Люциус Шепард - Eternity and Other Stories

Something gave way in Chemayev. The pressures of the preceding months, the subterfuge, the planning, and now this pitiful recitation with its obvious omissions—his inner defenses collapsed under the weight of these separate travails, conjoined in a flood of stale emotion. Old suffocated panics, soured desires, yellowed griefs, lumps of mummified terror… the terror he had felt sitting alone at night, certain that he would lose her, his head close to bursting with despair. His eyes teared. He linked his hands behind her neck and drew her to him so that their foreheads touched. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry it took so long.”

“It wasn’t long! It’s so much money! And you got it all in less than a year!”

“Every day I see enough money to choke the world. I could have fixed the books, I could have done something.”

“Yes… and then what? Polutin would have had you killed. God, Viktor! You amazed me! Don’t you understand? You were completely unexpected. I never thought anyone would care enough about me to do what you’ve done.” She kissed his eyes, applied delicate kisses all over his face. “When you told me what you were up to, I felt like a princess imprisoned in a high tower. And you were the prince trying to save me. You know me. I’m not one to believe in fairy tales. But I liked this one—it was a nice fantasy, and I needed a fantasy. I was certain you were lying to me… or to yourself. I prepared for the inevitable. But you turned out to be a real prince.” She rubbed his stubbly head. “A prince with a terrible haircut.”

He tried to smile, but emotion was still strong in him and his facial muscles wouldn’t work properly.

“Don’t punish yourself. Can’t you see how happy I am? It’s almost over now. Please, Viktor! I want you to be happy, too.”

He gathered himself, swallowed back the tight feeling in his throat. “I’m all right,” he said. “I’m sorry. I just… I can’t…”

“I know,” she said. “It’s been hard for both of us. I know.” She lifted his wrist so she could see his watch. “I have to go. I don’t want to, but I have to. Are you sure you’re all right?”

“I’ll be fine,” he said. “Go ahead… go.”

“Should I wait for you here?”

“Yes,” he said. “Yes, wait here, and we’ll ride up together. As soon as I’m through with Yuri I’ll call my security people. They’ll meet us at the entrance.”

She kissed him again, her tongue flirting with his, a lush contact that left him muddled. “I’ll see you soon,” she said, trailing her hand across his cheek; then she walked off toward a recessed door next to the fireplace at the far end of the room—the same door that led to Yuri Lebedev’s office and, ultimately, to the inscrutable heart of Eternity.

Without Larissa beside him Chemayev felt adrift, cut off from energy and purpose. His thoughts seemed to be circling, slowly eddying, as the surface of a stream might eddy after the sudden twisting submergence of a silvery fish. They seemed less thoughts than shadows of the moment just ended. On the television screen above the bar a child was sitting in a swing hung from the limb of an oak tree, spied on by an evil androgynous creature with a painted white face and wearing a lime green body stocking, who lurked in the shadows at the edge of a forest. All this underscored by an anxious, throbbing music. Chemayev watched the video without critical or aesthetic bias, satisfied by color and movement alone, and he was given a start when the bartender came over and offered him a drink in a glass with the silver initial L on its side.

“What’s this?” Chemayev asked, and the bartender said, “Yuri’s private booze. Everybody gets one. Everybody who meets with him.” He set down the glass, and Chemayev viewed it with suspicion. The liquid appeared to be vodka.

“You don’t have to drink,” the bartender said. “But it’s Yuri’s custom.”

Chemayev wondered if he was being tested. The courageous thing to do, the courteous thing, would be to drink. But abstinence might prove the wiser course.

“I can pour you another if you’d like. I can open a new bottle.” The bartender produced an unopened bottle; it, too, was embossed with a silver L .

“Why don’t you do that?” Chemayev told him. “I could use a drink, but… uh…”

“As you like.” The bartender stripped the seal from the bottle and poured. He did not appear in the least disturbed, and Chemayev supposed that he had been through this process before.

The vodka was excellent and Chemayev was relieved when, after several minutes, he remained conscious and his stomach gave no sign that he had ingested poison.

“Another?” the bartender asked.

“Sure.” Chemayev pushed the glass forward.

“Two’s the limit, I’m afraid. It’s precious stuff.” The bartender lifted the glass that Chemayev had refused, offered a silent toast and drank. “Fuck, that’s good!” He dabbed at his mouth with a cocktail napkin. “Almost everyone who tries it comes back and offers to buy a couple of bottles. But it’s not for sale. You have to meet with Yuri to earn your two shots.”

“Or work as a bartender in Eternity, eh?” Chemayev suggested.

“Privileges of the job. I’m always delighted to serve a suspicious soul.”

“I imagine you get quite a few.”

“People have every right to be suspicious. This is a weird place. Don’t get me wrong—it’s great working here. But it takes getting used to.”

“I can imagine.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t bet on it. You have no idea what goes on here after hours. But once you’ve met Yuri”—the bartender slung a towel over his shoulder—“you’ll probably be able to educate me. Everyone says it’s quite an experience.”

Chemayev downed the second vodka. Yet another video was showing on the TV, and something was interfering with the transmission. First there was an intense flickering, then a succession of scenes skittered across the screen, as if the video were playing on an old-fashioned projector and the film was breaking free of the spool. He glanced at the bartender. The man was standing at the opposite end of the counter with his head thrown back, apparently howling with laughter; yet though his mouth was open and the ligature of his neck cabled, he wasn’t making a sound. His white hair glowed like phosphorus. Unnerved, Chemayev turned again to the TV. On screen, to the accompaniment of a gloomy folk song, two women in white jumpsuits were embracing on a couch, deep in a passionate kiss. As he watched, the taller of the two, a blond with sharp cheekbones, unzipped her lover’s jumpsuit to the waist, exposing the slopes of her breasts… It was at this point that Chemayev experienced a confusing dislocation. Frames began flipping past too rapidly to discern, the strobing light causing him to grow drowsy yet dumbly attentive; then a veneer of opaque darkness slid in front of the screen, oval in shape, like a yawning mouth. There was a moment when he had a claustrophobic sense of being enclosed, and the next instant he found himself standing in the blackness beyond the mouth. He had the impression that this black place had reached out and enveloped him, and for that reason, though he remained drowsy and distanced from events, he felt a considerable measure of foreboding.

From Chemayev’s vantage it was impossible to estimate the size of the room in which he stood—the walls and ceiling were lost in darkness—but he could tell it was immense. Illumination was provided by long glowing silvery bars that looked to be hovering at an uncertain distance overhead, their radiance too feeble to provide any real perspective. Small trees and bushes with black trunks and branches grew in disorderly ranks on every side; their leaves were papery, white, bespotted with curious, sharply drawn, black designs—like little leaf-shaped magical texts. This must be, he thought, the garden Polutin had mentioned, though it seemed more thicket than garden. The leaves crisped against his jacket as he pushed past; twigs clawed at his trouser legs. After a couple of minutes he stumbled into a tiny clearing choked with pale weeds. Beetles scuttered in amongst them. Fat little scarabs, their chitin black and gleamless, they were horrid in their simplicity, like official notifications of death. The air was cool, thick with the skunky scent of the vegetation. He heard no sounds other than those he himself made. Yet he did not believe he was alone. He went cautiously, stopping every so often to peer between branches and to listen.