The Black Pelican Part I

contents

To this day I remember the long road to the City of M. It dragged on and on, while the thoughts plaguing me mingled with the scenes along the way. It seemed as if my surroundings were already at one with the place, although I still had a few hours to go. I passed obscure farms in empty fields, small villages and lonely estates surrounded by cultivated greenery and forest hills. Man-made ponds and natural lakes skirted the road and reeked of wetlands, which later, right before M., turned into peat bogs and marshes, with no sign of life for miles to come. The countryside was dotted with humble towns sprouting out of the earth, the highway briefly becoming their main street: squares and clusters of stores gleamed in the sun, banks and churches rose up closer to the center, a belfry whizzed by, silent as usual. Then the glint of the stores and gas stations at the outskirts said farewell without a word, and just like that, it was over. The town was gone, without having time to agitate or interest you. Again the road wound its way through the fields, its monotony wearing you down. I saw the strange people that swarm over the countryside – for a fleeting moment they appear amusing, but then you measure them against their surroundings and stop noticing them, understanding how unexceptional they are. At times, locals waved to me from the curb or just followed me with their eyes, though more often than not, no one was distracted by my fleeting presence. Left behind, they merged with the streets, as they withdrew to the side.

At last the fields disappeared and real swamps engulfed the road – a damp, unhealthy moor. Clouds of insects smashed into the windshield; the air became heavy. Nature seemed to be bearing down on me, barely letting me breath, but that didn’t last long. Soon I drove up a hill. The swamps remained a bit to the east, retreating to the invisible ocean in a smooth line overgrown with wild shrubs. Now the trees grew dense, casting the illegible calligraphy of their shadows over the road, before, several miles ahead, the road became wider, and a sign said I had crossed the city limits of M.

Everything I had heard was turning out to be true. I recognized not the details, but their essence: the frequently repaired road full of cracks and potholes, the impoverished projects in the outskirts, the industrial warehouses closer to the center, the unfinished Memorial with its useless gleaming steel. Then the gold coating of a garish arch – a monument to Little Blue Birds – flashed and passed without a trace in the setting sun. Cars slowed; intersections interrupted the flow of traffic; trees gave way to cheap motels and antique shops. After passing a modest sign that said I’d reached the inner city, I crawled in a traffic-jam for half an hour and finally found myself downtown.

Instantly it all changed. The area around me contracted, and it became difficult to see in the congestion. Different-sized houses surrounded me, their sides dilapidated, with spots here and there turning black either from soot or the moist climate. The architecture did not impress me, and it was hard to talk about a general style, yet the buildings had a look of dignity, not needing visitors to assess their value. It was not that the streets were empty at this afternoon hour, but the people who appeared on them did not look like an important part of the area. The city would do just fine without them, for what could they give it – a beggar with an ashy gray beard and one white pupil, a crowd of slackers by the movie theater, isolated groups of housewives, or a small cluster of strangers, me and my sedan? Nothing gave me a sign, perhaps having failed to notice me among the utterly ordinary others. The world had not reacted to my appearance and did not understand my intentions. It was as if I had used a double-bottomed suitcase to smuggle them in. I sought an indication or a clue; I was ready to use my imagination for all it was worth and to be grateful for even a slight hint, but I saw nothing that could give me the impetus, nothing that could motivate me or stimulate my attentive mind.

I told myself that this was how it should be: when something was real, it didn’t reveal itself right away. Nonetheless, the insult and impatience made my chest ache, forcing me to contort my face and shake my head from side to side. Look at me, I wanted to cry out to the silent buildings, look, I didn’t come empty-handed. I brought you some intrigue, which is equal to your most formidable mysteries. Things like this don’t happen every day. I am capable of a lot, and my scheme is pernicious – what else do you need to breathe life into your day dreams?.. But the stone would not reply, life resumed its normal course, and I began to have doubts: Am I cheating by jacking up the price in advance? Ahead of time, you can’t prove anything, neither to yourself nor others. Try as you might, you’ll just fritter away the hours with hordes of rhetoric.

It was all getting confused as my thoughts spun with the web of streets, turns and alleys, road signs and store names. My route became unclear; I slowed down and began to block traffic. People honked and stuck their heads out the window as they passed. I was flustered, quickly tried to figure out my whereabouts, then veered to the right without a goal in mind – just to get out of someone’s way – and stopped short in a dead end.

That was the right thing to do – the city had already become a little too close to my heart. It’s probably the same for a third of the visitors; and the remaining two-thirds are just fools. The dead end calmed me down. I climbed out of the car and took a seat on a bench next to a small apartment house. Linen was drying on a line hung between trees; the courtyard was empty, and only an apparently stray cat gazed blankly at my car from a basement window. A vacant lot off to the side stretched down the hill. It was under construction: workers were digging a pit and puttering about with concrete blocks for the foundation, their bright jackets scurrying over the site; an excavator discharged a high-pitched screech as it left behind a flawlessly leveled edge. Good work, I thought sarcastically, feeling out of nowhere that the City of M. was losing its aura and turning into something conventional, even if I still knew almost nothing about it.

At this instant, a momentary feeling of melancholy rose up in me. It was like realizing that coming here had been pointless – there was no road for me and no hope of finding what I sought. But the whim passed quickly, I was no longer the person I had been, and had almost forgotten how to pity myself. Every place you visit brings some grim thoughts – as well as some pleasant ones, just not as many of the latter. Now I was ready for them all, for the grim and the pleasant. On this I congratulated myself, despite the uninspiring nature of M.’s welcome: a construction site on a vacant lot and a dismal courtyard. This suited me just fine – as I grasped that I was not looking for inspiration from without. The first outburst had passed, my gaze turned inwards, as if the details around me had overstrained it. Inside, you can always ferret out something to arrest the eye. I felt calm, forgetting for a time the indifference of my surroundings, thinking about my own matters without any bitterness, going over and over the well-trodden paths – not like a traveler rushing to his final destination, but like a flaneur out for a walk.

I drifted through fragments of my former knowledge, although they were not worth much, especially when you return to them time and again, almost remembering their order and recognizing them without the slightest bit of interest. Here they are in space: reverberating streets; a dim background; frozen groups of mute characters in backyards – pathetic pieces with no content. Then come the more distinct ones: an old park, trees packed close together with their branches intertwined, scratches and chipped paint on a bench – the echo of a place where you were once loved in your youth. No one lives there now, yet there’s still more – a stadium and a boat stop, someone’s hand that has turned dark in the sun, the small puzzle of my first apartment divided into three unequal sections… But no, we're getting out of order. That was in Chronus: summer vacation and a pile of carefree plans, a time of big bumble bees buzzing through the air, then a time of hopes that are way too brave, and – a time when you suddenly grew up without realizing what you were sacrificing… Three unequal sections. With roommates and without. One woman. Another. Then – alone and no distractions…

As so many times before, I tried to imagine the exact shapes and vibrant paints, something that you know by heart, even if it’s only the color of the leaves, the wallpaper, or the blanket on the narrow bed. But you can never alter the order of former knowledge; the links are involuntary; you can’t order one thought to suddenly freeze and stay as it is for a thorough examination later. You’re always on the go – the glimmer of taxis, strange games of hide and seek somehow related to careers, the faces of people clinging to you, trying to find a connection, convinced that there is something special in the secret union that has been created without anyone knowing. Features deceived and deceiving. Mostly unintentionally.

