The Diamond Chariot

THE GARDEN GATE




Erast Petrovich ran across the broad lawn, brightly illuminated by the moonlight. He walked round the house – if he was going to climb in through a window, it would be best to do it at the back, so that he would not be seen by some chance passer-by.

Behind the house he found a garden wrapped in dense shade – just what he needed.

Going up on tiptoe, the adventurer glanced into the first window after the corner. He saw a spacious room – a dining room or drawing room. A white tablecloth, candles burning out, the remains of a supper served for two.

His heart suddenly ached.

So, she dined with one and set out for a tryst with another? Or, even better, she returned from her dramatic rendezvous and calmly sat down to a meal with her ginger-haired patron? Women truly were mysterious creatures. After two more windows, the next room began – the study.

The windows here were slightly open and Fandorin could hear a man’s voice speaking, so he acted with caution and first listened to ascertain where the speaker was.

‘… will be reprimanded, but his superior will bear the greater part of the guilt – he will be obliged to resign in disgrace …’ said the voice in the study.

The words were spoken in English, but with a distinct Japanese accent, so it was not Bullcox.

However, the senior adviser was also there.

‘And our friend will occupy the vacancy?’ he asked.

Two men, Fandorin decided. The Japanese is sitting in the far right corner, and Bullcox is in the centre, with his back to the window.

The titular counsellor lifted himself up slowly, inch by inch, and examined the interior of the room.

Shelves of books, a desk, a fireplace with no fire.

The important thing was that O-Yumi was not here. Two men. He could see his rival’s fiery locks sticking up from behind the back of one armchair. The other armchair was occupied by a dandy with a gleaming parting in his hair and a pearl glowing in his silk tie. The minuscule man crossed one leg elegantly over the other and swayed his lacquered shoe.

‘Not this very moment,’ he said with a restrained smile. ‘In a week’s time.’

Ah, I know you, my good sir, thought Erast Petrovich, narrowing his eyes. I saw you at the ball. Prince … What was it that Doronin called you?

‘Well now, Onokoji, that is very Japanese,’ the Right Honourable said with a chuckle. ‘To reprimand someone, and reward him a week later with promotion.’

Yes, yes, Fandorin remembered, he’s Prince Onokoji, the former daimyo – ruler of an appanage principality – now a high society lion and arbiter of fashion.

‘This, my dear Algernon, is not a reward, he is merely occupying a position that has fallen vacant. But he will receive a reward, for doing the job so neatly. He will be given the suburban estate of Takarazaka. Ah, what plum trees there are there! What ponds!’

‘Yes, it’s a glorious spot. A hundred thousand, probably.’

‘At least two hundred, I assure you!’

Erast Petrovich did not look in the window – he was not interested. He tried to think where O-Yumi might be.

On the ground floor there were another two windows that were dark, but Bullcox was hardly likely to have accommodated his mistress next to his study. So where were her chambers, then? At the front of the house? Or on the first floor?

‘All right, then,’ he heard the Briton say. ‘But what about Prince Arisugawa’s letter? Have you been able to get hold of a copy?’

‘My man is greedy, but we simply can’t manage without him.’

‘Listen, I believe I gave you five hundred pounds!’

‘But I need a thousand.’

The vice-consul frowned. Vsevolod Vitalievich had said that the prince lived on Don Tsurumaki’s charity, but apparently he felt quite free to earn some subsidiary income. And Bullcox was a fine one, too – paying for court rumours and stolen letters. But then, that was his job as a spy.

No, the Englishman would probably not accommodate his native mistress on the front façade of the house – after all, he was an official dignitary. So her window was probably on the back wall …

The wrangling in the study continued.

‘Onokoji, I’m not a milch cow.’

‘And in addition, for the same sum, you could have a little list from Her Majesty’s diary,’ the prince said ingratiatingly. ‘One of the ladies-in-waiting is my cousin, and she owes me many favours.’

Bullcox snorted.

‘Worthless. Some womanish nonsense or other.’

‘Very far indeed from nonsense. Her Majesty is in the habit of noting down her conversations with His Majesty …’

There’s no point in my listening to all these abominations, Fandorin told himself. I’m not a spy, thank God. But if some servant or other sees me, I’ll cut an even finer figure than these two: ‘RUSSIAN VICE-CONSUL CAUGHT EAVESDROPPING’.

