Boris Akunin - The Coronation

‘I agree,’ I said, interrupting him.

At that moment I did not feel afraid at all. I was thinking of only one thing: Emilie and I would be together. I think it was the first time that I had thought of Mademoiselle by her first name.

There was a brief pause, and then Erast Petrovich got to his feet.

‘Then get some rest, you look tired. Be in the d-drawing room at ten o’clock. I’ll give you and Emilie a briefing.’

The late sun had warmed the velvet curtains, and there was a distinct smell of dust in the shaded drawing room. Velvet is always a problem – it is in the nature of the material: if it is left hanging for years without being washed regularly, as it had been here in the Hermitage, you simply cannot completely get rid of the dust that has eaten into it. I made a mental note to have the curtains changed that very day. Provided, of course, that I came back from the operation alive.

The success of the proposed undertaking appeared highly doubtful to me. At this last meeting – I had to assume that it was indeed the very last – only those directly involved in the operation were present: Mademoiselle and I, Mr Fandorin and the two colonels, Karnovich and Lasovsky, who were as meek as lambs and as quiet as mice, and listened to Erast Petrovich with emphatic respect, which may have been genuine or false, I do not know.

The plan of the area between the Novodevichy Convent and the Novodevichy Embankment that was laid out on the table had been carefully drawn, not like that morning’s demonstration on the oilcloth. Cross-hatched circles marked the positions of the secret sentries who surrounded the wasteland on all sides: the senior agent (Fandorin gave his name – Kuzyakin) in a hollow in an old oak tree on the corner of Vselensky Square; six ‘attendants’ in the dormitory of the children’s clinic that had windows overlooking the pond; eleven ‘monks’ on the wall of the convent; seven ‘boatmen’ and ‘buoy keepers’ on the river; one man disguised as a female street trader on the turn-off from Pogodinskaya Street; three ‘beggars’ at the gates of the convent; two ‘fishermen’ by the pond, the closest of all. The total number of agents in the first ring of the cordon was thirty-one.

‘The exchangemust take place as follows,’ Fandorin explained after he had indicated the positions of the sentry posts. ‘The two of you will be led to the chapel and taken inside. You will demand that your blindfolds be removed. The doctor’s own jeweller is bound to be there. You will give him the Orlov to examine and then take it back. Then Mademoiselle Declique will go down into the vault and collect the boy. When the boy is brought out to you, you hand over the stone. At that point, Ziukin, your mission is over.’

I could hardly believe my ears. I was already familiar with Mr Fandorin’s adventurous disposition, but I had not expected such irresponsibility, even from him. The most astounding thing was that the head of the court police and the high police master of Moscow had listened to this insane plan with a perfectly serious air and did not utter a single word of protest!

‘What nonsense!’ I declared with a trenchancy that was quite uncharacteristic of me (but entirely justified by the circumstances). ‘I shall be alone, unarmed, and Mademoiselle’s presence will not help me. They will simply take the diamond away from me once they are satisfied that it is genuine. And they will not even think of returning Mikhail Georgievich. They will simply escape through some underground passage and kill all three of us. A fine operation that will be! Wouldn’t it be better towait until Mademoiselle Declique and I have been taken inside, and then storm the tomb?’

‘No, it would not,’ Fandorin replied curtly.

And Karnovich explained: ‘If the place is stormed, His Highness will certainly be killed. And so will the two of you.’

I said nothing and glanced at Emilie. I must admit that she looked much calmer than I was and she was gazing at Fandorin as if she trusted him completely, which was particularly painful to see.

‘Erast Petrovich,’ she said quietly, ‘Doctor Lind is very cunning. What if Monsieur Ziukin and I are taken to a different place today, somewhere completely new? If that is the case, then your embuscade 1will be in vain.’

I turned to the sagacious Fandorin, for the question had, as they say, hit the bullseye.

‘That is not out of the question,’ he admitted. ‘But I have taken certain m-measures to deal with it. And your concerns, Ziukin – that they will take the stone and not return the boy – are also perfectly reasonable. It will all depend entirely on you. And so now I come to the m-most important thing of all.’

And so saying, hewent across to a smallwooden chest standing on a table beside the window, opened it and, using both hands, lifted out a smooth, shiny golden sphere the size of a small Crimean melon.

‘Here is your guarantee,’ said Erast Petrovich, setting the sphere down in front of me.

‘What is it?’ I asked, leaning over it.

The mirror surface of the sphere showed me a comically extended reflection of my own face.

‘Abomb, Afanasii Stepanovich. Of appalling destructive power. There is a small button on the inside. Pressing it releases the detonator, and after that the slightest jolt – for instance dropping the sphere on a stone floor – is sufficient to cause an explosion that would completely obliterate you, Lind and his men, and the entire chapel. The Orlov, as it happens, would survive, because it is indestructible and afterwards we would c-certainly find it among the rubble . . . You will have to explain all this to the doctor. Tell him that at the slightest sign of foul play you will drop the sphere. This is the only argument that will have any effect on Lind. It is our little surprise, so to speak.’

‘But the bomb is not genuine?’

‘I assure you that it is entirely g-genuine. The charge consists of an explosive mixture invented by chemists at the Imperial Mining and Artillery Laboratory. The Commission of the Central Artillery Department has not approved the mixture for use because the risk of accidental explosion is too great. If they try to search you when you are getting into the carriage, you will say that the sphere is a case for the Orlov and you will not allow them to open it under any circumstances. Say that the journey is cancelled if they do not agree. But then, if it is the same mute coachman who comes for you, any discussion is unlikely.’

Erast Petrovich picked up the sphere and prised open a barely visible lid with his nail.

‘The Orlov really is inside, in the upper section of the sphere. When you take out the stone to hand it over for inspection, you press here and so activate the mechanism. Under no circumstances do this in the carriage, or else the jolting might produce an explosion. And after you have pressed the button you will tell Lind or his men what kind of toy this is.’

I glanced inside the sphere. The priceless relic of the House of Romanovwas lying in a rounded niche, glinting with a dull bluish light. At close quarters the miraculous stone seemed to me like a cut-crystal door handle, similar to those that adorned the chest of drawers in the grand duchess’s dressing room. To be quite honest, I was far more impressed by the red metal button that was almost invisible against the background of scarlet velvet.

I wiped the sweat off my forehead and looked at Emilie. If things went badly, or if I simply made a blunder, we would die together, and the fragments of our bodieswould be intermingled. She nodded to me calmly, as if to say: It is all right. I trust you and everything is certain to turn out well.

‘But then what?’ I asked. ‘Lind will not want to be blown up, that is clear enough, so he will not break the rules of the game. He will give us Mikhail Georgievich and then escape through some cunning secret passage. And the Orlov will be lost forever!’