Sister Pelagia and the Black Monk (13 page)

The following morning, after spending the night in a tiny room with a view of the blank brick wall of the monastery's fish-smoking shed, the chief of police drank tea and immediately set out to reconnoiter. The information that His Grace had received from Alexei Stepanovich Lentochkin needed to be thoroughly checked, for it raised doubts about absolutely everything—in the first place about the character of the emissary himself, whom the colonel knew slightly and personally thought of as a “skitter bug.” And now, as if it were not enough to be a frivolous and irresponsible character who ought to have been kept under police surveillance following the outrageous events in K——, Lentochkin had decided to go insane as well. But who could tell exactly when his reason had become clouded—perhaps he'd arrived in Ararat already totally barmy, and this entire business was a load of raving nonsense!

Felix Stanislavovich armed himself with a map of New Ararat, divided the town up into squares, and two hours later had combed every one of them thoroughly, keeping his ears and his eyes open and jotting down anything worthy of interest in a special little notebook.

Beside a little fountain of medicinal water he found several respectable-looking pilgrims of a rather advanced age talking in low voices, discussing the night just past, which had turned out bright, although the moon was already a mere sliver.

“He's been seen again,” a gentleman in a gray top hat with a mourning band of black crepe was saying in a voice of hushed mystery. “Psoi Timofeevich was watching through a telescope, from the Conception Bell Tower. He didn't risk going any closer.”

“And what did he see?” asked his listeners, moving closer.

“You know what he saw.
Him.
Walking along over the waves. Then the moon went behind a cloud, and when it came out again, he was gone …” The narrator crossed himself and all the others followed his example.

“Psoi Tim.,” Lagrange jotted down, so that he could locate the eyewitness later and question him. However, in the course of his reconnaissance he heard talk of the previous night's water-walking not just once, but quite a number of times. It turned out that in addition to the unknown Psoi Timofeevich, several other bold fellows had been observing from a safe distance, and they had all seen something—one of them even asserted that the Black Monk had not walked, but
rushed
along above the water. Another had actually seen a pair of webbed wings, like a bat's, behind Basilisk's back (and we all know who has those).

In the Fatted Calf chophouse the chief of police heard an argument between two elderly ladies about whether the buoy keeper's wife and the infant she had miscarried ought to have been buried in hallowed ground, and whether the monastery cemetery might be defiled in some way as a result. After all,
he
had been seen by the fence two days ago— one of the women who made the Communion bread had gotten such a terrible fright that she was still stuttering and stammering. They eventually agreed that the buoy keeper's wife was all right, but the unchristened fruit of her womb ought to have been burned and the ashes scattered to the wind.

Later, some of the senior, gray-bearded brothers from the monastery were sitting on a bench in a square overlooking the lake and discoursing in low, decorous voices about how any doubtfulness in matters of faith led to wavering and temptation, and one old monk, to whom the others listened with particular attention, called for Basilisk's Hermitage to be closed for a while, in order to see whether the monastery's patron would calm down, and said that if, after all this, he stopped his rampaging, it meant that Outskirts Island was a bad place, possibly even cursed, and should be left uninhabited.

The colonel stood behind the bench for a while, pretending to be admiring the starry sky (for basic astronomical reasons there was no moonlight that night). Then he walked on.

He heard all sorts of other things too. Apparently, Basilisk had been seen at night not only on the water and by the graveyard, but even in Ararat itself. Near the old Church of SS. Kosma and Damian (which had burned down), on the monastery wall, in the Gethsemane Grotto. And every time the Black Monk appeared to anyone, he had pointed a monitory finger in the direction of Outskirts Island.

And so it turned out that the skitter bug's exposition of the facts had not been a lie after all. Certain phenomena, the meaning and significance of which had not yet been established, had indeed occurred. The first task of the investigation could be considered complete.

Further investigative activities were planned in the following sequence: take testimony from Dr. Korovin and interrogate the insane Lentochkin—provided, of course, that he had not already become totally inarticulate—and then after that, having collected all the preliminary information, set up an ambush on Lenten Spit, arrest the phantom without fail, and establish his true identity. In short it was all not so very difficult. Felix Stanislavovich had unraveled more cunning tangles in his time.

The hour was already too late for a visit to the clinic, and the colonel turned back toward the Refuge of the Lowly, now not so much listening to the conversation of the people he met as simply observing the mores of New Ararat.

Lagrange definitely liked the town. A clean, decent, sober place. No tramps, no beggars (who would let them onto the steamer so that they could get to the island?), no one dressed in patched rags to insult the eye. Simple people, nonecclesiastics—fishermen and artisans—dressed cleanly and respectably; women in white head scarves with round faces and well-nourished bodies. All the streetlamps lit and working properly, pavements made of smoothly planed planks, good quality roadways surfaced with oak tiles, without a single chip in them anywhere. You probably couldn't find such an exemplary town anywhere else in Russia.

The colonel also found New Ararat interesting for another, exclusively professional reason. As a settlement that had grown up around a monastery and was located on church land, the town was not included in any administrative district—it was under the direct governance of the archimandrite and therefore lacked the usual administrative structures. From the provincial statistics, Lagrange knew that there were never any crimes or untoward incidents of any kind on the islands. He wanted to find out how they managed here without any police or bureaucrats or firemen.

The answer to the last question was not long in coming—it was almost as if someone had deliberately decided to arrange a demonstration for the police chief of Zavolzhsk.

As he was walking across the town's main square, Lagrange heard a noise—people shouting and bells ringing frantically—and he saw some boys running as hard they could, with intensely serious expressions on their faces. Drawing in the night air with a nose that was highly sensitive to extraordinary events, Felix Stanislavovich caught the smell of smoke and realized there was a fire.