In fact, it is easier with faces – you can remember them longer. You can feel touched or hate them all over again, or challenge them to a duel without wishing your opponent any harm. You can kick them out in disgust, knowing all the same that their memory will stay as long as you don’t close the trap door. But it still gets boring fast. You don’t concentrate properly – everything is somehow anachronistic: wordless gestures; a silent movie with no captions. And when you remember the dialogues, you romanticize and embellish and improvise something new every time, for the temptation is too great. That’s how it was now as I sat delving into the past, uttering names that I hadn’t heard in ages. Time and again I caught myself in an excessively bold lie. With some embarrassment I’d try to worm my way out of it by changing the details, before feeling that I wasn’t able to, didn’t want to, was too lazy, or that my former knowledge was almost exhausted. My memory was pushing me outside, to a place where you can’t even distinguish between the shots from the last few months and the last few years. They run together all the time, whether they’re long or short. If you lose count, confuse the numbers and give up, it doesn’t matter – the images remain the same. It’s already easy to imagine them without any scenery. They add up to a vision of your own gloomy self: waiting for a call, waiting for letters, waiting for bad news, receiving bad news, waiting for another call… Off you go – back around the circle. It’s unstable however, if you aren’t scared, if you make up your mind to rip it up abruptly like taking a dive and resurfacing to: indifference, cold mockery, self-antipathy, then self-pity, and finally a decision… Yes, this is the difference and this is what I’m getting at: it’s no longer a self-contained loop. You can preserve the conceived plan like a little treasure or an intimate titillating thought, but I like to do it differently and I call it something different too: I call it “my secret,” which adds another dimension. You can live with this secret, believe me, and set off for the City of M. – which is exactly what I did. I severed my ties, all of them. Everyone thinks this is the road to despair, yet in fact it brings peace of mind. Again and again I thought it over from all sides, and every time my consciousness painted not a vicious circle, but something rational and almost real. It was my secret and the City of M., with me inside it, right in the middle – the spy who had passed through the body check, the secret agent of the invisible army. Now everyone will say: Yes, the distinction is unmistakable; he’s a completely different person.

It isn’t shameful to look on as a bystander: a different man, an unfamiliar hero, an unemployed and reckless fugitive-pilgrim. He doesn’t have a permanent address, doesn’t live anywhere, except perhaps in his sports car, a five-year-old Alfa-Romeo with stiff springs. This is who I am. The circumstances do not bother me; no attachments are holding me back. I have no one to worry about, and no one cares about my future. I do have Gretchen, but she doesn’t count – I’ll explain that later. Is it better this way? Let’s compare the items on the list. The pluses and minuses come out equal. Then again, there’s a lot I didn’t take into account…

Having got carried away, I jumped to new episodes in the silent movie: Another man, an unfamiliar hero, comes out of a dilapidated apartment building one sunny morning. He jerks as he walks, while a fleeting memory entrances his gaze. He’ll never return there; he has said his last “farewell” to the concierge-gossiper. They have moved out his belongings and given them away. His keys have been handed over too – or discarded, or lost – if he turns around now, he will have to find a new home. It doesn’t matter and makes no difference. He betrays not a hint of doubt, does not talk about regret. His car is already waiting at the entrance, its tank full of gas. What can he do at the end? For Dear Gretchen – an ethereal kiss in my mind; silence on the outside. The bills have been paid – simply out of habit; nothing is meant by it. He has no idea when he might return, has not given any thought to those who will forget. All he’s willing to do is imagine different scenes that include:

A former resident of the capital steps out of his second class car at the main train station. He is tanned and somber, his gaze turned inward. No one is there to meet him, and he hardly has any luggage. His collar is raised – as protection against the dampness and fog. A taxi driver takes him for a visitor and tries to hustle him but gets caught in a lie, takes offense and falls silent. This is the welcome from his hometown – they are waiting for you here. Hello, you look so refreshed – like an entirely different person. Where are we going? To theater square? To the opera house? The square is empty. Who will suggest another address? The former resident of the capital touches his coarser wolf’s hair and glances around frowning. What did he do there, way off in the distance? What did he live through? He says nothing…

Images are just images, yet some of them almost come to life. Capital or no capital, returning is not crucial. Instead, you could go farther south, live in the sun among bleached houses and palm trees, drink with tourists, sleep with prostitutes. It’s as enticing as a glittering dream. You can win easy money and build a mansion, get horses and servants, donate a lot to the local church… The opportunities are endless and, yes, most of them are awfully boring. That’s why you shouldn’t think about the future, I told myself, while stretching my arms. The City of M. and my secret are more alive than all these fleeting images. I have not had a chance to savor them to my heart’s content, so I am hurrying to show quick affection for access to their realm, despite the mustiness of the courtyard that is sheltering my temporary weakness. But this isn’t the time to be weak – even though there is nothing to hide. You can even remove your make-up now. They don’t catch spies here, and besides, I haven’t come for mysteries.

My thoughts calmed down. The shots faded little by little, scattering like fine dust. Almost an hour had passed, perhaps even more. The house almost regained consciousness after its afternoon siesta. Voices wafted through the air; a child’s sobs spluttered out from the open window above me. By the lobby next door, a small group of men had gathered. It seemed as if I could grasp their wary thoughts, the absence of curiosity, their usual aversion to strangers. To make you feel unwanted, it is enough to have no one look at you – but I couldn’t have cared less. If anything, we were equally disinterested. Tired of sitting, I got up to move my legs. The screech of the excavator became louder, more high-pitched; the kitten disappeared; night was falling. After dawdling a little, I started the engine and drove back to the main street.

Everything had become livelier: work was over; the city – animated and alive. Even more cars packed the street, while people congregated on the sidewalks, their faces flowing together. No one was honking at me now. My car rolled along easily with the general flow, and I was not suspected of being an outsider. Only insecurity stood out, yet that can happen to anyone – it’s not a basis for distinction. Storefronts and entrances slipped by; traffic lights blinked, dictating the cars’ rhythm and introducing an even tempo as the first sign of recognition. I reveled in my freedom, it was still new, not yet repulsive or obsolete. For the first time I was running not from something, but toward something, which is completely different. Everything was in my hands and depended only on me. Of course, this “for something” still needed to be extracted from my own mind, and I looked forward to long evenings without distractions, the blessed solitude of interpretation, which can always be interrupted by going to a nearby pub. But the main components were there, in place, in my immediate thoughts that had always been ready to turn into words, into those phrases that engender believable proximity. They straighten out the curves – scared of getting bogged down in the irritating cycles of falls and flights – and draw a thick line to the final dot, not at random in the best case scenario, though trying to ignore the subtlety of the original outline. Yes, the outcome turns out similar, you can’t even tell the difference at first. That, of course, is just an approximation, yet in my case it might work. After all, some of the words are already there – I can refer to two genuine names: M. and Julian. They are much more reliable than the common ones, which you usually make do with. And even if I’ve made a mistake, I can change the order of these names afterwards. We’ll get to Julian later, for the blood still pulsates through my veins when I think of him. The City of M. however – here it is around me, so even immediate straightening up might not be needed, unless laziness gets in the way. But no – I’m not that lazy.

Lost in thought I turned off the avenue, following the fork in the road that suddenly sent my car into a tricky U-turn. Now I was circling through small cross streets, a pageant of various signs, shops, cafes and bars – some crowded, others clearly half-empty. With cars parked on both sides, it was not easy to drive, and I slowed to a crawl, picking my way carefully like a man in a dense mechanical forest.

My thoughts began to sparkle again in agitation, as if awoken by another riddle. It would be easy to get seriously lost here, I thought, get lost and remain face to face with the urban ghosts, feeling their shadows slither along your clothes as they come out of the arches and alleyways, before disappearing again without giving you time to make them out. You could wrestle with them – for fun anyways, when your head is preoccupied with the day’s problems, or even now when you don’t have any problems at all. But you’re sensitive enough to feel the tickle of excitement that is already running down your spine. It was as if I had gained new strength and could taste the air after picking up the barely perceptible scent like a well-trained hound. The city’s magic was enveloping me. And though it was hardly discernible to anyone, I, as you can tell, am not like anyone. It suddenly became clear: everything here is for real. It just can’t be any other way, even if there’s no proof and your sensations lose their power when expressed casually aloud. Nonetheless, my conviction was getting stronger, I couldn’t argue with it. Wings seemed to have grown from my shoulders or sprouted on my car. Every corner cached either an ally or an overt enemy, my secret victim. I even had to hold myself back in order not to succumb to the opiate and do something dumb just because I wanted to do something… I thought about cigarettes, deeming it a really good time for one. Yet I remembered that I’d finished the last pack a while ago and began looking impatiently for a store.

