And down in the hall, Gene was already speaking a second time, a little more quietly, but with the same clarity, with that inner weight that does not need repetition, but still repeats:
"We're leaving."
The phrase no longer sounded like a reaction. It had become a fact. Simple, solid, like a valise by the door. No one responded. No one could, because there was no one to argue with.
Karen, standing slightly to the side, seemed to shrink. Not from fear, but from something dying inside her. She did not look at Gene, did not make any sudden movements. Only her hand slowly rose and found his palm, squeezed it tightly, like on that evening when everything was just beginning. In this squeeze there was agreement, and a plea, and some kind of hopeless "yes" that could not be refused. Not a protest - a farewell.
She said nothing. Because there were no words left. All the necessary ones had already been said - in the kitchen, in the offices, in their bedroom, even in Delia's looks. And everything else was superfluous.
In the silence of the room, Lisa moved away from the window. Not a sharp movement, just enough to indicate that she had heard. She did not strike a pose, did not cross her arms, did not sigh. She only slightly moved her shoulder, like an actress who has heard a line and is now ready to respond.
"It's a pity," she said almost tenderly. "Everyone's worried."
And nothing wavered in her voice. No anger, no bitterness. Only this emphasized, perfected evenness. Like a thermometer in an empty room.
Gene looked at her silently. Not with irritation. With some kind of attention, as if she were a person he suddenly no longer recognized.
"It's impossible to work here anymore," he said. "Not to raise a child. Not to be."
Lisa paused. Too long to be unintentional. Then, in the same polite voice:
"If necessary, I will collect your daughter's things by the evening."
The word 'things' sounded special. Cold, like an inventory act. Not 'dresses', not 'toys', not 'books'. But 'things'. Like a prisoner leaving or a retired official.
Karen sucked in a breath. She seemed about to object. But she stopped herself. Not out of fear, but out of weariness. She understood, as did Gene: everything had been decided long ago. All that remained were these pleasantries, like silverware at a garage sale.
Lisa came a little closer - and now something like concern appeared on her face. But it was learned, as if rehearsed - like all her intonations. She had the right to remain silent, but she chose to speak.
"I hope you will weigh everything," she said. "Haste... It can be irreversible."
Gene put on his coat. He did it slowly, without haste, but each movement was irrevocable. He adjusted his collar with the delicate precision of a man closing a diplomatic briefcase.
"I don't weigh anything," he said. "I do."
Karen was already standing behind. Silent. Just holding on to the railings - as if they were the last real object in the house, in life, in the city that had suddenly become alien.
Lisa stood opposite. Without hostility. Not even a challenge. But in her calmness there was a threat - not a direct one, but an existing one. She did not dissuade. She simply recorded. And already, perhaps, she was writing a report - in her head, point by point.
And that was what Gene noticed. He realized: she wasn't surprised. She knew. And now she was acting - in her own way, cold-bloodedly.
He nodded - not to her, not to Karen, but as if to himself.
"We're leaving," he repeated. No longer into the hall. No longer into space. Into reality. And he left.
...666...
While the adults were still talking in low voices downstairs and someone was saying goodbye in a hurry in the hall, Delia and Xander climbed the stairs and entered her room. The door closed softly behind them. Lavender in the air mingled with the smell of paper and candy. A withered branch, left by one of the guests, swayed on the windowsill.
"I'm leaving," Delia said haughtily, smoothing out the folds of her hem. "Forever," she added with a hint of command.
Xander stood by the door, hunched over. He nodded, but not right away.
"I know," he answered dully. "Everyone is leaving. But I'm not."
She walked up to the table and ran her hand over the lid of the candy box, as if checking to make sure everything was in place.
"I don't want this to look like… running away," she said quietly, almost defensively.
"And how was it?" he asked sharply, but his voice trembled. "How was the trip?"
"As a necessity," Delia said, looking out the window. "It's just... It's just different now."
Xander came closer. He sat on the edge of the chair and rubbed his hands on his knees.
"What if I hide? In a chest. Or in a suitcase. No one will notice."
"Stop it," she smiled weakly. "You know you can't do that."
"What if I run after you? To the station?" he asked, as if casually, but his eyes were shining. "I'll run out of strength, but I'll catch up?"
"This is not a game, Xander," she said, slowly turning to him. "There's a border there. There are documents there. Everything is real there."
"And we are not real?" he asked suddenly. "Are we a game?"
Delia was silent for a moment, then came over and sat down next to him. Very close.
"We are forever. Just... Just not close," she said, and it sounded sincere, without any importance.
He nodded, quickly, as if he didn't want to show how much it affected him.
"I'll write to you," she continued. "Every month. Or even more often."
"But I can't write," he said stubbornly. "Only read."
"Then you'll wait. Just wait," she said softly.
He looked at her - point-blank, seriously, like an adult.
"I'll wait. Just you... Just don't forget."
"I will never forget," she said immediately. "Never."
They were silent.
"Can I take something?" he asked suddenly. "As a keepsake. Well, something of yours."
"Take it," she nodded. "That hairpin. I won't wear it again anyway."
He walked over to the chest of drawers, picked up a hairpin, and held it tightly in his hand.
"Thank you."
"Xander," she said suddenly. "Just don't cry, okay?"
"I didn't intend to," he muttered and quickly turned away.
They sat in silence. Delia looked at the window, Xander at the floor, where a ray of sunlight thinly traced a crack in the planks. The silence was almost cozy, but with some kind of suspended tension, as if there was still one more, unspoken question in the air.
"Xander..." she suddenly said, completely calmly. "And how did your dad die?"
He raised his head, puzzled.
"Why do you need it?" he asked, without malice, but with caution. "You know."
"Tell me," she repeated, leaning forward slightly. "I want you to tell me."
