they saw one, two, three, four, five figures detach themselves from the sleigh. The last two were carrying something - either a sack or a human body.

A body!' gasped Anisii. 'Maybe it's time to take them.'

'Not so fast,' the Chief replied. 'We need to work out what's going on first.'

He set sleighs with agents on all the strategic routes and only then gestured to Tulipov to follow him at the double.

They approached the abandoned chapel cautiously and walked round it. On the far side, by a modest, rusty little door, they came across a sleigh and a horse tethered to a tree. It reached out its shaggy face to Anisii and gave a quiet, pitiful whinny - it had clearly been standing in the same spot for a long time and was feeling bored.

Erast Petrovich pressed his ear against the door; then, to test it, he pulled gently on the handle. The door unexpectedly opened slightly, without making the slightest sound. A dull light glimmered in the narrow crack and he heard a resounding voice uttering strange words: "Where are you going? I'll turn you to stone!'

'Curious,' whispered the Chief, closing the door hastily. 'The hinges are rusty, but they've been lubricated recently. All right, let's wait and see what happens.'

Five minutes later there was a loud commotion and rumbling inside, but almost immediately everything went quiet again. Fandorin put his hand on Anisii's shoulder: Not now; it's too soon.

Another ten minutes went by and suddenly a woman's voice started screeching: 'Fire! We're burning! Good people, we're burning!'

Immediately a man's voice took up the cry: 'Fire! We're burning! Fire!'

Anisii made a desperate rush for the door, but fingers of steel seized him by the half-belt of his greatcoat and pulled him back. 'I assume that so far this is just the first scene, and the main action is yet to come,' the Chief said quietly. 'We have to wait for the finale. It is no accident that the door has been oiled, and no coincidence that the horse is loitering outside. You and I, Tulipov, have taken up a key position. And one should only hurry in those cases when to delay is quite impossible.' Erast Petrovich raised a finger in admonition and Anisii could not help admiring the velvet glove with the silver press-studs.

The Court Counsellor had dressed like a dandy for the night operation: a long cloth coat lined with beaver fur, a white scarf, a silk top hat and a walking cane with an ivory knob. Anisii may have been wearing a ginger wig, but he had dressed up for the first time in his functionary's greatcoat with buttons bearing official crests and put on his new cap with a lacquered peak. Beside Fandorin, however, he was as dowdy as a sparrow beside a drake.

The Chief was about to say something else equally instructive, but suddenly there was such a bloodcurdling howl from behind the door, filled with such genuine suffering, that Tulipov also screamed at the shock of it.

Erast Petrovich's face tensed up; he clearly did not know if he ought to wait a little longer, or if this was the very case in which to delay was impossible. He twitched the corner of his mouth nervously and inclined his head to one side, as if he were listening to some voice that Anisii could not hear. The voice evidently told the Chief to act, because Fandorin resolutely swung the door open and stepped inside.

The scene that met Anisii's gaze was truly astonishing.

An old man with a grey beard, dressed in a hussar's uniform and a white robe that had slipped down towards his head, was hanging above an empty wooden table with his legs parted and attached to two ropes. Behind him, swinging a long, coiled whip, stood Eropkin's black-bearded cut-throat. Eropkin himself was sitting a bit further away, on a chair. There was a tightly stuffed sack lying at his feet, and the two sturdy young fellows who had travelled on the coachbox earlier, were squatting down by the wall, smoking.

But Tulipov only took all this in, out of the corner of his eye, in passing because his attention was immediately caught by the frail figure lying face-down and unmoving, lifeless. In three bounds Anisii rounded the table, colliding on his way with some weighty folio but keeping his footing and going down on his knees beside the recumbent woman.

When he turned her over on to her back with trembling hands, the blue eyes opened on the pale face and the pink lips muttered: 'Oh, how ginger ...'

Thank God, she was alive!

'What kind of torture chamber is this we have here?' Erast Petrovich's calm voice asked behind him, and Anisii straightened up, recalling his duty.

Eropkin switched his dumbfounded gaze from the dandy in the top hat to the nimble functionary and back. 'And who are you?' he asked menacingly. Accomplices? Right, Kuzma.'

