Natalia Solntseva

The Three Deaths of Colombina

All coincidences are random and unintentional.

The beauty is very young
But not from our century,
We can't be together - the one, the third,
Will never leave us.
You move a chair for her
I generously share flowers with her ...
What we do - we do not know ourselves,
But every moment we are more afraid.
Like getting out of jail
We know something about each other
Terrible. We're in a hell of a circle
Or maybe it's not us.

Anna Akhmatova

Moscow. A few months before the events described

The first day of November turned out to be cloudy and cold. The old park was dropping its last leaves. Fog lay in layers in the lowlands, dampness was drawn from there. A large fire was burning by the ravine. Some people gathered around the fire - either to warm themselves, or to perform a demonic rite.

Everything that is not from God is from the evil one. Today there are many lovers of flirting with ancient magic, appealing to dark forces. Few people think what this frivolity can result in ...

At this time, the distant alleys of the park were deserted. A few walkers tried to stay close to the manor house, to the light falling from the windows.

A corpulent gentleman in an elegant overcoat hurried past a group of fancy dressed young people, slipped under the twilight canopy of trees. He was tormented by shortness of breath, his lower back ached. He didn't expect it to get dark so early. Approaching the stone bridge, the gentleman slowed down and listened.

It seemed that someone's shadow was following him, someone's eyes were watching him. Had he acted recklessly, heading here alone, without guards? Branches crunched somewhere behind him, and fallen leaves rustled. The crimson flame of the fire illuminated the slopes of the ravine, the outlines of the bridge, drowning in the fog ...

The gentleman peered into the greenish haze until his eyes hurt. It seemed to him that bright clothes flickered on the other side, he heard women's heels clicking on the stones. Is she? Came ... did not deceive ...

He started to move forward, but came to his senses, restrained himself. It is not good for him, like an impatient youth, to rush at full speed to the long-awaited beloved. Yes, and she is far from an enthusiastic and sentimental girl, she will even laugh at it ...

The gentleman breathed heavily, feeling his heart thump in his chest. Only a fleeting moment separated him from the woman walking across the bridge. Beautiful and unique, it suddenly stopped ... although he did not ask for it.

Knock-knock... knock... The heels fell silent, and the female silhouette disappeared into the fog...

The fire crackled, drops fell from the branches, someone spoke in a monotone in the distance, conjuring this moonless night, this flame and this greenish haze.

The master became uncomfortable. He looked around, but saw nothing but dark, wet trunks, hot tongues of fire, and thick fog.

He wanted to call the woman... and he couldn't. His tongue did not obey him, aching pain stirred in his side. The empty, blind eye sockets of death looked coldly at him from the surrounding darkness...

* * * France, 16th century. Paris, Louvre

Those born in purple bear the stamp of the divine... or the devil. They have different blood, different thoughts, different life and different death. They love and hate differently. In their destiny, gold, intrigue and power rule the ball. They bathe in luxury, but sometimes they feel poorer than the last subject. Their power is ephemeral, and sometimes they are the most unfortunate of people. Hostages of the crown that exalts and kills them.

Marguerite did not like the Louvre, its cold splendor, the smell of swollen candles and dusty carpets, the rustle of velvet draperies, the eternal drafts, the dampness of dark passages, the booming steps of the guards, the rattling of weapons and the muffled whispers of the courtiers. Her mother, the cunning Florentine Catherine de Medici, ruled everything here. She gave birth to the French king Henry II of seven children, and he openly cheated on her with the beautiful Diane de Poitiers. Shedding tears in her lonely bed with a canopy woven with royal lilies, Catherine cursed her unfaithful husband.

The Three Deaths of Colombina

Artifact detective. Astra Yeltsova - 5

Mystical Detective

All coincidences are random and unintentional.

The beauty is very young

But not from our century,

We can't be together - the one, the third,

Will never leave us.

You move a chair for her

I generously share flowers with her ...

What we do - we do not know ourselves,

But every moment we are more afraid.

Like getting out of jail

We know something about each other

Terrible. We're in a hell of a circle

Or maybe it's not us.

Anna Akhmatova

Chapter 1

Moscow. A few months before the events described

Everything that is not from God is from the evil one. Today there are many lovers of flirting with ancient magic, appealing to dark forces. Few people think what this frivolity can result in ...

At this time, the distant alleys of the park were deserted. A few walkers tried to stay close to the manor house, to the light falling from the windows.

Knock? Knock ... knock ... The heels fell silent, and the female silhouette disappeared into the fog ...

The fire crackled, drops fell from the branches, someone spoke monotonously in the distance, conjuring this moonless night, this flame and this greenish haze.

The master became uncomfortable. He looked around, but saw nothing but dark, wet trunks, hot tongues of fire, and thick fog.

Natalia Solntseva

The Three Deaths of Colombina

All coincidences are random and unintentional.

Anna Akhmatova

Moscow. A few months before the events described

Everything that is not from God is from the evil one. Today there are many lovers of flirting with ancient magic, appealing to dark forces. Few people think what this frivolity can result in ...

At this time, the distant alleys of the park were deserted. A few walkers tried to stay close to the manor house, to the light falling from the windows.

Knock-knock... knock... The heels fell silent, and the female silhouette disappeared into the fog...

The fire crackled, drops fell from the branches, someone spoke in a monotone in the distance, conjuring this moonless night, this flame and this greenish haze.

The master became uncomfortable. He looked around, but saw nothing but dark, wet trunks, hot tongues of fire, and thick fog.

* * * France, 16th century. Paris, Louvre

At first, it was rumored that she had brought a rare and terrible poison from Italy and that the days of the favorite were numbered. However, the queen turned out to be smarter and more far-sighted than her enemies. Alien in this country, where the struggle of influential clans for the throne did not stop, and the court was mired in gossip and debauchery, she gradually, imperceptibly took the reins of government into her hands. While the king arranged knightly tournaments and enjoyed love in the arms of the charming Diana, his wife comprehended the science of weaving intrigues, gaining supporters and enlisting the secret support of nobles.

There were rumors that dark things were going on in Catherine's chambers. A certain Cosimo Ruggieri, an astrologer and sorcerer, brought by her from Florence, clears the path to power for his patroness with the help of black magic. Ruggieri allegedly masterfully makes poisons and wonderful perfumes, but few people dare to use these spirits. Also, the queen's personal astrologer constantly watches the stars, and without his advice, Catherine will not take a step. In a narrow circle of her close associates, they whispered that Ruggieri was going to exterminate the king with magic spells. Such words could cost the gossiper his life, so they were afraid to repeat them.

Be that as it may, and at one of the tournaments, the king-knight, who performed with the flowers of the “beautiful lady” de Poitiers, was seriously wounded by the Earl of Montgomery, captain of the Scottish royal guard. Quite by accident, of course! The enemy's spear hit Henry's helmet with terrible force, damaged the visor, broke, and its fragments pierced the monarch's face. A cry of horror rippled through the ranks of the courtiers. The defeated king was carried away from the stadium, Diana lost consciousness, and the lawful wife hurried after her dying husband ... What was she thinking about in those moments? What did you feel? Hidden triumph, complete devastation, belated repentance, pity ... or the cruel bitterness of a loving but unloved woman?

The king is dead. Long live the king! Thanks to Catherine, France received heirs to the throne. Sons were crowned and ascended the throne, while their mother remained in the shadows. But it was she who predetermined politics at court, and without her knowledge not a single mouse could slip through the musty nooks and crannies of the Louvre.

The gloomy Italian Ruggieri, using magical tricks and interpreting the location of the stars, predicted the decline of the Valois dynasty to the Queen Mother. One by one, she will lose her sons, and Paris will go to their second cousin, the hated leader of the Huguenots, Henry of Navarre.

- Shut up! cried the poor woman, tearing her lace cuffs in fury. - Don't you dare... This rogue, lecherous dog, a mess that reeks of horse sweat, will never sit on the throne of France! I won't let it!

Cosimo bowed in respect. "As you wish, Your Majesty," his posture said. "Alas, the Bourbon star rises over the kingdom!" - said his eyes, when he raised them to the stunned Catherine.

"That won't happen," she whispered. - Don't be...

But she didn't believe her own words. Perhaps it was at that fateful moment that she had the crazy idea to do away with Heinrich de Bourbon and his henchmen in one fell swoop. Yes, there will be a lot of bloodshed. Who said that the path of monarchs should be paved with roses? This path is the lot of the strong.

Catherine decided to fight to the end, and her daughter Margarita was to become a bargaining chip in this struggle. A lovely sheep will have to be slaughtered. When it comes to the fate of the ruling dynasty, any means are good. There is no time for sentiment.

Margarita was the seventh child, the youngest daughter of Henry II and Catherine de Medici. She matured early, blossomed, striking those around her with marvelous beauty, quick wit and independent character. The shrew gave her mother and brothers a lot of trouble. As soon as she was sixteen, she fell in love with the Duke of Guise without memory - even the chambermaids and palace stokers knew about their stormy romance.

Her brother - King Charles IX - forbade her to think about marriage with the duke. Margarita sobbed furiously, locked in her bedroom, and he tried to reason with her.

“Judge for yourself, Margot… the Guises belong to the House of Lorraine, and your… hmm… lover leads all the Catholics in France. By marrying you, he'll probably lay claim to the crown. We can't take that risk.

- That's her! yelled Margarita, rushing about the room like a mad cat. “These are the tricks of our mother!” She persuaded you, brother, admit it! I love him... Don't do this to me!

Carl shook his head in puzzlement.

- Calm down. First of all, we care about the welfare of the state, and then about the personal. And you, as a princess of the Valois family, must ...

The Three Deaths of Colombina Natalia Solntseva

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Title: The Three Deaths of Columbine

About the book by Natalia Solntseva "The Three Deaths of Colombina"

Carnival is the favorite pastime of kings. The courtiers cover their faces and change to suit their mask. Sometimes all base feelings - envy, hatred, anger - crawl out of her empty eye sockets. How interesting to watch it from the side!

A happy married couple suddenly splits into two frightened people. They no longer trust each other. And all because of the fact that Colombina, Harlequin and Dr. Death are always nearby ... Some kind of masquerade! But after all, the mummers are real people, and their goal is material: to get the watch of the royal astrologer ...

The book was previously published under the title The Royal Astrologer's Hours.

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Natalia Solntseva

The Three Deaths of Colombina

All coincidences are random and unintentional.

The beauty is very young

But not from our century,

We can't be together - the one, the third,

Will never leave us.

You move a chair for her

I generously share flowers with her ...

What we do - we do not know ourselves,

But every moment we are more afraid.

Like getting out of jail

We know something about each other

Terrible. We're in a hell of a circle

Or maybe it's not us.

Anna Akhmatova

Moscow. A few months before the events described

Everything that is not from God is from the evil one. Today there are many lovers of flirting with ancient magic, appealing to dark forces. Few people think what this frivolity can result in ...

At this time, the distant alleys of the park were deserted. A few walkers tried to stay close to the manor house, to the light falling from the windows.

Knock-knock... knock... The heels fell silent, and the female silhouette disappeared into the fog...

The fire crackled, drops fell from the branches, someone spoke in a monotone in the distance, conjuring this moonless night, this flame and this greenish haze.

The master became uncomfortable. He looked around, but saw nothing but dark, wet trunks, hot tongues of fire, and thick fog.

*** * ***

Cosimo bowed in respect. "As you wish, Your Majesty," his posture said. "Alas, the Bourbon star rises over the kingdom!" - said his eyes, when he raised them to the stunned Catherine.

"That won't happen," she whispered. - Don't be...

Her brother - King Charles IX - forbade her to think about marriage with the duke. Margarita sobbed furiously, locked in her bedroom, and he tried to reason with her.

- That's her! yelled Margarita, rushing about the room like a mad cat. “These are the tricks of our mother!” She persuaded you, brother, admit it! I love him... Don't do this to me!

Carl shook his head in puzzlement.

- Calm down. First of all, we care about the welfare of the state, and then about the personal. And you, as a princess of the Valois family, must ...

Margarita, bursting into tears, fell on her knees before her brother.

- She's up to something, I feel - a terrible thing will happen ... Carl! I beg you, don't listen to her!

There was a strange rustle behind the tapestry that covered the wall. Margarita jumped up, looking around wildly.

Painfully pale, Karl took her hand - it was cold as ice.

- What's the matter? You're all trembling...

- She's here! Her eyes and ears are everywhere. She listens to us...

It seemed to Marguerite that the black shadow of the Queen Mother slipped into the bedroom.

- I'm afraid, Carl! I'm afraid of her...

Moscow - Kamyshin. Nowadays

Matvey Karelin, the owner of the design bureau, was in a great mood. The business expanded, profits grew, and this allowed him to hire a director, who freed him from many small responsibilities and the need to control every order.

Now Matvey could devote more time to the boys from the Vympel military sports club, where he led a group of "difficult teenagers", and to a private investigation. Astra Yeltsova introduced him to the latter - a charming, intelligent, but rather strange woman. The circumstances were such that she demanded that Karelin call himself her fiancé, almost a common-law husband, and he could not refuse. The situation was aggravated by relations with Astra's parents - a wealthy couple who doted on their only daughter and received Matvey in their house as a future son-in-law. Astra was amused, he was angry.

Sometimes it seemed to him that she was having an affair with him. Sometimes - that she leads him by the nose, teases and mocks. She then lit up, then cooled, then allowed intimate pranks, then it became impregnable and this ambiguity brought him to white heat. She had quirks that could alienate any man, but given the capital of her father - Yuri Timofeevich Yeltsov - she would not have needed a hand and heart seekers. Unfortunately or fortunately, Astra's wedding was upset. Treason, scandal and, finally, the death of her fiancé affected her life: Astra decided to leave her parental nest, go wherever her eyes look, get a job. The case threw her into the very remote village of Kamyshin near Moscow, where Matvey had a house.

Grandmother Anfisa left her grandson a chopped mansion of three rooms and a kitchen with a large Russian stove, a garden and a kitchen garden. He built the bath himself - new, but according to all the old rules. It was necessary for Astra to wander into that street exactly at the time when Matvey arrived there? It can be seen that there is this thing - fate. No matter what turns the path of life makes, it will lead to its own.

A non-binding acquaintance grew into a close friendship, which, as you know, does not happen between a man and a woman. "What binds us?" Matvey asked himself from time to time and answered differently each time.