One appeared on the very next corner. I bought my favorites and lingered a little, before walking in the wide-open door of an adjacent café. I was anticipating hot chocolate or at least coffee with sugar and milk, but got only disappointment. An elderly waiter informed me ruefully yet firmly that the only hot drink they had was tea. He then proceeded to stand stock-still with his arms folded over his belly, as if he were ready to be thrashed and humiliated, but would not be forced back an inch. I nodded indifferently, peeking in aggravation at the cheap, fake gold on his ring finger. The waiter cast another rueful glance at me, opened his pad, scribbled something down and retreated, stooping and dropping his shoulders. As he shuffled across the room, I noticed that several people turned to watch him.

I waited for my tea, lighting a cigarette and beginning to examine the locals sitting in the café. There weren’t too many of them, just a few homely fellows, the only interesting one being a scrawny man of about forty in wrinkled and soiled clothes, with disheveled hair and a two-day old stubble. But his gaze was astonishing, one full of pure sadness that struggled through his dense, weather-stained eyebrows. Having noticed that I was watching him furtively, he nodded to me and smiled so openly that his wizened face became ten years younger, while his eyes, on the other hand, grew much older – although the sadness in them disappeared and gave way to passive melancholy. I was stunned by the change and turned away, just barely nodding in response, since I didn’t want to appear too impolite. But the man, after fidgeting a little, suddenly got up and started to make his way towards me.

This was pointless and wasn’t part of the plan. Annoyed, I berated myself and thought I’d have to leave without waiting for my tea. But the stranger did not make an attempt to sit down and talk. Humbly he asked for a cigarette, received it, and then swiftly dug a small harmonica out of the recesses of his raincoat. Taking two steps back and turning to the side, he started playing an excerpt from something solemn and unfamiliar. Nonetheless, it was unexpectedly good and clear, filling the room at once with the sound of sobbing violins. So much so that the air even rang, soot fell from the walls, and the dim lanterns on the ceiling turned into a sparkling crystal chandelier. Yet a moment later it all ended. He had played several phrases and now stopped as abruptly as he’d begun, awkwardly and briefly bowing his head before returning to his chair. Someone laughed, someone applauded jokingly. In general it was obvious that they had gotten used to him long ago and that such episodes surprised no one. I felt a strange sense of uneasiness and tried not to look at him any more as I hurried to finish my cigarette and gulp down the hot and almost tasteless tea that had somehow appeared on the table out of nowhere.

Suddenly, I heard loud steps resonating as if steel were banging on concrete. Another visitor burst into the café: a tall man, a bit over thirty, with slicked-back raven hair, dressed in an expensive black suit and an elegant scarf. He walked without regarding anyone, his entire appearance in absolute contrast to the rest of the crowd. His arrival quieted them down and made them cringe. Only my random acquaintance, the man with the harmonica, jumped to his feet and dashed to meet the newcomer, his face lighting up with joy when he realized who it was. His expression was totally out of place for everyone including the man in the expensive suit, who barely turned his head as he put out his arm and gave the musician a jolt in the chest, so the latter nearly fell and had to grab a table at the last minute to break his fall, his harmonica flying to the corner, to the spring doors with an amateur painting of a slipper on one and a boot on the other. There were chuckles all around, but my acquaintance was not discouraged in the least – scrambling to his feet and smiling benignly at those who were laughing. By the far end of the room, the tall man sat down and began reading something with his back to everyone and his head propped on his palm. “Good work,” I thought again, yet it didn’t turn out sarcastically. Something had sobered me up. It seemed as if the city was showing its unfamiliar side, agitating me and hitting a sore spot. Interfering still crossed my mind for some time, but I was unsure how, and then just cursed my stupidity, chucked some change in the saucer and walked off.

It was already getting dark and the lights came on. A sharp gust of wind made me shiver. I felt I’d had enough impressions and needed to think about where to spend the night. The first encounter is over, I thought somewhat sadly, it’s time to get used to the new place and forget my fantasies. In fact, they had already retreated into the darkness and hid in the corners with all their demons, supplanted by a tedious list of mundane trifles. My recent revival faded; I was alone in a strange city that was completely preoccupied with itself, and I had yet to find my role in its life.

My car was waiting for me, not bothered by anyone, its bumper shimmering reassuringly. I started the engine, went around an obelisk that rose up in front of me, and drove in search of a policeman or a store where I could buy a tourist guide. But it was neither a policeman, nor a guide that I needed, since a hotel soon appeared with a sign that invitingly said there were vacancies. Then came another, and subsequently a third, where I stopped and received a single with a bathroom and windows looking out on the courtyard. Haphazardly I unpacked a few things and went to lie down on the bed, dozing off quickly.

It was not long before someone woke me up by knocking politely at the door. I opened it and found myself standing face to face with an elderly man in a uniform that consisted of a jacket with a carnation in the buttonhole and wide pants with stripes on the side. He introduced himself as Piolin, an innkeeper who had been in business for many years and was getting up there in years himself. He certainly wasn’t young, looked sixty, though afterwards I learned he was only fifty-five. But figures like these – sixty and fifty-five – are almost identical from my side of the forty-year-old barrier, so it wasn’t as if I’d been misled. He greeted me with a nod and walked in slowly, taking a seat in the room’s only chair. As he made himself comfortable, I went over to the window and stood there with my arms crossed, for his presence irked me and I was waiting for him to leave.

Piolin was in no rush however. He asked about my trip, wondered if the room wasn’t too hot, and inquired into what I disliked more – the heat or the cold. When I snapped back that I couldn’t stand either the one or the other, he informed me that the air conditioner was running at full steam and the room wouldn’t get any cooler no matter what was done.

“Not under any circumstances,” he repeated with gusto. Then he became interested in the size of the shoes I wear and the ties and shirts I prefer. He gave me a detailed description of the hotel’s laundry and ironing services, the completely standard ones, and asked what soap, shampoo and shaving cream I like to use. After going into the bathroom to get a bar of the hotel’s soap, he was about to give it to me for a sniff, but sniffed it himself instead, bending his head so that I could see the round bald spot on the crown of his head. Smelling it, he said it reeked something wretched, then broke the bar in two, tossing both halves in the trashcan, and went to sit on the bed.

The conversation moved on to cologne. Piolin minutely described the three brands of cologne he had preferred, one after the other, in the course of his conscious life as a man, although he did mention various incidental lines that he had not gotten used to and thus did not deserve in-depth consideration. He asked me to describe the cologne I use, and when I simply gave it to him for a sniff, he screwed up his face and said he hadn’t been asking for that at all. What’s more, he added, the smell is in fact quite easy to describe. It’s not like a color, which is simply impossible to describe in words, but with a smell it’s quite possible, isn’t it?

“All the more so, young man, when someone has talents like yours,” Piolin went on authoritatively. In his hand I saw he was holding the registration card I’d filled out downstairs, where I’d written that I was a “journalist.” This was not true and it made me feel ashamed. Piolin, however, wrapped up the conversation on cologne, apologizing for his insistency and explaining that he was generally interested in smells, that smells had occupied a long and lasting place in his life and had always been very important, just like women – things that are closely related indeed.

I decided to get rid of him or at least change the subject, which was depressing, irrelevant, and dull. Besides, I was hungry and told him this, yet Piolin only mumbled distractedly: “Yes, yes, hungry. That’s not good…,” and started talking about his niece Mary, about how she was constantly hungry, though also unbelievably skinny. “Here, you can see for yourself,” he suggested unexpectedly, pulling a threadbare notebook out of his breast pocket and an old photo from the pages inside. But before holding it out to me, he glanced at it, frowned, slipped it back in and pulled out another. He probably has a number of nieces, I thought with a smile. Mary turned out to be an unattractive girl with a long, thin face and bulging eyes. She did not resemble Piolin in the least and I told him this just to say something.

Piolin replied with genuine curiosity: “Really?” – and added – “But everyone says we look alike… Well, it’s hard to say from the photo. The lighting, you know, the focus – there’s no life on paper…” He held the photograph in his hands a bit longer, peering at it suspiciously, then lifted his eyes to me and smirked slyly: “By the way, she lives in your part of the world now; you haven’t met her by any chance, have you?”

