R. Morris - The Cleansing Flames

‘I. . that is to say, Konstantin Arsenevich thought. .’ Virginsky felt foolish and cowardly for trying to shift the blame onto Dolgoruky.

‘What Konstantin Arsenevich thought is immaterial. You do not take orders from Konstantin Arsenevich. You take orders from the central committee. Your instructions were clear.’

‘Come now, Tatyana Ruslanovna,’ began Dolgoruky smoothly. ‘You yourself know I am impossible to resist! Don’t be too hard on the boy.’

‘He is not a boy. He should not be behaving like a child. He is old enough to take responsibility for his own actions. This does not bode well at all.’

‘But you must realise this is devastating for him to hear. After all, you know he only shot his friend to get you into bed!’

Virginsky felt the heat rise to his face. To his surprise, Tatyana Ruslanovna did not react to Dolgoruky’s words with equal force. In fact, she merely laughed: the lewd, broken laugh he remembered from an earlier time, an earlier Tatyana Ruslanovna.

‘The poor fool was going mad from boredom in that apartment. I mean, look at him. He’d taken to dressing up to amuse himself.’ Dolgoruky’s laughter was disproportionate, bordering on manic.

Tatyana Ruslanovna shook her head. ‘This will not do, Dolgoruky.’

The Prince’s face snapped into an expression of exaggerated solemnity. ‘But he is one of our people now. Surely?’ Dolgoruky seemed suddenly abashed. He added hurriedly, addressing the floor, ‘I promised to introduce him to Dyavol.’

‘You had no right to make such a promise,’ said Totsky.

Dolgoruky straightened up and gave Totsky a defiant look. ‘Dyavol and I, we have our own relationship. It exists without reference to you.’

Totsky turned to Tatyana Ruslanovna. ‘Once again, this man proves himself to be reckless and ill disciplined. There can be no place for him, and his kind, in the movement.’

But all Tatyana Ruslanovna said was, ‘Dyavol is not here.’

‘Pity,’ said Dolgoruky. ‘I will have to settle for showing him the next best thing.’

‘Which is?’ wondered Virginsky.

‘Dyavol’s toys.’

‘No,’ said Totsky quickly. ‘For one thing, they are not toys. This is not a game, Dolgoruky.’

Virginsky made out several workbenches and tables arranged about the place. A number of glass phials and bottles were laid out on one table, together with a range of laboratory equipment, such as retorts and beakers. Elsewhere, he noticed a poised and sprung machine, which he identified as a small printing press; it confronted him with its circular platen, moon-faced and disconsolate.

‘This is where you print the manifestos,’ he observed.

‘Oh, we do more than that, my friend!’ Dolgoruky inhaled deeply. ‘Do you smell that? Do you know what it is?’

Virginsky sniffed but the smell seemed to burn the membranes of his nostrils. He started to cough, and placed a hand over his nose and mouth to protect his vital organs from the vicious air.

‘That’s how the world will smell when it has been burnt clean by us. This is where we make the ultimate cleansing solution, my friend. More powerful than carbolic acid. It will clean away the accumulated layers of filth that have clogged up our society for centuries. Burn and clean.’

‘Enough, Dolgoruky,’ warned Totsky.

Dolgoruky took a step towards the table. Totsky’s hand — the one that had been concealed in his jacket pocket — flashed up. In it, Virginsky saw a revolver. His heart beat sternly.

‘Halt!’

Dolgoruky turned towards the shouted command and saw the gun levelled at him. He stopped in his tracks. ‘Now, now. We are all friends.’

‘Back away from the table.’

‘I only want to show him — our newest recruit — what’s there. I believe it will strengthen his resolve and bind him more firmly to the cause.’

‘You are a dangerous fool.’

‘But you would not shoot me, old fellow.’

‘Oh, but I would, and with pleasure. I know you have your protectors, those who think you will be useful to the cause.’ Totsky flashed a resentful glower towards Tatyana Ruslanovna. ‘But as far as I am concerned, you are part of the order that must be wiped away.’

Dolgoruky took another step towards the table. ‘On second thoughts, perhaps it would be for the best if you shot me. It is strange how the organism’s first craven instinct is to cling on to life at all costs. But it is only now that I consider the full implications of what you are threatening, that I find it does not frighten me at all. In fact, I welcome it.’ His hand darted out and he grabbed one of the small phials, the dense brown glass like a congealing of negativity. ‘So shoot me! Shoot me now, and let us see what happens.’

‘Put it down. Carefully. You don’t know how to handle it.’

Dolgoruky grinned back at Totsky. ‘You will not shoot me? I find I have no more appetite for life.’

Totsky’s hand trembled, it seemed with the effort of preventing himself from squeezing the trigger. ‘Now is not the time or place.’

Dolgoruky’s grin became triumphant. He lifted the phial and held it high above his head.

‘What is it?’ murmured Virginsky.

‘Death,’ said Dolgoruky, with an exalted gleam in his eye. ‘This little bottle is enough to kill us all. And all I have to do is cast it to the ground. Is that not so, Totsky?’

‘Stop playing games, Dolgoruky. That is valuable materiel. We cannot afford to waste it.’ Still he kept the gun pointed at Dolgoruky, though his hand was shaking so badly now that it was far from certain that he would hit his target.

‘You are making bombs here?’ Virginsky’s voice brimmed with awe.

‘We are making the future, Magistrate.’

‘Enough!’ Tatyana Ruslanovna’s intervention was delayed but decisive. Virginsky had the feeling that this was often the case. He sensed that she enjoyed waiting to see how far a situation could progress in the direction of chaos, before deciding whether to help it on its way or return it from the brink. She stepped between the two men. ‘Totsky, put down the gun. You know you are not going to shoot him. And you are certainly not going to shoot me.’

Tatyana Ruslanovna watched him do as she had ordered: he placed the hand holding the gun back in his jacket pocket. She then turned to face Dolgoruky. Her hand became an extension of her tender gaze, laid softly on his cheek. ‘My dear, it is good that you are ready to die. But Totsky is right. Now is not the time or the place. It would be a waste of your death. A waste of you. There will come a time when we will call upon you to lay down your life. And rest assured that your death will be glorious and noble — and more than anything, useful.’

Still Dolgoruky did not lower the phial. ‘But he is outside now ! If I do it now, I will destroy him too.’

‘Who is outside?’

Dolgoruky shook his head violently, refusing to answer.

‘Is there ever a time when he is not near you?’

‘Never!’ cried Dolgoruky, desperation straining his face.

‘Then you will have another opportunity to destroy him. We will choose the occasion carefully. There will be others destroyed. The oppressor and his agents. I urge you to save your death for that!’

Her hand was still on his face. But it was as if he noticed it for the first time only now.

Perhaps he saw her gesture as a reminder of a tenderness that had once existed between them, or the promise of one to come. He lowered the phial and gave it to Tatyana Ruslanovna.

With a nod to Totsky, she placed it carefully on the table.

There was a groan from Dolgoruky. He moved towards the door and drew open the bolt. His look back to the room before he slipped out was defeated, spent.