He Lover of Death, page 28
Senka’s enemy looked up at the newcomers with bleary eyes. He asked the Caucasian: ‘Who are you? And what do you want?’
‘I am Kazbek.’
‘Who?’
‘He must be the one who arrived from the Caucasus not long since with twenty horsemen,’ Deadeye said in a low voice, leaning against the wall and folding his arms. ‘I told you about him. They showed up three months ago. Put the bite on the Maryina Roshcha bandits, took over all the girls and the paraffin shops.’
The Caucasian warrior chuckled, or rather, he twitched the corner of his mouth.
‘You Russians came to our mountains and you do not leave. And I have come to you and I shall not leave soon either. We shall be neighbours, Prince. Neighbours can get along – or not. They can talk with their knives, we know how to do that. Or they can be kunaks – blood brothers, you call it. Choose which you like.’
‘It’s all the same bollocks to me,’ the Prince replied languidly. He downed a glass of vodka, but didn’t take a cucumber to follow it. ‘Live any way you like, as long as you don’t get under my feet, and if you annoy me, we can get the knives out.’
Deadeye warned him in a low voice: ‘Prince, you can’t deal with them like that. He’s come alone, but we can be certain the others are hiding somewhere not so far away. He only has to whistle and there’ll be daggers everywhere.’
‘Let them bring on the daggers,’ the Prince hissed. ‘We’ll see who comes off best. All right, Deadeye, don’t be so gutless’ – and he laughed. ‘What are you glowering at, Kazbek? I’m laughing. The Prince is a jolly man. Right then, kunaks it is. Let’s shake on it.’
He stood up and held out his hand. That made Senka feel a bit better – he’d been preparing his soul to join the holy saints in heaven.
But the Abrek didn’t want to shake hands.
‘In our mountains just squeezing fingers is not enough. You have to prove yourself. One kunak must give the other the thing most precious to him.’
‘Yeah?’ The Prince swung his arm out from the shoulder. ‘Well, ask for anything you like. The Prince’s heart is as open as a Khitrovka mamselle. Look at this candlestick here, it’s pure gold. I took it off this merchant just the other day. Like me to give it to you.’
Kazbek shook his head in the shaggy astrakhan hat.
‘Then what do you want? Tell me.’
‘I want Death,’ the Caucasian said in a low, passionate voice.
‘Whose death?’ the Prince asked, startled.
‘Your Death. They say that is the most precious thing you have.
Give me that. Then we shall be kunaks to the grave.’
Senka was the first to catch on. Well, that was it now, for sure. Now there’d be fountains of blood, and some of it Senka’s: dear old mum, welcome your poor son Senya into heaven with the angels.
Deadeye caught on too. He stayed where he was, but the fingers of his right hand slipped quietly into his left sleeve. And inside that sleeve there were little knives on a leather cuff. He had only to fling a couple, and that would be the end of the visitors.
The Prince was the last to twig. He opened his mouth wide and tore open his collar so they could see the veins on his neck, but the shout couldn’t force its way out – his fury strangled it in his throat.
Kazbek went on as if nothing had happened. ‘Give me your woman, Prince. I want her. And for you, see, I have brought the best of my mamselles. As slim and supple as a mountain goat. Take her. I give her to you.’
And he pushed Senka out into the middle of the room.
‘A-a-agh!’ Senka squealed. ‘Mum!’
But his whimper was drowned by the Prince’s loud roar: ‘I’ll rip your throat out! With my teeth! You carrion!’
He picked up the big two-pronged fork for getting cucumbers out of the jar and was about to throw himself on the Abrek, but suddenly out of nowhere a small black revolver glinted in the Caucasian’s hand.
‘You – hands on your shoulders!’ Kazbek said to the Jack. He didn’t say a word to the Prince, but his eyes were blazing.
Deadeye raised one eyebrow as he contemplated the black hole of the gun barrel. He showed the Caucasian his empty hands and put them up. The Prince swore obscenely and flung the fork down on the floor. He didn’t look at the gun, he stared into the eyes of the man who had insulted him and chewed on his lips in a fury – a trickle of red blood ran down his chin.
‘I’ll kill you anyway!’ he shouted hoarsely. ‘I’ll get you, even in Maryina Roshcha. I’ll rip your guts out for this, and make sausages with them!’
