Methodius Buslaev. Third Horseman Of Gloom. Дмитрий Емец

this?” Methodius thought. He did not like oblong objects, on top of that even covered. The emerging association was not in favor of what was inside. “Where did this come from?” he asked.

      “Ares brought it,” Julitta replied lazily.

      “And went off again?”

      “He stated that he needs some tool. And that you’d wait for him and not take it into your head to be off anywhere.”

      “What tool?” Methodius was puzzled. The situation looked strange. Guards of Gloom usually did not need tools. In order to demolish a wall or pierce a solid twenty-metre stone well, it was enough for them to stare at it or desire it.

      “Listen, Met, I’m a smart girl, of course, but not enough to answer every question that you have enough stupidity to ask,” Julitta remarked compassionately.

      Methodius carefully tapped the long cover. It was a quick, almost fleeting touch, but also enough for him. With his fingers he came into contact with something deathly cold and hard like a diamond. An icy viper crept along the vessel to his elbow. His arm went numb. His temples ached. Methodius hastily withdrew his hand and took a step back.

      “Ah, that’s what you are!” he said vindictively to the strange object.

      Angry, Methodius wanted to decisively pull a long brush and tear away the cover, but something, more real than fear or suspicion, stopped him. He simply felt that it was not worth doing. What was inside presented a threat no less than Mamzelkina’s scythe.

      The thought flickered in him to ask Julitta, but he doubted that he would receive an answer. Julitta was very busy, touching up Essiorh’s bumpy alcoholic nose. Not limiting herself to this, she drew Essiorh with fangs and about ten vampire pimples. In addition, she bestowed on him a ski cap, a homeless sporty look, and admired the result.

      “Why do you do it?” Methodius asked, forgetting for the moment about the strange object hidden by the cover.

      “Do what?” Julitta did not understand.

      “You’re distorting Essiorh.”

      Julitta pondered, after staring with surprise at the pencil in her hand. Apparently, even she herself clearly did not know why she abused Essiorh’s image. “A complex question! I want to be certain that when I need to, I’ll be able to get him out of my head just in case. Because somehow I’ve very often begun to be reminded of him recently!” the witch said, studiously depicting a dumpster next to Essiorh.

      “And you think that you’ll forget him by sketching him?” Methodius was incredulously curious.

      “An amateur is visible from afar! I localize the image in order to banish it from my consciousness! In order to stop loving someone, it’s useful to present him in a silly and ridiculous way. I’m working on this. I’m creating a many-sided portrait of our ‘ideal’.”

      “So, how’s it turning out?”

      Julitta appraised the figure and, leaning over, whispered something to it. The homeless-looking Essiorh took out a herring skeleton from the dumpster and began to chew on it with greed. After finishing with the skeleton, he wiped his lips on his sleeve, hiccupped with satisfaction, and again started to burrow in the bin. This time his attention was drawn to a cracked bottle of cologne, to which he clung immediately.

      Примечания

      1

      The Nagant M1895 revolver, designed by Belgian industrialist Léon Nagant (1833–1900), was adopted by the Russian Empire in 1895 as standard issue firearm.

      2

      The copper mines of Timna Valley in Southern Israel had been attributed to King Solomon, but most archaeologists considered them to be earlier than Solomon’s era.

      3

      Vladimir Ivanovich Nemirovich-Danchenko (1858–1943) was a Russian and Soviet theatre director, playwright, producer, and co-founder of the Moscow Art Theatre.

      4

      Ivan Petrovich Kulibin (1735–1818) was a Russian mechanic and inventor. He had a special interest in the clock mechanism. In 1791, he built a push-cycle cart using a flywheel, a brake, a gearbox, and a roller bearing.

      5

      The Ural motorcycle is manufactured by IMZ-Ural, Irbit Motorcycle Factory, a Russian maker of the heavy sidecar motorcycle. The first prototype M-72 was built in 1941, modelled after the late-1930s BMW R71 sidecar motorbike. It was the bike suitable for the Red Army during WWII. A modern day Ural can come with or without a sidecar.

      6

      In Norse mythology, a host of female figures called valkyries is sometimes connected to swans. These valkyries are responsible for choosing who should be slain in battle.

      7

      Famous verses by Punlius Vergilius Maro (70-19BC), usually called Virgil, one of the greatest Roman poets during the reign of Caesar Augustus (63 BC -14 AD), the first emperor of the Roman Empire.

      8

      The quote is from Ode 1.3 – To Virgil, Setting Out for Greece – by Horace, Quintus Haratius Flasccus (65 BC – 8 BC), the leading Roman lyric poet during the time of Augustus, Illi robur et aes triplex circa pectus erat, qui fragilem truci commisit pelago ratem primus – there was both oak and a triple layer of bronze around the heart of he who first launched a frail craft on the savage open sea.