He followed the boys, lengthening his stride. After he turned one corner and then another, there it was, blazing like a scarlet bush that had blossomed in the darkness—the Unleavened Bread Pavilion, a wooden construction in a pseudoclassical style. It was blazing furiously, unstop-pably—some sparks from the brazier must have found their way into the wrong place, and the cook had failed to notice. There he was in his white cap and leather apron, and two kitchen boys with him, all running around the burning bush, waving their hands in the air. But there was no point in waving like that—the establishment was done for; the colonel could see straightaway, with his experienced eye, that there was no way to put the blaze out. The danger was that it might leap across to the next house. Ah, what was needed here was a fire pump.

And then immediately, the very moment he had the thought, he heard a ringing of bells, a clatter of hooves, and a cheerful jangling of harness from around the corner, and two teams of horses came hurtling onto the street illuminated by the blaze.

The first was a dashing threesome of blacks drawing a carriage in which an extremely tall, emaciated monk was standing erect, wearing a purple skullcap and a pectoral cross with precious stones (the archimandrite himself, Felix Stanislavovich immediately guessed from the cross). Hurrying along behind it came a team of six sorrel horses, drawing the very latest fire engine, far more modern than anything that had ever been seen in Zavolzhsk. Seated in state on this monster with gleaming copper flanks were seven monks in polished helmets holding gaffs, picks, and axes.

The reverend archimandrite leapt down to the ground while his carriage was still moving and began issuing commands in stentorian tones, and the firemen carried them out with a precision that the colonel found simply delightful.

In an instant they had rolled out the tarpaulin hose and attached the pump to the water barrel. They first of all gave the next building, which had not yet caught fire, a good dousing, and only after that did they turn their attention to the Unleavened Bread Pavilion.

In less than half an hour a genuinely serious danger had been completely eliminated. The monks dragged out the charred beams with their gaffs as the damp, subdued embers steamed; Father Vitalii, looking like a victorious general in the middle of a battlefield covered with bodies, was sternly interrogating the downcast cook.

A fine priest, well done there, Lagrange thought approvingly. A pity you didn't go in for a military career—you'd have made a fine regimental commander. Or something even higher than that—a divisional general.

His question about the police was answered too. While the fire was still blazing away, a platoon of strapping monks wearing cassocks shorter than usual, boots, and white armbands appeared out of nowhere. They were commanded by a sturdy-looking hieromonk who looked the very picture of a local police inspector. And hanging on his belt each of them had an impressive-looking rubber truncheon—that most humane invention from the New World, so excellent in absolutely every respect: hit some ruffian across the head with one of those things and it wouldn't knock his brains out, but it would certainly give him something to think about.

In a jiffy the police monks had surrounded the huge blaze and moved back the crowd, for which the truncheons were not required, since the idle onlookers heeded the appeals of the guardians of public order without a murmur.

Now Felix Stanislavovich understood how order was maintained on the islands and why there were no crimes. If only I had some fine fellows like that, he thought enviously.

As he made his way back to his night's lodging through the quiet, rapidly emptying streets, he was visited by a fit of inspiration: under the impression of what he had just seen, the colonel conceived the thrilling idea of a total reorganization of the gendarmerie and the police.

If only he could establish some order of monastic knights, like the Teutonic Order, to provide a firm foundation for the entire structure of Russian statehood, Felix Stanislavovich thought fancifully. Accept only the very finest servicemen devoted to the emperor and his throne, make them take a vow of sobriety, unquestioning obedience to their commander, poverty, and celibacy. A vow of total chastity was probably not required, but it would be a good thing if they were not married—it would avoid a lot of problems. Of course, police constables and even low-ranking officers would not necessarily have to be members of the order, but only those who had taken the vow would be able to rise to a high position in the hierarchy. Then the true kingdom of order and the dictatorship of rigorous legality would be made manifest on earth!

The colonel became so carried away with his great ideas, the clattering of his heels on the oak surface of the street was so sweet in his ears, that he almost walked right past the Refuge of the Lowly (which would not have been hard to do in the dark, for the sign offering rooms was lit only by the dim glow of the stars).

The helpful attendant tore himself away from his well-thumbed book, undoubtedly on some divine theme, cast a reproachful look at the guest over the top of his iron-rimmed spectacles, pursed his lips, and said, “You had a visitor.”

“What kind of visitor?” Lagrange asked in surprise.

“A female one,” the pious attendant informed him. “In a large hat, with netting over her face. She did not look the prayerful type.”

It was she! Felix Stanislavovich thought, the moment he heard about the “netting.” His manly heart began pounding rapidly.

But how had she found out where he was staying?

The police master immediately answered his own question. It was a small town, after all; there were not many hotels, and he was a fine figure of a man. It had not been hard to find him.

“Who is this lady, do you know?” he asked, leaning down toward the attendant. “What is her name?” He almost decided to put ten kopecks, or even fifteen, on the counter, but instead he hammered on it with his fist. “Well!”

The attendant gave the remarkably tough fist a deferential look, the reproach in his eyes faded, and he began speaking in a more respectful tone of voice.

“I don't know that, sir. I have come across her around the town, indeed, but this is the first time she has called in here, sir.”

That was easy to believe—what would such a beautiful and elegant lady be doing in a dive like this?

“But she did leave a note for you. Here it is, sir.”

The colonel grabbed the narrow sealed envelope and sniffed it. It had a heady, spicy aroma that provoked a languid palpitation in Felix Stanislavovich's nostrils.