Astra was not like other women. But doesn't every lover think so? Although Matvey could not agree to the role of her admirer, he was still aware that he could no longer imagine life without her. Without her foolish reasoning and ridiculous superstitions. Without her "clairvoyance", in which he did not believe. However, she managed to somehow guess what would happen, and her seemingly stupid conclusions often turned out to be correct. She called mirror by name and spoke to him as if he were a person, and she also claimed that she was getting tips from him. She did not part with a dry spine wrapped in a scarlet rag, and called him "mandrake man", Alraun. She adored fire, bought candles in packs, placed them everywhere and lit them, surrounding herself with tongues of living flame. She hung her portrait in the apartment, painted by the famous artist Domnin, confident that it was hers. Double. She…

However, Matvey could endlessly list its advantages and disadvantages, confusing one with the other. He could endlessly be surprised, indignant or indignant, but three days without Astra made him an irritated grump who does not find a place for himself. He began to miss her, call, invite her to dinner or take a walk ...

And now he was tempted to dial a familiar number, hear her voice and gladly set off to carry out Astra's instructions. Of course, he will buy red wine, which she likes. Of course, he will stop by the supermarket for groceries, because she has an empty refrigerator. And just what does she do? Looking forward to another investigation? For hours sitting in front of a mirror? Traveling through your dreams with Alraun? Talking to Doppelgänger? Or looking out the window at the melting snow?

He endured until dinner, and then still could not stand it - he called and heard the unexpected:

- I want to go to Kamyshin. Shall we go?

- With pleasure.

- Will you heat the bath? Do you have herbs for steam?

- I have everything.

Astra dreamed of the house of the Kamyshin German Baroness Grimm, where she served as a companion and where she almost died in a fire. She was drawn to Ozernaya Street, to the ashes ... I wonder what is there? Ruins covered in fallen leaves?

She didn't tell Matthew about it.

Easy-going, by the evening of the same day they left for Kamyshin. Arrived without incident. The blue spring night stood over the village, the moon froze over the roofs, the headlights snatched out of the darkness wooden fences, sleeping houses. The street seemed to be dead.

"Passat" Karelin slowed down at the house of Anfisa's grandmother. A light flickered in the window, and smoke rose from the chimney. Neighbor dogs barked.

“Grandfather Prokhor is heating the stove,” Matvey was delighted. - Well done old man.

Kamyshinsky old-timer appeared on the porch, put his hand to his eyebrows, peering at who came.

- Receive guests, Prokhor Akimych! Astra screamed.

Grandfather, falling on his left leg, hobbled to the gate.

“I see you are not alone. Come on, goluba, go to the stove ... warm yourself. I put a samovar there. Did you bring sugar?

The old man was waiting for gifts from the city: a pack of good tobacco for hand-rolling and lump sugar - he liked to drink tea as a bite.

- Brought, grandfather ...

Matvey stretched with a crunch and breathed in the cold, clean country air. Oh, and good! The moonlit garden looked blue. Large stars scattered across the sky like a handful of gems.

Prokhor Akimych led Astra into the house, into the warmth, into the spacious kitchen with a white-scraped table. A samovar gleamed on a dish, and a kerosene lamp burned nearby. The corner was occupied by a large Russian stove, painted in blue flowers. The chintz curtains at the windows were drawn, and the homespun rugs were rolled up and folded in a corner.

- In the morning the light was turned off ... - the old man complained. - Herods. They have a breakdown.

Astra, instead of being indignant, blossomed.

So let's burn candles! Fire up the stove!

- Well, I already melted it. Your master has a whole shed of firewood. Wait, I don't want to. He is thrifty with you.

Astra sat down on a small makeshift bench closer to the fire. A crimson flame curled in the cracks of the shutter, rumbled, eating birch logs.

- And what, no one bought the house on Ozernaya Street, where the German woman lived?

Everyone knew the Kamyshin Baroness.

- I'm not at home. Heads alone! - Prokhor, eager for gossip, happily announced. – Who needs them?

- Maybe relatives announced ...

- No, there was no one. The rumor would go right away. Who is Matthew to you? Zhanih? Ali husband?

Astra vaguely shrugged her shoulders, and the grandfather grunted in embarrassment and fell silent. Today's youth is in no hurry to the crown. So they live in fornication. Prodigal children are conceived ... and then they tear their hair out!

“People don’t go to the church, that’s all the trouble,” he said with conviction. “My own grandchildren are clueless. Lazy and greedy for moonshine. You can't force the old man's wisdom into their empty heads! So I'll die, I'll take it to the grave.

- Wisdom! Prokhor got angry. - You are incomprehensible! Twisted-twisted. I suppose you didn’t get married with Matthew?

- Didn't get married...

- Here! The old man held up his gouty, nicotine-yellow index finger.

Astra hid her smile.

"He doesn't want to, Prokhor Akimych!" – feigning innocence, she complained. - At least tell him. Why am I bad?

Grandfather narrowed his half-blinded eyes. A good girl, marriageable age ... and in the body, not thin, like some who starve themselves. Everything is with her. The hair is not cut - not a braid, it's true, but not frizzy curls either. She looks like a woman, not a sheep.

“I’ll talk to him…” the old man promised. "I'll blow his brains out!"

Astra was pleased. No wonder she studied to be an actress. She did not work out with the professional scene, but she does not regret it. Why is life worse than theater?

*** * ***

Moscow

Glebov listened.

Magda spoke on the phone. She tried to pronounce phrases by which it was impossible to determine either who her interlocutor on the other end of the wire, or the meaning of what was said. "Yes"... "OK"... "I understand"... "No"...

Where had her talkativeness gone, her casual way of expressing her thoughts, her sarcastic tone?

- Are you going?

Magda peeped out of her room, which looked like a sultana's bedroom with an abundance of sofas, Turkish cushions, low inlaid tables, tassels, satin and velvet.

“Yes, I’m in a hurry,” the husband answered businesslike, pretending to be absorbed in current worries. Business, contracts, equipment supplies. I have a meeting at nine.

She silently closed the door, quieted down. She probably lay down on her bed under a transparent canopy embroidered with stars, stared at them and plunged into erotic dreams. She had so many fantasies that any man would tire of trying to fulfill them. Sometimes she was insatiable, and sometimes cold, aloof, like a Sleeping Beauty, and then it seemed to Glebov that he was kissing a marble statue.

They increasingly slept apart - Magda in her room, and Glebov in the living room. He returned home after midnight, quietly undressed, took a shower and lay down on the bed prepared by the housekeeper. For some time now, she had been laying on the sofa for him in the living room, and Glebov could no longer remember whether he himself had asked her about it or Magda. It seems that the initiative came from his wife. What's the difference? This state of affairs suited him. Magda, he believed, wanted to scare him with her disgrace. But she miscalculated - Glebov was only pleased to be excommunicated from marital duties. Yes, he satisfied his sexual hunger on the side - with his mistress. Not burdened with intelligence and principles, but temperamental and unassuming.

Magda did not notice anything ... or pretended not to suspect her husband's adventures. Glebov did not want scandals in the family, so he carefully concealed his connection.

There were moments when he was ready to repent, fall at his wife's feet, confess everything, beg for forgiveness and again, as before, idolize her, please, grovel. This is what stopped him. crawl… What for? In the name of what? Gradually, the attacks of remorse faded away, leaving only bewilderment and gloomy, bilious irritation. What did he once find in Magda? How did she bewitch him, drive him crazy?

He tried to inspire indifference to her, and he almost succeeded.

Alexey Dmitrievich Glebov was engaged in the sale and purchase of medical equipment and pharmaceutical products, and recently opened a private clinic, where he decided to combine his knowledge with the achievements of science. At the insistence of his parents, he graduated from medical school, tried himself in surgery, but abandoned it. Commerce interested him much more than the selfless work of a doctor who was poorly paid and promised nothing but hassle and remorse. Medicine hopelessly lost to diseases, and Glebov did not want to walk in outsiders. Skepticism coexisted in him with humanistic ideas, so he chose a different way to help his neighbors - to supply the afflicted with the latest medicines and diagnostic equipment. As for the clinics, he preferred to own them rather than practice in them.

Alexei's father, when he was an influential official of the Ministry of Health, provided his son with a decent start. The Medius company, founded by the younger Glebov, quickly began to make a profit, and the parent calmly retired. However, the son himself turned out to be not a mistake - an experienced businessman could envy his ability to conduct business. Where did the acumen and flair come from, the ability to take advantage of a hopeless situation and turn it to your advantage!

Honored pensioner Glebov was rightfully proud of his only son. Even at school, he was distinguished by intelligence, ingenuity, diligence and perseverance. He studied without triples, entered the institute, albeit under the patronage of his father, but he did not have to blush for his offspring. Alexey did not have enough stars from the sky, but he approached everything thoroughly. Including relationships with the fair sex.

He began to like the girls early, even in high school, he courted one or the other. Without fanaticism, without teenage enthusiasm - for the sake of interest. With slight excitement, he kissed their young warm lips, hugged their fragile shoulders, promising nothing, not pretending to anything, living this moment, like a moth lives in contact with a flower - he ate it and flew on.

At the institute, he was expected to marry the dean's daughter, a rosy-cheeked sports activist, an excellent student, with strong thighs and firm breasts. Her name was Christina. At student parties, she clung to him with her hot body, dousing the smell of lemon and coriander. This combination of aromas still reminded him of his first sexual experience - real, without childish shyness and shame, without lyrics and heartfelt confusion. Christina gave herself in a medically competent way, with a healthy appetite of a mature female, while not forgetting about reliable contraception.

Glebov did not even try to realize what struck him more - her arrogance or his own disappointment. It was as if he had visited a sex therapist, who in practice showed him how to enjoy in a marital bed. After a violent orgasm, the "patient" was sick at the mere thought that they would to make love in the same way tomorrow, in a week, in a month… In sex with Christina there was a lot of biology and very little feeling.

For some time, Alexey tried to convince himself that this was how it should be: sobriety is necessary in love, as in life, and that intoxication deprives a person of common sense, pushes him to stupidity.

“Your libido is like a thundercloud,” he once told Christine. – Ripened, struck lightning and discharged with torrential rain. Just a natural phenomenon, nothing more.

She was offended, her eyes reddened, filled with tears. What's bad about it? Is man not a part of nature?

“You seem to want to insult me?” she whispered with restrained indignation.

“I'm stating a fact… I'm making a diagnosis,” he said lazily.

“Love is not a disease.

- What a disease! Dangerous, incurable... But you and I are fine, both of us! We are indecently full of health.

Cristina looked at him like he was crazy.

“Two healthy people will have healthy offspring…” she blurted out.

“You seem to be confusing me with a breeding bull.

- And you me - with a Dutch cow! Christina yelled. “I won’t drag you to bed by force!”

- We satisfy our instincts - you and I, by mutual agreement.

He fucked her! She swung, wanted to slap him in the face. He seized her hand, playfully turned her face down, slapped her tight buttocks.

Do you want healthy children? she muttered, lying face down on the crumpled hospital sheets.

Why are you taking pills if you want to become a mother?

- Everything has its time.

Christina planned her life in advance - point by point, in order of importance. Set priorities, mark, calculate. And she included Alexei Glebov, the most handsome and promising groom on the course.

Her father arranged for them to practice together in a prestigious clinic, knowing full well how evening shifts, youth and a soft couch in the staff's room bring together. With a son-in-law like Glebov, or rather, with Glebov Sr., it will be possible to resolve issues in the ministry, arrange a doctoral defense for his daughter, get a lot of things for herself, for the faculty, for ... In a word, it's up to Christina.

- Lyosha is not going to marry me ...

This phrase, uttered by a crying daughter, hit the dean like a bolt from the blue. And after all, you can’t put pressure on a bureaucrat’s son, you can’t squeeze a scoundrel, you can’t scare him with expulsion, a hacked career. The Glebovs themselves have a mustache, you won’t approach them - it will come out more expensive for yourself.

“You are a woman, you have the cards in your hands,” the dean flared up. I hope you were smart enough to get pregnant? teach you, right? Where else can I find someone like Glebov?

Christina sobbed aloud, biting her elbows from her "forethought." A sober approach to love games played a cruel joke on her. She was languishing with passion, and Glebov rejected any intimacy. He had no intention of tying the knot. Noticing once that she did not take, as usual, a pill, he became alert. And slipped out of the nets.

- From the student's bench - and to the registry office? he chuckled. “It's too dizzying a stunt for a down-to-earth guy like me.

- We love each other! Christina exclaimed.

I don't want to force you to have an abortion.

He completely cooled off towards her, as if there were no hot caresses between them, no sweet kisses, no mutual attraction. The moments of pleasure came true and faded, fell off, like leaves touched by frost.

Years passed before Glebov met another woman - Magda ... and he was all on fire, plunged into blissful languor, contrary to logic and vaunted reason.

Aleksei didn't think about how to name what he experienced just by looking at Magda - her dark coppery hair, her rounded forms protruding from under her colorful dress, her graceful and light gait. She brightly, pretentiously dressed in Indian fabrics, bloomers, fluffy skirts, in long, to the heel, tunics - an oriental bird that flew into someone else's garden. Jewelry with large stones went amazingly well with her fair skin, and Glebov belatedly learned how amethysts and hyacinths can change eye color from deep indigo to emerald green and transparent blue.

Alexey preferred stylish, intelligent women who adhere to the golden mean in everything, smart, balanced and flexible. Magda was the complete opposite. She did not recognize any style - or rather, invented her own, and instead of the middle, she went to extremes. Her mind was like a Scythian burial mound: in order to get to the bottom of deeply hidden treasures, it was necessary to shovel the mountains of the earth. However, Magda did not care whether she was considered smart or stupid. There was no talk of complaisance at all - it seems that Magda had no idea what it was. She did only what she herself wanted, not paying attention to the needs of others. Whether she suffered from a special form of egoism or had such a character trait, Glebov could not determine. He could not think about Magda, he delirious...

They met and met in Venice, a city on the water. Glebov, who considers himself an aesthete, dreamed of visiting there almost from childhood. Walk along the famous St. Mark's Square under the shadow of a gilded angel, go to the cafe where Byron and Hemingway sat, glide in an elegant gondola along the Grand Canal, admiring the marble palaces reflected in it, breathe in the salty air of the lagoon and spicy Italian dishes, drink new wine, catch the looks of idle, curly-haired and swarthy women ... Certainly curly and swarthy!

He was over thirty, and he gave himself this trip - a trip to a medieval city full of famous shadows, luxurious palazzos and tracery bridges. The sun, the marble and the dim shine of the canals created a golden-pink haze, from which a thin, bright woman materialized - dark-haired, pale-skinned, with gazelle eyes, in a turquoise dress blown by the wind ...