He stole along the wall to a drainpipe and tugged on it cautiously, to see whether it was firm. The titular counsellor already had some experience in climbing drainpipes from his previous, non-diplomatic life.

His foot was already poised on the lower rim of brick, but his reason still attempted to resist. You are behaving like a madman, like a thoroughly contemptible, irresponsible individual, his reason told him. Come to your senses! Get a grip on yourself!

‘It’s true,’ Erast Petrovich replied abjectly, ‘I have gone completely gaga.’ But his contrition did not make him abandon his insane plan, it did not even slow down his movements.

The diplomat scrambled up nimbly to the first floor, propped one foot on a ledge and reached out for the nearest window. He clutched at the frame with his fingers and crept closer, taking tiny little steps. His frock coat was probably covered in dust, but that did not concern Fandorin just at the moment.

He had a far worse problem – the dark window refused to open. It was latched shut, and it was impossible for him to reach the small upper section.

Break it? He couldn’t, it would bring the entire household running …

The diamond on the titular counsellor’s finger – a farewell gift from the lady responsible for his missing the steamship from Calcutta – glinted cunningly.

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?

There was not a soul to be seen.

He saw Don Tsurumaki’s palace in the distance and, much closer, a pond overgrown with water lilies, glinting in the moonlight – it was inexpressibly beautiful, with a tiny island, little toy bridges and spiky rushes growing along its banks. He could hear the melancholy croaking of frogs from that direction. The black surface seemed to be embroidered with silver threads – the reflections of the stars.

The vice-consul thought that the dark pavilion by the water’s edge looked particularly fine, with the edges of its roof turned up like wings, as if it were preparing to take flight. A weather vane in the form of a fantastic bird crowned a weightless tower.

Erast Petrovich set off along the bank of the pond, gazing around. He was still stupefied. What kind of miracles were these? Someone must have opened the gate, and then closed it. Someone had rescued the nocturnal adventurer from certain death.

Not until the pavilion and the pond had been left behind did Fandorin think to look at the palace.

An elegant building, constructed in the style of the mansions on the Champs Élysées, with a terrace that faced in the direction of the little lake, and on the first floor someone standing behind the elegant balustrade was waving to the uninvited visitor – someone in a long robe and a fez with a tassel.

Erast Petrovich recognised him from the fez: it was the owner of the estate in person. Seeing that he had finally been spotted, Don Tsurumaki gestured invitingly in welcome.

There was nothing to be done. Fandorin could hardly take to his heels. Cursing under his breath, the titular counsellor bowed politely and set off towards the steps of the porch. His supple mind started functioning again, trying to invent some at least vaguely credible explanation for his scandalous behaviour.

‘Welcome, young assistant of my friend Doronin!’ a rich male voice said above his head. ‘The door is open. Come in and join me up here!’

‘Th-thank you,’ Fandorin replied drearily.

Erast Petrovich walked through the dark hallway, where the orchestra had thundered and skirts had been lifted above kicking legs in the cancan during the Bachelors’ Ball, and then up the stairs, as if he were mounting the scaffold.

What should he do? Repent? Lie? What good would it do if he did lie? The Russian vice-consul, fleeing from the British agent’s garden. The situation was quite unambiguous: one spy spying on another …

But Fandorin had still not realised just how wretched his situation really was.

Walking out on to the stone terrace, he saw a table laid with a magnificent spread of various kinds of ham, salami, fruits, cakes and sweets, as well as an array of sweet liqueurs; candles protruded from candelabra, but they had not been lit – evidently because of the bright moon. But the table was not the problem – there was a powerful telescope on an iron stand beside the balustrade, and its seeing eye was not pointed up at the heavens, but towards Bullcox’s house!

Had Don Tsurumaki seen or hadn’t he? Erast Petrovich froze on the spot when the thought hit him. But no, the real point was: What exactly had he seen – just a man running away through the garden or …

‘Well, don’t just stand there!’ said the Don, puffing on his black briar pipe as he moved towards Fandorin. ‘Would you like something to eat? I love eating alone at night. With no forks and no chopsticks – with just my bare hands.’ He held up his palms, gleaming with grease and smeared with chocolate. ‘Sheer piggishness, of course, but so help me, it’s my favourite time of the day. I regale my soul with the sight of the stars and my body with all sorts of delicacies. Take a quail, they were still soaring over the meadow this morning. And there are oysters, absolutely fresh. Would you like some?’