“No, not that I recall,” I replied in the same tone. And a moment later I found myself hearing the story of how Mary got involved with a teacher from the capital. He had come to M. for a three-month qualification course, but took off after a month or so because of the unprecedented heat wave that had tormented the city that summer.

“And this dimwitted floozy went off after him, without even saying goodbye. At first she was unaffectionate, treated him coolly, though soon – you wouldn’t have recognized her – she got pregnant right away, like a cat,” – Piolin confided in a whisper, looking me right in the face with unblinking, watery eyes. – “What happened then is as clear as day: he brushed her aside. She’s still sitting there however; she wasn’t gonna go back for anything,” he complained, saying finally that they definitely could’ve crippled her seducer for life, even in the capital, yet it was no longer relevant because Mary was pregnant again – and this time it wasn’t the teacher.

“Uh huh,” I drawled, not knowing what else to add. – “It’s interesting, what can I say… Well, thanks for stopping by. I suppose I’m going to go have some dinner now, if you don’t mind. I’ve been on the road all day and haven’t eaten anything substantial…”

At this, I resolutely walked across the room to demonstrate that I was ready to leave him, although that didn’t make much of an impression on Piolin. – “Well, sure, you need to have dinner. You and I can eat dinner together,” he said contemplatively, looking off to the side, before transferring his gaze to me and adding with some irritation: “But why are you in such a hurry, why can’t you sit still? We need to get to know each other first, have a talk like human beings…”

“Actually, I was planning to eat alone…” I objected, a bit bewildered. Yet Piolin casually dismissed me: “Why are you insisting on being alone?” – He raised his finger and repeated instructively: “You’ve got to act like a human being.” – Then he closed his eyes and added importantly that he wasn’t in fact there just to chat. That is, he was there to chat too – why not – but he’d also come on business. He had to ask me a question – “a completely, completely formal one; nothing personal at all” – and there was no way to avoid it, because the city laws required it, and all innkeepers were obliged to obey the law, like other residents of M. As for me, I was not one, and its laws did not apply to me, so I was completely within my rights not to answer the question. But even if the laws had applied to me, I could still have refused to respond, because first of all, there was no law requiring me to do so and then there was no one who would ask me such a question in this case.

After reasoning along these lines for several more minutes, Piolin fell silent, assumed a dignified air and inquired in a soft, ingratiating tone of voice: “Tell me, my dear friend, what is the purpose of your visit to the City of M.?” – And with this, something swiftly changed: he stood erect and exuded a sense of threat, becoming what appeared to be a sly and unpleasant man. I sensed that he was uptight and even a little nervous, as if he were getting to something he’d been expecting for a while and had now almost reached. There was nothing terrible about his question. And though I’m not fond of idle curiosity, there was no reason not to respond – that is, for anyone other than me, because just then I had reasons and couldn’t tell the truth to the first person I met. That’s why I found the question abhorrent. It was as if someone were obstinately prying into my soul, trying to penetrate its most private places.

My cheeks started burning. I realized I was blushing and saw the expression on Piolin’s face reflected badly concealed curiosity. He knew he’d nailed me on something. I needed to pull myself together. It wasn’t worth arguing with the man, and it was high time I got used to my plan, for I couldn’t blush every time someone asked me about it. Still, I was totally confused: What could I say without saying anything? How could I possibly pretend to be nonchalant and speak of Julian when my nerves began to tremble at the thought of him? Furthermore, you can’t explain anything to others anyway, so I stood there baffled and didn’t say a word for a few seconds. Piolin waited patiently, and I, at last coming to myself, insinuated that I wanted to leave the question unanswered, as I had a fairly personal reason.

Yet he continued to look at me in expectation, not giving the slightest impression that we had concluded the matter. I got irritated and told him more brusquely that the question also somewhat surprised me. However this made me angry at myself: I was saying something unnecessary and losing my temper while I indulged him. Nevertheless, irritation got the better of me again, this time even worse. I descanted on something about how the very article in the civil code of M. seemed strange, smelling slightly of restrictions on personal freedom and causing the development of some unpleasant habits in innkeepers. This upset my companion tremendously – though I’m not sure what disturbed him more, my refusal to answer or my chaotic accusations.

As he remained seated on the bed with his head tilted to the side, Piolin began tediously to explain that there were no restrictions on freedom here since the law did not forbid anyone from doing anything. Moreover, it almost did not force anyone to do anything at all, and if it did, it was only to inquire about trivial matters. Furthermore, he went on, it forces an insignificantly small group of people to do this – just innkeepers and no one else. You could certainly talk about restricting the freedom of innkeepers, but it’s not worth it, because they don’t feel their liberties have been violated or circumscribed. Give them the right to act as they please, and the first thing they’ll do is ask their guests the very same question, as anyone else would, because – and here Piolin raised his finger – because how else can these guests interest the residents of M., if not by telling us why they came here. And especially out of season, this takes on a rather unhealthy form: as soon as a new guest appears, everyone keeps trying to worm the reason out of him, digging and digging until he finally loses his temper. So the law was passed to help regulate all this and – what’s more – to protect innkeepers just a bit. And if it doesn’t protect them, then at least it provides moral support, since they are usually among the first people to meet a visitor, and consequently it is even more difficult for them to restrain their curiosity than it is for others. On top of that, you have to consider the neighbors’ curiosity – and innkeepers are well aware of this. It excites them, drives them to extract the truth hastily, unprepared, leaving them confused and embarrassed afterwards. So now they do it in compliance with the law, as if others require it, and they are only subject to a small fraction of the embarrassment, an insignificant amount of embarrassment, which can’t really be called that – it’s just a little awkwardness.

He went on in this vein, until I interrupted him and proceeded to expound just as tediously and disjointedly that everything certainly appeared in a different light now and that I was not offended in the least. Everything, I added, seems quite natural and even somewhat logical, especially if you consider the remarkable curiosity of the residents of M., and so on and so forth.

The minutes went by. Piolin still sat on the bed, shaking his head from time to time. When I finished, it became clear that I might understand the situation with the law perfectly, but nonetheless I was not intending to answer his question. He sighed and tried to persuade me. He explained that this collective curiosity, the City of M.’s little weakness, was not something humiliating for its visitors – you can and should understand it as simply part of the local color, which is one of the main attractions anyway for everyone who’s dying to come here. Moreover, Piolin added, no one is interested in the precocious phraseology that seems to roll off some people’s tongues. No, he continued, visitors can’t get away with lame excuses; they’re expected to give real answers, not those blasé ones like “to do some sightseeing” or, even worse, “to swim in the ocean.” In these instances, the asker simply feels insulted; and even slightly insulting your hosts – to tell you the truth – is never a good way to begin a stay in an unfamiliar place. Once again, I felt something unpleasant emanate from Piolin and a shutter ran involuntarily through my body.

With a scowl on my face I noted peevishly that it was easy to imagine the kind of people who came there for precisely the reasons that Piolin had suggested. What’s more, those visitors probably made up the vast majority. But Piolin moved his head back and forth before embarking on a spout of absolute drivel. At this moment I remembered I was very hungry and decided that I just couldn’t take it any longer. Instantly, as if he were reading my mind, he fell silent and turned into the man that had entered my room two hours ago, an elderly man who was a polite and very ordinary innkeeper. He quaintly apologized for his talkativeness and said with a wink that he wouldn’t mind getting a bite to eat too, proceeding further to beg my pardon for his forgetfulness: “You must be dying of hunger, while I’m tormenting you with conversation. It’s already high time to expand the scope of your knowledge about the hotel and hospitality in the City of M. in general, and the best way to do this is to go to the restaurant downstairs and have a proper meal…”

He started heading for the door, but then stopped and ended up by the window instead, drumming his fingers on the windowsill, as he elaborately described the roast rabbit in red wine with a local plum sauce – all of which would be brought to us immediately. I certainly should have refused with the utmost firmness, yet the useless discussion had depleted my energy so much that I could no longer argue. I said that if it was up to me, I was ready to go without delay. Piolin, though, held me up with a cautious gesture and said gently, gazing into my eyes: “The only problem is that I have a little question for you, one about the affinity of souls, so to speak. Tell me…” – and he again inquired about the purpose of my visit to the City of M., as if we hadn’t just spent a torturous half hour squabbling over precisely this. I dropped down on the bed in despair, sitting in the place he had occupied earlier. I realized that I was losing my self-control, that I could not fight this man. Yet Piolin kept going. He passionately explained that he didn’t want to torment me. No, on the contrary, he wanted to do something nice; but still there was no avoiding the question. Moreover, he wouldn’t even insist on a complete description of all my motives and surreptitious reasons, although he did expect at least a hint, at least a tiny clue.