There was something in her voice... Something special. Not mockery, not pity, but interest. A strange interest, as if she was waiting for something.
Xander frowned and, after thinking for a bit, shrugged.
"He fell," he sighed, lowering his gaze. "Out of the window."
"From which window?" Delia asked quietly, without letting go, without looking away.
"From the second floor," he said, a little more slowly. "When I was changing the putty."
She didn't answer, just nodded. He sighed again, deeper, and added:
"He was sick then. He caught a cold. When..." Xander hesitated, "when he jumped into the river after you. Into the Fontanka. Remember, at the party?"
"I remember," she said briefly.
"And then..." he paused for a second. "Then I got sick. For a long time. I kept coughing, and I walked around with my shirt unbuttoned because of the heat. But I still climbed onto the windowsill because they told me to change the putty. And... And I couldn't hold on. I fell. And I broke my neck.
He spoke calmly, in an almost even voice, but in the end he swallowed.
Delia didn't say anything right away. She was silent, and her expression was strange - not sympathetic, not surprised, not even sad. More like... More like attentive. Thoughtful. Almost like an adult who is putting together an important picture in his mind from many Mr.ar pieces.
Then she gently placed her hand on his shoulder. Quietly, lightly.
"No," she said quietly, slowing her words slightly. "That's not why he died."
Xander shuddered and turned to her, with amazement and something like childish resentment.
"What do you mean - not because of that?"
"I'll tell you. Just promise..." Her voice was almost a whisper, but not confused, but firm. "Promise that you won't be angry with me. No matter what you hear."
Xander froze. He looked at her - no longer with surprise, but with alarm, as if for the first time he felt that there was something more behind her words than just a story.
"Do you promise?" she repeated, this time very quietly.
He nodded slowly.
"I promise..." he exhaled, not quite understanding why, but no longer able to not listen.
"You... You're a very good person, Xander," Delia said, not looking at him, as if she was afraid that he would start laughing.
Xander frowned.
"Oh, what are you saying?" he muttered and immediately turned red, even his ears turned red. "Stop it."
"No. I'm serious," she continued, looking him straight in the temple. "You're like no one else. And I…" she faltered a little, but then found the right tone, "and I don't want you to think that your dad died for no reason."
He became wary and remained silent.
"You said it yourself, he was in my room. Cleaning putty off the old frame. It was right after you were hired. We had just moved in, and dad - my dad - told us to tidy everything up. He wasn't happy with the way things had been before. A mess, he said. And there he was - your dad - sitting on the window, with tools, carefully cleaning off that dry, hard old putty...
"Well," Xander said sullenly, "I know that."
"And then I went in. Because it was my nursery. And I saw that there was a stranger in it. I was indignant. I said that he had no right. I was capricious. Well... As best I could. I screamed for him to leave.
"And what?"
"And he..." Delia looked straight ahead, without blinking. "At first he answered me irritably, like, don't bother me. But I didn't let up. I came closer. I tugged at his sleeve so that he would move away from the window.
Xander tensed up.
"So?.."
"And he suddenly turned around... And told me something. That no one knew. No one. Except me. He looked straight into my eyes and said out loud... This."
"What exactly? - Xander leaned forward. "What did he say?
But Delia, as if she had not heard his question, continued:
"I froze. How he knew this, I don't understand. Probably when he pulled me out of the Fontanka... He saw something. Or guessed. But he definitely knew. And he said it. I was scared. Not for myself, but for him. Because at that moment when he said it... I looked at him like that, Xander. I wanted him to... Go away."
Xander was silent. He just blinked.
"He..." Delia continued, a little more quietly, "he looked at me. He saw my gaze. And he recoiled. He slipped. He lost his balance. And... And that was it."
She fell silent. Xander didn't move a muscle and looked at the floor. Delia gently touched his shoulder.
"What's wrong?"
He didn't answer. Delia came closer. Carefully, as if every movement might frighten the air between them. Xander didn't move. His face was wet - but he wasn't crying. He swallowed his tears, as if they were shame that needed to be swallowed, hidden.
"So you..." he looked up, his voice trembling, but there was something firm, almost adult, in it. "You mean to say that it was you... That it was you who killed dad?"
He said it as if he was afraid to hear himself.
Delia shook her head slightly. Her gaze was direct, serious, but not stubborn. She did not defend herself.
"I... I didn't mean it that way," she said slowly, emphasizing each word. "But if you thought so... Then blame me. I won't argue. Let it be so."
Xander turned away, his shoulders shaking. He sucked in a breath, then exhaled sharply.
"No," he said. "No... No, you are not forgiven."
Delia didn't move. She just looked to the side, where the curtain was fluttering in the draft. Then she looked at him - and silently asked with her eyes: "You won't forgive me?"
Xander nodded. But not right away. And not confidently. As if agreeing with something difficult.
"Yes," he said. "I won't forgive."
And then he added quickly, sharply, as if something inside him would not let him remain silent:
"Because there is nothing to forgive! Got it?"
She didn't understand.
"What, nothing?" Delia whispered. "I... I told you myself that I drove him crazy. That he was afraid of me. That I..."
"Don't you dare," he interrupted. "Don't you dare say that. It's not true."
"But you..."
"You're not like that!" Xander almost shouted, stepping towards her. "You... You're kind! You're not evil. And you never really wanted... For anything to happen. You were just too little then. And..." he hesitated, "And beautiful. Even when you're angry. And even if you scream, it's still..."
He stopped short, swallowed hard and took a step back.
"I won't dare..." he said dully. "I won't dare think badly of you. Because you're good. Do you understand?"
Delia froze. She seemed to shrink into herself, but she didn't leave, didn't turn away. A shadow appeared on her face - not a smile, no - something confused, vulnerable. And then tears came to her eyes. She didn't cry - she just looked at him, as if she didn't believe he'd said it.
