‘To a Higher Other?’ Gesar asked, to make quite sure.
‘A Prophet!’ said Olga, sounding almost jolly. ‘Definitely a Prophet!’
‘Can you repeat it for us, Anton?’ Gesar asked in a voice that was perfectly calm and friendly now.
‘By all means. “You are Anton Gorodetsky, Higher White Magician. You are Nadka’s father. Because of you … all of us …”
‘What came after that?’
‘At that point he was interrupted.’
Gesar muttered something and started drumming his fingers on the table. I waited. Everybody else was waiting too.
‘Anton, I wouldn’t like to seem impolite … but are you certain it was your own decision to drink beer?’
I was flabbergasted. Not even offended, just flabbergasted. To ask an Other if he has fallen under someone else’s influence is quite a serious matter. It’s like … well, it’s like one man enquiring about the success of another man’s intimate life. Between close friends, of course, that kind of question is possible. But between a boss and his subordinate … and in the presence of other colleagues … naturally, if an inexperienced Other commits some kind of inept blunder, then the question ‘Were you thinking with your own head?’ is quite appropriate, although even so it’s rhetorical. But asking a Higher Other a question like that …
‘Boris Ignatievich,’ I said, furiously tearing away all my layers of mental defence. ‘I must have given you some reason to say that. I honestly can’t think exactly what. In my view, I acted entirely of my own free will. But if you have any doubts, scan me – I don’t object.’
Of course, that was another rhetorical phrase. Absolutely rhetorical. The kind of thing a man who has fallen under some absurd suspicion would say – for instance, when he’s a guest in someone’s house and is accused of stealing the silver spoons off the table …
‘Thank you, Anton. I accept your suggestion,’ Gesar replied, getting up.
The next moment I blanked out.
And then I opened my eyes.
Between those two points, of course, some time had passed – five or ten minutes. Only I didn’t remember it. I was in Gesar’s office, lying on the small divan referred to ironically by everyone as ‘the brainstorm launch pad’. Olga was holding my head – and she was very, very angry. Gesar was sitting on a chair opposite me – and he was very, very embarrassed. There was no one else in the office.
‘Well, then, am I a trembling wretch or am I justified?’ I asked, quoting Dostoevsky’s famous phrase.
‘Anton, I offer you my very humblest apologies,’ said Gesar.
‘He’s already apologised to all the others,’ Olga added. ‘Anton, forgive the old fool.’
I sat up and rubbed my temples. My head didn’t actually hurt – it just felt incredibly empty and it was ringing.
‘Who am I? Where am I? Who are you, I don’t know you!’ I muttered.
‘Anton, please accept my apologies …’ Gesar repeated.
‘Boss, what made you think I was under some kind of influence?’
‘Doesn’t it seem strange to you that after seeing off our guest you sat down to drink beer in a lousy, expensive little cafe, even though you knew you were going to drive?’
‘It does, but that’s the way the day went.’
‘And that, at the precise moment when you suddenly decided to linger at the airport, a clairvoyant boy threw a hysterical fit right in front of your eyes?’
‘Life is made up of coincidences,’ I said philosophically.
‘And that the plane reached Barcelona safely?’
That really knocked me back. ‘How?’
‘The usual way. Engines roaring and wings swaying. It got there, offloaded all the people and set off on the way back an hour ago.’
I shook my head from side to side. ‘Boris Ignatievich … of course, I’m no clairvoyant. But when I specifically check the probability of one event or another … The boy started howling about a catastrophe. I glanced at his aura – an uninitiated Other in a spontaneous outburst of Power. I started checking through the reality lines – the plane crashed. With a probability of ninety-eight per cent. Maybe … well, there are no absolutely certain predictions … maybe those two per cent came up?’
‘Possibly. But how else can you interpret what happened?’
‘A deliberate provocation,’ I said reluctantly. ‘Someone pumped the boy full of Power and hung a false aura on him. It’s a well-known move – you yourself … Hmm. Well, then the boy has a fit of hysterics, I hear him howling and start calculating the probabilities … let’s assume they’ve been distorted, too.’
‘With what intent?’
‘To make us use our right to a first-level intervention for nothing. The plane was never going to crash, the kid is of no interest. And we, like idiots, have wasted our bullet.’
Gesar raised his finger didactically.
‘But we didn’t have the right to intervene in any case!’ I exclaimed.
‘We did,’ Gesar muttered gruffly. ‘We did and we do. But reserved exclusively for me. If you had come directly to me … I would have allowed you to intervene.’
‘So that’s how it is …’ I said. ‘Well … that really does make it look like a trick. But what about the kid?’
‘A Prophet …’ Gesar said reluctantly. ‘A very powerful one. And you bear no signs of having been influenced. So you’re probably right.’
‘But the plane didn’t crash,’ Olga said quietly.
We stopped talking for a moment.
‘Prophets don’t make mistakes. The boy is a Prophet, since he made predictions about his own fate and the fate of a Higher Other. But the plane didn’t crash. You didn’t interfere in events …’ Gesar said quietly.
That was when it hit me. ‘You weren’t checking if I was under some kind of influence or not,’ I said. ‘You were checking if I saved the plane without permission.’
‘That too,’ said Gesar, not even embarrassed now. ‘But I didn’t want to state a reason like that in front of our colleagues.’
‘Well, thanks a million.’ I got up and walked towards the door.
Gesar waited until I opened it before he spoke. ‘I must say, Anton, I’m very pleased for you. Pleased and proud.’
‘Why, exactly?’
‘Because you didn’t intervene without permission. And you didn’t even come up with any human nonsense like phone calls about a bomb on the plane …’
I walked out and closed the door behind me.
I felt like screaming out loud or smashing my fist against the wall.
But I held out. I was imperturbable and cool.
I really hadn’t come up with any ‘human nonsense’! The thought had never even entered my head. I was convinced that we had no legal right to save two hundred people – and I had saved one Other and his mother.
I must have learned all my lessons well – I had behaved entirely correctly for a Higher Other.
And that made me feel lousy.
‘Anton!’
Looking round, I saw Semyon hurrying to catch up with me. He seemed slightly embarrassed, like an old friend who has just witnessed an awkward and ugly scene. But we had been close friends for a long time already, and Semyon didn’t have to pretend that he had been detained by chance.
‘I thought I’d have to wait longer,’ Semyon explained. ‘Well, that was a freaky move by the boss – very, very freaky …’
‘He’s right,’ I admitted reluctantly. ‘It really was a strange situation.’
‘I’ve been assigned to talk to the boy, initiate him and explain to the mother why he should study in our school … basic standard procedure. Why don’t we go together?’
‘You mean you’ve already found him?’ I asked. ‘I only read the names, I didn’t take any more trouble …’