11:11:01, 11:11:02, 11:11:03, 11:11:04…
Swardilin flew up onto the stage with a guttural croak. He swayed, unable to stay on his feet, and fell.
‘The wires!’ he shouted. ‘Eriza-san, the wires!’
‘What?’ she asked in confusion, staring spellbound at the blinking figures.
11:11:05, 11:11:06, 11:11:07…
Crawling sideways like a crab, the Japanese tumbled in over the threshold of the geisha’s little house and jerked the casket towards him with all his might. The wires snapped, the display went blank and for some reason sparks showered down from the ceiling above the hall.
‘That’s orr,’ said Swardilin, and he lay down on his back and squeezed his eyes shut. His head must have been spinning very badly. ‘A beautifur death can wait. First a beautifur rife.’
There won’t be any explosion. We’re saved, Eliza thought. And she burst into tears. What good was that if he, he had been killed? It would have been better for them to die together. Enveloped in thunder and flame!
‘Erast Petrovich… He saved us all and he’s been killed, he’s been killed,’ she moaned.
Masa opened his eyes and sat up. He looked at his master, lying there face down, and protested resentfully.
‘I saved orr of us. My master herped me. He onry tord me: “Masa, jyuichibyo!” – “Masa, ereven seconds!” and ran off. And I had to puzzur out what he meant. My head was broken anyway, it hurt. It was hard to think. But I understood!’
‘What difference does it make, who saved everybody… He has been killed! He fell from such a great height!’
She crept across to her beloved on her knees, fell against his back and started crying.
Swardilin touched her on the shoulder.
‘Ret me see, prease, Eriza-san.’
He gently moved Eliza aside, then felt his motionless master for a short while and nodded in satisfaction. He turned Fandorin over onto his back. Erast Petrovich’s face was pale and motionless, quite unbearably handsome. Eliza bit herself on the wrist to stop herself howling with grief.
The Japanese, however, treated the fallen hero disrespectfully. He pressed on his neck with one finger, leaned down and started blowing into his nose.
Fandorin’s eyelashes fluttered and his eyes opened. The blue eyes gazed at Masa – first indifferently and then in astonishment. Erast Petrovich pushed the Japanese away from him.
‘What on earth do you think you’re doing?’ he exclaimed, and started staring around.
It’s a miracle!
He’s alive, alive!
Swardilin shook his head and said something reproachfully. Fandorin’s face took on an embarrassed expression.
‘Masa says that I have completely forgotten how to jump from a height. I haven’t p-practised it for a long time. He’s right. There are no bones broken, but the impact knocked me unconscious. I’m ashamed. Well now, how is our artist of Evil doing?’
He and Masa started massaging and probing at Nonarikin. The assistant director cried out. He was alive too.
‘A quite exceptionally hardy constitution. He got off with a broken collarbone,’ Erast Petrovich summed up, and turned towards the hall. ‘It’s all over, calm down! Those who can get up may do so. Those who are too agitated had better remain in their seats. Gentlemen of the company, bring the ladies some water! And sal volatile.’
Cautiously, still not fully believing that they had been saved, several of the actors got up. The first to jump to her feet was Comedina.
‘Don’t touch him! You’re hurting him!’ she shouted at Masa, who was tying the assistant director’s wrists together with a leather belt.
‘He should be sent off to serve hard labour! He almost did for the lot of us!’ Mephistov brandished his bony fist at Nonarikin. ‘I’ll testify at the trial. Oh, I’ll testify, won’t I just!’
Noah Noaevich mopped the top of his head with a handkerchief.
‘Forget it, Anton Ivanovich, what trial are you talking about? He’s a violent lunatic.’
The leader of the Ark was recovering before their very eyes. His expression grew firm again, and his eyes started glittering. Clambering up onto the stage, the director assumed a majestic pose, standing over the groaning Nonarikin.
‘Congratulations on a phenomenal flop, my talentless pupil. An artist with this specific gift belongs in the aforementioned lunatic asylum. They employ progressive means of treatment there, and I think there is even a drama circle. When you have recovered a bit, you can lead it.’
Suddenly Stern was almost sent flying as Comedina jumped up and crashed into him from behind.
‘Don’t you dare make fun of him! That’s mean and base! Georgy Ivanovich is unwell!’ She went down on her knees and started rubbing the dust and dirt off Nonarikin’s face. ‘Georges, I still love you anyway! I’ll always love you! I’ll come to visit you in the hospital every day! And when you get well, I’ll take you away. The only problem is that you imagined you were a titan. But there’s no need to be a titan. Titans are always huffing and puffing, so they’re unhappy. It’s better to be a little person, believe me. See how little I am? And you’ll be the same. We were made for each other. You’ll come to understand that. Not now, but later.’
Stunned and in pain, Nonarikin couldn’t speak. He merely tried to move away from the stage fool. If his grimace was anything to go by, he didn’t wish to be a little person.
‘Well now, colleagues,’ Noah Noaevich exclaimed. ‘The benefit performance turned out rather impressive, as a matter of fact. It was only a shame that there was no audience. And if we tell anyone, no one will believe us. They’ll think that we acted out the whole thing ourselves and stuck dynamite all over the place for the sake of the publicity… By the way,’ he added anxiously, switching to a whisper, ‘dynamite can’t simply go and detonate for some reason or other, can it? Quiet, I implore you! Konstantina Petrovna, don’t shout like that, please!’
After the Benefit Performance
RECONSTRUCTION
A woman in love spoke beautiful words to the man who had almost blown up the theatre. Then an ambulance carriage arrived and orderlies led away the madman, carefully supporting him from both sides. Soft-hearted Vasilisa Prokofievna, forgetting the terror she had suffered, threw a coat over the shoulders of the wilted assistant director and also made the sign of the cross over the sick man.
People are compassionate with the insane, thought Fandorin, and that is probably right. But at the same time, the type of psychological disorder known as manic obsession gives rise to the most dangerous criminals in the world. They typically possess steely determination, absolute fearlessness and brilliant inventiveness. The greatest threat is represented by manic obsession on a grand scale. Those who are not possessed by the petty demon of lust, but by the demon of global transformation. And if they cannot manage to transform the world in accordance with their ideal, they are willing to kill everything that lives. Fortunately, as yet it is not possible for any Herostratus to incinerate the temple of life, that is beyond their reach. But progress is creating ever more powerful means of destruction. The imminent war – which is clearly, unfortunately, inevitable – will be unprecedentedly bloody. It will break out not only on the land and the surface of the sea, but also in the air and in the depths of the waters, everywhere. And the century has only just begun, technical progress is unstoppable. The tragicomic Georges Nonarikin is not simply a theatre director driven insane by his artistic vanity. He is the prototype of a new kind of villain. They will not be satisfied with just a theatre as a model of existence: they will want to transform the entire world into a gigantic stage and present on it the plays that they themselves have penned, to allocate to mankind the role of obedient extras, and if the production is a flop – to die together with the Universal Theatre. That is exactly how everything will end. Madmen obsessed by the grandeur and beauty of their conceptions will blow up the Earth. The only hope is that people will be found to stop them in time. Such people are essential. Without them the world is doomed.