By generally accepted standards, Magda could hardly be called a beauty. Wrong facial features, wrong figure, too simple hairstyle, ridiculous manner of dressing - individually, everything was no good. What were her rhinestone sandals and fringed purse worth?! But in general, it was impossible to take your eyes off Magda.

Glebov suffocated ... and for the first time in his life he felt pain in his chest, felt how strongly his heart began to beat, his heart ached, and a taste of blood appeared in his mouth ...

Now he understood that then a salty wind from the sea hit him in the face, and he took it for a rush of passion.

Kamyshin

- Why did we come here?

Matvey looked discontentedly at the ruins of the former cottage of Baroness Grimm gaping with empty gaps in the windows.

“I don’t know…” Astra whispered.

They walked along the fence. Dripping everywhere. The snow turned gray and dirty. The garden was not damaged by the fire, and its branches stuck out into the street, as if reaching out to passers-by, trying to stop them.

– See?

- What should I see? Matthew raised his eyebrows.

“Sad stretches out his hands to us… wants to say something.

- The same "hands" stick out from behind each fence.

Astra stopped, held her breath.

“I think the spirit of the baroness still haunts here.

“For what reason?”

Astra clung to the fence and whispered into the depths of the abandoned yard.

– Mirror I have. He is OK. I keep it...

She relived that terrible night when the baroness and her house were overtaken by death. The hostess died before the fire, while Astra miraculously managed to jump out of the cottage in flames. She took out only her bag, where she put Mrs. Grimm's Venetian mirror, a mandrake spine and a flash drive with an amateur film, which consisted of scattered fragments, united by strange symbolism.

“The house is also dead,” Astra said sadly and pointed to the large window. “That was my room over there. Rather, a room reserved for the companions of the baroness. Sometimes it seems to me that Madame Grimm was waiting for me. I was supposed to live in her house, find a hiding place in the wall and take Alrauna and a flash drive. She foresaw her own death!

Matthew expressed disagreement with a gesture.

– We have already discussed this.

- Why do you think she left Germany and dragged herself to the godforsaken Kamyshin? For local beauties?

- Ida Vilhelmovna's mother was Russian, wasn't she?

- Don't talk to me about nostalgia! Astra rolled her eyes. - The Baroness did not see Russia - she was born on German soil.

“Don’t talk about her Celtic roots!”

- I don't say.

Astra frowned. Some ancient mystery lay behind everything that had happened on Lake Street, behind the death of Mrs. Grimm, behind the videotape on the flash drive.

“Let's talk about your Celtic roots,” she turned to Matvey. - You also have Double? Bruce... descendant of Scottish kings.

“Who watched the stars through a telescope and melted lead into gold?”

– Do you admit it?

- No, of course not.

Karelin was cunning. There were moments when he suddenly began to feel a different reality ... the eighteenth century, the time of the bold transformations of Peter the Great - it was as if another person woke up in him: a courtier, a field marshal and a warlock. Some called him a sorcerer and alchemist, others called him a hero and a scientist, others called him an astrologer and a freemason, and others called him the most mysterious person in the environment of Peter I.

Matvey caught himself thinking like Count Bruce, reasoning like Count Bruce, and knowing things that only Count Bruce could know. By coincidence, he even got a count's suit - a camisole, a wig, a shirt and shoes with buckles. One can explain how this costume came to him: the boys from Vympel invited a mentor to Halloween and got him the outfit of a Peter's nobleman.

But how did you get to him? thoughts Bruce?

Astra insisted that there were no coincidences. It's just not always possible to link cause and effect. For some time now, Matvey has been inclined to admit that she was right, but not in everything and not always. There is still common sense, besides wild fantasies!

For example, Astra attributed episodes from a flash drive with almost prophetic significance. They de display future events. Something has already come true - not exactly. In some ways one could see a similarity - but a very distant one. It cannot be denied that among the scattered fragments there is the so-called "Bruce's estate" - the house of the count in Glinka near Moscow. Everything else is doubtful.

Astra watched the strange footage many times and memorized it:

A snake coiling around the trunk of a mighty tree… horsemen galloping after a wild boar that lures them into the fog… gloomy vaults of a castle and a cauldron over a fire… a bronze mermaid on a pedestal in the middle of a round pond… dancing masks of the Venetian carnival… a severed head on a golden platter… the facade of a manor house in Glinka... mummers burn a straw effigy... masked lovers on a bed of passion... the Milky Way in the starry sky... a marble statue of Aphrodite in a wreath of mandrake flowers... a cow chewing grass... a hanged man sways on the gallows... a fountain where tourists throw coins...

Who, when and why made this video? A crazy killer who's already dead? A ghost from the underworld?

Astra talked about Celtic magic, about the ability to turn imaginary things into reality - pictures can come true!

Matthew objected... bruce believed it was possible. In his opinion, the flash drive should have been destroyed.

Astra was against it. She came to the house on Lake Street to consult with the baroness..."Mistress Grimm seems to have given a negative answer."

*** * ***

Five years ago. Venice

Magda drove, or rather, drove along the canal streets, and the smell of wet stones and damp seemed to him sweeter than the scent of roses, and the splash of water sounded like a magic flute. Glebov did not notice the famous beauties of the capital of carnivals - he caught Magda's every breath, every movement, every turn of her head. He regretted that he did not know how to paint pictures: this woman was worthy of the brush of Renaissance artists - the perfection of antiquity was combined in her with the sensuality of the East.

Parting with Magda in the twilight, colored with yellow lights, Glebov, like a drunk, returned to the hotel, threw himself on the bed in a cool room with windows overlooking the canal, and until morning went over in his memory - pebble by pebble, glass by glass - every particle, which formed her incomprehensible image. Sunlit Venetian stained glass… Byzantine panels… Roman mosaics…

And in the morning he feverishly got ready - washed, shaved, smoothed the naughty hedgehog hair with a comb, already feeling an internal tremor, excitement, the hum of blood in the arteries. He ran down to the first floor, went out into the street, flooded with azure and gold, and before meeting Magda, he was dying of desire only to touch her hand, to see a strand of her hair put behind her ear, a long neck line, a hollow of her chest in the neckline of an open bright dress ...

As soon as she appeared, it seemed to Glebov that he was sitting on a carousel, and some hidden force began to rotate it ... faster and faster ... and now nothing can be seen, everything flashes, dizziness, and emptiness appears in his chest, as before a flight into the unknown.

Magda showed him Venice as if she had lived there for centuries. The clock tower with the Moors, the Doge's Palace, the murals of Titian and Veronese, the Library of St. Mark, the Rialto Bridge ...

“And Desdemona lived here,” she said, taking him by the hand, and as if thousands of fiery needles dug into his body, burning him. - Then she was kidnapped by a terrible jealous Othello!

She turned to Glebov, as if hinting at some of her and his involvement in this fact, and slowly, breathlessly laughed. And he was horrified to feel with what pleasure one could squeeze a tender female throat with iron fingers ...

Are all men jealous? Magda asked flirtatiously. “And you could kill too?” Confess...

He nodded thoughtfully.

Alexei raised his eyes to the small palazzo with tall lancet windows and openwork balconies.

“On a moonlit night, she goes out onto the balcony,” whispered Magda, clinging to him. - Do you want to see her?

- No no. What for?

He bent down and kissed her awkwardly on the chin, on the neck, on the neckline of her dress, dry from the heat. The boat where they were sitting swayed on the muddy water, and because of that everything around seemed unsteady, unreal. Spots of sunlight shimmered on the palace wall.

“Women are more jealous than men,” she said without moving away. “If you ever cheat on me… I will kill you.”

Her words were all the more strange because Glebov did not declare his love and did not take an oath of allegiance. But after that, he was already bound by such an oath - and not only did not object, but was stunned with happiness. If she had ordered him to die now, he would have thrown himself into the canal without hesitation.

Probably, he was fascinated, bewitched by medieval stones, the elusive spirit of Venice and the vibes of an endless series of lovers who make obviously impossible promises to each other.

The next day it started to rain. The drops fell askew into the water, and the city, like a bashful beauty, put on a silvery veil. Ghostly arches and columns, Byzantine church domes, Gothic spiers jutted through it.

Magda's hair was wet and curled at the ends, her damp skin shone.

“From above, Venice looks like a fish,” she said, leaning her head on Glebov’s shoulder. - Head, abdomen, tail ... But you need to admire it not from the sky, but from the water. It is designed to look from the boat. It can not be passed ... only to swim. Have you ever kneeled in front of a woman? Magda suddenly asked.

“No,” he admitted honestly.

- This city should be looked at like a woman from her knees - with admiration and love ...

Venice merged with Magda on that rainy day. They both loved to adorn themselves and admire their beauty. One stared into the mirror, the other into the water. Therefore, mirrors were born here - on the island of Murano - and began to be called Venetian.

Magda lived in a small hotel far from the center - she hated noise, crowds, loud music. There she brought Glebov when they were completely wet and cold. She treated him to thick, sweet wine, and he suddenly got tipsy, reached out for her with cold lips, knocked her over on his back, fell on her, tearing the slippery silk of her dress ... Magda laughed and groaned, her teeth glittered in the red twilight of the cramped room, his body writhed, forcing him to use more force. Glebov would never have believed that he was capable of such a thing - not controlling himself, attacking a woman, tearing clothes ... Nightmare! Their frantic love struggle ended in an explosion that blinded and deafened Glebov, devastated him, took out his heart and threw it at Magda's feet...

She made him kneel down and beg for forgiveness.

- You're a rapist! she laughed. - And I love gentle men ... You almost tore me to pieces.

He repented, although he was sure that she herself wanted it.

Magda went to the window, beckoned him with the gesture of a satiated lioness, and lifted the red curtains. The darkness, full of rain, cut through the lights. A boat was sailing along the black water of a narrow canal, in it were people in traditional Italian carnival costumes - Jester, Harlequin, Pierrot, Colombina, Pantalone. Music was playing... One of the mummers raised his head and waved his hand to someone.

Magda turned pale and recoiled.

- What's the matter? Glebov was surprised.

“He saw us…” she whispered in confusion.

– Doesn't matter… Anyone. Alien... Mask!

So the carnival is coming soon. Venice is the city of masks.

“Before, everyone here wore masks…” she nodded. “From the doge to the last maid or fishmonger.

– What are you afraid of?

- I AM? Who told you?

She was absolutely beautiful, completely naked. Light streamed in from the street into the room through the red curtains and tinted her skin and hair bronze.

“Don’t look at me…” Magda was embarrassed. Let's pretend it's not us. Other lovers, such as the Moor and Desdemona. Or Romeo and Juliet...

Glebov laughed.

Are you having fun, Alex? Did I manage to cheer you up?

She gracefully sat down and took out two white volto masks from the nightstand - real Venetian ones. She handed one to Glebov, put on the other herself.

“Now it’s not me and it’s not you…

Her naked body, hair flowing over her shoulders and snow-white "face" with dark slits for the eyes made a strange impression. She approached Glebov and ran her palms over his torso, barely touching him. Her fingers fluttered, and the motionless "face" froze in front of him. Two masks made them mysterious strangers and gave freedom to fantasy. The fact that it was no longer possible to kiss turned out to be very erotic ...

The night breeze lifted the curtains, bringing with it the sharp, fresh smell of the lagoon, the coolness and echoes of the music. Somewhere the participants of the future carnival were having fun, someone was quickly talking in Italian on the first floor of the hotel... All this was mixed with the breath of a woman-mask, passion emanating from her, saturated with the aroma of absinthe and almonds...

This Venetian night revealed to Glebov the whole depth of his ignorance in the love mystery, when a man and a woman act as two universal principles, and not as two thirsty bipedal orgasms. The masked woman led him through the labyrinth of pleasures, where he learned mystery after mystery, initiation after initiation...

That night turned him into a slave. He completely lost his head. The first thing he did when he woke up at noon was to beg Magda to become his wife. She refused. I called and ordered oysters, grapes and champagne to my room. Without a mask, in a thin yellow tunic, she looked sweet and tired of long caresses. She wanted to lie in bed, sipping wine, smoking a hookah.

- I love you ... - repeated Glebov. - And you?

She laughed at his confessions, and he himself suddenly felt embarrassed - the words “I love”, “marry me” seemed so empty, meaningless. For the first time he realized how poor, imperfect and rude the language of people and how he himself is helpless and clumsy in trying to express his feelings.

Magda took pity on him and covered his lips with her hand:

- Shut up...

Moscow

Mr. Feoktistov, panting, strolled through the wild park. In early spring, desolation was especially felt here. If not for the alleys, unkempt plantings would look like light forests. The snow on the paths had melted, revealing last year's foliage, and the businessman's boots left deep dents in it. With difficulty, complaining about his obesity, he reached the round pavilion with columns and stopped, admiring the view. The forest and the plain with black thawed patches seemed bluish in the dazzling sun.

The guard put a folding chair in the gazebo for the boss.

“I won’t sit, it’s cold,” he muttered. - Take it away!

- All right, Igor Vladimirovich, - he nodded, not moving from his place.

He knew from experience that the boss was exhausted, but did not sit down out of pride. He will catch his breath and sit down, begin to philosophize. Bratsevsky Park disposed him to lengthy discussions about the frailty of everything worldly, about the forgotten destinies of the once rich and influential people, about the imperishable beauty of nature ...

This time the guard made a mistake - Feoktistov took out his phone and called the head of security to him.

“The old man is acting weird,” thought the guard. In his twenty-four and fifty-six years, Feoktistov seemed like old age. - He ordered Tavrin to stay in the car, now he is calling. Seven Fridays in a week! I wonder if everyone is like that at his age?

The head of security did not keep him waiting. The owner loves diligence and quickness, it is better not to anger him. Especially when his kidneys are playing tricks.

Before that, Feoktistov visited a private clinic, a well-known Moscow urologist professor. He did this in the most extreme case, when it became unbearable to cope with the disease - Igor Vladimirovich could not stand the hospital and everything that reminded him of the fragility of the human body and death.

Igor Vladimirovich stared at Tavrin with a squeamish grimace - youth, excellent physical shape and courageous features of the head of the security service involuntarily contrasted with the plump figure and the puffy face of the businessman. The metabolic disorder has gone so far that no procedures, foreign resorts and the most miraculous diets have helped Feoktistov to lose weight. For all that, he managed to follow pretty women and buy their love, not sparing money. And their Feoktistov managed to earn so much that would be enough for three lives. Unfortunately, he had only one at his disposal, which terribly depressed Igor Vladimirovich.

