‘Thank you and g-goodbye. Madam.’
Genji bowed to the model and set off rapidly towards the door. Columbine and Masa went dashing after him.
‘Why didn’t you ask him about anything else?’ she asked him furiously, when they were already on the stairs. ‘He’d only just started talking about the most interesting part!’
‘He had already told us the most interesting part. That is one,’ Genji replied. ‘We wouldn’t have learned anything else interesting from him. That is two. Another minute and there could have been a scandalous incident, because someone was behaving with extreme impudence. That is three.’
After that he started speaking some kind of gibberish – it must have been Japanese, because Masa understood it very well and started gibbering away in reply. From his tone of voice he seemed to be making excuses.
Outside in the street Columbine suddenly felt as if she had been struck by lightning.
‘The voice!’ she cried out. ‘During the seance Ophelia mentioned some voice! Remember, when she was talking to Avaddon’s spirit!’
‘I remember, I remember. Don’t shout like that, p-people are looking at you,’ said Genji, the staid guardian of propriety. ‘But did you realise what that voice was singing? What it was calling on Avaddon to do? And in a way that left absolutely no room for doubt?’
She tried howling quietly: ‘Do-o-o-oh! Ko-o-o-oh!’
She imagined it was the dead of night, with a storm outside the window, a flickering candle flame, a white sheet of paper with crooked lines of writing. Oh my God!
‘Go-o-o!, g-o-o . . . Oi!’
‘Yes, “oi!” indeed. Just imagine it, a terrible inhuman voice repeating over and over again “Go, go, go”, hour after hour. And just b-before that Avaddon had been openly named as the Chosen One. That’s more than enough. Just write your farewell poem and p-put the noose round your neck.’
Columbine stopped and squeezed her eyes tight shut in order to remember this moment for ever. The moment when the miraculous had entered her life with all the incontrovertibility of scientific fact. It was one thing to dream of the Eternal Bridegroom, without being completely sure that he really existed. It was quite another thing to know, to know for certain.
‘Death is alive, he sees and hears everything, he is here beside us!’ Columbine whispered. ‘And Prospero is his servant! It’s all absolutely true! It’s not just a fantasy, it’s not a hallucination! Even the neighbours next door heard it!’
The surface of the pavement swayed beneath her feet. The young lady squeezed her eyes shut again in fright and grabbed hold of Genji’s arm, knowing that afterwards she would be angry with herself for being so weak and impressionable. Why, of course Death was a thinking, feeling being, how could it be otherwise?
She recovered quite quickly. She even laughed as she said: ‘Isn’t it wonderful that there are so many strange things all around us?’
It was well-put, impressive, and she glanced at Genji in the right way, throwing her head back slightly and half-lowering her eyelashes.
It was just a pity that he was looking off to one side and not at Columbine.
‘Mmm, yes, there are certainly many strange things,’ he murmured, not really seeming to have heard what she said. ‘ “Go, go” is impressive enough. But there is another circumstance even m-more surprising.’
‘What’s that?’
‘It is strange, surely, that the voice carried on howling right until dawn?’
‘Why is it?’ Columbine asked after thinking for a moment.
‘Avaddon hanged himself no later than three o’clock in the morning. There was no answer when Stakhovich started hammering on the wall some time after three. And the results of the autopsy indicate that d-death occurred at about three. If the Beast was sent by Death to summon her lover, then why would it carry on howling until d-dawn, when the guest had already arrived?’
‘Perhaps the Beast was mourning him?’ Columbine suggested uncertainly.
Genji looked at her reproachfully.
‘From the Beast’s point of view, it ought to have been rejoicing, not mourning. And then, long after the man had died, the Beast was still wailing “Go, go”. Doesn’t Death’s emissary strike you as being rather stupid?’
Yes, this is a very strange and mysterious story, thought Columbine. And the greatest mystery of all is why you brought me with you, sir.
The look in the prince’s blue eyes was warm and friendly, but she could not sense any hidden motive.
In short, it was a puzzle.
She shook the crystal teardrop from her lashes
From Basmannaya Street they drove for a long time past places that looked like hospitals and barracks, then the buildings on the streets gradually shrank and changed from stone to wood, until eventually the landscape became entirely rural. Columbine, however, did not look around much, she was still under the impression of the revelation that had been granted to her. Her companions did not speak either.
But then the carriage halted in the middle of a dusty, unpaved street lined with small, single-storey houses. On one side she could see the steep bank of a small river or a narrow ravine through the gap between two wooden fences.
‘Where are we?’ Columbine asked.
‘On the Yauza,’ Genji replied, as he jumped down from the footboard. ‘According to the description, th-that house over there is the one we need. This is where Ophelia used to l-live. Or to use her real name, Alexandra Sinichkina.’
Columbine could not help smiling at the funny name. Alexandra Sinichkina was even worse than Maria Mironova. No wonder the girl had preferred to be called Ophelia.
It turned out that the oracle of the ‘Lovers of Death’ had lived in a tidy little house that had four windows with white shutters, embroidered curtains and flowers on the window-sills: behind the house there was a green, leafy apple orchard, and the branches of the trees were bowed under the weight of gold and red fruit.
The knock at the gate was answered by a neat old woman of about forty-five, dressed in black.
‘Her mother,’ Genji explained in a low voice as the old woman walked towards them. ‘A provincial secretary’s widow. She and her daughter lived alone.’
When Ophelia’s mother came closer, her eyes proved to be as bright and clear as her daughter’s, but the eyelids were red and swollen. That was from crying, Columbine guessed, and she felt a sharp tingling in her nose. How could you explain to the poor woman that what had happened was not a misfortune at all, but the greatest possible blessing? She would never believe it.
‘Good afternoon, Serafima Kharitonovna,’ Genji said with a bow. ‘P-pardon us for disturbing you. We knew Alexandrovna Ivanovna . . .’
He hesitated, evidently uncertain how to introduce himself. After all, he wasn’t really a Japanese prince. But he was spared the need.
The widow opened the wicket gate and sobbed.
‘So you knew my Sashenka? She did have some friends after all? Thank you for coming to see me, I’ve been sitting here all on my own, with no one at all to talk to. The samovar’s all ready. We don’t have any relatives, and the neighbours don’t call, they turn their noses up. Of course, a suicide is a disgrace to the entire street.’
Their hostess led them into a small dining room where there were embroidered covers on the chairs, a portrait of some bishop on the wall and an old-fashioned clock ticking in the corner. She obviously really was in desperate need of company, because she started talking immediately and carried on with hardly a pause. She poured tea, but didn’t drink any herself, just ran her finger round the rim of the full cup.
‘While Sashenka was alive, we had plenty of lady visitors, everyone needed my daughter. They wanted her to read the candle wax, or cure a headache, or turn away the evil eye. Sashenka could do everything. Even tell if someone’s betrothed was still alive in a faraway country. And she did it all out of the goodness of her heart, she didn’t accept any gifts, she said that was wrong.’