Boris Akunin - The Coronation

SomehowIwas not really convinced of the lieutenant’s powers of analysis. However, Endlung surprised me.

‘And who is it that cannot stand women?’ he asked with a triumphant air.

‘Yes, indeed, who?’ Pavel Georgievich echoed.

His Highness and his friend exchanged glances.

‘Come on now, Afanasii, think.’

I thought a little more.

‘Well, there are many women who cannot bear their sisters.’

‘Ah, Afanasii, what a slowcoach you are, really. We’re talking about Doctor Lind, not women.’

Endlung said emphatically: ‘Buggers.’

For a moment I did not understand what he meant, but then I realised that he was employing the French word bougre , which means menwho are referred to in decent society as homosexuals. In any case, the lieutenant immediately explained his idea by using a different term that is not accepted at all in good society, and which I therefore shall not repeat.

‘And suddenly everything is clear!’ Endlung exclaimed. ‘Lind is a bugger, and his entire gang are all queers – buggers and pansies.’

‘What?’ I asked.

‘Pansies, also known as girlies, little nieces, snivellers, passive queers. Naturally, in a gang like that, they’ll all stick up for each other! And it’s no accident that Lind chose Moscow for his atrocities. Thanks to Uncle Sam, this place is a real Mecca for queers now. You know what the people say: “What a queer place Moscow is these days!”’

I had heard this phrase alluding to the specific partialities of Simeon Alexandrovich before and I considered it my duty to say to Endlung: ‘Surely, Mr Gentleman of the Bedchamber, you do not think that the governor general of Moscowcould be involved in the abduction of his own nephew?’

‘Of course not!’ Pavel Georgievich exclaimed. ‘But crowds of all sorts of riff-raff hang around Uncle Sam. For instance, take our own dear guests, Carr and Banville. Let us concede that His Lordship is more or less known to us, although the acquaintance is only recent. But who is this Mr Carr? And why did Banville ask Papa to invite him here?’

‘Oh come now, Your Highness, such a great event – the coronation.’

‘And what if it was for a completely different reason?’ Endlung asked, with a sweeping gesture of his pipe. ‘What if he’s not really a lord at all? And of course that slicker Carr is especially suspicious. Remember, they arrived at the Hermitage on the very day of the kidnapping. They’re always wandering about, ferreting things out. I’m absolutely certain that one or the other of them is connected with Doctor Lind, or perhaps even both of them are.’

‘Carr, beyond a shadow of a doubt, it’s Carr,’ the grand duke declared confidently. ‘Banville is a man from high society, after all. There’s no way to fake those manners and that way of talking.’

‘And just who, Paulie, told you Doctor Lind is not a man from high society?’ the lieutenant objected.

They were both right, and in general it all sounded very far from stupid. This was something I had not expected.

‘Should you not inform Colonel Karnovich of your suspicions?’ I suggested.

‘No, no,’ said Pavel Georgievich, shaking his head. ‘He or that blockhead Lasovsky will only ruin everything again. And in any case they both have plenty to worry about with the coronation tomorrow.’

‘Mr Fandorin, then?’ I asked reluctantly.

Endlung and His Highness looked at each other.

‘You know, Afanasii,’ the grand duke said slowly, ‘Fandorin is a clever chap, of course, but he seems to be preparing some cunning kind of operation. So let him get on with it.’

‘We’ll manage on our own,’ the lieutenant snapped. ‘Andwe’ll see whose operation is more cunning. But we need someone to help us. Tell me, Ziukin, are you with us or not?’

I agreed immediately, without even the slightest hesitation. I found the idea of doing something useful again, and without Mr Fandorin being involved, immensely inspiring.

‘What do we have to do?’ I asked.

‘First, tail them,’ Endlung announced briskly. ‘Both of them. Paulie can’t do it – he’s too conspicuous and also he has heaps of responsibilities. The royal family has an all-night vigil today, and in general he’s going to be like a little pug dog on a tight lead. That’s why we’ve brought you in. So I’m going to follow Carr and you, Ziukin, are going to follow Banville.’

I noted that he had kept the most promising suspect for himself, but I did not object – itwas Endlung not Iwho had come up with the idea.

‘Ah, how I envy you!’ His Highness exclaimed ruefully.

In accordance with our agreement, I installed myself with the Moscow Gazette on the bench beside the stairs, from where I had a view of His Lordship’s door. Endlung sat down to lay out a game of patience in the small drawing room, because he could see Mr Carr’s room from there.

In anticipation of our surveillance work I had changed my livery for a good suit of dark-grey English wool, a present from the grand princess the previous year. Endlung had also changed into civilian clothes – a sandy-coloured two-piece suit and dandified shoes with white gaiters.

To while away the time, I read the text of the solemn announcement to the people of the next day’s coronation:

His most Serene, Sovereign and Great Highness, the Emperor Nikolai Alexandrovich, having ascended the ancestral throne of the Russian Empire and the Kingdom of Poland and Grand Dukedom of Finland incorporated therein, has deigned, in the fashion of those devout sovereigns, his ancestors, to decree as follows:

The most sacred coronation of His Imperial Majesty and his anointment from the spiritual world shall take place, with the help of Almighty God, on the fourteenth day of this month of May. His Imperial Majesty has decreed that his consort, Her Majesty the Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, shall also be privy to these most sacred proceedings. This triumphant festivity is hereby proclaimed to all loyal subjects so that on this long-awaited day they might redouble their prayers to the King of Kings to illumine His Majesty’s kingdom with all the power of His grace and strengthen it in peace and quietude, to His own most sacred glory and the unshakeable prosperity of the state.

The sublime dignity of these majestic words filled my heart with a calm certitude. Reading official documents had always had a most salutary effect on me, and especially now, when the inviolability of the edifice of the Russian monarchy had suddenly come under threat.

I also studied with pleasure the composition of the company of heralds that was reading out this message every day on the Senate Square of the Kremlin: ‘An adjutant general with the rank of full general, two adjutant generals of adjutant-general rank, two high masters of coronation ceremonies, two heralds, four masters of ceremony, two Senate secretaries, two divisions in mounted formation – one of Her Majesty the Empress Maria Feodorovna’s cavalry guards and the other of the mounted lifeguards, with kettledrums and full choruses of trumpets, each division to have two trumpeters with trumpets decorated with cloth of gold displaying the state crest and twelve lead mounts in richly decorated horsecloths.’ How beautiful! Such music in every word, in the sound of every rank and title!

The previous year, on the initiative of the new empress, who wished to be more Russian than the Russians themselves, a genuine revolution had almost taken place in the names of court rankingswhen a projectwas conceived to replace all the German titles with old ones from Muscovy. According to Endlung the unrest among the servants at court had been reminiscent of the picture The Last Day of Pompeii by the artist Briullov, but, thank God, it had come to nothing. When the High House Marshal Prince Alten-Coburg-Svyatopolk-Bobruisky learned that under the new (or rather, old) order he would simply be called a butler, there was a great scandal, and the project was consigned to oblivion.