Turkish Gambit by Boris Akunin Page A

Turkey,' Varya heard Paladin say in Russian that was quite correct, but with a charming Gallic roll to the r's.
    'No miracle, Monsieur Correspondent, but perfectly straightforward treason,' the lieutenant-colonel said with a smile, looking at Fandorin as he spoke. 'I simply cannot imagine, Mister Volunteer, how you are going to explain yourself to His Excellency.'
    'You t-talk too much, Lieutenant-Colonel.' Erast Petrovich's glance slid even lower, to the top button of the gendarme's uniform jacket. 'Personal ambition should not interfere with the p-performance of one's duty.'
    'What?' Kazanzaki's swarthy face began twitching. 'You dare preach to me? Well now! I've had time to make a few inquiries about you, Mister Wunderkind. In the line of duty. And the character that emerges isn't exactly a highly moral one. Too sharp altogether, above and beyond the call of duty. Made a highly advantageous marriage, didn't you, eh? Doubly advantageous in fact - pocketed a nice fat dowry and still held on to your freedom. Very nice work indeed. My congrat—'
    He never finished. Striking as deftly as a cat with its paw, Erast Petrovich swiped the palm of his hand across Kazanzaki's plump lips. Varya gasped, and several officers grabbed hold of Fandorin's arm, but immediately released it when he showed no signs of agitation.
    'Pistols,' Erast Petrovich pronounced in a humdrum tone of voice, looking the lieutenant-colonel straight in the eye now. 'Immediately. This very moment, before the command can interfere.'
    Kazanzaki was deep crimson. His eyes, as black as plums, flushed bright red with blood. After a moment's pause he swallowed and said: 'By order of His Imperial Majesty duels are absolutely forbidden for the duration of the war. As you, Fandorin, are perfectly well aware.'
    The lieutenant-colonel went out and the canvas flap swung shut violently behind him.
    Varya asked: 'Erast Petrovich, what are we going to do?'
    Chapter Five
    IN WHICH THE ARRANGEMENT OF A HAREM IS DESCRIBED
    La Revue Parisienne (Paris) 18 (6) July 1877
    Charles Paladin
    Old Boots A front-line sketch
    Their leather has cracked and turned softer than the skin on a horse's lips. In such boots one could not possibly appear in respectable company. And, of course, I don't - the boots are meant to serve a quite different purpose.
    They were sewn for me ten years ago by an old Jew in Sophia. As he fleeced me of ten lire, he said: 'Monsieur, long after the burdock is growing thick over my grave, you will still be wearing these boots and remembering old Isaac with a kindly word.'
    Less than a year passed before the heel of the left boot fell off in the excavation site of an Assyrian city in Mesopotamia. I was obliged to return to camp alone. As I hobbled across the burning sand, I cursed that old swindler from Sophia in the vilest possible terms and swore that I would burn those boots on the campfire.
    The British archaeologists I was working with at the site never did get back to the camp. They were attacked by the horsemen of Rifat-bek, who regard all infidels as children of Satan, and every last one of them was butchered. I did not burn the boots,- instead I replaced the heel and ordered silver heel-plates.
    In 1873, in the month of May, while I was on my way to Khiva, my guide Asaf decided to appropriate my watch, my rifle and my black Akhaltekin stallion Yataghan. At night, while I lay sleeping in my tent, Asaf dropped a carpet viper, whose bite is deadly, into my left boot. But the toe of the boot was gaping wide open, and the viper crawled away into the desert. In the morning Asaf himself told me what had happened, because he saw the hand of Allah in it.
    Six months later the steamship Adrianople ran on to rocks in the Gulf of Therma. I drifted along the shoreline for two and a half leagues. The boots were pulling me down to the bottom, but I did not take them off, for I knew that act would be tantamount to capitulation, and then I would never reach land. Those boots