Because every hint is true in its own way, Piolin was saying, if you try, it’s possible to find a compromise that’s acceptable on all sides, so no one’s offended. But some effort is needed, and a little good will doesn’t hurt either – after all, a compromise doesn’t come out of nowhere. It’s all up to me now, after he told me so much – about M., about the little weaknesses of its residents. At the very least he had been candid with me and was now presuming that it wasn’t really beneficial for me to slip off all of a sudden and slam the door in his face without making any effort to help.

“Okay,” I said, “you win, Piolin, I’ll answer your question with the utmost sincerity, without any hints, without concealing anything, because I’ve got no more energy.”

Then, looking spitefully into the street, I divulged that I had come there to find a certain person, an acquaintance who, as far as I had heard, had already been living in M. for six months; and that I intended to stay there till I found him. Piolin’s face took on an expression of interest and he asked about the name of my acquaintance, if, of course, I could tell him; that is, if there was no reason for me to conceal it. I interrupted him quite harshly with my tongue not obeying me as I enunciated the name Julian, and added nastily: “Now, if you don’t mind, I would finally like to eat.”

Then I took a step away from the window, but Piolin appeared next to the door with surprising agility, his arms extended toward me as if to hold me in the room. I felt like he was going to keep me inside until he had obtained everything he wanted. And he knew that I knew this.

“Just one sec though,” he said quickly, “just one incy-wincy second, because you misunderstood something there, something we need to clear up right away, so it doesn’t get in the way later and doesn’t become an insurmountable barrier between you and everyone else you run into here, including me, to be completely frank. This misunderstanding is so obvious that it’s a little bit strange to even talk about it.” – And Piolin really did stop speaking for a moment, as if to give me a chance to intervene and clear up the matter on my own. But I was silent, and he continued immediately, embarking on a long edifying speech.

No one comes to M. looking for “certain people,” he pontificated sadly. It’s impossible to find “a certain person” in the City of M., that is, the one you have come for and knew before. You just have no hope of finding someone here, even an old friend, even if you remember his face and know everything about his former life. You may repeat his name over and over again, write it down somewhere and keep it in a secret place next to his photo; you may be on good terms with your memory, and armed to the hilt, yet in reality you are absolutely unarmed, because there’s no such person in M. You have to understand this – he poked his finger at me – understand and not give in to delusion. It’s certainly easier to lie to yourself than it is to look the truth in the eye, but I’ll tell you the truth, because I see you’ll appreciate it. You won’t find anyone here, not your friend, not a woman if you need a woman, not compassion if you deserve compassion, and you’ll leave the city without resolving its riddles, because your misunderstanding won’t let you open your eyes. Your goal isn’t clear to me, though I can see your delusion a mile away. Give it up, abandon the useless, and M. will come to your aid. Otherwise… otherwise, you will remain a stranger, and those who you come across here will view you as a stranger and respond with indifference…

Piolin got agitated. His jacket puckered, and his carnation bent sadly over to the side, as it wilted away. Even his face transformed; his cheeks sagged over his chin, where a deep wrinkle or scar slit the skin; his eyes sunk in their sockets and looked out from deep pits, like those of a hermit who had lost track of time. I was surprised by his pompousness, since it didn’t seem to fit him, and I tried to slow him down with objections. But there was no stopping Piolin; he stood his ground and acted as if he had become deaf to the words of others.

“Certainly anything can happen,” he said forcefully. “You’ll run right into the person you’re searching for on the street and you’ll recognize him from the photo in your wallet; you’ll be sure he’s in front of you, sure you can’t be mistaken. There’s a chance he’ll respond to the name you know and will even agree that he’s the one you’re so unceremoniously trying to find, perhaps against his will. And you’ll think that you’ve accomplished your goal, yet that’s hardly the case, because the chances are so minimal that it isn’t even worth talking about. The City of M. isn’t as small as it might seem at first sight, although it’s certainly no match for the capital. If you enter on the main road, then you’re downtown in a flash, and it seems that the whole city is right there, half of it left behind. But no, there’s a lot more to M., things that don’t reveal themselves immediately. One glance isn’t enough to take it all in, while hoping to capture the face you need. If you look at the map – and I’ll bring you a map – it won’t take more than a second to see how confusing it is, what intricate lines can be drawn by tracing one single street with a pencil. And there isn’t just one street here, but hundreds, hundreds... Furthermore, there are also quite a few people, each one different from the others; you can live here all your life and fail to understand who’s who. That’s what happens to the majority, and not all of them are dumb, not even close. Here, many are searching for many, and some of the many who were once very visible – well, just try and unearth them now, you won’t hear a thing.”

“Your acquaintance may be someone extraordinary,” Piolin continued, calming down a little. “Yet there are always others who are no worse. It’s useless to ask everyone where you can find so-and-so who’s like this and that. At best, they’ll listen to the end and go their own way, though they might laugh behind your back, or even in your face. And allegories won’t help: every hint has a cost, but the cost usually isn’t high, and the white stitches always stick out… Of course, if you don’t want to talk, don’t.” – He sighed. – “My job is to warn you. My amicable sentiments as well as my official duty require it, because do we really know how long you’ll stay here? It might not be that long, since you don’t have any idea yourself, and it’s better to spend your time beneficially – for your benefit, of course, not mine. It happens, I know – you act with the best of intentions, but run up against a wall, and those intentions get you nowhere… The least you can do is not act deviously.” – He shook his head, enticing me to the door and letting me go first. – “It would be best if you said right away that you didn’t want to answer, although it’s your business, of course…”

As we walked down the corridor of the hotel, an uncomfortable feeling crept over me. I forgot about my irritation and thought that Piolin had become offended with me for nothing, but his face didn’t show any sign of emotion. He appeared just as he had at the very beginning of our acquaintance, and even the carnation in his buttonhole freshened up and acquired its original spiffy look. Politely directing me to the elevator, Piolin drew my attention to the new carpet and ornate chandeliers – signs of the hotel’s prosperity. He thanked me on behalf of the entire hotel staff for deciding to stay there and he assured me that the service was excellent, the staff well trained, and the maids gentle and modest, with some even being very cute. He did lament that the ocean side was windy at the moment, and that this was why most of the rooms were unoccupied, informing me nonetheless how impossible it was to find a room there during the holiday season.

“It’s all full, young man; you wouldn’t believe it, but it really is,” he said, and became somewhat distracted, pushed the wrong elevator button, turned away and started humming some melody.

Suddenly he swiveled around again and thanked me in the most official tone for the understanding I had shown. He appreciated my cooperation in the formal procedure he was obliged to follow, which had been demonstrated by the fact that I, in full compliance with the rules for visitors, had refused to answer his question while stating this in a clear and intelligible manner. It was delightful, because not everyone was like that. Some tried to be sly and elusive, which led to mutual exhaustion and even dissatisfaction with the other party. It was for this reason that one could not help but rejoice when the whole matter went quickly and smoothly because, in truth, it wasn’t worth a damn.

As for my request, Piolin continued when we were in the elevator, my request to receive help with the search for my acquaintance, a certain Julian, a person, it seems, with enviable gifts and personal qualities, he was sure that the entire hotel staff and he himself would be glad to help any visitor, or better yet, any guest, with whatever he was doing there. They would, for example, provide useful advice or offer maps and other topographical materials for a decent price – and Piolin again turned away and started humming under his nose. The elevator moved so slowly you could hardly say it was crawling, and it seemed like an eternity before the doors finally opened and we proceeded down a large bright passageway.