- What will you please, my dear? he squeaked irritably. How is your ward?

The guard looked into the distance, pretending not to listen. Perhaps he really did not care about the conversation between the boss and Tavrin, but they immediately agreed not to name names. God saves man, who save himself.

- You, as always, turned out to be right, Igor Vladimirovich, - the head of security lowered his voice. - He has a mistress.

- Who is she?

- Not yet known. I'm clarifying, Igor Vladimirovich.

- Hurry up, Grisha. I don't like to wait. Scoundrel, huh? What doesn't suit him, in your opinion?

- It's hard to say, Igor Vladimirovich.

Mr. Feoktistov was very rich and very voluptuous. Despite health problems, he managed to change one woman after another. His first wife died a few years ago, he divorced his second and gave free rein to his libido. Although both spouses did not interfere with his adventures, freedom from marriage bonds gave a new impetus to Igor Vladimirovich's hobbies. He hunted down the women he liked, hunted for them, like a hungry fox for wild ducks. And if they fell into his mouth, then there was no chance to escape - the money and gifts with which he showered them worked wonders. Slender blondes, buxom brunettes, red-haired and fair-haired, thin and moderately well-fed ladies themselves walked into his arms, mesmerized by the thickness of his wallet and courteous manners. For all his unseductive appearance, he knew how to please women and perfectly knew their weaknesses.

Satisfied, Feoktistov let them go in peace and sometimes rewarded them with a decent dowry - if his partner really liked him, she could count on his generosity. After parting with another girlfriend, he never thought about her again, as if she disappeared once and for all not only from his bed, but from life in general.

Something has changed in the last year. Either there was a lull in Feoktistov's soul, or he ran out of steam - age, whatever one may say, kidneys, heart, pressure, overweight again ... In a word, the banker calmed down, stopped shooting eyes behind every skirt and licking his lips at the sight of a round ass and long legs. And here is a new surge.

“The boss was written off early,” thought Tavrin, standing behind him and shifting from foot to foot. He was a dandy, and instead of warm shoes he wore fashionable ones, which sometimes caused inconvenience. - Feoktistov is still in power. Look how it is understands!"

“A beautiful gazebo,” he suddenly said, turning to the head of security. - But in poor condition. Major repairs are needed, restoration. The columns peeled off, the vault cracked ...

“Restoration wouldn’t hurt you either,” Tavrin noted to himself.

No one asked him for his opinion, so he smiled reservedly and tilted his head slightly. I look forward to further instructions.

Do you see the pedestal? Feoktistov pointed to the middle of the arbor with his finger. “There used to be a statue of Cupid here. From marble. And now - an empty stump. Ugliness…

- Well, how is she - good?

- Good, Igor Vladimirovich.

Tavrin knew a lot about women. He was married, but allowed himself connections on the side.

- You look at me! the fat man shook his finger. And don't you dare think! I'll grind it into powder... Do you see the swamps in the lower reaches? If you throw a corpse there, they will never find it.

Tavrin tensed. The young guard shuddered, goosebumps running down his beefy body. He diligently examined the bark on the nearest birch, regretting that he had not moved away.

“She is a dangerous woman, Igor Vladimirovich,” Tavrin whispered, leaning towards the boss. “Maybe not worth it…

Who are you to teach me? Your job is to follow my orders! It’s worth it, it’s not worth it ... What do you understand, jerks? Everything in life is worth something, only few people know the true price. And even fewer able to pay ...

*** * ***

Kamyshin

Matthew heated the bath. A hot herbal mist hung in the steam room. Everything here was wooden, fragrant: walls, floor, ceiling, flooring, a barrel of water, a bucket, a ladle for dousing - and once again he was glad how well he arranged everything here.

- Well, that's it, go ... - Astra escorted him out. - I'll wash myself.

- You won't get pissed off?

- Will try.

- And who will walk on you with a broom?

His gaze rested on the bag she'd taken with her into the dressing room, and his eyebrows went up.

- Did you take it with you? mirror?

- Yes, I did. For divination. It turns out that you have to guess at night, in the bath, naked. Katya told me.

Katya, Astra's cousin on her mother's side, recently came from Boguchany to Moscow to visit her relatives. Matvey was introduced to her as the future son-in-law of the Eltsovs.

Can men be present? – just in case he asked, already foreseeing a negative answer.

- Not at all! Let's get out of here. I need to get ready.

- Girls want a betrothed in mirror see. Why would you guess? I am your betrothed!

- Why do you think so? We're just playing... bride and groom.

She was unbearable. Matthew tried not to show disappointment.

- Are you leaving or not?

He reluctantly left. Left alone, Astra felt sad for some reason and sighed. What does she want to know through divination?

She took off all her clothes and took out mirror and placed it on a wooden tabletop. She lit two candles on the sides, sat opposite ... The golden Venetian amalgam blinded, reflecting the tongues of flame. Rainbow circles swam before Astra's eyes... Maybe the hot, humid air made her feel unwell. “We shouldn’t have let Matvey go…” she regretted belatedly. “I’m going to faint inadvertently and I’m sure I’ll die.”

Antique bronze frame in curlicues made mirror similar to a picture in a baguette - only instead of the image some kind of fog swirled.

“It’s steam…” Astra whispered.

She was thrown into a fever, and a picture really appeared in the frame - a vague, blurry one. A lady in a powdered wig, in a magnificent dress with lace and frills, smiling, listened to the courtesies of Harlequin. She wore a dark mask, Harlequin held his in his hand. He leaned over to the lady and said something pleasant or funny in her ear ... A little in the distance, under the canopy of trees, couples were dancing in a dance, fireworks scattered in the night sky ...

"I knew you'd be sick from the habit," Harlequin said, and splashed her face with cold water. - I see that I listened in vain and left. You are really bad.

Of course, there was no lady or Harlequin in sight. Astra was sitting on the bench in which her mother gave birth, and in mirror reflected two candles. Matvey delicately threw a towel over her and held out a mug of kvass.

“Drink… it will make you feel better.”

“I saw the beauty and the Harlequin.

Do you remember the New Year? Alina-Colombina and Styopa-Harlequin are also still fresh in my memory. A colorful couple.

“That’s not it…” Astra objected languidly.

Matvey was referring to the Butylkins, whom they met at a recent party at Boretsky's house. The Butylkins dressed up in costumes of an Italian comedy of masks, but behaved like a Russian husband and wife: he shot his eyes at young girls, she was jealous and scolded him.

Stepan and Alina went to Venice. To the carnival.

- Do not disappear the same suits? – quipped Matthew. - I bet, a lot of money was stolen!

“Lady and Harlequin…” muttered Astra. - Is there such a picture? Or am I confusing something?

After the “mysteries of the Sphinx” case, she developed an interest in painting - she wandered through museums, bought glossy illustrated albums.

“Art is a special world,” she said. “Before, I hardly noticed it. It exists in parallel with ours.

Matvey, who understood art at the level of the intellectual minimum necessary to be known as an educated person, was surprised to find that paintings and sculptures had ceased to bore him, on the contrary, he seemed to be returning to a forgotten hobby.

Once, admiring the landscapes of Shishkin in the Tretyakov Gallery with Astra, he suddenly declared:

- Peter I liked the pictures of the Flemish school - seaside places and harbors with sailing ships. It was he who started the custom in Russia to collect paintings and decorate palaces and parks with statues. Imitating the king, the nobles began to do the same.

- How do you know?

- I just know…

He spoke again Bruce - he was well aware of the tastes of the sovereign-reformer.

“Venice is now a tourist Mecca,” said Astra, returning to the conversation about the Butylkins. - Every self-respecting esthete considers it his duty to go there.

- Which one of them is "esthete" in your opinion? Matthew chuckled. - Alina or Stepan? And in general, we are going to take a steam bath! To whom is Venice, and to whom is the Kamyshin bathhouse!

Not listening to loud protests, he, laughing, picked her up in his arms and carried her into the steam room, into the hot aroma of hot stones, wood and steamed birch leaves. Astra kicked, but Matvey did not let her go:

“You’ll leave here unwashed without me!”

- Did Tsar Peter also take a steam bath?

- How soared! And the queen with the ladies of the court steamed like simple hay girls ...

Astra giggled and dodged the hot broom until she grew faint from the fragrant steam, from the closeness of the man, from his touch, muffled voice, hidden desire ...

"You fell in love with me, didn't you?" Confess!

- Nothing like this.

- What a fool! She closed her eyes and gave herself into his arms. - You're lying...

Moscow

Glebov returned home after midnight, opened the door with his keys. Magda seemed to be asleep—not a sound came from her bedroom door.

He took a contrast shower for a quarter of an hour, trying to cheer himself up. Carefully, trying not to make noise, he took a bottle of cognac from the bar, poured a third of the glass and drank it in small sips. To fall asleep. He lay down, involuntarily listening to see if he had awakened his wife. The sofa in the living room was hard and uncomfortable, but now go to Magda's room, after ...

Glebov groaned in annoyance and bewilderment. How did he get himself into this dead end? How did you let all this happen? Wet snow was falling outside the windows. March weather is capricious - either spring comes, or winter shows its teeth. The headlights of cars passing along the road floated in stripes along the walls and ceiling. Glebov closed his eyes. Nervous tension slowly released, dissipated in the twilight space of the room. He dozed off...

Long and confused dreams began to disturb him. He ran away from someone along the narrow streets paved with stone, hid in dark dirty dead ends, listening to the stomp of his pursuers, then he himself crept after someone, holding his breath and peering into the darkness. Crimson reflections of torches darted along the damp walls, and water was splashing somewhere very close by. From afar came the melodious song of the gondolier, sad, soul-stirring...

“This is Venice! Glebov guessed. - Again Venice, where the Moor Othello was inflamed with passion for Desdemona, seeing her on the carved balcony of an exquisite palazzo. And how did it all end? He was also bewitched, enchanted by this city, in which the desire for beauty and unbridled fun has become a cult. But laughter sometimes turns into tears, and love ardor develops into a dangerous obsession ... "

He remembered with horror how he himself wanted to strangle the sleeping Magda - in order to get rid of the painful craving for her, for her low soft voice, for her insinuating gestures and delusional speeches. And she wasn't even pretty! None of her features corresponded to the classical canons - her forehead was high, her mouth a little large, her eyes were excessively long, predatory, like those of a lynx ... he was ready to swear that they glow in the dark. And the figure? The shoulders are thin, the chest is heavy, the waist is low, the hips are wide, the ankles are dry, like those of the Akhal-Teke mare ... But she would not leave indifferent any artist, sculptor or poet. I wanted to capture it on canvas or in marble ... describe it in a poetic style. She felt female, free from prejudice and rumor opinion, special, unique, as if created to order in a single copy. She was carrying celestial master's mark as seductive as it is dangerous. She seemed to be able to do everything - to make happy, bewitch, kill, rob, kiss to exhaustion, torture to death, exalt and destroy, turn into dust, into dust on her sandals ... so that later, without regret, cheerfully shake her off and go on to new triumphs. She, like a guillotine, attracted the eyes of those sentenced to death ...

"I'm ready to put my head under her shining blade!" Glebov admitted with horror.

Magda drove him crazy. There was only one way to shake off this obsession - to kill her. A terrible thought pierced Glebov's brain with lightning, and he ... woke up. He opened his eyes, looking ahead through his lashes. A dark shadow hung over him.

He got up and grabbed her hand. Her hair was loose, her eyes flashed yellow fire. Or was it a car driving past the windows, headlights flashing in her pupils? ..

Are you awake, Alex?

“I slept, but… what are you doing here?”

- I'm scared.

"Tell stories! - covered with perspiration, thought Glebov. - My deadly Scheherazade! I'm not as stupid... as the Sultan of Arabian legends. Why did you come here?

He tried to sound carefree.

- Did you have a nightmare?

“No… I… didn’t you hear anything?”

Glebov feigned surprise on his face - she made him not only a skillful lover, but also an excellent actor.

- What do you mean?

“Someone is standing at our door…” Magda breathed. Or walking.

– Really?

Didn't you hear footsteps?

“I didn’t even hear your steps, dear. And he almost let himself be taken by surprise.” He looked at her breasts under the thin lace of her shirt, and a wave of uncontrollable desire hit him under the heart.

“Let go… it hurts…”

He realized that he had gripped her wrist tightly, but instead of opening his fingers, he pulled her towards him.

Magda groaned, and he, losing control of himself, knocked her over, fell on her, tore at the blue lace, exposing her white warm body, so tender, moist from love thirst ... or from fear? He took her hard, quickly, forcing her to choke and shudder, to bite her lips to hold back her scream... She was on fire, but she suppressed her reciprocal passion, turning away from his kisses. Pain burned his arm… What is it? Knife? Oh my God…

Magda clutched a knife in her hand, hiding it in the folds of her peignoir, but her husband, blinded by desire, did not notice. At some point, her fingers loosened and released the handle.

“I cut myself,” Glebov whispered.

- What, Alex?

She saw the blood and pressed her lips to the wound, licking off the salty drops. He pulled away and stood up.

- Where is the knife from?

On a crumpled sheet lay an Italian stiletto dagger with a sharp triangular blade. Magda bought it in Venice from an old antiquary who looked like an astrologer, with long gray hair, in velvet clothes - or rather, Glebov bought it himself.

- What a stiletto! She froze in admiration.

The seller in broken English began to praise the goods.

- He's amazingly good! Such a weapon in a precious scabbard was worn by Maria de Medici herself, a Florentine who became Queen of France, on her belt.

He memorized a fable intended for gullible tourists. It was his bread. Who will be expensive to buy a regular knife? But the mention of the famous surname Medici immediately changes everything. People's eyes sparkle, and their hands reach for the cherished relic. Still would! This stylet, perhaps, was touched by the French queen, the mother of Louis XIII, famous thanks to the novels of Dumas the father, the mother-in-law of Anna of Austria, whose pendants the whole world knows - after all, it was for them that d'Artagnan and the three musketeers went to England.

- I want to! Magda beamed.

How could Glebov refuse her? He laid out a tidy sum for a stiletto and with the thought: “This is pure swindle!” Smiling, he presented it to the young woman. She blossomed and since then has not parted with the stiletto, carried it in her purse along with a powder box and almost put it under her pillow.

“A dagger is considered a melee weapon, by the way,” he once said to Magda.

- Yes ... - She amused herself with a steel blade, like a favorite toy. “He’s very handsome… isn’t he, dear?”

You might get in trouble for him.

– And without him? What if someone attacks me? You are so strict, Alex! Like my father...

