They scattered.
In less than the prescribed half an hour, a crowd had gathered, as uncertain and murmurous as the sea. Darger climbed to the top of the stack of crates to address them. “Good friends, congratulate me!” he cried. “For today I have made a discovery that will leave my mark in history. I have found that which everybody said could not be found…the books for which I have searched for so long…the lost library of Ivan the Great!”
He paused, and a puzzled, halfhearted cheer went up.
“In honor of which discovery, I will now give away three packs of cigarettes to everybody who steps forward to congratulate me.”
A much heartier cheer arose.
“Form a line!” Darger cried. Then, dragooning the slum-boys as his helpers, he pried open the first crate and gave a handful of cigarette packs to a drab woman at the head of the line. “They are yours if you say: Congratulations for finding the library.”
“Congratulations for finding the library.” “Excellent. Next. You must say…” “Congratulations for finding the library.”
“Good.”
Beside him, Kyril was handing out cigarettes and receiving perfunctory congratulations, as were his four comrades. Darger noted that their pockets already bulged with packs.
“Congratulations for the library.” “Congratulations.” “Good luck. Glad for ya.” “Um…books?”
“Close enough,” Darger said. “Keep the line moving.”
It took less time to give away the cigarettes than Darger had expected, and yet the experience left him wearier than he would have thought. Finally, though, all the crates had been opened, their contents distributed, and the troglodytes (and a certain number of habitues from the bar and nearby service workers who had come out to see what the noise was about) had gone.
Darger scrupulously paid out the promised money to his half-sized allies. He would have done so even if he hadn’t known how such young men repaid broken promises.
When they had been paid, four of the young men instantly scattered. Kyril, however, remained, looking unaccountably abashed. “Uh, sir,” he said. “What you said about finding the library…does that mean I have to move out of it now?”
Zoesophia was pleasantly surprised by Surplus’s performance. He had, as it turned out, extraordinary stamina for one not born of the breeding vats of Byzantium. It was not until the Way of the Wounded Crane that he gasped, “Enough! Pax! I am but mortal-I must… I have no breath! I can do no more!” And then, when she ignored his pleas and continued onward, he made it all the way through the Way of the Supple Monkey before turning pale and passing out.
“Well!” Zoesophia said, pleased.
Having gotten more of a gallop than she’d expected, Zoesophia found herself feeling decidedly fond of the ambassador. She scratched him behind the ears, and noted with amusement how his feet scrabbled briefly against the cushions. Then she gathered up all the scattered items of clothing and carefully smoothed and laid them out for the morning. She always carried a small mirror with her and this she used to make sure she had no scratches or bruises that would show when dressed. Her hair was a dreadful mess. So she commanded it to go limp and then flicked her head so that it flew out, undoing any snarls or tangles. Six passes of her hands and a command for it to resume its usual body, and she looked as if she had just spent an hour with a beautician.
As she always did before sleeping, Zoesophia took a mental walk into her memory palace and carefully sorted her day’s thoughts into three cabinets-one sculpted from fire, one of ice, and the third merely rattan. She was all but certain that the ambassador was nothing more than a confidence trickster, doubtless planning to run some elaborate scheme on the Duke of Muscovy. But that was tangential at best to her real mission, so she placed that thought in the rattan cabinet, which she reserved for whims, fancies, and idle speculations.
Finally, Zoesophia lay down alongside Surplus, with one hand around his root, so that he could not awaken without her knowing of it. The first thing in the morning, she would dictate terms. For now, she could enjoy her beauty sleep with a clean conscience and a sense of a job well done.
The carriage climbed toward the estate’s hedge-wall, swaying on its springs so that the manor house behind it seemed to dance in the starry night sky. Gentle strains of music could be heard in the distance, for the baronessa’s guests were dancing now, their eyes still afire with the divine Spirit and their souls at peace with all humanity. Arkady had climbed into the carriage with the warmth of the drug dying down within him and his back stinging from the comradely slaps of the men. He could still feel the swift farewell kisses and furtive squeezes of his stones bestowed on him by the women. The carriage cushions were soft, and there was a bucket of iced champagne, should he feel the urge for a drink on his way home. By slow degrees the last embers of indwelling sanctity were fading gently to ash.
How stupid of him to have taken the rasputin immediately after dinner, rather than waiting for the orgy to begin, as the others had! Had it only been otherwise, Arkady would even now be laughing, dancing, gossiping about the ways of angels with his erstwhile comrades in lust. He would be engaged in the pleasant apres-sex social activities with which the aristocracy customarily eased the transition from ardor back to everyday life.
He would not now be alone with his thoughts. With his memories. With the images that, try though he might, he could not dispel from his mind. He would not be tormented by the horrific knowledge of what he had done.
In the carriage’s dark interior, Arkady wept bitterly.
…8…
The merchant from Suzdal strolled down Teatralny proezd, tapping his cane on the sidewalk in time with a hummed tune. Idly, he noted a string of posters pasted one after the other on the lantern-poles lining the street:
LOST
Diamond Necklace with Gold Leaf Clasp in the vicinity of Red Square
5000 SILVER RUBLES REWARD!!!
Apply to A. Kozlenok, Hotel New Metropol
Five thousand rubles was good money for whatever lucky soul found the bauble and was honest enough to return it-more, indeed, than the merchant normally earned in a month. However, this business trip had been an exceptionally profitable one; he had sold all the house-gourd seeds he had brought at a considerable markup-word had not yet reached Moscow of the fast-spreading blight that would attack and kill the gourds before they reached bungalow size-and so he could contemplate the necklace without suffering too greatly the pangs of avarice.
Nevertheless, he could not refrain from peering into the gutters in the furtive hope of seeing a diamondy glitter.
He was thus occupied when, abruptly and without warning, a street urchin slammed into him, almost knocking him to the ground and sending his cane clattering onto the sidewalk.
Clapping one hand to his wallet (for he was well acquainted with the tricks of pick-pockets), the merchant snatched up his cane and rounded upon the young rascal, prepared to thrash him soundly for his insolence. But the face that the child lifted to him was streaked with tears and his expression so distraught that the merchant stayed his wrath and asked, “Are you in pain?”
“Mister, you got to help me.” The waif pointed to the Hotel New Metropol. “The doorman there won’t let me in.”
The merchant, who was himself staying at that very hotel, could not help feel a twinge of amusement. “I should hope not. You’d track mud on the carpets and leave stains on everything you touched.”
“But I gotta get in!”
“Oh? And why is that?”
To the merchant’s astonishment, the boy reached into his jacket and pulled out a diamond necklace. It was only exposed for an instant before being stuffed back away, but that was long enough for him to see the leaf-