The fat man spoke with such mouth-watering enthusiasm that Erast immediately realised just how hungry he was, and wanted the quail and the oysters. But he had to find out a few things first.

Since his host was in no hurry to interrogate him, the vice-consul decided to seize the initiative.

‘Tell me, why do you need a gate leading into the next garden?’ he asked, feverishly trying to think of how to approach the most important question.

‘Algernon and I are friends …’ (the name came out as ‘Arudzenon’ on his Japanese lips) ‘… we pay each other neighbourly calls, with no formalities. It’s more convenient to go through the garden than round by the street.’

And it’s also more convenient for your lodger to sell his secrets, the vice-consul thought, but, naturally, he didn’t tell tales on Prince Onokoji. Fandorin recalled that, unlike the other guests, Bullcox and his consort had arrived at the Bachelors’ Ball on foot, and they had appeared from somewhere off to one side, not from the direction of the front gates. So they must have used that gate …

‘But … but how did you open it?’ Erast Petrovich asked, still avoiding the most important point.

The Don became excited.

‘O-oh, I have everything here running on electric power. I’m a great admirer of that remarkable invention! Here, look.’

He took the vice-consul by the elbow and half-led, half-dragged him to a kind of lectern standing beside the telescope. Erast Petrovich saw a bundle of wires running down to the floor and disappearing into a covered channel. On the lectern itself there were several rows of small, gleaming switches. Tsurumaki clicked one of them and the palace came to life, with yellowish-white light streaming out of all its windows. He clicked the switch again, and the house went dark.

‘And this here is our gate. Look through the telescope, the telescope.’

Fandorin pressed his eye to the end of the tube and saw the metal railings very close up, only an arm’s length away, with three canine silhouettes beyond them. A green spark glinted once again in a bulging eye. What patient brutes they were.

‘One, two!’ the Don exclaimed, and the gate swung open with a lively jerk, as if it were alive. One of the dogs bounded forward.

‘Three, four!’

The gate slammed shut again just as quickly, and the mastiff was flung back into the garden. And serve the son of a bitch right!

Pretending to adjust the focus, Erast Petrovich raised the aim of the telescope slightly. First the wall of the house appeared in the circle of vision, and then the drainpipe, and then the window – and all very close indeed.

‘That’s enough, enough!’ said the lover of electricity, tugging impatiently on his sleeve. ‘Now I’ll show you something that will really make you gasp. Nobody has seen it yet, I’m saving it for a big social event … The pond, watch the pond!’

Click! An emerald glow appeared above the black, shimmering patch of water as the tiny island was flooded with light from electric lamps, and the tiny stone pagoda standing on it was also lit up – but pink, not green.

‘European science!’ the millionaire exclaimed, with his eyes glittering. ‘The wires are laid along the bottom, in a special telegraph cable. And the bulbs have coloured glass, that’s the whole trick. How do you like that?’

‘Astounding!’ Fandorin exclaimed with genuine delight. ‘You’re a genuine inventor.’

‘Oh no, I’m not an inventor. Making discoveries is what you gaijins are good at. The Japanese are not inventors, our element is Order, but pioneers are always children of Chaos. But we are really clever at finding good uses for others’ inventions, and you can never keep up with us there. Give us time, Mr Fandorin: we’ll learn all your tricks, and then we’ll show you how clumsily you have used them.’

The Don laughed, and the titular counsellor thought: It doesn’t look to me as if your element is Order.

‘Are you interested in astronomy?’ Erast Petrovich enquired, clearing his throat and nodding at the telescope.

Tsurumaki understood the hidden meaning of the question quite clearly. His laughter rumbled even more freely and his fat cheeks crept upwards, transforming his jolly, sparkling eyes into two narrow slits.

‘Yes, astronomy too. But sometimes there are very curious things to be seen on the ground as well!’

He slapped his visitor on the shoulder in familiar fashion, choked on tobacco smoke and doubled over in laughter.

Erast Petrovich flushed bright red – he had seen it, he had seen everything! But what could Fandorin say now?