The unflattering comparison cooled Glebov, and he stopped educating Magda. After all, she knows what she's doing.

And now the ill-fated stiletto was in his bed - thank God that it was not in his heart.

Why did you bring the knife? ' he asked, trying to suppress a grin.

- I got scared...

"You wanted to slit my throat?"

“Are you… Alex?” I thought someone was walking through the door. What if some thief or bandit is going to break into the apartment?

Through an armored door?

“I asked you to install an alarm.

- Whoever wants to get in, you can't stop him. We have nothing to take! I keep money in the bank.

What about my jewelry?

If they are stolen, I will buy you new ones.

- Well, Alex ... You completely stopped loving me, right? she said petulantly, wrinkling her nose.

There was blood on her lips—his blood. Just like in vampire movies. In the light that came into the living room from the bedroom, the blood looked black. Glebov wiped his hand on the sheet - the cut was not deep, but it bled and hurt.

Magda took the stiletto and, as if burned, threw it on the floor.

“I’m sorry… I didn’t expect you… to pounce on me.” Himself to blame.

Glebov raised his blade and placed it against her chest. The blade, unreasonably sharp for a souvenir item, flashed cold steel.

- Come on, kill me! Come on! - the wife said with a challenge. - Are you going to do that?

- Not afraid?

- You? Not…

Beads of sweat appeared on Glebov's forehead.

“Dew of passion…” Magda smiled carnivorously. - Or fear ... Words are similar, but feelings? How are you feeling now, Alex?

“Damn… I've seen enough stupid movies on TV. Imagine yourself Sharon Stone!

- I do not watch TV. A long time ago, ever since my parents died and I heard about it on the news...

- Sorry...

“I hate cinema,” Magda whispered, rolling over onto her back. - There is an imaginary life that people replace their own. Are you living life to the fullest? Or are you imagining everything? How should you be, how to behave, how to love a woman, how to have sex?

She puzzled him with her questions.

I can't stand the word "sex"!

“Me too,” Magda was not taken aback. “Tell me, what did you and I just have?” Love? But does it happen from time to time?

“He is talking to me with his teeth,” thought Glebov. “Distracts from the main thing: why was she standing over me with a knife.”

You have changed a lot since we met.

- Truth? You should have gotten to know me better before stuffing yourself into a husband.

The phrase he was about to say stuck in his throat. Magda knew how to cut on the living - she was cruel, like children not accustomed to spare others.

“It can’t go on like this anymore,” Glebov repeated to himself. “We’ll both bring ourselves to something terrible, irreparable…”

“You wanted to kill me,” he said affirmatively.

- What nonsense. I explained that...

He jumped up, tossed aside the blanket, and walked barefoot, without clothes, to the front door. Cling to the eye. Of course, the landing was empty...

She and Magda had been married for five years, and he never got used to her quirks. She really changed - after that incident ... However, she had enough oddities before.

“It must have been not she who fascinated me, but the salty, hot breath of Venice, the mystical city of lovers and poets, cheerful women, music, an idle and festive crowd - a city that lives for pleasures and for the sake of pleasures. I just caught a contagious disease there!”

The doctor woke up in him, offering a homeopathic prescription: like is healed by like. Venice bewitched him, she will save him from the spell ...

*** * ***

France, 16th century. Paris, Louvre

Margarita hurriedly laced up her corset, dressed without outside help, put her feet into elegant morocco shoes, and went out into the corridor through a secret door.

She had her own little courtyard - several ladies, maids of honor, maids with servants, priests, secretaries and butlers. There was even a treasurer. However, the princess has mastered the art of eluding them when she needs to.

The Louvre was a complex labyrinth, but she was well versed in the numerous passages, stairs and corridors. The main thing is not to catch the eye of any couple in love. The residence of the French kings resembled a brothel and was full of adventurers and seekers of royal favors. Only the chambers of her brother Charles and the queen mother were carefully guarded. With a certain dexterity, it was possible to get into the apartments of the other inhabitants of the Louvre without difficulty.

“You are demonstrating the rudeness of your temper, my child,” the mother instructed Margarita pompously. “You are a noble princess, not a street girl. You are behaving inappropriately. Royal blood is not appropriate ...

Margot had her own thoughts during the long sermon, but pretended to listen. Mother - despite the palace etiquette - could close up her daughter's slap in a related way. Her hand was heavy, as was her gaze.

A dress of pale red satin, embroidered with gilded braid and pearls, sat on Margarita like a glove. That's just the hem rustles, creates extra noise. She picked it up, walked up the stone stairs on her toes, and clung to the gap where the yellow light was shining through. This passage was somehow shown to her by the Duke of Guise so that she would run to him on dates. He said that the "old woman" - as he called Catherine - ordered to equip a room for her sorcerer in this wing.

“They lock themselves up there at night and whisper,” he said, laughing. “They are plotting against the unfortunate brother Henri. "It's time to put an end to the atrocities of the King of Navarre!" he mocked the queen mother. She must have commissioned a Florentine to make a poisoned perfume for the poor Huguenot leader! Ha ha ha!

- In vain you laugh ... Mother is not so simple. If she endured Diana for so many years, then because of Heinrich, she won’t dirty her hands even more. She'll come up with something worse... or she already has.

“Serve him right…” Guise muttered carelessly and reached out to her beautiful lips.

Margot immediately forgot about everything. The intrigues of the mother and her astrologer moved away, her young tender body was seized by a passionate languor ...

“I can’t live without you…” she whispered, breaking away from the duke.

Let's get married and rule France. The heir to the powerful House of Lorraine has the right to claim the hand of the Princess of Valois. Your brothers are frail and weak-willed... I will make you the most charming and great queen!

- Do not say that…

The image of her lover appeared before her and disappeared. She cannot choose a husband for love. Princesses are given in marriage for other reasons, "according to the state benefit", as Carl insists. She will never be happy...

She knew that none of her brothers managed to escape from Catherine's care. They put on the crown, but felt helpless in the face of crises and political unrest that shook the country.

The future Queen Margot, sung in the novels of Alexandre Dumas père, did not suspect who would make her famous through the ages. She did not know about the vicissitudes of her fate, about the love dramas that her ardent heart would have to endure. On that dank autumn day, she was worried about something else. What are the queen mother and the damned sorcerer doing in the damp and gloomy wing of the palace? What are they up to?

Frozen with fear and curiosity, she clung to the crack where the light came from, and saw an old dusty dressing room, littered with chests and heaps of unnecessary clothes. Someone left a lit candle there - probably Catherine.

"They are here! Margarita rejoiced. - I was not mistaken! That gloomy man who flickered in the crowd of hangers-on wandering around the palace is he, Ruggieri. Unnoticed by anyone, he slipped in here and is waiting for an "audience". What if they are not just a queen and a subject?

The thought that mother and Ruggieri were lovers made the princess laugh. She carefully examined the walls of the dressing room. The flame of the candle wavered, tilting to the right. So, somewhere in that direction - a secret entrance. Didn't have to search long. The linen closet served as a door to the next room, a trick typical of the palace. As children, he and his brothers played hide-and-seek using the same closet-door.

Margarita pulled the sashes towards her, trying not to make any noise - they silently opened: someone had generously greased the rusty hinges - she did not notice how she soiled the cuffs. Now she heard muffled voices, a man and a woman talking in Italian. That's right, they are! It was impossible to make out the words.

How long Margarita stood like that, all turned into a rumor, she did not know. For a long time. My legs were tired, my nose was full of dust. Just don't sneeze!

Finally, the queen mother and the astrologer talked to their heart's content. The recalcitrant daughter miraculously managed to extinguish the candle and dive behind a huge chest, as the back wall of the closet turned, letting two people dressed in black pass. Margarita, neither alive nor dead, held her breath.

“The candle went out,” Catherine said in Italian. - Was there someone here?

Her wide skirt touched the chest behind which the princess was hiding.

“Probably blew air…

- I can not see anything…

“There is a torch burning in the corridor, Your Majesty…”

- Shh! Do not call me that…

They left the dressing room without lighting candles. The dress of the Queen Mother gave Marguerite the smell of smoke. "They burned something!" she guessed.

Ruggieri caught hold of a hook in the darkness and let out an exclamation of displeasure. Something fell and rolled across the frayed carpet at the feet of the princess.

Their footsteps melted away in the passages of the Louvre, and Margot sat behind the chest, trying to calm the frantic pounding of her heart. Her mother and this gloomy Florentine terrified her inexplicably.

It didn't take long for her to come to her senses, catch her breath, and climb out of her hiding place. Something rolled underfoot... The object that Ruggieri had dropped? Or lost? Margarita bent down and picked up a small thing from the floor...

Moscow. Nowadays

Mr. Feoktistov swallowed the pill, washed it down with water and grimaced. He lost his temper. To give up somewhere for a week or another ... You can’t do that - business. Things have piled up - you can’t rake it.

He raised his bulging, colorless eyes, constantly covered with moisture, with yellowish whites and red streaks, to Tavrin.

- Well, what about her husband?

Feoktistov and the head of the security service were having lunch at a cafe on the ground floor of their own office. The owner needed dietary food, the cook cooked for him separately. In fact, it was not in the habits of the boss to talk over food, especially to share a meal with subordinates, but Magda Glebova was very interested in him - she simply deprived him of peace and sleep. Only the appetite, unfortunately, was not affected.

Looks like it's going somewhere.

- Seems? Don't disappoint me, Grisha.

Tavrin's name was Grigory Ivanovich, but the boss addressed all employees only by name.

“In the next few hours I will have accurate information.

- Don't save money. Not that case. If not, I'll add more.

Secretary Glebova - fidgety painted girl Yulia - supplied Tavrin with information about her boss. She said that he sharpened his skis somewhere, but where exactly is still unknown. The girl turned out to be mercenary and without hesitation agreed to “knock” on Glebov.

If I get fired, will you help me find a new job? she asked.

Tavrin assured her that she need not worry.

Seeing dollar bills, the secretary did not even demand a “crust” from him, confirming the legend: he introduced himself as an employee of the special services, however, he kept silent about which one. The girl was interested in money, not his professional affiliation.

“I want to meet her…” Feoktistov said, dropping each word heavily.

- We'll arrange it, Igor Vladimirovich. Only…

The fat man slammed his hand on the table so that the cymbals rang.

"Don't give me advice!" he bellowed. Did you find out where she goes? Where does it happen?

- Recently, Mrs. Glebova has been sitting at home.

- Does she have a car?

- Yes. He drives a blue Peugeot. Very rarely gets behind the wheel. She calls a taxi, or her husband takes her wherever she needs to go. Sorry…

Tavrin's mobile phone emitted a melodious signal - the secretary "recruited" by him called.

“I saw him have a plane ticket,” the girl said quickly. - To Venice.

- One ticket?

- Yes! Departure tomorrow. He warned that he would be away for a week.

– Is that how? Thank you, Yulenka, I owe it.

The head of security breathed a sigh of relief.

“The object is flying to Venice tomorrow,” he said to Feoktistov. - Apparently, one, without a wife.

- With a mistress?

- Apparently not.

- What are you doing the same thing! the banker crumpled his napkin irritably. - "Seems to be"! We need to know, not assume.

- We'll find out.

Follow him to the airport. No, better before the plane.

- Good.

*** * ***

She loved to look at the wall hung with paintings and photographs. All of them are Columbine women of different times, in different costumes, with different faces.

Portrait of the actress Biancolelli from a family of actors famous in the seventeenth century - a charming Italian, graceful, slender, in a wide skirt with frills, a bright corsage, a white apron and a hat, with a basket in her hands, where two doves sit. "Colomba" means "dove" in Italian. This is probably where Columbine comes from.

The famous Tamara Karsavina, a talented ballerina of the early twentieth century, recognized as the "Queen of Columbine". Star of the Mariinsky Theater and Diaghilev's "Russian Seasons" in Paris.

Other women depicted by artists and captured by photographers in flirtatious outfits of this frivolous and charming soubrettes. Who is she? The heroine of street performances? The uncomplicated plot of performances for the common people came from the puppet theater and revolved around adultery, where lovers in every possible way lead by the nose those who are trying to interfere with their bliss. Typical characters of a love affair turned out to be immortal, they traveled from century to century, from city to city - first with puppeteers, then with troupes of itinerant artists, then became the progenitors of the dramatic theater in Europe.

And now the most magnificent, magnificent and cheerful spectacle, the Venetian carnival, cannot do without them. Thousands of people come from all over the world to gather in the central square of Venice and wait with bated breath for a paper dove to fly from the bell tower of St. Mark's Cathedral. Then many Harlequins, Pierrots and Colombines will flood the narrow sidewalks, occupy the marble balconies, start dancing, sit down in festively decorated gondolas and go to the water parade. And in the old palazzos, windows will burn brighter than the stars all night long, music will rattle, and the most sophisticated ladies and gentlemen will put on the costumes of a simpleton from Bergamo Harlequin and a naive peasant girl Colombina. What kind of hastily sewn flaps and patches? They will not be allowed to the masquerade ball for the elite in anything. Today, dresses made according to medieval fashion will cost their owners thousands of euros.

Every morning she walked up to Colombina's custom-made outfit, inhaled the smell of satin, brocade and lace ... the smell of wealth, adventure and forbidden love. She'll have it all... She already has. She will go to Venice and meet there with a handsome man, ready to fulfill her whims. He won't see her face, only the mask. That is her condition.

Plane tomorrow. They will settle in different hotels, and he will come on dates to her room - just as in Moscow he comes to an apartment rented for secret meetings. They never lit a light, only one candle. This was also her condition. He called her Mask, and she liked it. The secret gives love a particularly spicy flavor.

Why did she choose the image of Colombina? Does she have anything in common with a village girl who gets into trouble every now and then because of her naivety? Partly yes. Basically, no. That's the beauty of transformation! If you change habits, clothes, manners, face and even name, you may be able to outwit fate.

Time has amended the traditional features of Colombina, given her gloss, wit, grace, turned dexterity into slyness, rude coquetry into skillful flirting. Why not a symbol of the "elusive female soul"?

Life is a carnival. Puppet Theatre. comedy performance del arte. Or a mixture of the first, second and third.

She opened the suitcase, threw in the things she had prepared beforehand. The mask would be her main tool - closely fitting to the face, ivory with red and gold patterns, with a narrow slit of the eyes. So what else? Carefully selected cosmetics, perfumes, jewelry.

