He proffered another rouble, but the clerk shook his head with dignity.
‘A Moscow enquiry is two kopecks. My direct responsibility. I won’t take anything. Anyway, it only takes a moment.’ And indeed, he very soon declared: ‘No one by that name, either living or working here. Of course, I could look through previous years, but that would be by way of an exception…’
‘Fifty kopecks a year,’ replied the perspicacious client: it was a pleasure doing business with a man like him. At this point the enquiries started dragging on a bit. The clerk took out the annual directories volume by volume and moved from the twentieth century back into the nineteenth, burrowing deeper and deeper into the strata of the past.
Vasilii Alexandrovich had already reconciled himself to failure when the clerk suddenly exclaimed:
‘I have it! Here, in the book for 1891! That will be… er… seven roubles!’ And he read it out: ‘“E. P. Fandorin, state counsellor, deputy for special assignments to governor-general of Moscow. Malaya Nikitskaya Street, annexe to the house of Baron Evert-Kolokoltsev”. Well, if your acquaintance held a position like that fourteen years ago, he definitely must be an Excellency by now. Strange that I couldn’t find him in the ministry listings.’
‘It is strange,’ admitted Rybnikov, absentmindedly counting through the reddish notes protruding from his wallet.
‘You say the Department of Police or the gendarmes?’ the clerk asked, narrowing his eyes cunningly. ‘You know the way things are there: a man may seem to exist, and even hold an immensely high rank, but for the general public, it’s as if he didn’t exist at all.’
The customer batted his eyelids for a moment and then livened up a little.
‘Why, yes. My father said that Erast Petrovich worked on secret matters at the embassy!’
‘There, you see. And you know what… My godfather works just close by here, on Maly Gnezdnikovsky Lane. At the police telegraph office. Twenty years he’s been there, he knows everyone who’s anyone…’
There followed an eloquent pause.
‘A rouble for you, and one for your godfather.’
‘Where do you think you’re going?’ the clerk shouted at a peasant who had stuck his nose in at the door. ‘Can’t you see it’s half past one? It’s my lunch hour. Come back in an hour! And you, sir’ – this was to Vasilii Alexandrovich, in a whisper – ‘wait here. I’ll be back in a flash.’
Of course, Rybnikov did not wait in the office. He waited outside, taking up a position in a gateway. You could never tell. This petty bureaucrat might not be as simple as he seemed.
However, the precaution proved unnecessary.
The bureaucrat came back a quarter of an hour later, alone and looking very pleased.
‘A quite eminent individual! As they say, widely known in very narrow circles,’ he announced when Rybnikov popped up beside him. ‘Pantelei Ilich told me so much about your Fandorin! It turns out that he was a very important man. In the old days, under Dolgorukov.’
As he listened to the story of the former greatness of the governor’s special deputy, Vasilii Alexandrovich gasped and threw his hands up in the air, but the greatest surprise was waiting for him at the very end.
‘And you’re lucky,’ said the bureaucrat, flinging his arms wide dramatically, like a circus conjuror. ‘This Mr Fandorin of yours is in Moscow, he arrived from Peter. Pantelei Ilich sees him every day.’
‘In Moscow?’ Rybnikov exclaimed. ‘Really! Well, that is a stroke of luck. Do you know if he’ll be here long?’
‘No way of telling. It’s something highly important, government business. But Pantelei didn’t say what it was, and I didn’t ask. That’s not for the likes of us to know.’
‘Certainly, that’s right…’ There was a peculiar expression in Rybnikov’s slightly narrowed eyes as their glance slid over the other man’s face. ‘Did you tell your godfather that one of Erast Petrovich’s acquaintances was looking for him?’
‘No, I asked as if I was the one who was interested.’
He’s not lying, Vasilii Alexandrovich decided. He decided to keep both roubles for himself. His eyes widened again to assume their normal expression. And the clerk never knew that his little life had just been hanging on the very slimmest of threads.
‘It’s very good that you didn’t. I’ll arrange a surprise for him – in memory of my late dad. Won’t Erast Petrovich be delighted!’ Rybnikov said with a radiant smile.
But when he walked out, his face started twitching nervously.
That was the same day that Glyceria Romanovna came to their meeting with a new idea for saving Rybnikov: to appeal for help to her good friend, the head of the Moscow Gendarmes Office, General Charme. Lidina assured him that Konstantin Fyodorovich Charme was a dear old man whose name suited him perfectly, and he would not refuse her anything.
‘But what good will that do?’ asked Rybnikov, trying to fight her off. ‘My dear, I am a state criminaclass="underline" I lost secret documents and I went on the run. How can your general of gendarmes help with that?’
But Glyceria Romanovna exclaimed heatedly:
‘You’re wrong! Konstantin Fyodorovich himself explained to me how much depends on the official who is assigned to handle a case. He can make things go badly or make them go well. Ah, if we could find out who is dealing with you!’
And then, giving way to the impulse of the moment, Vasilii Alexandrovich suddenly blurted out:
‘I do know. You’ve seen him. Do you remember, beside the bridge – that tall gentleman with the grey temples?’
‘The elegant one, in the light-coloured English coat? I remember, a very impressive man.’
‘His name is Fandorin, Erast Petrovich Fandorin. He has come to Moscow from St Petersburg especially to catch me. For God’s sake, don’t ask anyone to intercede – you’ll only make them suspect that you are harbouring a deserter. But if you could find out cautiously, in passing, what kind of man he is, what kind of life he leads, what his character is like, that might help me. Every little detail is important here. But you must act delicately!’
‘You men have nothing to teach us about delicacy,’ Lidina remarked condescendingly, already figuring out how she would go about this business. ‘We’ll set this misfortune right, just let me sleep on it.’
Rybnikov didn’t thank her, but the way he looked at her gave her a warm feeling in her chest. His yellow eyes no longer seemed like a cat’s, as they had during the first minutes of their acquaintance – she thought of them now as ‘bright coffee-coloured’ and found them very expressive.
‘You’re like the Swan Queen,’ he said with a smile. ‘“Dearest Prince, do not pine so, for this wonder I do know. In friendship’s name, do not be sad, I shall help you and be glad.”’
Glyceria Romanovna frowned.
‘Pushkin! I can’t stand him!’
‘What? But surely all Russians adore Pushkin, don’t they?’
Rybnikov suddenly realised that in his astonishment he had expressed himself rather awkwardly, but Lidina attached no importance to his strange words.
‘How could he write: ‘“Your end, your children’s death, with cruel joy I do behold”? What kind of poet is it that rejoices at the death of children? So much for “a star of captivating happiness”!’
And the conversation turned from a serious subject to Russian poetry, which Rybnikov knew quite well. He said that his father, a passionate admirer of Pushkin’s lyre, had cultivated the taste in him as a child.
And then 25 May had come, and Vasilii Alexandrovich had entirely forgotten the inconsequential conversation – there was more important business afoot.
The ‘dummies’ had been instructed to collect the packages from the left luggage office at dawn, just before they set off. The postman would cover the three crates with sackcloth, daub them with sealing wax and conceal them among his parcels – the best possible hiding place. Bridge’s job was even easier, because Vasilii Alexandrovich had done half the work for him: while riding in the closed wagon, he had tipped the melinite into eight cardboard boxes and wrapped each one in anthracite-black paper.