hmm…of harvest for our manager. And, indeed you can trust me, it’s not Ligul. Otherwise, I would have been in them long ago.”
Methodius suddenly perceived how his hair started to throb, ache, and hurt. It was a strange sensation, almost a warning, emerging exactly at the moment when he wanted to pose a question to Julitta. But he did, nevertheless. Simply because he was Methodius Buslaev. Stubborn as the log, on which Eddy Khavron sat. “Listen, if K exists… then why did Ares either in jest or in earnest call me the sovereign of Gloom? Or does K… intend to hand over his authority to me?”
Julitta blew on her long bangs. “Puff… Well, you, pardon me, pose some questions! I myself don’t know how the rest goes here, but, I think the authority of Kvodnon is now of another kind. Kvodnon is now a spirit, and the authority of a spirit is always more ideological than real. The sovereign of Gloom in his present understanding – it’s…to compare it to something…well, like a king. Only I immediately warn you: don’t be flattered. Yes, a king has authority and power. He can execute or show mercy. He can declare war or make peace. Everything, it would seem, is tiptop. But you see: a king can be overthrown, poisoned, executed, struck down in battle, or in the end, he can die by himself. And furthermore, the usual story is: ‘The king is dead… Long live the king!’ Isn’t there such a thing?” Methodius unwillingly nodded.
Julitta looked at him sympathetically and continued, “Here Kvodnon – the old, solid Kvodnon, not the current, Faceless – once keeled over in battle with Light, and now they carefully cultivate you to fit on his throne in order again with your help to try to even the score with Light. If not you, sooner or later another Buslaev will be born. However, no one can become Two-faced Kvodnon and the more so Faceless. He’s unique. He existed primordially. He’s more ancient than this world.” “This Gloom of yours is a muddled organization,” said Daphne, shaking her head. “Don’t say it, Light. A simple horror, so muddled. On the other hand, it’s more understandable to me than that Eden,” agreed Julitta.
Behind the door, Ares gave a resounding cough and struck the table with his fist. Julitta hurried. “Well, that’s it, party’s over! Chief’s in a bad mood! Daph, Met, take your infernal kitty away – it had gnawed a corner off the marble table over there! – and march to Glumovich’s school to lead the poor fellow to a heart attack! Methodius, you will be needed tomorrow at midnight. Make a note of it!” she stated.
Chapter 3
Minister of Scrofula, King of Aspirin
In the infinite flow of humanity that crawls along the subway escalators all day and a substantial part of the night, thousands of female faces flicker. They float past and are lost in the expanse of the subway reeking of rubber and the twisting passages under the streets. Their motley army includes: battalions of workaholics and regiments of harassed housewives, squads of sympathisers and artillery battalions of stinkers, logistic units of prisoners of the office, cavalry of hundreds of adventure seekers, divisions of wild hysterical women, draft reinforcements of bluestockings, strategic reserves of former wives, lawless detachments of good-natured mindless ones with canine fur on their skirts, and finally, platoons of poor devils supplied with the newest weapon of tears.
However, one ought not think that it is possible to cover all skirts rushing about with the above given modest classification. Some do not fall into any classification at all. A martyr, a pivot, or pouty lips and all ears? And this is still nothing – a mild case. There are even some, whom a guard of Gloom will not talk about, that are everything before him, and he will only scratch his head and go away. Women are like water. They never stay in one spot and frequently flow from one state to another. To take at least this one or that one there… Today she is a bluestocking, tomorrow a nice frump, the day after a harassed hostess or prisoner of the office. It seems, all the same, she gets off quickly at the terminal. But that is a denial. A woman is always capable of surprises. Suddenly a miracle happens – and a recent bluestocking takes off like a speeding rocket. A phoenix flares up where there were recently the ashes of a person.
Zozo Buslaeva, mother of Methodius, belonged to the now extended category of women-motors. Their main special feature is that they spend their entire life in fussy and chaotic motion. For them, an hour spent in one place is equivalent to a year of strict confinement. It was now necessary for Zozo to spend her days exactly in one place. Recently she was sweating over the post of secretary in the firm Construction Battalion Forever, busy with deliveries of construction equipment. The owner of the firm was Isadora Cutletkina, General Cutletkin’s wife, through whom Khavron arranged the job for his sister. However, Zozo saw Isadora herself only once. Moreover, their dislike for each other was mutual. However, this had no influence on anything. Isadora was barely at the office. The owner and director, as is well known to many, are often treated differently.
Five days a week from ten in the morning to six in the afternoon Zozo accepted and put her signature on papers, on which demolition hammers chiselled, asphalt spreaders rumbled, crane clamping mechanisms clanked, paint sprayers hissed like a snake, and Black and Decker pistol drills droned hollowly. In her time free from the drills, Zozo answered the phone, entered into the computer requests for spare parts for cranes, or sorrowfully watered the flowers.
Next to her behind the wall, in the large room occupied by the sales division, the telephone shrilled non-stop. The old informer Xerox squeaked idiotically. The drywall-covered wall, against which it leaned, shook nervously. Sputtering managers flew along the corridor like clamorous flocks. Something like fastening chains and construction gloves reigned over their bickering. The flock with the gloves had barely managed to rush past and a new invasion turned up. The door was thrown open, someone looked in and shouted, “Seen Tsitsin? Where’s that idiot?” Zozo vaguely and languidly waved her hand in the air as if entreating: all of you stay away from me, I know nothing. The flock of lynchers setting off in pursuit of the idiot Tsitsin had only just disappeared but a commotion again began in the corridor. Zozo plugged up her ears in order not to hear the managers’ sorrowful whine, but it was not possible to work on the computer with plugged ears, and she willy-nilly tore her hands away from them.
They were again getting excited behind the door. There along the corridor they were dragging Tsitsin, caught red-handed in the cafeteria in an attempt to purchase a bottle of Holy Spring mineral water. “What were you thinking when you wrote ‘Country of Recipient Egypt’ in the documentation on a snow blower?” they yelled at him. “Don’t blame me! They screwed up the order!” a velvety tenor objected with dignity. “But you’re not a moron! You could consider that the most severe frost in Egypt is twenty plus degrees!” “I warned the deputy Alex Kurilko, and he said: stop! I can’t work when they say ‘stop’ to me! I have two higher degrees! And let go of my arm immediately! You have sweaty fingers!” the tenor defended himself. “Aha, right away! Go, go!” the voices said and, judging by some suspicious sounds, they were urging on Tsitsin in the back.
Zozo wanted to scream and, screwing up her eyes, threatened the monitor with her fist. She felt like a prisoner of the dull office Cyclops with the spat-upon whiskers, which she wanted terribly to hit on the head with the cover torn from the Xerox. Stretching and straightening her numbed back, she glanced through the window at the crows bathing with pleasure in the air eddies by their high-rise, and smiled at some of her own obscure, mysterious, but very pleasant thoughts. Nevertheless, even in these dreamy moments her fingers continued as usual to run along the keyboard, concrete mixers and dumpsters jumped in the columns assigned to them, and the stapler clicked loudly, biting into the papers.
Zozo was despondent. She wanted a personal life or at the worst to be on leave. But for the time being there was no chance for either personal life or leave. It was hot in the office. The air conditioner did not get rid of the stupidity and boredom of the place. The yogi and essayist Basevich had disappeared somewhere. He had stopped phoning and, apparently, running in the morning. Other adequate candidates had not yet showed up.
A couple of weeks ago, on a wave of drawn-out absence of fish, Zozo