She carefully removed Colombina's dress from the shoulders, went to the mirror - a large one where you can see yourself in full growth - put the outfit on her body and for a long time, meticulously looked at the reflection: her own and not her own. A beautiful young lady looked at her from that side. She slightly nodded her head, and the lady exactly repeated her movement.

- We go! she said solemnly. - It's decided.

The lady also moved her lips. She was very similar to a living woman, but still different. Detached, cold and somehow pale. Warning flickered in her eyes...

Astra and Matvey returned to Moscow. On Botanical Street, he pulled up at her house and asked, in the hope that she would invite her to dinner or offer to stay the night:

- What will you do?

“I'll take care of the Harlequin and the lady.

She was already all immersed in conjectures and reflections, under which there was no real underlying reason. Now she will sit down for books, get into the Internet, from where she can not be pulled out. However, he was convinced more than once: as soon as she uttered some sacramental phrase about what she saw in mirror, or the images she imagined… as they began to materialize.

The trip to Kamyshin forced Matvey to admit that he became attached to Astra more than he wanted, than he could have imagined. Why is their relationship frozen in uncertainty? They must both be afraid of something. Disappointment? Ordinary, which comes to replace the romantic love foreplay? Boredom? Painful breakup?

During the period of courtship, a man splashes out all his fantasy, and a woman - the art of flirting. They run out of resources before they can enjoy the results of their efforts. The ending depresses both him and her.

“Perhaps we are unconsciously trying to prolong the charm with each other,” thought Matvey, helping Astra out of the car. “Maybe I’m wrong and everything will be different with her?” But I don’t have the courage to check it…”

March painted the city gray and black. It was freezing at night. The puddles were covered with crisp ice, and during the day everything melted.

“I’ll walk you…” he offered. - I'll bring the bag.

- She's light! Astra smiled. - I myself.

Matvey held her hand in his, feeling the warmth of her palm through the glove.

"Crap! I get sentimental…”

- You know what's the scariest thing? Happiness ... - she whispered, touching his cheek with cold lips.

An hour later, he was already sitting in the living room of his apartment, drinking cognac and regretting that he had not asked for it to visit Astra. They just broke up, and he already misses her voice, her utter inventions and even her silence.

After dinner, she called and, breathlessly, theatrically, said into the phone:

- There is such a picture of the artist Konstantin Somov - "Harlequin and the Lady"! Exactly as I saw in mirror. Are you intrigued, honey?

- Inexpressibly...

- Do you want more news? We are waiting for a new investigation.

- Where did you get it?

- I got a call from one person ... Mr. Glebov. He flew in yesterday from Venice.

“I bet your phone number was given to him by the Butylkins. They met in Piazza San Marco and rejoiced at the meeting. Where else can Russian people meet, if not on an African safari or a Venetian carnival?

- Guessed! she laughed softly. Only the carnival is over. True, for whom. So, this Glebov once got rare drugs for their child, and Alina decided to render him a favor in return. He was in a predicament - something family - and she advised him to contact me. She recommended me as a specialist in parapsychology and as Yeltsov's daughter, of course. The latter tipped the scales in my favor.

– I don’t remember that Alina Butylkina was delighted with your detective abilities.

“She just has an aggressive reaction to stress. Murder on New Year's Eve will unbalance anyone. In any case, it was not in vain that I took their masks as a keepsake. It was a prediction! Tonight, Mr. Glebov made an appointment with me.

- May I know where?

- Are you jealous? Astra giggled. - Right. Judging by the voice, our future client is a very attractive man.

Matvey sniffed angrily into the phone:

- I hope this mmm ... Glebov is not connected with crime? Call Borisov.

- I already called.

Borisov had long worked for her father as the head of the security service, and from time to time she turned to him for information.

- Borisov made inquiries through his channels: Glebov is a doctor by profession, and a businessman by vocation. Successfully engaged in business. Deliveries of diagnostic equipment, medical equipment, medicines. He has connections in the Ministry of Health, where his father used to work. Married, no children. characterized positively.

- Probably, Glebov wants to hire a detective ... to keep an eye on his wife, - Matvey could not resist the irony. - Since she did not give her husband an heir, the husband is looking for a reason for divorce.

There are a lot of agencies that specialize in divorce. Why am I here?

- The bottlekins just planted a pig on you ...

*** * ***

Feoktistov paced the study, furnished in the English style. Nothing superfluous, strict forms - mahogany, green cloth, leather chairs. The British are great: they do not tolerate window dressing. The one who knows his business well, there is no need to splurge.

Igor Vladimirovich forgot what his very first love date was - probably, it did not leave a noticeable mark on the soul. But the first meeting with Magda Glebova produced an internal upheaval in him. It happened in Bratsevsky Park, in one of the secluded alleys. It was early autumn, a quiet day, such as one gets in mid-September. The leaves are just starting to fall off. Gold was breaking through the green crowns of the trees, and there was a tart smell of pines and late flowers. There were acorns on the path.

And suddenly - like a firebird miraculously flown into foreign lands - a young charming woman in an unimaginably bright dress: yellow, red, purple, fringe, beads, feathers - something fantastic, in the spirit of Bakst's theatrical costumes. Feoktistov was taken aback, as if he saw a tropical bird in iridescent plumage in the middle of a Moscow square. The “Bird” turned its face towards him, on which confusion froze. This face startled the banker. And he rushed to the rescue, although no one asked him for anything.

- What's wrong with you? Are you… not feeling well?

- The heel is broken. She frowned at a branch, slipped and ...

She handed Igor Vladimirovich a high, thin stiletto heel, covered with lilac suede, and he involuntarily glanced at her legs - she was shod in boots with rounded toes, embroidered with gold patterns.

Feoktistov often walked in the park in Bratsevo. He loved this estate, undeservedly overlooked by the Muscovites, with which the big names of the Russian nobility were associated: Khitrovo, Zubov, Naryshkin, Apraksin, Golitsyn, Stroganov, Gagarin, Shcherbatov. Now the once magnificent house and park were slowly falling into disrepair, which reminded of the futility of worldly bustle and evoked a slight melancholy.

Feoktistov, this aging celadon, was struck by a strange stranger on the spot. She aroused in him trembling admiration and sublime delight. Who is she? A ghost from his past? An actress dressed for a shoot? Maybe some kind of film group is here again? Igor Vladimirovich heard that they filmed in Bratsevo "The Young Lady-Peasant Woman", "Say a Word About the Poor Hussar" and even, it seems, the final series of "Petersburg Secrets".

He sharply, bitterly regretted his corpulence and sluggishness. I would like to pick up the lady in my arms, carry her to the car, or at least to the bench ... No, it's better to the car. Alas! With his complexion and muscles swollen with fat, there was nothing to try - except for shame, nothing would work. Feoktistov turned to the well-trained guard accompanying him at some distance, and he briskly ran up, froze in anticipation of orders.

- Will you allow me, ma'am? The banker bowed ceremoniously to the stranger. He will carry you to my car. Or wherever you want. Walking without a heel is uncomfortable.

She nodded eagerly.

- I came here by taxi. Terribly embarrassing to bother you, but...

- You make me happy! He broke into a stupid smile. So you're not an artist?

- Not. Why do you think so?

She smiled shyly. Feoktistov was stunned by this smile - the corners of his lips slightly lifted, his eyelashes lowered, the shadow from them fell on half his cheeks ... and his whole face changed, blushed. Rokotov, Borovikovsky, but in everything else - Bakst, Vrubel ...

- We'll take you home.

- I would appreciate it!

In the car, she gave the driver the address and fell silent, and Igor Vladimirovich was painfully worried, looking for an excuse to continue the acquaintance.

– Do you often walk around Bratsevsky Park? - without thinking of anything else, he squeezed out.

- Often.

Her short answer spoke of an unwillingness to carry on a conversation.

I love these places too. Far from the center, but not outside the city. Previously, Bratsevo was an estate near Moscow, passed from hand to hand. Do you know his story?

- In outline.

She showed no interest in his words, and, unfortunately, no other topic occurred to him.

- The scandalous divorce of Count Stroganov is connected with the estate. This rich man and philanthropist had no luck with his wives. Was the smartest person! He traveled a lot in his youth in Europe, studied philosophy, architecture, languages, music. And what an art gallery he set up in his palace in St. Petersburg, what a collection of antiquities he collected! He headed the Academy of Arts and the Directorate of the Imperial Libraries. Apparently, women value other qualities in us men?

His question hung in the air. The pause dragged on, and Feoktistov was forced to continue his historical digression. Once he lectured to students and over the years has not lost his skills:

- The count's family life was tragic. When he was young, Empress Elizaveta Petrovna betrothed him to the daughter of Chancellor Vorontsov, but the marriage did not work out. Stroganov decided on a divorce, which dragged on for a painfully long time and was cut short by the sudden death of the countess. Soon the widower fell in love with Princess Ekaterina Trubetskaya, a beautiful, sweet and pleasant lady in everything. The new Empress Catherine II contributed to this wedding. After the wedding, the young people went abroad, where they lived happily for about ten years. The return to Russia prepared the second family drama for the count. The favorite of the Empress, Ivan Nikolaevich Rimsky-Korsakov, was wonderfully good-looking, amiable, was known as an excellent conversationalist, sang decently and even played the violin. Appointed as an aide-de-camp to Catherine II, the young officer was soon granted a full chamberlain, a major general, received a house on Palace Embankment and a large estate in the Mogilev province as a gift. Within a year and a half, he became rich. And then ... the newly minted major general meets with Countess Stroganova, who is ten years older than him, loses his head, begins to court her and seeks her disposition and reciprocity. The Empress sends her former favorite from St. Petersburg to Moscow, the Countess leaves her husband and follows him. Stroganov has no choice but to accept and give his wife compensation - a house in Moscow and a large estate near Moscow Bratsevo. Where the retired favorite and his "beloved Katenka" settled away from the world and palace intrigues. They were separated by the death of Ekaterina Petrovna. The inconsolable Rimsky-Korsakov moved to his Mogilev estate, rarely came to Moscow, but always visited the Bratsevo estate, where memories of past happiness lived ...

Feoktistov made an expressive pause.

There was no response from the stranger. The driver drove the car without turning around. The guard, silent and focused, froze in the front seat. They seemed to be deaf and dumb.

Did I bore you?

Why are you telling me all this?

The stranger raised her eyes to him - two salons shimmering in the dusk, either amethyst or aquamarine.

“We have to talk about something. You are not interested?

- Not at all. What do you care about this estate?

“You see, I have earned enough money and now I can spend it on something worthwhile. For example, for the restoration of Bratsev. The house, park and gazebo are dilapidated and require repair, that is, financial investments. In Russia patronage has always been honored. So Count Stroganov, who once acquired this estate for his unfaithful wife, was a patron of the arts. The Stroganovs got rich in the salt mines, mining and metallurgical plants. There was even a saying: “You won’t be richer than the Stroganovs!” However, everything falls into decay, everything is covered with the dust of oblivion. And I want to leave a trace in the fleeting time. Here you come here in about ten years, and here is cleanliness and order, as under the previous caring owners. And a sign at the entrance to the estate: "Restored at the expense of Mr. I. V. Feoktistov."

- Not inspiring.

- It's a pity. Well ... then let's get acquainted. I already introduced myself...

“Magda,” she said dryly.

- Rare name…

- Just a name. She stared at the road. - Turn around here...

“I know,” said the driver. - I'll deliver it right to your door.

“Now she will leave, and I will be left with nothing,” Feoktistov flashed through his mind. - How can I stop her? How to get her attention?

“You like to walk in the park, where the shadows of the past roam,” he blurted out. “To be honest, I took you for a shadow.

- And if you are not mistaken?

Feoktistov was still haunted by that casually dropped phrase.

That day, as soon as Magda disappeared behind the front door, he dialed Tavrin's number and instructed him to find out everything about the woman living at such and such an address.

Thus began this one-sided romance. Igor Vladimirovich made attempt after attempt to meet Mrs. Glebova. Once he almost managed to lure her out on a date. It ended before it began, and ended so strangely that Feoktistov had doubts - with whom he was dealing? With a living woman or ... with a ghost?

He instructed Tavrin to follow her husband - how Mr. Glebov spends time, where he most often happens, with whom, whether he is cheating on his wife. It turned out that he was cheating, and she does not seem to be aware of his deceit. While Glebov was away, Igor Vladimirovich hoped to fulfill his dream and finally meet his beautiful wife. The alien "firebird" both shines brighter and sings sweeter.

Feoktistov had never been so excited, he had never prepared so carefully for a long-awaited date, he had never chosen a gift for a lady so meticulously. Having visited several of the best jewelry stores, he settled on a necklace made of large lilac and green stones, pearls and diamond placers. The jewelry lay in a safe in his office… teasing with the anticipation of the near happiness of seeing the one for whom it was bought.

And then, quite inopportunely, her husband returned from Venice on a night flight.

Aleksei Glebov looked tired and depressed, but otherwise flawless. He was taller than average, with a strong, athletic build and large, expressive features. A heavy chin and a hard line of lips spoke of his stubbornness, and a swarthy skin tone, dark hair and eyes framed by thick eyelashes betrayed an admixture of oriental blood.

He was waiting for Astra at the Miranda cafe and managed to place an order: for her, pears in honey syrup and a vanilla cocktail; for yourself - a double coffee with cognac.

- Does your wife have a sweet tooth? she smiled.

“Not really… that is, it all depends on her mood. Maybe you want something different? Cherry dessert, for example.

- Thank you. It's enough. Astra bit off a piece of pear. - Oh! Yummy. You state your problem.

He forced a smile and looked around the room. The interior of the cafe, designed in brown tones, was conducive to calmness and unhurriedness: chocolate-colored panels on the walls, beige curtains and tablecloths, and the same chair covers. There were few visitors - two elderly matrons and a family with a teenage son. The boy was obviously weary of the presence of his parents, looked around bored and jerked his long, skinny leg. His mother pulled him up.

- It's nice here ... hmmm ... - Glebov coughed.

The waitress brought the family an order - a small cake, lemonade and ice cream.

- Like in kindergarten! The teenager snorted loudly.

“And I’ll have tea, perhaps,” his father said just as loudly and displeasedly. - I don't drink sparkling water.

Mother muffled began to educate them.

Why did they come here? Astra giggled. Ritual, probably. Family tradition: on weekends, take your child to a candy store. And a child with much more pleasure would drink a beer with peers!

Her remark cleared the air. Glebov breathed a sigh of relief and also began to make fun of the "traditions" and the teenager, who angrily chewed the cake, taking it with his hand and deliberately ignoring the spoon, slipped by his mother.

Astra cautiously reminded him of the essence of the matter.

