Аркадий Стругацкий - Six Matches

That evening Komlin, sparkling with gaiety and good humour, demonstrated some conjuring tricks to his colleagues. He had an audience of four-Alexander Gorchinsky, his adoring, unshaven assistant, and the three young girl assistants, Lena, Dusya and Katya, who had stayed behind to finish up some urgent work.

The tricks were quite sensational. To begin with Komlin offered to hypnotize someone, and when no one agreed, he told a funny story about a hypnotist and a surgeon.

"Now then, Lena," he said. "Would you like me to guess what you have hidden in the drawer of your desk?"

Two of his three guesses were correct. Dusya accused him of peeping. He denied the charge, but the girls continued to tease him, whereupon he announced that he could extinguish a flame merely by looking at it. Dusya snatched up a box of matches, ran off into a corner of the room, and struck a match. It flared up and went out at once. Everyone was amazed and all eyes were turned to Komlin. He stood with his arms folded over his chest, his brows knitted in the classical pose of the professional conjuror.

"What powerful lungs!" said Dusya admiringly. Komlin was standing a good ten paces away from her. Komlin then told them to tie a handkerchief over his mouth. When this was done, Dusya struck another match, and again it went out.

"Do you blow through your nose then?" said the amazed Dusya. Komlin tore off the handkerchief, burst out laughing and seizing Dusya waltzed around the room with her.

After that he performed two more tricks: he dropped a match and instead of falling straight down it fell sideways at a considerable angle. ("You're blowing at it again," Dusya said uncertainly.) Then he laid a piece of tungsten spiral on the table and the spiral crawled over the glass top to the edge of the desk and fell on the floor. Everyone was astonished, of course, and Gorchinsky begged him to tell them how it was done. But Komlin suddenly turned serious and offered to multiply several sums in his head.

"Six hundred and fifty-four by two hundred and thirty-one and the result by sixteen," Katya said timidly.

"Take a pencil and write," Komlin ordered in a strained voice and proceeded to dictate: "Four, eight, one..." his voice dropped to a whisper, and he wound up in one breath: "Seven, one, four, two... Right to left."

He turned (the girls were shocked at the change in him -his whole figure seemed suddenly to droop) and shuffled heavily over to the generator chamber and locked himself in again. Gorchinsky, who had been checking the figures, stared after him anxiously for a few moments and then announced that the answer was correct-reading the figures from right to left the answer was two million four hundred and seventeen thousand one hundred and eighty-four.

The girls worked until ten o'clock that evening. Gorchinsky also stayed behind, but he was too restless to be of much help to them. Komlin did not reappear. At ten they said good night to him through the door and went home. The next morning Komlin was taken to hospital.

The "official" result of Komlin's three months' research was "neutrino acupuncture," a method of treatment by directing streams of neutrinos at the brain. The new method was tremendously interesting in itself, but what was the explanation for Komlin's injured hand? Or his phenomenal memory? And what about the tricks with the matches, the spirals and his lightning calculation?

"He kept it all a secret from his colleagues," the Inspector murmured. "I wonder why? Was it because he was unsure of himself or because he did not want to endanger his comrades? Odd. Very odd indeed."

The videophone clicked and the face of his secretary appeared on the screen.

"Comrade Gorchinsky is here," she said. "Show him in," said the Inspector.

A burly giant of a man in a checked shirt with rolled-up sleeves appeared in the doorway. The Inspector got the impression of a powerful neck, massive shoulders, and a large head covered with a shock of thick black hair, with, surprisingly, a small bald spot (two small bald spots, in fact) in the middle, for the man came into the room backwards. He was holding the door open for someone else who turned out to be the Director. The man in the checked shirt closed the door after him, then turned and made a curt bow. He wore a small but very bushy moustache and his expression was rather grim. This was Alexander Gorchinsky, Komlin's "personal" laboratory assistant.

The Director sank into an armchair and stared out of the window. Gorchinsky stood before the Inspector in an expectant attitude.

"Will you..." the Inspector began.

"Thanks, I will," boomed the laboratory assistant and sat down, placing his hands on his knees and turning a pair of steely grey eyes on the Inspector.

"Gorchinsky, I presume?" asked the Inspector.

"That's right. Alexander Borisovich Gorchinsky."

"Pleased to meet you. My name is Rybnikov, I am the Labour Protection Inspector."

"This is a pleasure, Inspector," drawled Gorchinsky with exaggerated politeness.

"You are Komlin's 'personal' laboratory assistant."

"I don't know what you mean by 'personal'. I'm a member of the staff of the physics laboratory of the Central Brain Institute."

The Inspector glanced quickly at the Director and caught a faint ironical twinkle in his eye.

"Do you mind telling me exactly what problems you have been working on during the past three months?"

"We have been doing some research in neutrino acupuncture."

"Could you be a little more explicit please?"

"There is a detailed report on the subject," said Gor-chinsky stiffly. "You will find everything there."

"No doubt. Nevertheless I would be much obliged if you would clarify the term for me," said the Inspector very calmly.

For a few seconds the two men looked each other squarely in the eye, the Inspector's face slowly reddening, Gorchinsky's moustache bristling. At length the laboratory assistant narrowed his eyes.

"Very well," he boomed. "If you insist. We were studying the action of focussed neutrino beams on the grey and white matter of the brain, and on the animal organism in general..."

He spoke in a flat toneless voice, and seemed to be swaying slightly as he spoke.

"... Besides registering pathological and other changes in the organism, we measured the activated currents, differential decrement and lability curves in various tissues, as well as the relative quantities of neuroglobulin and neu-rostromin..."

The Inspector leaned back in his chair, listening with mixed admiration and annoyance. "You just wait, my fine fellow!" he thought. The Director continued to stare out of the window, drumming his fingers on the table.

"Tell me, Comrade Gorchinsky, what has happened to your hands?" the Inspector asked, cutting the laboratory assistant short. The Inspector disliked being put on the defensive. He preferred to take the initiative.

Gorchinsky glanced down at his hands lying on the arms of the chair. They were a mass of scratches and dark blue scars. He made an involuntary movement as if to thrust them into his pockets, but instead he slowly clenched his huge fists.

"The monkey we were experimenting with scratched me up," he muttered.

"Did you experiment on animals only?"

"Yes. I experimented only on animals," said Gorchinsky, faintly emphasizing the "I."

"What sort of an accident did Komlin have two months ago?" the Inspector asked quickly.

Gorchinsky shrugged his shoulders.

"I don't remember."

"Let me refresh your memory. Komlin cut his hand. How did it happen?"

"How should I know? He just cut himself and that's all I know."

"Alexander Borisovich!" the Director said reprovingly.

"Why don't you ask Komlin himself?" Gorchinsky said defiantly.

The Inspector's eyes narrowed.