The director’s car stopped, and Kolya jumped out of it.
At that moment, Sinitsin appeared from behind Samsonov’s back. “Leaving us, Pavel Mikhailovich?”
Kolya was approaching, hopping up the ramp.
When Nina recalled that moment afterwards, she was unable to pinpoint in her memory the explosion itself, although it must have been deafening. She remembered seeing the director’s car jump up, tongues of flame bursting from under it. Kolya, who had been already just a couple of steps away, flew towards her and knocked her over. They both tumbled down.
Nina, in her luxurious evening dress, was lying on the pavement. Her head reeled, and all her senses were numbed. She did not feel like moving. “Thank God, the weather’s dry,” she thought, rather absurdly.
Slowly, she sat up. Next to her, Kolya, Pavel Mikhailovich and Sinitsin were rising from the ground. The car was a fright to look at. Crumpled beyond recognition, it was all on fire. From the garage came the wailing of the alarm sirens of dozens of cars which had been hit by the shock wave.
The pavement all around was littered with debris. Pavel Mikhailovich was still clutching the toy lion. A jagged piece of iron about a foot long was sticking out of the plush back of the beast.
Chapter 6
“Nina, are you all right? …”
Samsonov lifted her from the pavement. For the second time Nina floated up in the air in his strong arms. Once again, she saw very close his grey eyes and massive-featured face. This time, there was true concern and care in his look.
Carefully, Samsonov set her down on her feet.
“Are you OK, Nina? Does it hurt? Do you feel giddy?”
Nina was stupefied and only vaguely realized what had happened, but with all that she was feeling fine. Her exultation over her success as a woman and anticipation of something much bigger had not left her. She was not even frightened.
“Pavel Mikhailovich, everything’s all right with me. What was that?”
Samsonov drew himself up. “You want to know what that was?” he asked. His face was distorted with rage. “Damned outrage – that’s what it was! Scum, bastards!”
Sinitsin came up to them, limping.
“You are not hurt, Pavel Mikhailovich? Thank God. And you, Nina Yevgenievna?”
Samsonov turned to the man abruptly.
“Ah, here you are! Where have you been? How could you overlook that?”
The security chief made a helpless gesture: “I’m totally shocked, Pavel Mikhailovich. I believed we had taken all the precautions, but as it turned out, it wasn’t enough. Who knew that they would go as far as that…?”
Gradbank’s director grabbed his vice by the lapels of the man’s jacket, pulled him up, and roared him in the face: “You! You should have known! It’s your business to know everything!”
Samsonov was shaking the medium-sized Sinitsin like a tree – the security man was practically dangling up in the air, barely touching the ground with his toes.
“Listen, Sinitsin, listen carefully!” Samsonov roared on. “Do whatever it takes – don’t sleep, don’t eat, move heaven and earth – but give me security. If you blunder again – if the project wrecks because of you, or…” Samsonov glanced at Nina, “or if my people get hurt, I’ll kill you with my own hands. I mean it, you know me.”
He let Sinitsin go. The vice-director was all rumpled and had a remorseful look, but he did not strike Nina as being particularly scared.
Sinitsin smoothed his clothes. “I don’t deserve this kind of treatment, Pavel Mikhailovich,” he said quietly. “I am your man, too, and I am devoted to you. Believe me, I’ll do everything humanly possible…”
“Go away!” Samsonov barked at him.
Sinitsin flinched, dropped his eyes and retreated towards the burning car.
“Really, he shouldn’t treat people like that,” thought Nina.
Samsonov turned to the driver: “Kolya, how are you? Still in one piece?”
Contrary to his usual self, Kolya was not smiling. One could see now that it was a man, not a boy.
“I’m all right,” he responded. “What I don’t get is – where was the bomb? I checked everything out before starting up, as usual. Could they have planted it in the gas tank? … And it wasn’t a small bomb, either – three kilos at least.”
“Listen, Kolya,” said Samsonov. “You’re not working for me any longer. I promised your wife that your son would not be an orphan. So you hand in your notice and leave. I haven’t forgotten about your motordrome – you come round some time later, and we’ll have a talk about that.”
Kolya gave his boss a hurt look. “What kind of rat do you hold me for, Pavel Mikhailovich? You know I’ve been in Chechnya. Leave no man behind – that’s what we were taught there. I’m not leaving you until things quiet down here – don’t you even ask me to.”
“I am sorry,” said Samsonov. “And yet, don’t you be a fool! I don’t want you to get killed over nothing…”
“I’m in no hurry to get killed,” Kolya said seriously. “But if I leave, another guy will fill in – how about him getting killed? Me, I’ve been through stuff, at least.”
“That’s true,” muttered Samsonov. He was clearly touched. “And still, you are a fool, Kolyan.”
The familiar smile appeared on Kolya’s face.
“Yeah, Nastena says so, too. Well, it seems I was born that way.”
People began to pour out from the restaurant into the street; those were Gradbank’s guests of honor. In the street, they ran into the smoke-screen from the burning car. Startled cries and excited hubbub could be heard.
“To think that the bastard that contrived that must be here somewhere,” muttered Samsonov. “Scum…”
The guests realized at last what had happened. The cries grew into continuous tumult; the stockholders and partners rushed to the director – to satisfy their curiosity, to gloat, to sympathize.
“Kolya, take any car and drive Nina away,” said Samsonov. He turned to her: “Nina, you go home and stay put until I call you. You’ve got no business here…”
“Pavel Mikhailovich! …” Nina tried to protest.
“I don’t want to hear anything!” Samsonov cut her short. “One hero is enough… And anyway, you’ve already done your job – the rest is my business. You take a good rest now.”
“And one other thing,” he added, handing her a card. “Here, it’s my doctor’s. Tell him I sent you along. Let him make sure you don’t have a concussion or anything.”
“Yes, Pavel Mikhailovich. I get it – you need your employees to be able-bodied,” Nina tried to joke.
Samsonov ignored that. He was urging Nina to go away, and at the same time, he was keeping her, holding her by the hand.
“Nina, it’s awful that you had to go through this because of me. I’ll never forgive myself… But it’s a lesson for you, too: you see now that you’re better off away from me,” he smiled wryly.
More than ever before, Nina wanted to throw her arms around his neck and shout that she loved him and could not live without him. Embrace him and never let go. And let the bombs explode.
“Don’t worry about me, Pavel Mikhailovich,” she said simply.
“I do worry,” he objected.
He drew her up to his chest and kissed her on the cheek.
That was merely a friendly gesture, an expression of care, but still, that was their first kiss – and probably their last one, too.
“Well, you go now.” He released her.
Nina smiled, turned on her heels and walked away to where Kolya was waiting for her. Thus she missed her second chance to open her love to her man.
Nina was having rest. For once in a long while she had no work to do. Her brain and nerves which over the recent months had got accustomed to constant, great strain were idle now, which gave Nina a feeling of anticlimax and emptiness.
Nina was reliving the various episodes of her meetings with Samsonov. To her, it was like a favorite TV series, which she had already watched more than once but was eager to relish again, constantly finding something new in the familiar episodes. The last scene was, of course, the most important one – the culmination of the entire story. In it, the grey-eyed hero finally took notice of the heroine (modest, but full of inherent good qualities) and was about to open his armor slightly to let her into his heart, but… But at that very moment some scoundrels staged an explosion. Although Nina realized that Samsonov and his driver Kolya – and, incidentally, herself, too – had barely escaped getting killed, she did not give it much thought and was hardly worried at all – as if it really had been no more than a spectacular scene fixed by a skillful pyrotechnician.