Xander was silent. He was tense, as if he was holding back a scream. And only his clenched fists betrayed how much he had not said at that moment. Delia stood silently for a long time, her gaze lowered, as if she was still gathering her strength. Then she moved her lips slightly - only her lips, without a voice - and only on the second try did she exhale clearly, barely audibly:
"I will never forget you."
Xander raised his eyes. The movement was slow, as if he had been deciding on it longer than it seemed from the outside. He was not just raising his gaze - he was raising all his attention, all the heaviness inside. And when, finally, his eyes met hers, there was something in them that made Delia involuntarily hold her breath.
Something disturbing.
Not the anxiety that lives in fear, but the anxiety that lives in a question without an answer. There was no reproach, no reproach, no request in his gaze. But there was that childish tension that appears when words are too big for the mouth, and feelings are too sharp for the tongue. It was the look of a child who has had something important taken from him, but does not yet know whether he can ask for it back. Or perhaps he has already understood that he cannot, and so he simply looks. Deeply. Quieter than silence.
It was as if he didn't immediately understand what she had said. Or, on the contrary, he understood it too well. Too keenly. The way children sometimes understand what adults want to hide behind a half-tone. He didn't answer. But perhaps that was the answer.
Delia took a step toward him. There was no form to her movement - no chin-up, no playful arrogance that had seemed to accompany her every step before. This time she simply walked - the way people walk not because they have to, but because they can no longer stand still. Her legs moved on their own, without asking permission. It was movement without protection. Without a plan.
This step contained everything she had been avoiding before. Shyness. Doubt. Vulnerability. No grace, no theatrics - just a quiet, almost invisible need to be closer. Almost instinct. A step in which there is no pride - only the fatigue of trying to look stronger than she really is.
She hugged him.
Not timidly, not symbolically, not like you hug just "just in case." But tightly. For real. She hugged him as if she was afraid that he would disappear if she let go. With her thin hands - hands that had previously been used to clutching ribbons, picking up hems, holding pencils - they now held him. And in these hands there was a trembling of uncertainty, yes, but more than that - a trembling of the unsaid. Everything that was not said, everything that was experienced between the lines, in the pauses, in the averted glances. This trembling did not interfere - on the contrary, it made the embrace alive.
She pressed her cheek against his face.
There, where there was still moisture from tears. There, where the skin was slightly cold, as after strong feelings. She did not hide in this touch, did not seek protection. It was as if she was trying to preserve the feeling - like children do when they hug their favorite toy not because they are afraid, but because they love it too much. She held her breath. She stayed like that - not for a moment, but a little longer. So that time would stop. So that this point in space would not dissolve too quickly.
And then, slowly, almost hesitantly, she pulled away a little. Not abruptly, not suddenly, but as if breaking the embrace with an inner effort, like a person who knows that if you hold on longer, it will hurt more, but if you let go too soon, you won't have time to remember.
And then, carefully, as if passing through the thin ice of silence, she touched his lips. Not like adults, with determination and meaning. And not like children in fairy tales, where a kiss is magical and changes everything. But like someone saying goodbye. Not just to a person, but to time, to herself, to that fragile space where they existed together. A farewell in which there was no drama, only a quiet, almost invisible loss of something unique.
She touched him and froze. As if something was happening inside that could not be expressed with gestures. As if this kiss was her only chance to be truly understood - at least once, at least for a second. Understood without words, without explanations. Without conditions.
Xander didn't move.
He didn't flinch, he wasn't scared. There was no surprise. Only his breathing changed - a little deeper, a little quieter. He sighed the way adults sigh when they don't want anyone to notice how hard it is for them. When everything inside trembles, but his face remains calm. Not because nothing happened - but because everything already happened.
Delia took a step back, looking down.
"Go," she said quietly. "Please. I... If you see me crying... I can't."
Xander nodded. Once. Without a word. Then he Mr.nched his clenched white fists, turned quietly and left.
He walked down the hallway, as quietly as possible, as if he were walking not on the floor but on the air, trying not to touch anything or the walls with his gaze. It still smelled of yesterday: biscuits, lavender powder, wine that had gone flat at the bottom of the glasses. The smell no longer called - it remained as a reminder, like the residual light after a holiday.
On the floor, right by the door, lay a glove forgotten by someone. Laced, slightly crumpled. He looked at it - and walked past. To pick it up meant to admit that someone else would stay here. And he was leaving.
At the exit, as always at the right moment, stood Pelageya. In her eternal cotton apron, with a headscarf pulled down over her ear, she was fiddling with a shawl, wrapping some kind of bundle. Seeing Xander, she perked up:
"My God, there you are, and I thought you were upstairs", she hurried, as if making excuses. "Everyone left, you see, everyone was in what they were wearing, and the guests... Oh, my God, and the things all over the house are like after a fire."
She was about to say something else, but, looking into Xander's face, she fell silent - for a split second, but she understood everything.
"Come on, my little bird", she said more quietly. "Don't drag it out, or you'll catch a cold. Look, it's wet outside, there's a draft, and you..." She pressed the bundle to her chest and pursed her lips. "Well, that's it. It happened. Like in a bad dream. I can't find the words."
Xander nodded silently. He couldn't - didn't want to - speak. His throat was empty, and something was trembling in his chest, as if there was a bird inside that had lost its way.
Pelageya straightened his collar, shook him by the shoulder, and said slightly affectionately:
"Okay, okay. Don't keep it to yourself, do you hear? Don't keep it to yourself. She... She's too rich for you. And you... Who knows how life will turn out? Maybe everything will change. Just take care of yourself, my dear. Otherwise, I - just know - won't leave a single living place on you if you catch a cold. Uh-huh?"