‘Bravo, Fandorin-san, bravo!’ said the joker, brushing away his tears. ‘Here’s my hand!’

The vice-consul shook the proffered hand very feebly and asked morosely:

‘What are you so pleased about?’

‘The fact that good old Algernon is a … what’s the English word, now … a cuckord!’

Erast Petrovich did not immediately realise that the word intended was ‘cuckold’. He asked with emphatic coolness, in order to bring the conversation back within the bounds of propriety:

‘But you said he was your f-friend.’

‘Of course he is! As far as a native princeling can be a white sahib’s friend.’ The Don’s sanguine features dissolved into a smile that was no longer jolly, but frankly spiteful. ‘Do you really not know, my dear Fandorin-san, that one of the greatest of pleasures is the feeling of secret superiority over someone who thinks he is superior to you? You have given me a wonderful present. Now every time I look at Bullcox’s snobbish features, I shall remember your magnificent leap from the window and the clothes flying through the air, and inside I shall be roaring with laughter. Thank you very, very much for that!’

He tried to shake hands again, but this time the dumbfounded vice-consul hid his hand behind his back.

‘Are you offended? You shouldn’t be. I have a proposal for you, a secret Japano-Russian alliance, directed against British imperialism.’ The Don winked. ‘And I am offering you an excellent base for undermining English influence. You see the little pavilion by the water? A fine, secluded spot. I shall give you a key to the gates, and you will be able to get in at any time of the day or night. And I shall present the lovely O-Yumi with a key to the gate in the garden. Make yourselves at home. Feast on love. Only one condition: don’t turn out the lamp and don’t close the curtains on this side. Consider that the rental charge for the premises … Oh, just look at his eyes flash! Oh! I’m joking, I’m joking!’

He burst into laughter again, but to Erast Petrovich these playful jokes about the exalted and fateful power that had bound him and O-Yumi together seemed like unforgivable blasphemy.

‘I will ask you never to speak about this l-lady and my relationship with her in that tone again …’ he began furiously, in a hissing whisper.

‘You’re in love!’ Tsurumaki interrupted with a laugh. ‘Head over heels! Oh, you unfortunate victim of jojutsu!’

It is quite impossible to be seriously angry with a man who abandons himself to such good-natured merriment.

‘What has jujitsu got to do with it?’ Erast Petrovich asked in amazement, thinking that Tsurumaki meant the Japanese fighting art that he was studying with his valet.

‘Not JUjitsu, but jOjutsu! The art of amorous passion. An art of which top-flight courtesans have complete mastery.’ The bon vivant’s gaze turned thoughtful. ‘I too was once snared in the nets of a mistress of jojutsu. Not for long, only a month and a half. Her love cost me thirty thousand yen – all that I had in those days. Afterwards I had to start my business all over again, but I don’t regret it – it is one of the best memories of my life!’

‘You’re mistaken, my dear fellow,’ said Fandorin, smiling condescendingly. ‘Your jojutsu has nothing to do with it. I have not paid for love.’

‘It is not always paid for with money,’ said the Don, scratching his beard and raising his thick eyebrows in surprise. ‘O-Yumi not using jojutsu? That would be strange. Let’s check. Of course, I don’t know all the subtle points of this intricate art, but I remember a few things that I experienced for myself. The initial stage is called “soyokadzeh”. How can I translate that, now … “The breath of wind” – that’s pretty close. The goal is to attract the attention of the chosen target. To do this the mistress of the art gives the man a chance to show himself in the best possible light. It’s a well-known fact that a man loves those who he believes should admire him more than anyone else. If a man prides himself on his perspicacity, the courtesan will arrange things so that he appears before her in all his intellectual brilliance. If he is brave, she will give him a chance to show that he is a genuine hero. Fake bandits can be hired, so that the target can defend a beautiful stranger against them. Or he might suddenly see a beautiful woman fall into the water from a capsized boat. The most audacious courtesans will even risk being maimed by conspiring with a riksha or a coach driver. Imagine a carriage that has run out of control, and a delightful woman sitting in it, screaming pitifully. How can you possibly not go dashing to assist her? At the first stage of jojutsu it is very important, firstly, for the target to feel that he is a protector and, secondly, for him to be inspired with lust for the huntress, not merely compassion. To achieve that she is certain to expose, as if by accident, the most seductive part of her body: a shoulder, a foot, a breast, it varies from one individual to another.’