- Have you known the Butylkins for a long time?

- Two years. Their child got sick, and I... well, it's not interesting. Alina said that you can ... read the thoughts of other people, foresee how they will act.

I'm afraid she misled you.

- Don't be shy. The bottlekins are amazed by your abilities. They witnessed how you found the killer with almost no evidence and managed to expose him.

- I was just lucky.

“I don’t believe in luck,” Glebov jerked his chin, and his Oriental eyes stared at his interlocutor. - lucky professionals. Do you understand? Luck is nothing but a real skill. From the outside, in the eyes of an amateur, it looks like a miracle.

Astra laughed.

I am an actress by education.

- So what? There is another calling. A gift from above, if you will.

- Okay, agreed. How can I apply my gift in your case?

Glebov could not cross the line, overcome the barrier that did not allow him to reveal to an unfamiliar woman the background of his relationship with his wife. He had never discussed it with anyone and did not dare to start.

"I'll pay you," he assured Astra. – Cash. Here is the advance...

He took an envelope of money out of his pocket and placed it beside her plate.

- It's not my style to take money for I don't know what.

“I am aware of who your father is and that you are not constrained by means. But if you agree, your efforts should be paid.

Astra was getting impatient.

- What is required of me?

“Can you… get inside my wife’s mind?” Glebov squeezed out. “I mean… perhaps I’m misinterpreting… in a word, I suspect… I think she wants to kill me!”

His swarthy face darkened - apparently, he was so red. He was terribly embarrassed. After all, this woman will take him for a coward who is afraid of his own wife. She is already laughing at his cowardice.

So, do what you can.

“My methods are conventional.

“It doesn't matter how you help me figure out what's going on. I have reached a dangerous limit. I'm on the brink of collapse!

Glebov's throat went dry, and he took a sip of the cold coffee.

- Why did you decide that your wife is encroaching on your life? Astra asked. Is she threatening you?

– What then?

- She has changed. Became very strange. Her name is Magda. We've been married for five years, and I'm still trying to understand her. Does not work! I've tried both good and bad - different. Magda remains a secret box for me. Recently, I woke up from…” He stuttered, searching for words. “In my dream, I felt uneasy. I opened my eyes and saw her - she was standing over my bed with a knife.

- Kitchen?

“It was an Italian stiletto… never mind. We bought it in Venice as a souvenir. Actually, we met there - in the city on the water. We were immediately drawn to each other. I do not know what it was - passion, obsession, witchcraft. Returning to Moscow, we got married. Not a single day with Magda did I feel at ease. It's like sitting on a barrel of gunpowder!

– Do you love her?

Glebov shivered, as if he were cold, and averted his eyes.

Yes, if you can call it that. I'm scared to death of losing her. And she leaves...

Is your wife going to leave you?

- No, not in that sense. She just…” He took a deep breath. “There is a wall of alienation between us. I can't break her, and Magda doesn't even think about anything like that.

“Did you ask her why she approached you with a knife in her hand?”

- Certainly. Magda came up with some kind of excuse ... I forgot what it was. Oh yes! She said that she heard a noise outside the door, got scared and ...

- What noise?

- As if someone wants to open the lock and enter the apartment. That's why she took the knife, left the bedroom, and on the way decided to wake me up. You should have seen her! It sounded so fake... Magda doesn't know how to pretend. But sometimes it's as if the devil is possessed by her ...

Do you sleep in different rooms?

He nodded grimly.

- You don't believe her?

I don't believe myself anymore! That night I went to the front door, looked through the peephole: there was no one on the landing. Our house has a concierge. In the morning, leaving for work, I asked him about strangers. He didn't see anyone.

- It is unlikely that the concierge was awake during the night duty.

- I understand…

“And it won’t stop robbers.” They have tricks for every occasion.

It got dark outside the windows. The waitress turned on the extra lighting and, wiggling her short-skirted hips, stalked past their table. The elderly ladies ordered themselves a new portion of cakes and a pot of green tea - they no longer needed to take care of their figure, and they enjoyed life.

The teenager did not take his eyes off the high-open legs of the waitress, as, indeed, did his dad. The mother of the family turned purple and, not daring to make a remark to her husband, uttered something irritably to her son.

“Perhaps you should leave for a while?” Astra suggested. - Live apart, rest from each other.

- What? No-o-o! I am very attached to Magda. It never crossed my mind to leave her or divorce her. No, this is not an acceptable option.

Astra tasted a cocktail - sugar and vanilla were shifted into it.

“Bitter,” she said.

Do you think I'm out of my mind? Glebov interpreted her remark in his own way. “Sometimes I tend to come to that conclusion myself. Would you recommend seeing a psychiatrist? - he started to turn on.

“I didn't say anything like that.

You don't take my words seriously. But in fact, my marriage with Magda is heading for the abyss. Something terrible is happening to us. She's scared too!

- What? Alexey Dmitrievich ...

Just Alex.

- Good. Alexei, don't you attach too much importance to trifles?

- Not at all! he yelled. “I have never been shy. If I turn to a stranger for help, it means that I have despaired of coping with the problem myself.

Sorry, I didn't get what the problem is.

“I don't really know myself. I feel the clouds gathering around. And that's it! For this reason, I am looking for an unconventional way to resolve the situation. Magda is more than a woman, a lover or a wife for me. It sprouted through my soul and flesh, like bamboo, through and through. You know, there is such a terrible torture invented by Asians? So, my torments go on and on, I have already got used to them, and they give me pleasure. You say I'm a masochist? In a way, yes. Magda and I are inseparable! No matter what. Do you think I did not try to get rid of this slavery? Still trying! I wanted to throw her out of my heart, forget about her existence, even cheated on her. Nothing helps. I even decided to go to Venice, where I met and fell in love with Magda, to wander around those places, relive everything and dispel this obsession with one and only one woman. To make sure that that time has gone irrevocably and carried away with it the former charm. It wasn't there! Of course, I went to the place where Magda and I first met ...

- So what? Astra chuckled.

– Nothing! The carnival ended, and in general, the trip was not successful. Without Magda, the “pearl of the Adriatic” has faded, no matter how stupid it sounds. The magical city of masks has turned into an ordinary vulgar Disneyland for an idle crowd of tourists. Its beauty faded - imbued with the spirit of gloomy antiquity, it made a repulsive impression. The canals reeked of rot, and debris swayed on the water. The facades of the palaces below were covered with mold. And all this fun, yellow lights and music seemed to me like a feast during the plague! For some reason he lowered his voice. “Two days was enough to go berserk and come back.

Does your wife know that you went to Venice?

Glebov shook his head negatively.

“I didn't tell her. Lied about a business trip. But I have a feeling… as if she knows everything.

Astra pushed her cocktail glass away.

“You can't drink this crap. Order me currant juice.

He called a girl, who was defiling through the hall, as if on a catwalk, and asked her to bring juice and one coffee.

- On what means does your wife live? Astra asked. – Do you jointly own the business?

- Firm "Medius" registered on me and my father. And Magda has her own bank account, she is quite secure.

- Do you support her?

Yes, as a husband should. I adhere to the principle that the breadwinner in the family is a man. Although Magda doesn't need anything without me. She does not work, but her parents have left her a decent capital. They both died in a plane crash: they were flying in a small private plane, got into fog and crashed.

Did they have their own plane?

- Not. Some friend of theirs abroad owned an airline. They dealt with real estate here and abroad. We succeeded. And suddenly such a ridiculous death. Magda, it seems, still has not recovered from this blow.

How long ago did they die?

- About seven years ago. Magda was barely twenty-two.

Is she the sole heir?

- As far as I know, yes. Glebov smiled wryly. “So it doesn’t make sense for her to kill me for money.

- Do you have children?

He hesitated to answer.

We decided not to rush. Magda is not one of those breeds of women who dream of having children. I don't insist either. However, even if she insisted, she didn't care. She does as she pleases.

- So, in the event of your death, all property and money will go to your wife?

“Half of the business and everything that belongs to me personally. But I told you before, she's not interested in money. She has enough money for a comfortable existence.

- Do you rule out jealousy?

The more Astra got to know Glebov, the more attractive he seemed to her. Sensual, strong-willed, intelligent man. He does not at all look like a henpecked man, or a voluptuous womanizer, or an absurd, suspicious and picky jealous man, or a mentally unbalanced subject. A completely normal person with a normal outlook on life. However, the question of jealousy brought confusion to his face.

- Once upon a time, Magda jokingly warned me that if I cheat on her, she will kill me.

Is she capable of murder?

“Sometimes she gets delusional… Probably, everyone is capable of killing in certain circumstances.

The waitress brought juice and coffee on a cupronickel tray. Glebov fell silent, waiting for her to leave.

Did you give your wife a reason to be jealous?

His Oriental eyes lowered, and his beautiful lips said:

- Of course no. I had intimacy with other women, but purely physical. And Magda knows nothing. She herself pushed me to such a step! I was trying… to see if I would experience something similar to that… that… with another partner.” He hesitated, took the cup, almost spilled it, put it back on the saucer with a thud. “You can't call it cheating. Touching others, I think only of Magda, then I repent, I curse my dependence on her and my weakness ... In a word, you don’t understand.

“Did you sleep with others to spite your wife?”

- Yes and no… With others! Loudly said. There were a couple of episodes - empty, meaning nothing. I wanted to take revenge on Magda, without realizing what and why. Instead, he ruined the whole mass for himself. Believe me, I could not raise my eyes on her for a week after ... In general, when we began to sleep separately, I was relieved.

He still raised the cup to his mouth and took a sip, burned himself. His face was distorted by a grimace of pain - not bodily, but mental.

- Did your wife ... cheat on you?

“I-I don’t know… hardly…” Glebov seemed to wake up from some heavy thoughts. - She likes men. Sometimes flirting amuses her - nothing more.

- Are you sure?

How can you be sure of something? I never stooped to spying. This is baseness! Magda would not forgive. I don't control her, if that's what you mean. And she me too ... I hope.

Astra was confused. On the one hand, Glebov did not say something; on the other hand, she managed to become interested in his history. There was not enough thread to grasp and unwind this tangle of contradictions: love, fear, mystery.

- What is the name of Magda's parents?

- The Levashovs. Rufina and Philip. At one time, they talked a lot about them in connection with the tragic death. Then everything calmed down.

Was it really an accident?

- An investigation was underway ... Yes, the Levashovs and their foreign friend became victims of fog and rocky terrain. The owner himself flew the plane, apparently overestimating himself as a pilot.

“Experienced pilots crash too.

- You're right.

The elderly ladies, having gorged themselves on cakes, got up noisily from the table.

- Hey, honey! one of them called out to the waitress. - Get the bill!

They paid off standing, laughing at each other.

- Keep the change…

- You say Magda is strange. What is it expressed in? Astra asked.

- In a thousand little things. In the manner of dressing, in doing nothing, which is suddenly replaced by a stormy "musical" or "exhibition" period - then Magda drags me to all the concerts and opening days. Some kind of feverish thirst for impressions takes possession of her. Having had enough, she plunges into loneliness: she can sit at home for weeks without complaining of boredom - despite the fact that she does not watch TV or read. She is afraid of the dark and yet loves the night. She is afraid that someone will attack her, and walks in secluded corners of the park. It is impossible to get any explanation from her. You can't get a word out of her! He is silent and looks through me, as if I am not a person of flesh and blood, but some kind of transparent substance. But after one incident, I stopped recognizing her at all!

- What is the case?

- Do not consider me crazy, but I remember those days with a shudder. It was autumn, early November. The weather was gloomy and cold. I got sick - runny nose, cough, fever - and lay at home. In the evening, Magda got ready to go somewhere: she said she wanted to get some fresh air, and left. I had a fever, I fell asleep, and when I woke up, she had not yet returned. On the clock - half past two at night. What was I supposed to think? I started calling her cell phone. In response - "there is no connection with the subscriber." I already have chills, and then, in addition, the nerves played out. An hour passed in terrible restlessness, a second, a third. I fell into unconsciousness, came to my senses, called her, again forgot myself in a fever. Morning came, and Magda never came home. How should I have done, in your opinion?

Astra shrugged.

- Search, probably.

- Where? Who? Call the police? Raise office security guards? But I had no idea where she went. She has no parents, no friends.

- No friends at all? None?

- There are no relatives with whom she could stay overnight. Her former friends, the Kazarinov family couple, quarreled with her. The wife was jealous of her husband for Magda, well ... you understand. What kind of friendship is there? In general, it remained to call the hospitals, morgues and the police. But I couldn't... The thought that something bad happened to Magda didn't fit in my head. A high temperature, a painful condition affected. “She left me. Run away! I convinced myself. Or spending the night with a lover. Even that was less frightening to me than her death or injury. I must have been delirious. I do not remember how the day passed, the evening came. And when it got dark, she returned. As if nothing had happened!

Did you ask what happened? Where did she sleep?

- Certainly. At once. But Magda stared at me as if I had been absent somewhere for a whole day. She touched my forehead and nodded knowingly, “You have a high fever! Have you taken aspirin?" She began to do the most ordinary things - look for a thermometer, stick it under my arm, dissolve a pill in water, make tea. She didn't listen to me! She did not pay attention to my excitement, attributing it to the manifestation of the disease. And to all my questions she repeated one thing: “You have a fever. You're delusional!"

"You still didn't know where she was?"

- She claimed that she went for a little walk, froze and returned home. “I was gone for several hours, and you raised such a panic!” - that's what she said. She infuriated me with her secrecy, her idiotic stubbornness. I could hardly restrain myself from making a scandal.

Astra watched Glebov closely. He seemed to be quite sincere.

- Perhaps you really made a mistake, lost track of time. This happens at high temperatures.

– And you there too! he exploded. - Do I look like a lunatic? Yes?

Watching Alexei Glebov and his wife did not cancel Tavrin's other duties: he was torn between his main job and the boss's personal assignments. In addition, Gregory still had a wife and, like any self-respecting man, a mistress. To both he tried to pay attention and find time, and both expressed dissatisfaction.

Where do you go for days and nights? - the legal wife Nadia was indignant. Are you even getting paid?

Tavrin tried not to get annoyed.

- Need money? How many?

She counted the bills and fell silent for a while - gaining patience, until the next time.

- Our tap is leaking, Grisha!

“Call a plumber,” he sighed.

“We didn’t go on vacation for the second year ...

Buy yourself a ticket and go.

- Aren't you afraid that I will start a holiday romance? - the wife could not stand it. “You brush me off like a pesky fly. And by the way, I'm human.