He suddenly grabbed her hand firmly. Childishly. His fingers were cold, but strong. Pelageya gasped - not from pain, but from surprise. Then she nodded and said nothing.
He walked out. The door closed slowly behind him. Outside there was a smell of damp stone and ash. He didn't turn around. Because he knew that if he looked back, everything would collapse.
...666...
The next morning, Dr. Lou Hastings, lingering on the threshold of the Lyulyukovs' mansion, took off his gloves with a slightly deliberate slowness - not because he was in a hurry, but, on the contrary, emphasizing in every movement that measured slowness with which one enters not a house, but a performance in which the role has long been firmly fixed. The butler, hearing the familiar knock, hurried to open the door, respectfully bowing his head - so expressively that the doctor, glancing at the crown of his head, could not help but smile slightly.
"Is Her Ladyship in the drawing room?" he asked quietly, brushing a trace of street dust from his cuff.
"Of course, doctor. This is the third time she's asked me to heat up the tea. She's worried that you might be delayed in other... In other places.
"Worry is half the cure," Hastings remarked as he walked in. "The rest, as you know, costs ninety-three roubles a bottle."
He spoke quietly, but with such a tone in his voice that the footman suppressed a grin, although the corners of his mouth twitched traitorously. Hastings meanwhile stepped further into the room, across the carpets, which predatorily muffled the sound of footsteps, and found himself at the half-open doors of the drawing room, from which came the quiet shuffling of pages - probably Madame Lyulyukova patiently leafing through a magazine, pretending that she had accidentally found herself in an armchair at such an early hour.
"I apologize for the delay, madam," said the doctor, entering softly. "The weather today is contradictory: outside it is raining, but inside, I dare say, a front of troubles is approaching?"
Tatyana Lyulyukova, sitting in a deep armchair, turned around with the look of a sufferer who, out of delicacy, had not mentioned how long she had been waiting. She was wearing the same hoodie that a year ago she had called a "domestic misunderstanding," but since then, for some inexplicable reason, she wore it more often than anyone else.
"Ah, Doctor", she said, putting the magazine aside", I was beginning to think that you had forgotten me completely. And yet my worries have not disappeared. On the contrary, they have become more acute. The weather? Perhaps. But more likely... More likely it is a general tension. Like a ring - invisible, but perceptible, tightening around me."
"Interesting," he responded, settling into a chair. "And where exactly does this ring press?"
"Here," she touched her temple. "And here," she pressed her palm to her heart with theatrical grace.
"And between these two points, is everything okay?" he asked with polite skepticism.
She sighed, as if carefully checking her internal resources for violations.
"Insomnia, doctor. It's not that I can't sleep - I'm afraid I won't be able to. And then I'm afraid I'll wake up. Everything is like in a fog. Lethargy, melancholy... And he..." her face fell for a moment. "He, imagine, can't find the time. Either business trips or meetings. As if Swiss air is not a matter of life, but just a whim."
Hastings bowed his head slightly.
"Sad. Especially considering that your case is one of those where climate is decisive. You are not simply tired, madam. Your body requires change: sea, mountains, clean air. I would even say rarefied."
She leaned back in her chair:
"Well, you too. And he just frowns and whispers under his breath: 'Geneva, Carlsbad... six months?!' as if I were asking him to send me to Baghdad on an airship."
"Alas, madam," Hastings sighed, "men often perceive concern for their spouses' health as a personal sacrifice. Especially if it involves telegrams, expenses and - God forbid - visa processing."
"Oh, doctor…" she pretended to throw up her hands. "But you are sure that rest is really necessary?"
"Necessary?" He grinned. "I would say - the only possible one. Everything else is just a delay. A resort is not a whim, but therapy. And, by the way, the most reliable. No potion will give what a month of silence and salt in the air gives."
She thoughtfully ran her finger over the embroidery on her dress:
"So if I don't leave… everything can only get worse?
"Alas, madam. Your condition may take a form that will make even the most talented doctors shrug their shoulders. Of course, I can write out a recommendation again. More insistent. With a seal and signatures of colleagues. Sometimes men understand diagnoses better when they are seasoned with formality."
She smiled slightly, for the first time during the conversation, with gratitude:
"Ah, doctor... you are not just a doctor. You are a diplomat."
"No, madam," he bowed. "I'm still the same humanist. I just know how to talk to husbands."
And with that, he rose from his chair without haste, as if to make it clear that his presence was a medicine as strong as any Swiss drops. Tatyana, seeing that he was about to leave, ran her handkerchief over her temple with lazy melancholy, as if from stuffiness, and almost absentmindedly remarked:
"It's such a shame the Yorks are gone. They were such nice people. And their daughter is just lovely, though she seems a little too skinny..." She paused briefly, as if considering whether to continue. "You knew, Doctor, didn't you?"
These words were not spoken with any apparent purpose, but rather as a casual remark, thrown into the air, but in such a way as to be heard. Hastings, who had almost turned towards the door, seemed to freeze for a second, and then, without hurrying, returned to the chair from which he had just risen, and with that expression on his face that doctors wear in emergency rooms - attentive, sympathetic, but not without a little fatigue - he said:
"They left, yes. It's a pity, of course. I didn't have time to say goodbye to them either. I even wanted to pass on some papers... But, as you can see, the train is a merciless means of transport. It doesn't expect tears or belated visits."
He spoke simply, with that shade of slight annoyance which did not in any way disturb the polite evenness of his tone. Sitting back down, he even allowed himself to cross his legs slightly and stretch out his hand towards the silver vase with slices of candied fruit, as if to emphasize that he was no longer here as a doctor, but purely on vacation.
"However", he added, frowning", I came to you more quickly... More for the sake of peace. I'm tired, I admit. The last few days have been especially... Especially intense."
