‘Good day!’ he pronounced grimly, his deep voice booming off the walls.
His bass was answered by a slightly scratchy contralto. ‘Ah, Gor! It is I … Sveta.’
‘Oh, yes.’ He winced and swallowed a sigh, relaxing minutely against the wall. ‘How may I help you?’
‘We have a rehearsal shortly at your apartment, if I am not mistaken?’ She did not pause, despite the implied question. ‘However, I have to say Albina, my daughter, you remember? Well, she is really not at all well, and I have had to keep her home from school. I cannot leave her, obviously.’ Gor’s chest heaved with inaudible relief as the idea settled into his mind that Sveta was about to cancel their rehearsal. ‘But I was wondering …’ she continued, in a more intimate tone, ‘I would hate to miss the rehearsal, when we’ve just started, so do you think you could come to my apartment, and we could do it here instead? Albina will be very well behaved. She has promised.’
Gor’s black eyebrows locked for a moment and he chewed on his cheek, surprised by Sveta’s determination, and also disappointed by it, truth be told. ‘If there is no other option, Sveta, we will have to do what we can. I can come to your apartment, if it is absolutely necessary: that is, if you think I should.’ The woman did not detect his lack of enthusiasm, and thanked him for his flexibility before ringing off with a contrived tinkle of a laugh.
He had noted her address on the first piece of paper that had come to hand; the bank statement of the Rostov Regional Magic Circle. How he wished he’d never become treasurer. He chewed on his cheek as he stalked back to the kitchen to tidy, and fret.
Today, the convoluted tricks and the cabinet of magic, once his diversion of choice, held zero appeal. He felt tired, uninspired; preoccupied, perhaps. He coveted time to himself, to play the piano and ruminate on these problems of his disappearing memory, the strangeness of life, his burgeoning conscience, and the piles of doubt surrounding him, reaching to the ceiling, sometimes crowding out the daylight.
He did not sleep. The hands that combed through his hair sometimes shook. Odd events had been occurring, and it wasn’t just the stupid egg or the hideous rabbit. An afternoon at the baby-grand might give him peace to sort through his thoughts. An afternoon with Sveta surely would not.
As he came to the doorway, humming softly to himself, a movement in the window drew his glance. He looked up automatically, expecting to see a pigeon wing, or scrappy paper in the wind. Instead, to his astonishment, he glimpsed the imprint of a face, features clouded by the steam that clung to the cold glass, but definitely a human countenance – just hanging there, peering in – four floors up. He froze, dumbfounded as the face faded into the clouds, and then dashed over to the window. The hinges scraped as he pushed the frame and craned his head out and down, raking the view. There was nothing to see: no human, no bird, nothing at all except an empty wash of sky and the pitted courtyard below. Somewhere a dog barked, and a door slammed. Leaves fell to earth from a skinny silver birch. He stood, panting into the cold, damp air, watching his steam dissipate and waiting for his breath to slow to normal. When it did, he rubbed a bony hand across the cavities of his great, dark eyes, and shut the window.
Returning to his bedroom, he stood at the mirror for a long time. Was he sick? Was he losing his grip? He looked the same as before: there was no sign of dementia or confusion in his face. But then, what did they look like?
He held out his hands: they were solid, strong, ready for work. He could stand up tall and straight. He remembered everything he had done so far that day, and he absolutely knew what day it was, what year, where he stood and what he should be doing. He grimaced at his reflection. What he should be doing, he acknowledged, was packing the car with props and going over to Sveta’s.
There was nothing to be done: he must carry on as normal. He shrugged his shoulders, and pulled on his jerkin.
Once Gor’s little tea-chest car had been loaded up with his basic prop requirements, the short drive out to Sveta’s presented no problems. He switched on the radio, enjoying the heavy thunk of the solid black buttons as he progressed through the stations, searching for something mellow, wordless and reassuring. He eventually fixed on Rachmaninov, the notes bubbling in his blood like oxygen as he navigated massive pot-holes and waved with a swift, jerking movement to the newspaper seller on the corner – a man whose name he did not know, but who was a staple of his day. Later he would stop and buy a paper, and exchange nods and worldly wise shakes of the head: this he knew. He passed through the main square, bustling and full of business, and saluted the traffic policeman keeping order at the crossroads. He crossed the metal bridge over the River Don and drove on towards the newer side of town, increasing his speed as the road, if not the tarmac, broadened. He eased around a couple of rights and a left, past encampments of kiosks and packs of shaggy, mud-encrusted dogs, and set about the artful business of hunting down the correct boulevard, corpus, building and flat number for Sveta.
Despite the Rachmaninov and the wide, sweeping road, his thoughts dwelt on his new assistant. He was not sure she would do. Gor had not practised as a magician for a number of years, but his previous experience was relevant: he had the right demeanour, and a fitting temperament; he could be mysterious, and instil belief. If required, he could take the audience with him on a journey that could confound and perplex. In his own estimation, he was a master, if very rusty. But this Sveta: could she ever be an effective foil? If they were laughed off the stage he would get no further bookings, and if they simply weren’t very good, well, the bookings would be unpaid. And that would be bad news. Indeed, he nodded grimly to himself, the pay was the whole point.
A cloud of steam hissed from a pipe by the roadside, and Sveta evaporated from his thoughts, replaced by recollections of the empty pan, and the steamy face. Had it been real, or a hallucination? Were his nerves really that bad? Maybe neither he nor Sveta belonged on the stage. Maybe he should forget his plan. Would he really be able to confound and perplex and command a paying audience, if he couldn’t successfully boil an egg? Did people these days even want magic? What with their pop music, private enterprise and foreign holidays … He rubbed his chin and nodded as her building came into view, allowing himself a quick ‘rum-pum-pum-pah’ along with Rachmaninov to raise his spirits.
When Sveta opened the door to Flat 8, Building 4, Corpus 6 on Turgenev Boulevard, Gor was taken aback to see that the apartment behind her was entirely in darkness. She looked dishevelled compared to previous weeks, her blonde hair puffy and tufted around her hamster-like cheeks, and her make-up smudged. They stood facing each other, him nodding good day and she seemingly frozen.
‘Good—’ Gor began and was immediately quelled with a ‘sssh!’ that rattled his bones. ‘What is it, Sveta? Is something wrong?’ he whispered, still standing in the doorway.
‘Quietly, Gor! As I told you, my little girl is sick today. She must have absolute quiet. She is … she is a highly strung girl, and suffers, you understand?’
Gor thought he did not understand, and frowned. ‘I have to get my things from the car. That will, I am sure, make a little noise, but I will be as careful—’
‘Oh no! You must not bring the magical cabinet into the apartment! No, no, that would be too much! The noise and excitement! We must just rehearse, as if we had it with us. No equipment, thank you.’
‘Make believe, Sveta? I am not convinced. Maybe we need to have a talk.’ He raised his eyebrows. Still Sveta stood in the doorway, stepping uneasily from one swollen, slippered foot to the other, not inviting him in. The warm smell of the apartment rolled into his nostrils: furniture polish and something edible – gravy, perhaps.
He cleared his throat. ‘May I?’
‘Oh, of course, of course, come in, how silly of me!’ She stood away from the door and flicked the light switch. A blowsy ceiling lamp trickled pinkish light along the narrow hallway. ‘Please, take off