“But I have to warn you right off the bat.” – Piolin livened up at once. – “There’s no guarantee that this help will produce any results, especially with something like the search for an acquaintance in M. It’s generally hard to find anything here, even an inanimate object, let along a human being. Furthermore, sometimes you are looking for one thing, yet come across something totally different: instead of finding person X, you find some Y, and only then do you realize you needed Z. It’s the same now: you might think you’re searching for Julian, but end up finding someone named Gibbs – although in any case it’s easier to find Gibbs because it is he who manages the restaurant where we are going. So we’ll certainly achieve our goal here – at least to some degree.” – Piolin chuckled shrilly at his own joke. – “And there’s no need to wince, because Gibbs is in fact an expert in the Ocean Dunes, a local, so to say, trailblazer, and if he can’t help us find something in M., then nobody can. But even if the matter comes to nothing, it’s not that bad either, because at least Gibbs will give us something to munch on. That’s why it’s absolutely clear that none other than Gibbs is our man at the moment.” – And again Piolin turned away, continuing to hum to himself as if he’d completely lost interest in me.

This is how we entered the restaurant – without looking at each other. The staff addressed us respectfully, took us to a small table in the back, and a few minutes later Gibbs came over. I didn’t like him the moment I laid eyes on him, although there was something appealing that would not let me go and forced me to make an effort not to regard him too candidly. Of course, it would have been hard to miss the earlier comment on the Ocean Dunes, and any assessment after that was likely to be excessively partial. Nonetheless, I repeat, he left a bad taste in my mouth – which utterly dismayed me. Moreover, while we sat alone, Piolin added even more, telling me confidentially that Gibbs, on top of everything else, had actually seen the Black Pelicans – and didn’t hide it in spite of decorum. This excited me at once, and I no longer regretted eating my dinner with them, rather than alone as I had been planning initially. When I shook hands with Gibbs, however, I sensed somewhat bitterly that I was expecting too much and probably wouldn’t get what I hoped for. He was fussy and ostentatious and looked at me surreptitiously – at first with a rather unfriendly gaze, but then, after Piolin introduced me, with exaggerated joy. Still, you couldn’t completely believe his pose as you doubt a slightly shoddy masquerade, and the disappointment would not leave me in peace, until other thoughts distracted and let me forget about him for a while.

“He’s a very tricky guy,” Piolin whispered to me meaningfully before Gibbs was with us. “He’s complicated and makes a strange impression – if not to say worse. Which he may as well do, since he’s always running into trouble, leaving others speechless from the how and what of it all. Take this story with the Black Pelicans – when he lost half his face…” Piolin chewed his lip and glanced to the side for a few seconds before adding: “Yes, half his face was gone; there’s nothing else to say.”

“What do you mean?” I said in surprise, not feeling quite at ease.

“Just that,” Piolin cut me off roughly, before elaborating in a gentler tone: “You’ll see for yourself when he comes. However, don’t start grilling him – he doesn’t like to be questioned. He’s never spoken of them to me, but people prattle away – maybe some of them have heard something, although you wouldn’t understand what’s fact and what’s fiction… Any idiot knows: even when they come one by one, you need to keep your guard up. No, ‘keep it up’ is understating it a bit; in fact, you have to be very, very careful. Yet he ran into something like an entire flock and went right up to them for no reason at all. I don’t know what was going through his head – some whim or simply sunstroke – but he strode on up to them just like that, as if they had him by a leash. He wasn’t alone, no, he had a companion who understood everything instantly – that there was a whole host of them and that Gibbs was walking right there. The man was no blockhead: he threw himself facedown on the sand and lay there without moving, holding back his screams. When Gibbs returned, he was already out of sight – he waited, waited and then shuffled away – but, in all honesty, you don’t return from the Black Pelicans quickly… So Gibbs wandered about by himself, traipsed over all the northern dunes and didn’t meet anybody. The season back then was also over, and that was for the better – he had time to get used to himself, which must not be easy without half your face. When he emerged in public again, nobody paid much attention to him: he had long since ceased to be a novelty and they partially forgot him – despite his being well-known here, if not to say famous. And, as far as he saw it, he hadn’t become anything new, even if he did change after that…”

But Piolin did not have a chance to say how he’d been altered, because at that moment Gibbs approached us in person. I regarded him initially with a little fear, although I didn’t see anything terrible. Of course, if you look at him from the lost side, then it seems a little strange, like he has no face at all, even if all the parts are in place; and from the front it is also unconventional in some way, but from the other side there is nothing remarkable – a profile’s a profile.

We were introduced and took our seats, then the waiter appeared and all of us began to discuss the menu. As soon as we finished, the two of them moved directly to the subject of me. Piolin was especially zealous – spoke non-stop, told jokes and made rather blunt wisecracks, eyeing me furtively. Gibbs mostly agreed and cleared his throat, though he also tossed in a truism here and there. Still, neither let me get a word in edgewise.

I had no clue what brought me to the very center of their attention and listened in some surprise to the story of my past, which they had concocted on the spot from the scanty information on my registration card. Gibbs immediately guessed that I had studied at … the university; a good university, he said, and the students there were generally lively – no wonder some became journalists. Personally, he didn’t think too highly of these people, but you did meet a few acceptable ones among them. Then they pursued the question of whether I had graduated or not, and came to the conclusion that I had probably received my diploma, “because he’s more infatuated with himself than girls,” said Piolin, summing it all up in a way that was not completely comprehensible. Randomly Gibbs speculated on various activities that could have entertained me in my free time during those years, distracting me from the acquisition of knowledge and even muddling my thoughts for some days or months, and Piolin considered each flickering image before accepting or rejecting it: costly motorcycle racing (dismissed by Piolin), different games with balls (retained with some doubt), playing music (supported enthusiastically) and even mild political extremism – which made Piolin yawn. At this, Gibbs stopped the game, turned away from me and started to ask Piolin questions like, “How has the young man settled in here?”, to which Piolin replied that I was doing very well; or, “Does the young man know that the elevator doesn’t work at night?” and Piolin said, yes, I was aware of this, despite the fact that I wasn’t – nobody had told me anything about the elevator. And they continued in this spirit while we waited for our meal, though eventually Gibbs did recount a long story about how he had once been trapped in a lift with two chambermaids, but he didn’t manage to wrap it up, because at that moment the starters appeared on the table and everybody became preoccupied with their salad. It wasn’t half bad – the salad – and the rabbit they served afterwards was very good indeed. We barely exchanged a word as we ate, with only Gibbs mumbling something now and then. When we finished the main course, Piolin inquired about my preference for dessert, but I turned him down, since I was full and already craving sleep. Then, with a wave of the hand, Piolin sent the waiter away and declared that it was finally time to talk business.

To put it bluntly, my greatest wish was to pay and leave. I didn’t need any help and didn’t want anything to do with them, since their clumsy hospitality and continuous pressure rather annoyed me. We hardly knew each other, and I was not used to trusting anybody after the very first dinner, which I was about to mention when Piolin’s face took on such a purposeful expression and Gibbs suddenly tensed up so much that I became diffident and surrendered, calming myself with the thought that I could always abandon them and was in no rush just now. Then and there, Piolin turned formal and pompous, called Gibbs “my esteemed friend” and me nothing other than “our guest” or “our dear guest”, while I listened to them obediently, as if entranced.

“So, my esteemed friend,” said Piolin authoritatively to Gibbs, “Our guest, you know, is searching for someone in M.; that is, he still hasn’t set out – is only looking around – but rest assured, he will certainly begin soon. It’s a difficult matter, as you are aware, and it would be better for him to scratch his plan – right here, at once. However, our guest is not easily frightened (Gibbs regarded me quickly and acutely) and does not like to renounce his intentions. No, sir, he doesn’t…” He was silent for a few seconds, and Gibbs too did not speak, waiting for him to continue.