Tatyana tilted her head to the side, swinging her bracelet, and with an expression of sly interest said, as if she had not heard about fatigue:
"Papers, you say? Interesting. What kind, if it's not a secret? Or is it..." she looked up, "Or is it a state secret?"
Hastings, taking a sip of water, smiled slightly at the corner of his lips, but did not answer right away. It seemed that he was weighing not the answer, but the proportionality of the answer to the mood of his interlocutor.
"Ah, madam", he said softly, almost sympathetically, "if you only knew how much of our business depends on non-disclosure... Not state, no. But professional. The papers concerned, let's say... Certain medical reports. And we doctors, as you know, are bound by something more ancient than a ministry order. The Secret of Hippocrates, as pathetic as it may sound."
He spread his hands slightly, as if regretting that he couldn't share, but this only made me more intrigued.
"So," Tatyana said with a feigned sigh, "I have no right to know who was prescribed this... This, let's say, disease, and for what?"
"Alas," he bowed his head. "Even with your impeccable taste and gift for guessing diagnoses from facial expressions. I myself am sometimes surprised at how much you can read from just one look. But there are limits."
"And if, for example, I also complain of insomnia and... And terrible curiosity," she slowly ran her finger along the arm of the chair, "isn't it the doctor's responsibility to alleviate both symptoms?"
"It is the duty of a physician not to indulge in pernicious inclinations, madam. And curiosity, as we were taught at university, is the cause of eighty percent of failed marriages and a third of clinical breakdowns."
He said it with unperturbed seriousness, but the corners of his eyes betrayed a hidden smile. Tatyana laughed easily, truly, even leaning back in her chair.
"Oh, doctor," she said, "you are a terribly dangerous man. You hide behind seriousness, as if behind a prescription screen, but in reality, I am sure, everything has long been clear to you."
"Perhaps," Hastings nodded, rising a little more willingly. "But clarity is what the mind consoles itself with in the fog. And so I'd better remain silent... And again I'll ask for the bill for the prescribed drops. Even without a diagnosis."
Tatyana, without hurrying, took the handkerchief in her hands again - more as a gesture than out of necessity - and, lowering her eyes to the embroidered edge, said with that same feigned thoughtfulness that invariably preceded her maneuver, carefully calibrated according to the internal map of social battles:
"Papers... Hm. I suppose they concerned the fortune of... Young Delia York?"
It was said lazily, almost absentmindedly, but with that special emphasis on the middle of the sentence that turned all laziness into a trap. Hastings, who had already risen with sedate politeness, froze - not for long, but long enough to notice how a thin shadow of irritation passed over his face, quickly, however, hidden under the doctor's mask.
"Oh, no, madam," he said, coming back to the table, as if suddenly remembering that he had forgotten an umbrella or a button, "you are mistaken. It is not at all about... Mm... Young Miss York. The papers concerned a governess. Now deceased, alas, and with obvious signs of overwork, noticed before her death. A very simple case. More official than medical."
He spoke a little faster than he should have, and his gaze, so direct and even, darted for a second to the window, as if there was confirmation of what he had said. Tatyana, without raising her head, shook it slightly - not in agreement, but rather like a musician checking the tuning of his bow.
"The governesses, of course..." she drawled, and only now raised her eyes. "But you know, Doctor, I think I'll write to the Yorks when they return. One kind word is sometimes the only thing that can stop the flow of stupid gossip. But a careless one - alas - doubles their power. Sometimes, you barely let out a phrase, and it flies - from the lamp to the carriage, from the carriage to the stairs, and then all along Sadovaya..."
She spoke softly, with a slight smile, without taking her eyes off him. But the smile was cold, like ice in a glass at a dinner party: an adornment with no taste behind it, only a warning.
Hastings seemed to sit awkwardly on the edge of his chair, picked up the glass of water again, but did not drink. He felt something invisible, cold and increasingly dense, beginning to squeeze him from all sides. A damp sheen appeared on his forehead, and when he spoke, his voice trembled almost imperceptibly:
"Actually... These are... Routine notes. Observations. A simple formality. Sometimes parents... Sometimes they ask for an opinion - well, so to speak, for... For personal reassurance."
He rubbed his ear with his finger, a gesture he hadn't noticed himself making, and cleared his throat in an almost apologetic tone. Tatyana was silent, continuing to look at him, without looking away, as if looking at a clock that was bound to strike in the next second. The pause dragged on, and he, realizing that the exit was difficult, leaned forward, lowering his voice slightly:
"Yes... Perhaps you... You are not mistaken." He hesitated, then, exhaling, added: "She is... Not quite... In herself. But this is not a disease in the narrow sense. It is rather... Rather, a feature. A borderline, you know, condition. A matter of observation, not treatment."
He immediately regretted saying it, not because he had revealed it, but because he knew that now nothing could be taken back. Words spoken to a woman who was only waiting for confirmation of her own guess always turned out to be part of a dossier that could not be seized.
"Ah!" Tatyana exclaimed with sudden triumph. "I knew it! I knew it! I understood everything from one look at her!"
She fell silent and, lowering her eyes, added softly, no longer solemnly:
"Poor girl!"
At the word 'girl', Hastings's face instantly turned red, and he jerked his head up as if in pain. His eyes, which had been politely muted until then, flashed with an unexpected, almost physiological irritation, like those of a man who has had a callus stepped on.
"Excuse me..." he said in a strange, tense voice, barely holding back the trembling in his throat, "you said... you said 'girl'?"
Tatyana, leaning back slightly in her chair, raised her eyes to him with slight surprise - not so sharp as to be frightening, but enough to indicate that the sharpness had not escaped her.
"Well... Well, of course," she answered, drawing out the words slightly, as if checking to make sure she hadn't violated some invisible regulation. "She's not a boy!"
