If Erast Petrovich had only been in a normal, balanced state of mind, he would undoubtedly have felt ashamed of the very idea – how could he use a present from one woman to help him reach another! But his fevered brain whispered to him that diamond cuts glass. And the young man promised his conscience that he would take the ring off and never put it back on again for as long as he lived.
Fandorin did not know exactly how diamond was used for cutting. He took a firm grip on the ring and scored a decisive line. There was disgusting scraping sound, and a scratch appeared on the glass.
The titular counsellor pursed his lips stubbornly and prepared to apply greater strength.
He pressed as hard as he could – and the window frame suddenly yielded.
For just a moment Erast Petrovich imagined that this was the result of his efforts, but O-Yumi was standing in the dark rectangle that had opened up in front of him. She looked at the vice-consul with laughing eyes that reflected two tiny little moons.
‘You have overcome all the obstacles and deserve a little help,’ she whispered. ‘Only, for God’s sake, don’t fall off. That would be stupid now.’ And in an absolutely unromantic but extremely practical manner, she grabbed hold of his collar.
‘I came to tell you that I have also been thinking about you for the last two days,’ said Fandorin.
The idiotic English language has no intimate form of the second person pronoun, it’s always just ‘you’, whatever the relationship might be, but he decided that from this moment on they were on intimate terms.
‘Is that all you came for?’ she asked with a smile, holding him by the shoulders.
‘Yes.’
‘Good. I believe you. You can go back now.’
Erast Petrovich did not feel like going back.
He thought for a moment and said:
‘Let me in.’
O-Yumi glanced behind her.
‘For one minute. No longer.’
Fandorin didn’t try to argue.
He clambered over the windowsill (how many times had he already done that tonight?) and reached his arms out for her, but O-Yumi backed away.
‘Oh no. Or a minute won’t be long enough.’
The vice-consul hid his hands behind his back, but he declared:
‘I want to take you with me!’
She shook her head and her smile faded away.
‘Why? Do you love him?’ he asked in a trembling voice.
‘Not any more.’
‘Th-then why?’
She glanced behind her again – apparently at the door. Erast Petrovich himself had not looked round even once, he hadn’t even noticed what room this was – a boudoir or a dressing room. To tear his gaze away from O-Yumi’s face for even a second seemed blasphemous to him.
‘Go quickly. Please,’ she said nervously. ‘If he sees you here, he’ll kill you.’
Fandorin shrugged one shoulder nonchalantly.
‘He won’t kill me. Europeans don’t do that. He’ll challenge me to a d-duel.’
Then she started pushing him towards the window with her fists.
‘He won’t challenge you. You don’t know this man. He will definitely kill you. If not today, then tomorrow or the next day. And not with his own hands.’
‘Let him,’ Fandorin murmured, not listening, and tried to pull her towards him. ‘I’m not afraid of him.’
‘… But before that he’ll kill me. It will be easy for him to do that – like swatting a moth. Go. I’ll come to you. As soon as I can…’
But he didn’t let her out of his arms. He pressed his lips against her little mouth and started trembling, only coming to his senses when she whispered:
‘Do you want me to be killed?’
He staggered back, gritted his teeth and jumped up on to the windowsill. He would probably have jumped down just as lightly, but O-Yumi suddenly called out:
‘No, wait!’ – and she held out her arms.
They dashed to each other as precipitately and inexorably as two trains that a fatal chance has set on the same line, hurtling towards each other. What follows is obvious enough: a shattering impact, billows of smoke and flashes of flame, everything thrown head over heels and topsy-turvy, and God only knows who will be left alive in this bacchanalian orgy of fire.
The lovers clung tightly to each other. Their fingers did not caress, they tore, their mouths did not kiss, they bit.
They fell on the floor, and this time there was no heavenly music, no art – only growling, the sound of clothes tearing, the taste of blood on lips.
Suddenly a small but strong hand pressed against Fandorin’s chest and pushed him away.
A whisper right in his ear.
‘Run!’
He raised his head and glanced at the door with misty eyes. He heard footsteps and absentminded whistling. Someone was coming, moving up from below – no doubt climbing the stairs.
‘No!’ groaned Erast Petrovich. ‘Let him come! I don’t care!’
But she was no longer there beside him – she was standing up, rapidly straightening her dishevelled nightgown.
She said:
‘You’ll get me killed!’
He tumbled over the windowsill, not in the least concerned about how he would fall, although, incredibly enough, he made a better landing than he had earlier on, at the Grand Hotel, and didn’t hurt himself at all.
His frock coat then came flying out of the window after him, followed by his left shoe – the titular counsellor hadn’t even noticed when he lost it.
He buttoned himself up somehow or other and tucked in his shirt, listening to hear what was happening now up above him.
But there was a loud slam as someone closed the window; after that there were no more sounds.
Erast Petrovich walked round the side of the house and started off across the lawn in the reverse direction – Masa was waiting there, outside the open gate. The vice-consul took only ten steps and then froze as three long, low shadows came tearing in from the street.
The mastiffs!
They had either concluded their male business or, like the ill-fated titular counsellor, withdrawn disappointed, but either way the dogs were back, and they had cut off his only line of retreat.
Fandorin swung round and dashed back into the garden, hurtling along, unable to make out the path, with branches lashing at his face.
The damned dogs were running a lot faster, and their snuffling was getting closer and closer.
The garden came to an end, and there was a fence of iron ahead. Too high to scramble over. And there was nothing to get a grip on.
Erast Petrovich swung round and thrust one hand into the holster behind his back to take out his Herstal, but he couldn’t fire – it would rouse the entire house.
The first mastiff growled, preparing to spring.
‘RUSSIAN VICE-CONSUL TORN TO PIECES’ – the headline flashed through the doomed man’s mind. He put his hands over his face and throat, and instinctively pushed his back against the fence. Suddenly there was a strange metallic clang, the fence gave way, and the titular counsellor fell, sprawling flat on his back.
When evening time comes,
In the mystical silence
The garden gate creaks
THE SCIENCE OF JOJUTSU
Still not understanding what had happened, Erast Petrovich rose to a squatting position, ready for the hopeless skirmish with three bloodthirsty monsters, but the amazing fence (no, gate!) slammed shut with a squeak of springs.
On the other side a heavy carcass slammed into the iron bars at full pelt. He heard an angry yelp and snarling. Three pairs of furiously glinting eyes gazed at their inaccessible prey.
‘Not your day, folks!’ shouted the titular counsellor, whose English speech had clearly been vulgarised somewhat by associating with Sergeant Lockston.
He drew in a deep breath, filling his lungs with air, and breathed out again, trying to calm his heartbeat. He looked around: who had opened the gate that saved him?