Piolin loudly slurped a sip of water and started to talk unintelligibly about fellowship, trust, and some agreement that we had made and that I did not recall. For his part, Gibbs nodded absent-mindedly the whole time, as if he too did not completely understand. Only once did his face convey sympathy mixed with slight astonishment, and then he abruptly turned the other blank half to me and began scratching his neck violently. Piolin stopped, waiting for this to end, and Gibbs settled down, listening to Piolin and sitting as before – though with all expression having vanished from the normal part of his face. I knew I had to interrupt them and object. Piolin was again weaving some yarn, saying all sorts of drivel and furtively prodding me. But it was all the same to me now, I was tired and waited apathetically to see how it would play out – watching what was happening as if I were not a part of it and did not want to exhibit even the slightest bit of initiative. This apparently suited my interlocutors perfectly – they seemed to expect nothing else from me, which probably should have put me on the alert, yet for some reason did not.

“Yes, he dragged us into this, he did, but there’s no calling him a con man,” continued Piolin, threatening me jokingly with his finger. – “Anyone can deceive you, that’s right, but then those who deceive always get a beating for it… No, he pulled me into it openly, without any craftiness whatsoever. But how he knew about you, my esteemed friend, I can’t imagine for the life of me. That is, I’m aware of how he found out – I told him about you myself, but how he managed to force my hand – that’s a mystery, all right. Nevertheless, he got what he wanted, and for us, Gibbs, there’s nowhere else to go. So I’d say it’d be better to begin now, because it’s a little late to waffle and it’s easier to take care of it quickly: delays just do damage – faces, you know, get forgotten, names erased, and, worse still, people die inadvertently from time to time; so I would suggest,” – Piolin grew even more somber, – “putting aside the jokes and getting right down to business.”

Gibbs lay his elbows on the table, turned to me and again became tense all over. His muscles bulged under his jacket and the veins on his neck stood out, but he asked in a fairly benevolent voice: “Name?”

“July,” Piolin butted in immediately, answering for me, although nobody had asked him to do this. Then he corrected himself: “That is, almost July… Julian, not July… July-Julian, what’s the difference,” – and he looked at me encouragingly with a wry half-smile.

I didn’t say a word, merely gazed ahead with a dissatisfied air, as Gibbs contemplated a little, then crawled under the table and pulled out a small travel bag. He had probably brought it with him, and I simply hadn’t noticed – however, I could have sworn that there had been nothing in his hands.

Riddles, riddles, I thought irritably, while Gibbs rummaged out a photo that he lay on the table. It was a picture of an elderly man standing and leaning slightly to the side as he smiled sickly into the camera.

“Him?” Piolin asked me, turning it to himself and regarding it rapaciously.

“No, no resemblance whatsoever,” I replied, shrugging my shoulders. Piolin instantly lost interest in the photo and sat back in his chair, while Gibbs nodded in satisfaction, before he picked up his bag and left.

At this, Piolin leaned toward me and, breathing into my face, began to talk about how Gibbs was definitely a master in his field and a trailblazer in general, but that you couldn’t expect any results right away, especially without doing something. Nonetheless, it isn’t an easy task, even for Gibbs – and then you have to keep in mind that though Gibbs is a master, he isn’t famous for grasping the essence quickly and deciding correctly. He spends a lot of time oscillating, so it can seem like he’s just pulling your leg. Still, you shouldn’t underestimate Gibbs – he’s very dangerous indeed, above all when you don’t take him seriously. So you’ll have to muster up a good deal of patience and wait a little – he’ll come round now. Oh, take a look, there he is…

Gibbs approached us with a bundle of papers in his hands, sat down, beckoned to the waiter and ordered coffee. We followed his example. The bundle turned out to be a huge map of the city that had been folded up a few times. Gibbs tried to spread it out on the table, but there was no way the thing would fit and so it was impossible for me to see M. in its entirety. The map was divided into squares. Piolin and Gibbs began to count them and found it had four hundred and sixty – twenty lines across and twenty-three lengthwise. Each square, according to Gibbs, contained a few quarters, so, they were rather big and their delineation had to be reworked – the present one being done for another purpose and thus too large. Piolin proposed increasing the frequency of the lines by one and a half, but Gibbs argued that this would still be inconvenient and prevailed by advocating even more – one point seven five – and they agreed on this, immediately taking up a blunt pencil to redraw them, the new fat lines coinciding only rarely with the old ones. The result was such an enormous number of new and old streaks that, in my opinion, you couldn’t make out a thing. Yet Gibbs was content and said that the map was now divided just right, and Piolin also regarded their work in complete satisfaction.

Then Gibbs laid out his plan, warning us beforehand: he would begin with the very simple – that promised success – and would stay away from anything more complicated till later. Не intended to investigate every quarter thoroughly and completely – initially on the map, then “in the real world.” This way we will inevitably zero in on Julian and leave him no place to go – if he really is in the city. And if he isn’t here, which we’ll know for sure after covering the last quarter, then the second part of the plan will go into effect – which is actually only a frequent repetition of the first: we’ll start over again with square number one and move progressively forward as before, because if Julian isn’t in town at the moment, there’s nothing to stop him from appearing here any minute. Certainly, there’s also nothing to prevent him from clearing out till the end of our search, and then we’ll be in the same place we began, but you can’t control this – and moreover, he can just as easily flit from quarter to quarter and his path won’t necessarily cross ours. These considerations – is Julian living in M. or did he leave long ago, and, if he left, will he come back again and when – all this does not change our plan in the least and does not make it any better or worse. That is what he, Gibbs, considered the fundamental virtue of his scheme – hardly anything in the world could interfere with its implementation.

All that remained, said Gibbs, was for them to discuss the details, that is, the actual method. And here he was able to propose tried-and-true approaches such as continual surveillance in traditionally crowded places – like bars, movie theaters and tram stops – as well as talking with the locals who permanently resided in each quarter, without excluding the possibility of material encouragement to help untie their tongues. Although, he added with some doubt, we must not overdo it, so that our abettor does not fabricate something imaginary in a burst of zeal.

In this manner Gibbs continued, acting methodically and persistently, we will keep moving ahead, which will be reflected on the map by the path of crossed-off quarters or, even better, by gluing pieces of adhesive paper over them. Because no quarter, as long as one does not lead to complete success, can be dismissed from consideration forever. After all, we might return to any given one later, retracing the same course a few times. And surely we’ll return, since, between us, the chances of finding Julian on the first go-round or, more accurately, the first go-rounds are infinitesimally small. Nonetheless, gluing the squares will at least show us that we are not standing still but, quite the opposite, doing everything we can. And this, in turn, will give us an occasion not to hang our heads or spread our hands, which is important, since experience has dictated that despondency is precisely the reason for failure in all even slightly complicated initiatives.

Gibbs stopped talking, visibly satisfied with himself. Piolin – murmuring “trailblazer, trailblazer” – looked now at me, now at Gibbs, with his hands shaking. It was clear that I could not expect anything else worthwhile and had to leave them right then and there. In a few words I thanked them both for their help, and with Gibbs eyeing me thoughtfully, I pulled out my wallet, laid a few bills on the table and prepared to get up.

But I didn’t get far. A stone hand came down on my elbow and pinned me effortlessly to the table. I felt like a butterfly, a beetle sliced in two; I was so surprised that the light above me flipped over, then swung about and returned to its place, yet the hand on my elbow remained in the meantime, though its grip did relax.

“There’s no need to hurry, my dear guest,” said Piolin in a gentle voice, finally letting go of my arm. “What’s the rush? We still haven’t finished. You see, Gibbs is sitting patiently, and I’m not heading anywhere, and we’re dealing with your affairs, after all, not mine or Gibbs’s. We should stick together, as partners do – since that’s what we are in effect. And on top of that, Gibbs and I have already expended so much energy on this friend of yours, on our plan and on you in general that there’s no turning around now. Nobody likes it when you retreat after only going half-way, and Gibbs and I are no different: we’re not used to backing off. Are we, my esteemed friend?” – And Gibbs, to whom he spoke, nodded energetically.