The doctor did not answer at once. Instead, with a brusqueness that was not his usual manner, he thrust his hand into the side pocket of his coat, felt something - a sheet of paper folded in half, perhaps the very one he had not managed to give to the Yorks - and, pulling it out, silently handed it to Tatyana.
"Can it be... Can it be that you really want to call 'it' a girl?" he said, quietly, but with such a shade of disgusted reproach, as if he were not talking about a young person, but about something that even medical mercy bows down to with disgust.
Tatyana, carefully, with the slightest, coquettish disgust, as if someone had slipped her a purse with someone else's hair, took the paper with two fingers, glanced at it briefly, as if at a theatre poster on the fences, and just as casually pushed it back towards him, slightly bowing her head:
"Ah, doctor... Why do I need you?" she whispered with feigned modesty. "I don't understand the first thing about medical subtleties. That's why you exist, you who are so learned and..." she paused, "And observant. You can explain what's written here better than me. Besides, you do it much... Much more vividly."
He, left holding the sheet of paper for a moment, looked at her, long and searchingly. There was no fear or condemnation in her face, only that barely subdued interest with which grown-up ladies watch children's quarrels on a walk: not really seriously, but with pleasure.
Her words, polished and delivered with unwavering social grace, flattered - and at the same time provoked. The pride that had been wounded a moment before straightened out like a cat in the sun. Hastings nodded with exaggerated delicacy and, leaning forward slightly, lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper.
"In that case... In that case, I beg your attention, madam," he said, casting a quick glance at the door, as if to make sure that both servants and casual ears were kept away. "But I will say right away: what you are about to hear is not intended for society ears. Not over cakes, not over gossip, not even at the piano."
He fell silent, looking at her intently, almost searchingly, as if he wanted to make sure once again that the woman in front of him was not an impressionable person. Then, slowly, with pleasure entering into the role of the whistleblower, he added with emphasis:
"So," he began slowly, "during the examination, carried out, of course, solely at the request of the family, with the aim of establishing general development vectors - so, prophylactically, without alarm, without panic..." he made a gesture with his hand, as if waving away unnecessary drama, "I managed to identify a condition in young Miss York... A very peculiar one."
He fell silent for a second, looked at the ceiling as if choosing an expression, and then, almost solemnly, said something in Latin - polysyllabic, with soft, flowing endings, of which Tatyana caught only the echo of 'andro'.
She leaned over slightly:
"Excuse me, doctor, I... You said 'andro'? That's... What does that mean?"
Hastings straightened up and, placing the paper on the table, clasped his fingers together as if preparing to give a lecture:
"Simply put, madam," he began, with an air of importance that was almost tinged with pleasure at what was happening, "it is a form of deviation from the normative consensus. Not a disease, no, don't get me wrong, but... But let's say it this way: an anomaly. Not an external one - externally, on the contrary, everything is more than fine. Even - and this, let me say, is a characteristic feature - it is more than remarkable. One of those cases when, looking at a face, you see almost hypnotic beauty, and only then, when studying the parameters, anatomical, physiological," you encounter something... Something unexpected."
Tatyana turned pale, but remained silent, as if internally preparing herself for what she had heard. Hastings, lowering his voice slightly, continued:
"Imagine: all the external characteristics, even in excess - gait, height, voice, facial expressions - everything tells us about a young lady, and - please note - quite gifted in social terms. And at the same time, if you look deeper..." he tapped his finger on the paper, "something fundamental is missing. And instead - there is something so insignificant that in ordinary life it does not manifest itself in any way. But with careful medical analysis it indicates itself with all certainty."
"Oh God..." Tatyana whispered, slightly pressing herself into the back of the chair. "And this... This is dangerous?"
"Dangerous?" Hastings asked, smiling, but more gently. "No more dangerous than a goat among a flock of sheep. She won't eat them, as a wolf might, but her bleating will sound different from all the others. It's just... It's just nature itself, apparently, deciding to experiment."
He paused, looking at Tatyana with slight sympathy, in which there was still a hint of scientific superiority:
"It's surprising, madam, but it's a fact: the carriers of this state - and there aren't many of them, I assure you - have an amazing attraction. And at the same time... With a different structure. The internal processes, energy, even, I dare say, the rhythms are different. Everything seems to fit together, but at the same time it's not at all as it should be. And if you dig deep enough..."
"Doctor..." Tatyana interrupted him, now clearly turning pale", tell me frankly... Women with such... In such a situation... Can they... Can they live in society? Like everyone else? Be... I don't know... Happy, get married, have children?"
She spoke sharply, hurriedly, like a person who fears the answer in advance. Hastings paused and suddenly - cheerfully, with almost playful cynicism - shook his head:
"Have mercy, madam..." he said with an ironic squint. "How can the bearer of such a state claim full realization within the framework of the social model? If he, strictly speaking... Does not correspond even to the basic definition embedded in the term 'norma absoluta' from the point of view of logical analysis?"
He spoke with an exaggerated lightness, almost mockingly, as if he wanted to soften or, on the contrary, erase the seriousness from the very essence of what was said. But Tatyana was silent, staring at one point, as if she had not heard the last phrase - or, more likely, heard it too clearly.
The doctor wanted to say something else, perhaps to remind them of the need to leave as soon as possible, but the next second Evgeny Aleksandrovich, aka Mr. Lyulyukov, burst into the room. He was filled with irritation, like a bottle about to be popped by the cork, and his steps echoed through the parquet floor as heavy as the steps of an enraged animal who is tired of waiting by the cage.
"How much longer, damn it!" he barked from the doorway, not caring about his tone or those present. "I've been listening to this farce for a month, doctor! Carlsbad, Geneva, Yalta... Six months of rest? At whose expense, may I ask?! I have to finance a vacation for six months, excuse me, with an imaginary diagnosis?"
