Boris Akunin - The Coronation

‘That’s all now, Erast Petrovich, no more time-wasting!’ she shouted. ‘You already know enough for us to play one game keeping score. The rules are very simple. I’ll serve, because you don’t know how to anyway. First I’ll hit the ball into this square, then into that one, and so on by turns until the game is won. And you hit it back, only into the court. Is that clear? The loser will crawl under the net. And I’ll ask the Englishman to be umpire.’

She spoke to Mr Freyby in English and he bowed with a serious air and walked up to the net. However before signalling for the game to start, he turned to us and said something.

‘He want bet,’ Masa explained, and sparks of mischief glinted in his little eyes. ‘Two to one on rady.’

‘On the what?’ I asked, mystified.

‘On young rady,’ the Japanese replied impatiently and then he also started babbling away in English, pointing to his master and to Her Highness by turns.

‘All right,’ the Briton agreed. ‘Five to one.’

Masa translated.

With a despairing sigh, he took a brightly coloured wallet out from somewhere under his clothes, showed Mr Freyby a fiverouble note and put it down on the bench.

The Englishman immediately took out a squeaky wallet of fine leather and extracted a twenty-five-rouble note from it.

‘What about you, Mr Ziukin?’ he asked, and I understood that without any translation.

To my mind the idea of betting was not entirely decent, but as Georgii Alexandrovich was leaving, he had ordered me: ‘Fun and relaxation, Afanasii. I am relying on you.’ So I decided to behave in a relaxed fashion.

And anyway, the bet looked like a certainty. Xenia Georgievna had been exceptionally flexible and agile ever since she was a child, and there was no one among the ladies who could match her at tennis. And not just among the ladies, either – I had often seen her outplay Pavel Georgievich, and Endlung, while Fandorin had never even held a racket before today. Masa could only have bet on his master out of a sense of loyalty. I have heard that among Japanese servants loyalty extends to a fanaticism that knows no bounds. They write (I do not know if it is true) that a Japanese servant will rather rip open his own stomach than fail his master. Such self-sacrifice, in the spirit of the butler Vatelle, who fell on his own sword when the fish dish was not served in time, cannot occasion anything but respect. However, the spilling of one’s own intestines on a polished parquet floor is an act that is quite inconceivable in a respectable house.

I began feeling curious as to how far the Japanese valet’s self-sacrifice extended. I happened to have exactly fifty roubles in my purse, set aside to be deposited in my savings account at the bank. I took out the notes and put them in the same place on the bench.

To give the Japanese his due, he didn’t turn a hair. He took another ten-rouble note out of his wallet, and then Mr Freyby shouted: ‘Go!’

I knew the rules of the game very well, so I did not need to pay attention to what the Englishman shouted.

Xenia Georgievna arched over gracefully and served the ball so powerfully that Fandorin barely managed to get his racket in the way. The ball flew off at an angle, caught the top of the net, hesitated for a while over which way to fall, then tumbled over on Her Highness’s side.

Love–fifteen to Erast Petrovich. He was lucky.

Her Highness moved to the other side of the court and hit a very tricky serve with a powerful swerve, then ran rapidly up to the net, knowing in advance where her opponent would return the ball – if he returned it at all.

Fandorin did return it, but so powerfully that the ball would certainly have flown out of the court if only it hadn’t struck Her Highness on the forehead.

Xenia Georgievna looked rather shaken, and Fandorin seemed frightened. He dashed to the net and applied a handkerchief to Her Highness’s forehead.

‘It’s all right, it’s nothing,’ she murmured, holding Fandorin’s wrist. ‘It doesn’t hurt at all. You are a lucky beggar, though. Love–thirty. But now I’ll show you.’

The third serve was one of those that are quite impossible to get. I didn’t even see the ball properly – only a streak of lightning that flashed above the court. By some miracle Fandorin managed to catch the ball with his racket, but extremely awkwardly: the small white sphere flew up onto the air and began falling back down straight onto the net.

Xenia Georgievna ran forward with a triumphant exclamation, prepared to hammer the ball into the court. She swung and smashed the ball hard, and once again it caught the top of the net, only this time it did not tumble over on to the opponent’s side, but fell back to Her Highness’s feet

The grand princess’s face expressed confusion at the strange way the game was turning out. No doubt it was this confusion that caused Her Highness to miss twice on her last serve, a thing that had never happened before, and the game was lost ‘to love’, as the sportsmen say.

I felt my first twinge of dislike for Fandorin as his valet coolly stuffed his substantial winnings into his bright-coloured purse. It would take me quite a while to get used to the idea of losing fifty roubles in such an absurd fashion.

And I did not like the scene that was now played out on court at all.

As it had been agreed that the losing party would do, Her Highness went down on all fours and crawled under the net. Fandorin bent down hastily to help Xenia Georgievna get up. She looked up at him and she froze in that absurd pose. Embarrassed, Erast Petrovich took her by the hand and pulled, but too strongly – the grand princess fell against him with her chest and her hat went flying to the ground, taking her hairpins with it, so that her thick locks scattered loose across her shoulders.

‘I beg your pardon,’ Fandorin mumbled. ‘Thank you for the lesson. I must be going.’

He bowed awkwardly and strode off towards the house, with the Japanese waddling after him.

‘Lucky devil,’ said Mr Freyby.

Then he translated it: ‘

S-cha-stlivy . . . chort. ’

And he began counting the money remaining in his wallet with an obvious air of regret.

But I was no longer thinking about the money I had lost. My heart was wrung by a feeling of alarmand a sense of foreboding.

Ah, how Xenia Georgievna gazed after Fandorin as he moved away from her! The cunning beast walked as if nothing at all had happened and only looked round at the very last moment – just before he turned the corner. He glanced briefly at Her Highness and immediately turned away. A low trick, very low, perfectly calculated for its effect on a young, inexperienced girl!

The grand princess flushed bright red at that lightning-fast glance, and I realised that something monstrous, something quite scandalous had occurred – one of those events that shake the very foundations of the monarchy. An individual of the imperial blood had fallen in love with a person who was inappropriate. There could be no mistake about it, although I can certainly not be considered an expert on the subject of women and their feelings.

Afanasii is an old bachelor and will evidently remain one. Our honourable dynasty is destined to end withmebecause, although I have a brother, he has forfeited the right to continue the Ziukin line of court servants.

My father, Stepan Filimonovich, and before him his father, Filimon Emelyanovich, were married at the age of seventeen to girls from similar court servant families and at the age of eighteen they had already produced their eldest sons. God grant to everyone the respect and love in which they lived with their spouses. But with me our family’s good fortune faltered and stumbled. The Ziukins will die out because I was given a feeble soul incapable of love.