“And this plan of ours is crap,” continued Piolin unexpectedly, again addressing Gibbs and ignoring me, although I sensed the alertness of the hand lying a few inches from my elbow – the hand that was quicker than me. – “It’s nonsense because there are too many quarters and no amount of patience will be enough if you comb through them all and glue them up afterwards. We have to forget that plan and we should stop thinking about the city altogether, since it’s useless to search for Julian here. We must go to the Dunes, there’s no better place for hunting something anyway, and, in all likelihood, we’ll find him there – since where else should he be…”

“That,” drawled Gibbs, “is also an idea,” – And I thought to myself: “The Dunes – again the Dunes… Is it a coincidence or something meaningful indeed?”

Things had been happening much too quickly; I felt thoroughly confused. As recently as yesterday, I had known M. only from hearsay, not to mention those places I had never ever dreamed of reaching. Everyone preferred to keep quiet about them, as if to avoid straying into treacherous territory, but Piolin didn’t hesitate at all. Dunes or no Dunes, he babbled away without batting an eye… It’s strange indeed: long-standing respect vanishes entirely, it looks like you’re discussing nothing more than a routine trip to the countryside – and afterwards going recklessly to the very edge of the world, having no doubts, which, you’d think, would be unavoidable. Well, okay, some people have no fear at all, yet it’s still unclear: Are the Dunes really a place where everyone may feel welcome?

Like someone expecting clarification, I glanced at Piolin, then Gibbs, but they were occupied with each other, having proceeded enthusiastically to a discussion of the latest absurd plan – and moreover, they were outlining a concrete route, as if we had already decided to embark on the expedition. No, I thought, this won’t do, now you’ve gone too far – making decisions on my behalf, dictating where I will and won’t go. You can take off yourself, for all I care, just don’t count on me – thank you very much. Julian is a matter for me alone, and I’ll deal with him myself – no later than tomorrow. Furthermore, it’s hardly likely the Dunes have anything to do with him; whatever the case may be, you have to begin in town, and, to tell you the truth, too much has piled up already, even without the Dunes my head’s been spinning. And you shouldn’t think that the hand by my elbow could intimidate me – no, that’s not the kind of person I am.

At the same time I was listening to names that sounded ominous and strange, regretting to the depths of my soul that it was all in vain and my unexpected companions certainly weren’t summoning me seriously. But what if they were? Anything was possible with these two… What an adventure it would be! – What a shame I have to go my own way… They probably think that I can’t turn them down, that I’ve surrendered and agreed. Most people would acquiesce in my place, but I’m busy, busy, do you understand? You’ll have to wait for another chance. Of course, it wouldn’t be bad to get the better of Julian – he might have wound up here before me, but if, let’s say, I were the first to make it to the Dunes, then that would tip the scales. Or would it not change a thing? And who will you prove it to? And what if it actually ends up that he has already been there?..

The last thought was very unpleasant, and I squirmed in my seat. Gibbs even turned and looked in my eyes as if he were checking a momentary impulse. This passed in a flash, and he shifted his gaze, but it was still enough for me to start convincing myself – why not, why shouldn’t I go with them, even if just out of stubbornness, just out of independence or curiosity, even if no trace of Julian is there to be found? Certainly, these whims were a distraction and raised a lot of superfluous thoughts – I was surprised at myself but couldn’t come up with a decent objection. Gibbs’s expression still hovered over my eyes like a shadow and Piolin, as if to add to my confusion, began insisting that this plan was the one we needed and infinitely outweighed the other.

“You’ll get a good look at the ocean, my dear guest, and, who knows, maybe we’ll even find your guy…” He gibbered on and on – about Julian, about the trailblazer Gibbs, then again about the new scheme, which was nothing like the earlier one, a hundred times better. So that he, Piolin, was even sorry he could not join us. He had too much work – running a hotel, after all, is no joke. “But it’s not a problem,” he quickly reassured me. “Other people will be going with you, friends of ours, good friends – when you set out for the Dunes, you know, the more people the better…” and no sooner had he begun to speak about them, than a dead octopus came flying from a distant part of the room, hitting Gibbs right in the shoulder. Then there was a scream, we jumped up and mayhem broke out.

Everything happened so fast that I didn’t notice the emergence of two tanned men in black jackets that seemed to exude a swamp-like smell and a whole gang of thugs behind them – no less than ten. When I lifted my eyes, the swarthy men were hanging back against the wall to the right of us, while the striplings were advancing from the corner to our left – where the exit was – loudly and chaotically cursing at the two of them and chucking all the junk they could grab off the bar counter and tables in their path as they moved forward. We had landed in the center and I was very anxious: the cocky boys were walking straight towards us.

I glanced over at the two guys being pursued. They were quickly looking every which way, but appeared completely calm on the whole, although they had nowhere to go, and their position seemed thoroughly unenviable. A second passed, no more, yet, when I turned back, I suddenly saw that the boys were already there, at our table. Piolin was surveying them from top to bottom, his mouth opened idiotically, while Gibbs was saying something as he stood in front of them. Then one close by, a stocky blonde, hopped to the side and tried to deliver a whistling blow with something black, which Gibbs dodged like a cat. After that, everything spun in circles, as if I were having a disorderly dream. I remember Piolin holding the blonde’s throat in his iron grasp and thrusting a knee into his backbone. The youngster croaked and Piolin squinted at him with bloodshot eyes saying contentedly: “I’ll teach you something now, watch this…” Out of nowhere, the two men in black jackets emerged right in the thick of it and landed a series of vicious punches. Instantly, the floor became splattered with blood, a few boys were lying facedown, completely still, while the rest were being thrashed toward the door. I flung myself at Piolin to save the blonde, for I thought he was going to strangle him, but someone forced me back and we fell to the floor, right onto the slimy octopus – my face smashing down in the middle of it. The person holding me whispered in my ear: “Wait, wait, let the fun go on…” I jerked about in his hands, yet could not turn around, and when I finally broke free, the light suddenly went out and everything vanished in darkness.

Someone gave a terrible shriek – no doubt, certainly, the blonde, because when the light flipped back on, the boy sat in a chair, raising up his arms to shield him from Piolin who towered over him. One of his ears had almost been ripped off and dangled by a thread, he moaned and howled sickly, then spit a bloody glob at Piolin and the latter immediately grabbed a chair, grunted, and shattered it over the youngster’s head. Everyone froze, and in the silence you could hear Gibbs cursing bluntly. Then he appeared close at hand, obliquely looked at the crushed skull and drove Piolin to the door.

I ran to the restroom and barely made it before I shook with vomit. Afterwards, I stood next to the sink for a long time, washing the remains of the octopus off my face and the blood off my sleeve, although I had no idea where it came from. Some serious, absorbed men came in, but nobody paid any attention to me until I had the courage to ask one of them: “Excuse me, have they already cleaned everything up out there?” Yet he just approached me, stared in my face attentively and left without saying a word. I stood in front of the mirror for a few more minutes and then headed back to the room, walking unsteadily.

The place showed no signs of a fight. Gibbs sat alone at our table and smoked. “Where’s Piolin?” I asked, and was astonished at my foolishness.

Gibbs, however, was not surprised in the least and replied in a bored tone that he probably had business to take care of, that he always had way too much work, the hotel having to be run as usual – since even if it isn’t the season, an innkeeper has to look into everything. I agreed – yes, of course – and sat down. Gibbs handed me a cigarette.

“I have to go now,” he said. “It’s unfortunate we didn’t have time to discuss the details, but you got the gist of it, didn’t you?”

“The gist?..” I asked distractedly.

“Well, yes,” – Gibbs nodded impatiently – “the Dunes and all that… Think about it at leisure, mull it over. When the day comes to set out, we’ll let you know. And don’t worry about the bill for dinner – it’s on me.” – He stood up, gave a short bow and prepared to leave.

“Tell me,” I entreated him. “Who were those kids? Why did they get beaten up so badly?” And who were those two guys?” – I cast a glance at the wall to my right where the men in black jackets had been earlier. – “And I also wanted to ask: Are you sure Piolin won’t be going with us – that is, if you really head out and I agree to join you?..”

Gibbs turned, regarded me with a penetrating, serious look – and went away without a word.

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© Vadim Babenko.
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