Tatyana shuddered, but sat up straighter, pressing her handkerchief to her chest - not from fear, but with that icy resentment that most quickly arises in those who are confident in their inviolability.
"How dare you," she said with an exaggeratedly capricious intonation, "to talk about my condition in such... In such a vulgar manner? I'm suffering, Zhenya, I'm suffering, and you know it. If you'd ever woken up at three in the morning with a shiver all over your body and a cold in your chest, you wouldn't be asking such questions."
But Lyulyukov was no longer listening. His eyes, filled with anger, darted to the doctor, and this look was no longer simply irritated - it was disparaging. Like a man who had finally decided that his patience had officially run out.
"And you, doctor", he growled", if you were an honest man, you would have said long ago that she doesn't need a resort, but a good novel or, forgive me, a newer house servant! You have to think of this - 'climatic asthenia'! I've been sitting on state commissions for twenty years, and half the Caucasus wrote me off with words like that! Do you think I'm an idiot?"
Hastings rose. Not abruptly, but there was no trace of his usual gentleness in this smooth movement - there was a dry, precisely measured rage in it. He carefully put down the glass of water, measured Lyulyukov with his gaze and said with icy clarity:
"Mr. Lyulyukov, your aggression does not cancel the diagnosis. On the contrary, it confirms it. Your wife is suffering. Her nervous system is exhausted, her body is emotionally exhausted, she has symptoms that require not just rest, but isolation from the stressful environment. And this environment, I dare say, is you. Your tone. Your shouts. Your 'commissions'."
"The commissions may be shouting", interrupted Lyulyukov", but at least they don't whine for days about 'heavy air'! Convulsive dreams, ringing in the ears, 'an unwillingness to exist'! This is not an illness - this is poetry on a nervous basis!
"Zhenya!" Tatyana screamed, standing up. "You... You are a monster! I really can't breathe! I wake up in the dark - and it seems to me that I disappear, as if I don't exist! And all because you are nearby! You, with your reports, calculations and eternal irritation! It is you who make me sick!"
But her voice was already drowned out by the growing din of the scandal. Lyulyukov clenched his fists and took a step forward - as if about to knock over the nearest vase - but Hastings caught his eye and straightened up with such dispassionate, hard dignity that even the air in the room became thick.
"That's enough," he said quietly, but with steel in his voice. "I've tolerated your ignorance and suspicions long enough. I'm leaving. But remember: the day your wife really needs a doctor - a professional, cold one, not busy with calculations - I won't be around anymore."
He bowed to Tatyana - reservedly, without excessive politeness, but with respect. And, without waiting for an answer, he turned and left the house, slamming the front door in anger. Stepping onto the porch, he mechanically clenched his gloves in his fist. But he had barely managed to take two more steps when he suddenly felt that instead of the coolness of the street, the noise of carriages and the gray sky of St. Petersburg, he was washed over by soft, bookish, overheated air.
The doctor stood in a spacious room with tall cabinets, a massive oval table and green lampshades under which the flames of gaslight swayed. The carpet under his feet was old but well-kept, the walls were covered in engravings, and everything - down to the heavy inkwell with an anchor on the lid - was painfully familiar to him. An office at the Medical Institute. The very same one where he had often sat with his colleagues. He even recognized - with a slight twinge of unreality - a wax stain on the carpet that he himself had once spilled.
And what's strangest of all is that no one seemed to be bothered by his sudden appearance.
"Here you are, Hastings!" someone on the right responded animatedly. "Well, at last. We were just getting started."
"The consultation is in full swing," added another, "you're getting right to the point."
The doctor had no choice but to accept the rules of this strange scene. He sat down on the edge of his chair, still a little unsure of his eyes, but professionally restrained. The situation, strangely enough, resembled dozens of others, and the body, accustomed to the discipline of medical discussions, was already straightening itself, already folding its hands on its knees.
"We are talking about the patient who came to you last week," said Professor Brune, a gray-bearded man with an aquiline profile and a voice with a hint of clerical politeness. "A man of about fifty, without obvious pathologies. All the tests are normal. But you insisted on additional examination."
"And then," another colleague, Dr. Woods, intervened, "they pointed out a rare form... Well, however, you yourself will now clarify."
Hastings nodded, caught between mild anxiety and an attempt to regain his balance. He had just lost control in the house, where he had hung on every word, and now - as if to compensate - he wanted to shine, to convince, to assert his power. His voice was even, even a little solemn:
"Yes, the case is not as simple as it seems. The patient demonstrates characteristic signs of Pyrrho-Galen syndrome in a latent form. Slow reactions, periodic dizziness, a feeling of compression in the chest when changing body position. All this fits into the beginning of the dysfunction of vegetative regulation."
He was pleased with the way his voice sounded, how easily the sentences were constructed. But at that very moment a voice rang out, fresh, clear and slightly ironic:
"Excuse me, Lou," said Professor Mason, young, overly self-assured and wearing a white waistcoat, "but what exactly are the key symptoms you mean? In the materials that were passed on to us from the reception, there is no mention of dizziness. And certainly not of compression."
He leaned forward, kindly but firmly:
"You talked to him yourself. Tell me, what exactly do you base this diagnosis on?"
There was a moment of silence in the room - not awkward silence, but the kind of silence that comes when people quiet down without a word to hear each other's reactions. Someone - maybe Dr. Woods, always nervous - chuckled faintly, almost silently. The fire under the kettle hissed behind the glass, and for the first time in a long time Hastings felt his throat go dry, not from anger but from emptiness.
He was at a loss. It wasn't that he didn't know what to say - he knew dozens of versions, combinations, digressions. But he didn't expect the question itself. So direct. So... So simple.
His gaze swept over their faces: Brune was sullen, Mason was patiently motionless, and Woods was almost cheerful. Someone was scribbling with a pen at the window. Everyone was looking at him and waiting.