Kazbek clicked his tongue. ‘You Russians are like women. A man does not shout, he talks quietly.’
‘So she’s been with you too, with you!’ the Prince shouted, not listening to a word. He wiped away an angry tear and grated his teeth. ‘The whore, the bitch, I’ve no more patience for her!’
‘I came to you like a man, honestly,’ said the Abrek, knitting his black brows, and his blue eyes glinted with a cold flame. ‘I could have stolen her, but Kazbek is not a thief. I ask you like a friend: give her to me. If you do not give her, I shall take her like an enemy. Only think first. I do not take her for nothing.’
He pointed to Senka cringing in the middle of the room.
The Prince gave poor innocent Senka a shove that sent him flying against the wall and sliding down on to the floor:
‘I don’t want your painted whore!’
Senka had hurt his shoulder and he was terrified, but those words that were meant to be insulting were sweet music to his ears. The Prince didn’t want him, Jesus be praised!
‘I throw the mamselle into the bargain, so you will not be left without a woman.’ The Abrek laughed. ‘But the most precious thing I have, the thing I will give you, is silver, much silver. You have never had so much ...’
‘I’ll ram that silver down your throat, you filthy swine!’ the Prince retorted. And he ranted for a long time, shouting incoherent threats and obscenities.
‘How much is “much”, my dear fellow?’ Deadeye asked when the Prince finally choked on his hatred and fell silent.
‘It will take more than one wagon to carry it away. I know you have been searching for this silver for a long time, but I have found it. For Death, I will give it to you.’
The Prince was about to start bawling again, but Deadeye raised one finger: Ssssh, not a word.
‘Do you mean the Yerokha pen-pusher’s treasure?’ the Jack asked in a grovelling voice. ‘So you’ve found it? Oh, most artful son of the Caucasus.’
‘Yes, now the treasure is mine. But if you wish, it will be yours.’
The Prince tossed his head like a bull driving away horseflies. ‘I won’t give you Death! Not for all your silver and gold, I won’t! She’ll never be yours, you dog!’
‘She is mine already,’ the Caucasian said, stroking his beard with his free hand. ‘As you wish, Prince. I came here honestly, and you have called me “dog”. I know already that in Moscow you can curse in many different ways, but “dog” is answered with the knife. We shall fight. I have more guards than you, and every one is a mountain eagle.’
Kazbek started backing towards the door, holding his revolver at the ready. Senka jumped up and pressed himself against his master.
‘Where are you going, you snake?’ the Prince roared. ‘You’ll never get out of here alive! Go on, fire! My wolves will finish you off!’
One of the twins stuck his head in the door. ‘What did you shout for, Prince? Were you calling us?’
Without taking his eyes off the Prince and Deadeye for a single moment, the Abrek grabbed Maybe or Surely just below the chin with his left hand, held him like that for a couple of seconds and let go. The young man collapsed in a heap and tumbled over on to his side.
‘Wait, dear fellow!’ said Deadeye. ‘Don’t go. Prince, this man came to you in peace, as a friend. What difference does one woman more or less make? What will the lads say?’ Then he started talking in poetry again. ‘Dear heart, Prince, do not ponder, I know of a certain wonder.’
Ah-ha, thought Senka, I know that poem too. That’s what the Swan Queen told Prince Gvidon: Don’t go getting in a lather, I’ll fix you up in fine fashion.
But the Khitrovka Prince apparently hadn’t read that fairy tale, he just looked blankly at Deadeye. The Jack winked back – Senka could see that very clearly from the side.
‘Treasure, you say?’ the Prince muttered. ‘All right. For the pen-pusher’s treasure, I’ll swap. But the silver up front.’
‘On your luck?’ Kazbek asked. ‘As a thief?’
‘On my luck as a thief,’ the Prince confirmed, and ran his thumb across his throat, the way you were supposed to when you swore an oath. But Senka spotted another bit of cunning: the Prince held his left hand behind his back, and he had the thumb between his fingers –that meant his word as a thief wasn’t worth a bent kopeck. He’d have to tell Kazbek – that is, Erast Petrovich – about this villainous trick.