The black-bearded mute made an imperceptible movement with his hand and a long shadow went slicing swiftly through the air towards the Court Counsellor's throat. Fandorin threw up his cane and the furiously swirling end of the whip wrapped itself round the lacquered wood. A single short movement, and the whip was jerked out of Kuzma's huge, bear-like paws and landed in Erast Petrovich's hands. He unhurriedly unwound the tight leather tail and without any apparent effort, using just his fingers, began tearing the whip into tiny pieces. As more and more scraps went flying to the floor, Kuzma seem to deflate visibly. He lowered his shaggy head into his massive shoulders and backed against the wall.

'The chapel is surrounded by police agents,' Fandorin said, when he had completely demolished the whip. 'This time, Eropkin, you will answer for your defiance of the law.'

However, the man sitting on the chair was not frightened by this announcement. 'That's all right,' he said with a grin; 'the purse will take care of it.'

The Court Counseller sighed and blew his silver whistle. There was a high, ear-splitting trill, and the police agents instantly came tramping in.

'Take these to the station,' said the Chief, indicating Eropkin and his accomplices. 'Draw up a report. What's in the sack?'

'The sack's mine,' Eropkin said hastily.

What's in it?'

'Money - two hundred and eighty-three thousand, five hundred and two roubles. My money, income from trade.'

'Such a substantial sum in a sack?' Erast Petrovich asked coldly. 'Do you have financial documents for it? The sources of income? Has the duty been paid?'

'You, sir - will you, just for a moment... step to one side ...' Eropkin leapt up off his chair and dashed towards the Court Counsellor. 'I know the way things are done, you know ...'

He started whispering. 'Let's say there's exactly two hundred thousand, and the rest is at your discretion.'

'Take him away' ordered Fandorin, turning away. 'Draw up a report. Count the money and register it in due order. Let the excise department deal with it.'

When the four prisoners had been taken out, a cheerful, if somewhat hoarse voice suddenly spoke up: 'Of course, that's very noble - to refuse bribes; but how much longer am I going to hang here like a sack myself? I'm seeing stars already'

Anisii and Erast Petrovich took hold of the dangling man's shoulders and the young lady, now completely recovered - Mimi, wasn't that her name? - climbed up on the table and untied the ropes.

They sat the tormented victim on the floor. Fandorin pulled off the false beard and grey wig, revealing a quite unremarkable, absolutely ordinary face: close-set blue-grey eyes; light-coloured hair, whitish at the ends; a characterless nose; a slightly crooked chin - everything just as Erast Petrovich had described. The rush of blood had turned the face scarlet, but the lips immediately extended into a smile.

'Shall we introduce ourselves?' the Jack of Spades asked merrily. 'I don't believe I've had the honour ...'

'Then it wasn't you at the Sparrow Hills,' the Chief said with an understanding nod. Well, well.'

'Which hills did you say?' the rascal asked insolently. 'I am retired Cornet of Hussars Kuritsyn. Shall I show you my residence permit?'

'L-Later,' the Court Counsellor said with a shake of his head. 'Very well, I shall introduce myself again. I am Erast Fandorin, Deputy for Special Assignments of the Governor-General of Moscow, and no great lover of audacious jests. And this is m-my assistant, Anisii Tulipov.' From the fact that the stammer had reappeared in the Chief's speech, Anisii concluded that the intense action was over now and he allowed himself to relax and steal a glance at Mimi.

She turned out to be looking at him too: 'Anisii Tulipov. That's beautiful. You could act in a theatre with a name like that.'

Suddenly the Jack - for, of course, despite all the casuistry, it was he - winked at Anisii in the most familiar fashion and stuck out a tongue that was as broad as a spade and quite amazingly red.

'Well now, Mr Momos, how am I going to deal with you?' asked Erast Petrovich, watching as Mimi wiped her accomplice's forehead, which was covered with fine beads of sweat. According to the dictates of the law or the spirit of justice?'

The Jack thought for a moment and said: 'If you and I, Mr Fandorin, had not met for the first time today, but had a certain history of acquaintance, I would naturally throw myself wholly and entirely on your mercy, for it is immediately clear that you are a sensitive and noble man. You would undoubtedly take into consideration the moral and physical torments that I have suffered, and also the unappetising character of the party with whom I attempted so unsuccessfully to jest. However, circumstances are such that I have no need to exploit your humane inclinations. It seems to me that I have no reason to fear the stern embrace of the law. His Porcine Excellency Samson Kharitonovich Eropkin is unlikely to take me to court for this innocent prank. It would not be in his interest.'