Hastings moved his shoulders slightly, as if he wanted to shake off this strange weight, as if the elastic of an old cuff had pulled his chest tight. And slowly, with that mechanical movement that people have when they sense something is wrong, he turned his head. He most likely expected to see a bookcase, a barometer with a crack on the scale, perhaps a portrait of Paracelsus hanging at the back of the room. But what appeared before him did not fit into any of the normal dimensions.
Behind him, where just now there had been a smooth and polished parquet, now, as if after an explosion, someone's shadows, contours, fragments were piled up. Figures, broken, like dolls that had been set on fire and thrown onto the pavement. People - but not quite. One stood, swaying, with a hand hanging by a tendon, the skin of which had already turned gray. Another - as if instead of a face there was a stuck together mush of bone, fragments and a half-open mouth, where the lower jaw hung by one joint, like a door without hinges. And then - even worse. Someone, in something resembling a uniform, sat, clasping stumps - either the hands were cut off, or they were not given at all at birth - and quietly rocked, as if remembering a prayer.
And then, unexpectedly for Hastings himself, in the ominous silence of the office - no longer an institute, but some hall, as if inside a crypt where no one had taken out the trash for a long time - something rolled across the floor. A soft, wet sound, like a wet bag falling. It rolled toward his feet - round, but irregular, with reddish streaks. And only when this mass froze slightly, a few inches from his boot, the doctor, frozen, realized: it was a stump. A head - no. A torso - also no. Just a clot of something in which the outlines of a human body remained: half-rotten flesh, the twisted remains of shoulders where arms had once been, and a head ... A head, indecently clean, bald, and a face that seemed polished, with closed eyes.
He knew this face, for he had seen it more than once. Not on the operating table or in the ward, but somewhere in the passages, between offices, briefly - either a former patient or a guard. But now it was only a stump. Without arms. Without legs. And yet - alive. And this stump suddenly, without a single sound, opened its eyelids.
Somewhere behind him, there was a laugh. Dry, cracked, like the laugh of crumbling plaster. Then another, hoarse, raspy. Hastings turned sharply, hoping that at least one of his colleagues was still there, that someone - Mason, Woods, even Brune - would explain what was going on.
But the chairs they were sitting in were empty. He stood alone, surrounded by these living dead - if you could call them living - who continued to laugh at him, and someone even seemed to cough.
One, with a bloody mouth, was making strange sounds, as if he was trying to speak but had blood gurgling in his throat. Another, who had no head, was gesticulating wildly, as if he were speaking the language of the dumb. And the one closest, the stump at his feet, was simply looking straight at Hastings as if he knew him inside out, saw his lies and compromises, all his pills prescribed for profit and all his philanthropy with calculation.
And then, for the first time in many years, Hastings felt how not his hands, not his voice, but the very foundation of him - the very point where the doctor still feels like a man - twitched in horror.
He took a step back. Then another.
And he looked around like a man who no longer believes that he is dreaming, but cannot understand whether he is awake.
And at that moment he noticed a figure: short, motionless, appearing so calmly and naturally as if it had been there all along, just out of his sight. It was Delia York, in her severe, dark dress, with her hair smoothed down and her ribbon tied with the precision that is achieved not by children, but by those who are trained day after day to order. She looked at him calmly, with that special expression in which there was no anxiety, no sympathy, no irony - only simple, even clarity.
"These are your best clients," she said quietly, looking ahead, but not at them, as if through them.
Her voice sounded non-judgmental, almost affectionate, like a child speaking when trying to explain to an adult what he did wrong, but not angry, but with sad understanding.
"They pay what you ask," Delia continued, lifting her chin slightly. "They come when you tell them to. They drink what you say. You heal their wallets. Or maybe..." here she tilted her head slightly to one side, and for the first time something softly reproachful appeared in her voice, "it's time to heal their health?"
He opened his mouth, more from habit than from a desire to speak, either to justify himself or to clarify what she meant, but Delia had already looked away, and there was something final in the gesture, as if everything she needed to say had already been said and nothing more was needed. Her silhouette began to dissolve. Not suddenly or abruptly, but quietly, without flashes, without sound, without any effect, just the lines of her dress, the outline of her shoulders, the pale skin at her temples, gradually disappearing until only her eyes remained in the air: light, almost transparent, an unusually clear shade of blue.
They hung motionless in the void, expressing nothing but their presence, and gradually began to grow, not accelerating, but with inevitability, as if the plane of the gaze itself was expanding. Their color began to fill everything around: the walls, the furniture, the traces of recent fear. The space began to dissolve with it, and at some point it became clear that these were no longer eyes, but the sky.
Hastings drew in a sharp breath, and almost immediately a sharp pain shot through his chest, sharp and unpredictable. He instinctively pressed his hand to his heart, staggered, fell to his knees, and, barely able to keep his balance, raised his head. High above him, in the still, faded sky, two dark, serpentine shapes appeared. They moved slowly, and in their steady descent there was not a threat but something far colder: intent. The doctor no longer doubted that they were reaching for him, ready to descend and wrap themselves around him in a murderous embrace.
...666...
Since then, Alexander Sergeevich had developed an interest in American history, though the topic had previously held little appeal for him. It seemed as if this curiosity had come to him almost like an inheritance from the Yorks, who had long since left Russia. At that moment, Delia's fate remained a mystery. He had heard nothing more about her, and no one knew where she was.
However, some time after the Great October Revolution, having secured a good position at the embassy, he traveled to New York with the intention of finding out what had become of her and her family. To his disappointment, no one knew anything about her or showed any interest. On his way back to the airport, at one point, he thought he caught a glimpse of her, now grown older. He hurried to catch up with the woman, but it turned out to be a married actress from Toronto, who explained that her name was Asia and that she had three children.