‘Good.’ The Abrek nodded and put his weapon away. ‘Come to the Yeroshenko basement tonight, to the hall that is a dead end. Just the two of you come, no more. At exactly a quarter past three. If you come earlier or later, there is no deal.’
‘We’ll come alone, but won’t your wolves take their knives to us?’ asked the Prince, narrowing his eyes.
‘Why go to the basement for that?’ Kazbek asked with a shrug. ‘If we wanted, we could slice you into kebabs anyway. I need faithful kunaks in Moscow, friends I can trust . . . You will be met in the basement and taken to the right place. When you see who meets you, you will understand: Kazbek could have given you nothing and just taken it for free.’
The Prince opened his mouth to say something (to judge from his fierce grin, it was something angry), but Deadeye put a hand on his shoulder.
‘We’ll be there at quarter past three in the morning, dear fellow. On my luck as a thief.’
The Jack swore without any tricks, both of his hands were out in the open.
‘So you’re not taking the mamselle?’ the Caucasian asked from the doorway.
Senka turned cold. Ai, Erast Petrovich, why are you trying to destroy me? Holy Saint Nicholas and the Virgin Intercessor, save me!
But the Prince, may God lop a thousand years off his torments in hell, just cleared his throat and spat on the floor.
Senka was saved.
HOW SENKA WAS A PEACHER
Outside, once they’d got into the landau and driven off, Senka heaved a bitter sigh and said:
‘Thank you, Erast Petrovich, for taking such good care of me. That’s the way you treat a true friend, is it? What if the Prince had said “give me your mamselle”? Were you really going to hand me over to be tortured to death?’
‘Turn the corner and stop!’ the ungrateful engineer ordered the driver in his Caucasian voice. He answered the reproach when they got out of the carriage.
‘For the P-Prince only one woman exists. He won’t even l-look at any other. I needed you to look f-frightened, Senya – to make our little interlude m-more convincing. And you m-managed it very well.’
And then Senka realised that when Erast Petrovich was wearing fancy dress – as an old Yid or a wild mountain warrior – he didn’t stammer at all. That was amazing. And Senka remembered that the engineer had done the whole job on his own, without any help from his partner. He felt ashamed then, most of all for being such a coward and calling on the Virgin Mary and St Nicholas for help. But then, what was there to be ashamed of in that? He was a real person, wasn’t he, not some kind of stone idol like Mr Nameless. Erast Petrovich didn’t need to pray, Masa-sensei had told Senka that.
They walked along Pokrovka Street, past the Church of the Trinity in the Mud and the magnificent Church of the Assumption.
‘Don’t you ever pray to God, then?’ Senka asked. ‘Is that because you’re not afraid of anything at all?’
‘Why do you think I’m n-not afraid?’ Erast Petrovich asked in surprise. ‘I am afraid. Only p-people completely without imagination have no f-fear. And since I am afraid, I p-pray sometimes.’
‘You’re lying!’
The engineer sighed. ‘It would be b-better to say “I don’t believe you”, and best of all n-never to say such things unless it is absolutely n-necessary, because . . .’ He gestured vaguely with his hand.
‘... because you could collect a slap across the face,’ Senka guessed.
‘And for th-that reason too. And the p-prayer I say, Senya, is one I was t-taught by an old priest: “Spare me, Lord, from a slow, p-painful, humiliating death”. That is the entire prayer.’
Senka thought about it. The bit about a slow death was clear enough – who wanted to spend ten years just lying paralysed or withering away? The painful part was obvious too.
‘But what’s a humiliating death? Is that when someone dies and everyone spits on him and kicks him?’
‘No. Christ was b-beaten and humiliated too, but there was nothing shameful about his d-death, was there? All my life I’ve b-been afraid of something else. I’m afraid of d-dying in a way that people will f-find amusing. People don’t remember anything else about you after th-that. For example, the French p-president Faure will not be remembered for c-conquering the island of Madagascar and concluding an alliance with Russia, but for the f-fact that His Excellency expired on t-top of his lover. All that is left of the former l-leader of the nation is a d-dirty joke: “The president died in the p-performance of his duties – in every s-sense”. Even on his gravestone the p-poor fellow is shown embracing the b-banner of the republic. People walking by g-giggle and titter – that is the f-fate that I fear.’