- That's it… by the way.

Nadia started crying. Gregory hated women's tears.

- What are you crying about? I don't drink, I don't chase you like other husbands! I provide. Bought new furniture. The car was borrowed.

“I… want a baby,” she sobbed. - I'm almost thirty.

Tavrin could not have children, but his wife did not know about it. If he told her what the problem is, whining will begin, persuasion to go to the clinic ... the matter, perhaps, will come to a divorce. And he didn't want to get divorced.

“I told you I was busy twenty-four hours a day. If a child appears, all worries about him will fall on your shoulders. Do you have enough kids at school? Play with them as much as you like! And rest at home.

She worked at a private gymnasium - teaching mathematics to young child prodigies - and envied women who had such wonderful, talented children. She wanted her own boy or girl, but for some reason Grisha was against it.

He gave his wife a comforting present - a ticket to Egypt. Let him admire the pyramids, sarcophagi, mummies and all that. She will like it.

“Next time you will go to Tunisia,” Tavrin promised. - Then to the Czech Republic, to Hungary ...

Her eyes lit up, and she did not even ask: “And you?”

The woman with whom Grigory Ivanovich indulged in "forbidden pleasures" was the exact opposite of Nadia: ambitious, ambitious, with a complex character. She added adrenaline to his blood - and he hardly kept her in check.

Why don't you leave your wife? Do you still love her? And what about me? You should only belong to me.

She jealously listened to every word he said to Nadia on the phone, caught every gesture and found fault with every little thing.

“I love only you,” Tavrin assured her. You see, I'm all yours.

The immoderate sexual appetite of the passion began to tire him. The female temperament is a dangerous thing: unlike the male, it does not lose strength over the years, but gains strength.

"Shouldn't I break up with her? Gregory thought. “My calculations were wrong. Nadia never dreamed of doing in bed what this shameless and uninhibited woman allows herself, but I'm already fed up with violent bouts of ecstasy. Who said the love ship is looking for an eternal storm? A light wave is much nicer.

He began to meet with his mistress less often, explaining this by workload. He didn't even have to lie, just exaggerate the true state of things a little bit. Feoktistov shook him up. Sparks of madness jumped in the eyes of the banker when he spoke of Mrs. Glebova.

- You promised to arrange a meeting for us ... - the fat man hoarsely turned purple with anger. – How much longer to wait? I don't have much time for strategy, I prefer tactics. Move your brains, dear Grisha! I pay you such grandmas for nothing?

Saliva collected at the corners of Feoktistov's lips, and his flabby cheeks trembled slightly. “And he hopes to win the heart of a young sophisticated woman! You definitely won’t tempt her with the size of her wallet! the head of security thought squeamishly. - Found a "six" in my face! And I let him push me around. Okay, you'll have to be patient."

This job suited him, and you can’t call Feoktistov stingy, especially when it comes to a love affair. Tavrin tried. Already everything was on the ointment! Glebov went to Venice without his wife... And then he managed to return! What the hell bitten that swarthy playboy?

Tavrin's plan crumbled like a house of cards. Feoktistov was furious.

“She gave it to him! - Annoyed the head of security. - And I'm good too! Turned into a matchmaker for a fat cat. And the young lady safely slips out of the placed snares - as if she had a secret informant in our ranks.

Tavrin was not a matchmaker in the generally accepted sense of the word: he did not praise the dignity of his boss before Magda, did not lure her with dizzying prospects and the benefits that await her from rapprochement with Igor Vladimirovich - it is unlikely that Mrs. Glebova would listen to him. He decided to just guess a convenient moment when the husband of a beautiful lady leaves far away ... in order to prepare a "random meeting" between Magda and Feoktistov. There, let this pompous turkey take the initiative himself.

Once such a meeting almost took place. Tavrin still could not figure out why everything fell apart. The banker seethed with indignation and carried complete nonsense. What could Gregory say to that?

- Remember, be kind, your mistake! the boss shook his finger sternly. “And try to avoid it in the future.”

Tavrin nodded, hiding his bewilderment. What mistake did he make? And what should be avoided?

Feoktistov put forward almost the same conditions. The meeting should take place in a secluded place, away from prying eyes, preferably in nature - and look natural to Mrs. Glebova. So that not even a shadow of doubt crept in!

Dissatisfied with the word "turn up," the fat man frowned.

“I can invite her for a walk myself, but I don’t want to be direct,” he justified himself.

Tavrin laughed inwardly. “How! " I can invite... Yes, you are afraid that she will flatly refuse, and thereby cut off all approaches.

*** * ***

France, 16th century. Paris, Louvre

Margarita ran into the lady-in-waiting and almost knocked her down.

- Your Highness…

- Leave me alone!

- You have ... cobwebs in your hair ...

- Go away! the princess snarled and slammed the doors in her face. This impudent girl must be a spy for the Queen Mother.

Although de Guise, on the orders of Charles IX and under the threat of death, married the Duchess of Cleves in order to avoid being accused of encroaching "on the honor of the king's sister", they continued to follow Margarita - no matter how she threw something away!

Locking herself in her bedroom, Margot took out the object dropped by Ruggieri from the folds of her skirt and began to examine it. Candles were smoked: the treasurer saved on the maintenance of a small yard, but Catherine bought locks, and brother Karl did not deny himself anything.

The princess wrinkled her beautiful forehead. What is this thing? Two connected glass flasks inserted into a gilded case, a delicate pattern is carved on the stand. The glass is quite strong, otherwise it would break if dropped. On the flasks in the place of the neck - overhead golden birds, similar to pigeons, are in contact with their beaks.

She brought the little thing to the light - shiny dark sand poured inside the flasks.

- How strange...

Hourglass. She remembered that de Guise sometimes wore the same thing on his belt. While the sand flows, a certain period of time passes. Guise boasted that the sand in his watch was made from sifted powder of black marble boiled in wine and dried in the sun.

“Ruggieri used the watch for his diabolical experiments! Margaret guessed. - Well, of course! He also wore them on his belt, and when he walked through the dressing room in the dark, he got caught and lost. The carpet concealed the sounds, the astrologer was in a hurry, the queen mother was grumbling… Perhaps he had already missed the clock…”

- Late! Margot whispered triumphantly. Now they belong to me!

Satisfied that she had managed to annoy the sorcerer, she hid the clock at the head of the bed and called the maids.

- Get undressed! I'm tired, I want to sleep...

The dream came imperceptibly, descended from heaven along with the moonbeams and closed the eyelids of the youngest daughter of Catherine de Medici and Henry II. Even the most delicate ear would not have caught the soft rustle of sand in Ruggieri's watch under the feather pillows.

“Shhhh… shhhhhhh… shhhhh…”

It was the noise of the crowd at Notre Dame Cathedral. People, risking their lives, gathered to stare at the beautiful bride, who was given in marriage to Henry de Bourbon, King of Navarre.

Margarita can hardly stand on her feet. A cumbersome wedding attire cradles the chest, a heavy headdress squeezes the forehead, bitter tears cover the eyes. Soon the marriage ceremony will begin, and she will be given to this rude dork who only knows how to drink and fight. Such is the fate of women of royal blood.

Paris is teeming with Huguenots - they came to the wedding of their leader. The "tigress" Catherine herself is forced to reckon with them, and therefore gave the hand of the princess to Henry of Navarre. The people rejoice, admiring the magnificent procession. Finally, Protestants and Catholics will be given equal rights.

Under the arches of the cathedral, a golden haze flows. Margarita tries not to look at the groom. She's not herself...

- She is ill ... - sweeps through the ranks of the courtiers.

She is as pale as death...

"I'm about to lose my senses..."

Everyone is waiting for the newlywed to answer "yes", but she is silent. Heinrich's eyes sparkle. King Carl bites his lip nervously.

“Do something, sire…” Ekaterina whispers.

She is ready to sacrifice her daughter to political interests - in the truest sense of the word. Karl is soft-hearted, but the will of his mother prevails over him. He imperceptibly hits his sister on the back of the head, she screams, and this exclamation is perceived as consent.

Margarita sees, out of nowhere, blood splatters - on her wedding dress, on the groom's clothes embroidered with gold. The triumphant cries of the crowd outside the walls of the cathedral merge with the screams and death groans of the dying ... Blood! Blood... it's all over the place, red as festive roses, thick as sweet raspberry jelly...

Blood wedding!

The first wedding night of the royal newlyweds failed. Massacre in the Louvre. In the streets of Paris, torches are burning everywhere, shots are heard, the sound of weapons, terrible screams of people taken by surprise, who are looking for salvation, but find only death.

Catherine de Medici lured the Huguenot nobles to the wedding in order to deal with them, to ruthlessly destroy every single one, including Heinrich's “zamaraha”. And, if need be, his young wife. Then there will be a weighty reason to persecute and severely punish heretics, because the mess they started took the life of her beloved daughter. “Religious strife is draining France,” the queen mother urged Charles. “You must be firm, my son!”

The terrible noise and stomping of feet along the corridors of the palace alerted Henry. Margarita jumps up in horror ... The killers burst into the bedroom of the young with weapons in their hands. Unheard of. Monstrous! Deadly steel whistles over the bride's head. She stretches out her hand, protecting her husband, angrily, desperately screams and ... wakes up.

Twilight all around. Her room, the tapestries on the walls… the candle and the maid dozing in the corner. Silence reigns in the Louvre, only somewhere the royal guards are talking and the wind is buzzing in the chimneys.

Margarita lay for a long time, panting, unable to calm down. The picture that appeared in a dream seemed so plausible that the hair moved on his head. With her mother, perhaps, she will marry her to Heinrich in order to put an end to the Huguenots. I wonder what advice the astrologer gave her?

The princess suddenly remembered the clock hidden under the pillows. In the morning they will make the bed and stumble upon them. She silently got up, and, stepping barefoot on the cold floor, put the little thing away ...

Moscow. Nowadays

Astra invited Matvey to dinner. For some time now, she has fallen in love with homemade meals. The kitchen in her apartment was small, but cozy, comfortably furnished and equipped with all necessary appliances.

You cut the tomatoes, and I'll take care of the shrimp.

Matvey unloaded the food from the bag and turned on the water to wash the vegetables.

“We're starting a new investigation,” Astra said. – Our client is Alexey Glebov. He decided that his wife was going to kill him.

- Just going? So, we still have time to feast on shrimp skewers with tomatoes and sweet peppers.

It's about human life...

– What is our task? We will live in their house under the guise of a gardener and a cook? Will you cook real Wiener schnitzels and I will water the flowers? At the same time, we will not leave the spouses alone for a second - even at night we will hide under the bed, so that during the performance of marital duty, the wife does not strangle her husband in her arms.

Astra was stringing pink prawns on skewers.

- I like your sarcasm! She smiled admiringly.

- Do you have a better offer?

- Certainly. We need to talk to the Kazarinovs - these are former friends of Magda Glebova. Maybe they know something about her past.

So her name is Magda. Future Lady Macbeth, huh? Interesting.

- Quit your jokes. It's a serious matter! I already called Borisov and asked him to inquire about Magda's deceased parents.

Has she already killed them?

- Stop it. They crashed on a plane seven years ago. Crashed into a rock in the fog ...

Astra told him everything she had heard from Glebov.

“And you believed it, of course?” Matthew asked.

Why would he lie?

– What if he wants to make you a pawn in his game? Kill his wife and present it as self-defense. Say, she attacked him with a knife, he awkwardly pushed her away, she fell, hit her temple on the edge of the table ... And you will go as a witness! You will defend the murderer in court. He hired you in advance, because his wife had already made an attempt on his life. As I understand it, in the event of Magda's death, her husband inherits all her property and money?

Astra sat up and folded her hands in her lap. In this perspective, she did not consider the circumstances.

- By the way, Glebov is very handsome.

“I advise you first of all to check if he has a mistress.

Matvey deftly sliced the tomatoes and began to peel the peppers.

- Does the bow go here?

“I don’t know…” she said absently. - Probably…

Turn on the grill, let it heat up.

- Where are we going to barbecue? Not in the microwave?

Astra forgot about the shrimp. She wiped her hands on her apron and instinctively reached for a glass of white wine. She swallowed without tasting.

“Last thing I asked him about Columbine and Harlequin…” she muttered. “He still caught the carnival shows in Venice. After the main events are over, costumed entertainment continues for tourists.

- Glebov probably said that his familiar Butylkins were dressed up in the costumes of Columbine and Harlequin!

- How did you guess?

“Clairvoyance, dear,” Matthew laughed. Or deduction. Choose what you like best.

- It seems to me that comedy characters are certainly involved in this case. del arte.

Astra managed to turn a private investigation into a cross between a seance, where the role of a medium was mirror, and amateurish reasoning, which interspersed with no less amateurish surveillance. In part, she used information received either from Borisov or from other people, but she interpreted them too boldly. It can be said that she drew paradoxical conclusions from the most ordinary information and solved the problem in a way invented by her. One way or another, but she usually managed to figure out the criminal ...

*** * ***

Glebov drank brandy, sitting in an armchair in front of the TV. There was a movie about scouts. He looked at the screen, but he saw something completely different - a Venetian night full of lights and mummers, a dark blue sky and a golden gleam of water in a canal cramped by passing gondolas. The catchy beauty Colombina laughs, pushing his boat away with her hand.

“Sorry, I misunderstood…” he mutters.

It smells of lemons and dampness. The wind carries a brackish coolness from the sea ...

- They called you! Magda called from the bedroom.

Glebov woke up. He is in Moscow, in his apartment on Ostozhenka. In the next room, the wife tries on the dress she bought the day before.

“A woman, perhaps…

Why "probably"? She didn't introduce herself?

Magda appeared in the doorway, wearing a long, fitted dress with crimson and green streaks.

Notes

The poem is called "Through the Looking Glass". By "beauty" is meant the goddess of love Aphrodite. This follows from the author's explanations and the epigraph to the poem omitted here - from Horace.

Read about it in the book by Natalia Solntseva "The last meal of a harlot."

Read about the related detective story in the novel by N. Solntseva "Date on Halloween".

Hyacinth is a gemstone of red, yellow or orange color.

Volto is a neutral mask that replicates the classic shape of the human face.

Read about the detective story related to this in the novel by N. Solntseva “The Golden Idol of the Firebog”.

K. Somov. "Harlequin and Lady", 1921 Russian Museum, St. Petersburg.

Leon Bakst - real name Rosenberg (1866-1924). Russian artist, illustrator, master of easel painting and theatrical graphics, author of bright costumes and scenery for Diaghilev's Russian Seasons.