At first Fandorin listened to this story with a scornful smile. Then, when he heard the words about a carriage running out of control, he shuddered. But he immediately told himself: No, no, it’s impossible, it’s just coincidence. But what about the torn dress, and the alabaster shoulder with the scarlet scratch? a satanic little voice whispered.

Nonsense, the titular counsellor thought with a shake of his head. It really was absurd.

‘And what does the second stage consist of?’ he enquired ironically.

Tsurumaki took a bite out of a large, luscious red apple and continued with his mouth full.

‘It’s called “Two on an Island”. A very subtle moment. The point is to maintain distance, while demonstrating that there is some special kind of connection between the courtesan and the target – they are bound together by the invisible threads of fate. For this purpose all means are good: the mistress of the art sets spies on the target, gathers information about him, and then many of the ladies also have a good command of ninso – that’s like your physiognomics, only far, far more subtle.’

The vice-consul turned cold, but the jolly narrator crunched on his apple and implacably drove needle after needle into his poor suffering heart.

‘I think they call the third stage “The Scent of a Peach”. The target has to be allowed to inhale the seductive aroma of the fruit, but the fruit is still hanging high up on the branch and no one knows whose hands it will fall into. This is to show that the creature provoking his desire is a living, passionate woman, not some incorporeal angel, and she will have to be fought for. At this stage a rival is certain to appear, and a serious one at that.’

How she rode past the consulate with Bullcox, leaning her head on his shoulder! Erast Petrovich recalled. And she didn’t even glance in my direction, although I was sitting right there in the window …

Oh no, no, no!

The Don squinted up at the moon.

‘How does it continue now? Ah yes, but of course! The “Typhoon” stage. Immediately after the despair (“alas and alack, she will never be mine!”), the courtesan arranges a lover’s tryst, completely without any warning. Absolutely breathtaking, employing all the secret arts of the bedroom, but not too long. The target must get the real taste of pleasure, but not be sated. After that comes the “Ayatsuri” stage. Separation resulting from insuperable difficulties of some kind. Ayatsuri is the way a puppet master controls a puppet in the theatre. Have you ever been to a bunraku performance? You must go, you have nothing like it in Europe. Our puppets are just like real people, and …’

‘Stop!’ Fandorin cried out, feeling that he could not take any more. ‘For God’s sake, stop t-talking!’

Crushed, Erast Petrovich brushed a drop of icy sweat off his forehead and forced himself to speak.

‘I see now that you are right … And I … I am grateful to you. If not for you I really would have lost my reason completely … In fact, I have already … But no more, I will not be a puppet in her hands any longer!’

‘Ah, you are wrong there,’ Tsurumaki said disapprovingly. ‘You still have the very best stage to come: “The Bow String”. In your case the title is doubly piquant,’ he said with a smile. ‘“Bow” in Japanese is yumi.’

‘I know,’ Fandorin said with a nod, looking off to one side. A plan was gradually taking shape in the demoralised vice-consul’s head.

‘This is the stage of total happiness, when both soul and body attain the very summit of bliss and reverberate with delight, like a taut bowstring. In order to highlight the sweetness even more, the mistress of the art adds just a little bitterness – you will certainly never know …’

‘I tell you what,’ Erast Petrovich interrupted, staring sombrely into the eyes of the man who had saved him from insanity, but broken his heart. ‘That’s enough about jojutsu. I’m not interested in that. Give me your key, I’ll take it from you for one day. And give … give her the other key, from the gate in the garden. Tell her that I shall be waiting for her in the pavilion, starting from midnight. But not a word about this conversation of ours. Do you promise?’

‘You won’t kill her, will you?’ the Don asked cautiously. ‘I mean, it doesn’t really matter to me, but I wouldn’t like it to be on my estate … And then Algernon would resent it. And he’s not the kind of man I’d like to quarrel with …’

‘I won’t do her any harm. On m-my word of honour.’

It took Fandorin an agonisingly long time to walk to the gates. Every step cost him an effort.

‘Ah, jojutsu?’ he whispered. ‘So they call it jojutsu, do they?’

A host of students,

But such scanty progress made

In passion’s science