‘That sort of cock-up couldn’t happen to you,’ Senka reassured the engineer. ‘You’re in sound health.’
‘If not that k-kind, then some other. Fate loves to j-jest with those who are too concerned for their own d-dignity.’ Erast Petrovich laughed. ‘For instance, you remember the way the t-two of us were sitting in the water closet, and the G-Ghoul heard a noise and p-pulled out his revolver?’
‘How could I forget that? It still gives me the shakes.’
‘Well then, if the Ghoul had started f-firing through the door, he would have left us b-both draped across the toilet bowl. What a beautiful d-death that would have been.’
Senka imagined himself and Erast Petrovich lying on top of each other across the china potty, with their blood flowing straight into the sewage pipe.
‘Not exactly beautiful, I’d say.’
‘Indeed. I wouldn’t want to d-die like that. A stupid weakness, I realise that, b-but I simply can’t help myself.’
Mr Nameless gave a guilty smile and suddenly stopped dead –right on the corner of Kolpachny Lane.
‘Now, Senya, this is where our ways p-part. I have to drop into the post office and s-send off a certain important letter. F-from here on you will act without me.’
‘How’s that?’ Senka asked warily. What torment had the sly Erast Petrovich got in store for him now?
‘You will g-go to the police station and deliver a l-letter to Superintendent Solntsev.’
‘Is that all?’ Senka asked suspiciously, screwing up his eyes.
‘That’s all.’
That was all right, delivering a letter was no big deal.
‘I’ll take off the tart’s rags and wash the paint off my mug,’ Senka growled. ‘I feel a right nelly.’
‘I feel embarrassed in front of people,’ the pernickety engineer corrected him. ‘There’s no t-time to get changed. Stay as you are. It will be s-safer that way.’
Senka felt a black cat scrape its claws across his heart. Safer? What exactly did that mean?
But Mr Nameless only made the vicious beast scrape away even harder.
‘You’re a b-bright young man,’ he said. ‘Act according to the s-situation.’
He took two envelopes out of his pocket, gave one to Senka and kept the other.
Senka scratched at his chest to stop that cat scraping so hard, but his hand ran into something soft – it was the cotton wool Erast Petrovich had stuffed under the dress to give it a woman’s curves.
‘Why don’t I run to the post office, and you go to the superintendent?’ Senka suggested without really feeling very hopeful.
‘I can’t show my f-face at the police station. Hold on t-to the letter. You have to g-give it to Colonel Solntsev in person.’
There was no address on the envelope, and it wasn’t even glued shut.
‘That is so you will n-not have to waste any time b-buying a new one,’ Mr Nameless explained. ‘You’ll read it anyway.’
There was no way you could hide anything from him, the sly serpent.
Before Senka had even walked on a hundred steps alone, someone ran up from behind and started pawing his cotton-wool tits.
‘Oh, soft and springy, we could have some sweet fun,’ a fervent voice whispered in his ear.
He turned his head and saw an ugly mug that hadn’t been shaved and smelled of stale vodka and onions.
So this was what it was like for a girl to walk round Khitrovka on her own.
At first Senka was just going to frighten the randy villain, tell him he would complain to Brawn, the biggest pimp in Khitrovka, about this cheek, but the unwelcome admirer went on to lick the false mamselle on the neck, and Senka’s patience snapped.
Following the rules of Japanese fighting art, first he breathed out all the air in his lungs (to shift the root of his strength from his chest to his belly), then he smashed his heel into his admirer’s shin and then, when the admirer gasped and opened his filthy great mitts, Senka swung round rapidly, jabbed his finger into the top of his belly and winded him.
The lascivious wooer squatted down on his haunches and clutched at his belly. His face turned serious and thoughtful. That’s right, you think about how you ought to behave with the girls.
Senka turned into a quiet passageway and unfolded the letter.
’Dear Innokentii Romanovich,
I have learned from a reliable source that you have learned from a reliable source that I am in Moscow. Although we have never had any great affection for each other, I hopenonetheless that the orgy of atrocious crimes in the area entrusted to your care concerns you, as a servant of the law, noless than it does me, a man who left behind his former service and the cares of Moscow a long time ago. And therefore, I wish to put a business proposition to you.
