Claws of Mercy

“Who had the idea of assembling such a gruesome collection?” He wondered.

“Who is it? It is our oligarch, of course.”

“Or it is one of his secretaries,” Ruslan suggested. “Who among the bigwigs does not do without the advice of their assistants?”

“And what kind of collection would you advise him to collect? Are they paintings by Modigliani and Picasso?”

It was a joke, of course, but Ruslan answered seriously:

“I mean Shishkin, Aivazovsky, Rokotov, Bryullov, Levitsky.”

“It would cost too much. What if even an oligarch can’t afford it?” His partner always wanted to make jokes. With the help of jokes is easy to get away from the grim reality, but sometimes reality strikes.

“Even the merchant Tretyakov was able to collect paintings, which he then gave to the people, and the resulting is Tretyakov Gallery.”

“You can’t expect that here,” Dima grinned. “The exhibits were brought for a private collection.”

“But what if the rich man has awakened his conscience and wants to open a free museum here?”

“It’s too far from populated areas. Gasoline alone to get here would be expensive. And there’s no public transportation to get here at all. So how do we get visitors here?”

“It is on customized buses, like sightseers. Why are you thinking about technical problems? Can’t our customer afford everything?”

“Let’s say that’s true. But there’s another problem.”

“What is it?”

“Take a look! Look around! What do you see? Beauty mixed with horror.”

“Some like horror and even surrealism, although surrealist art is the world through the eyes of a madman. In surrealist paintings, all the objects are not in their place, so that it gives the impression of absurdity or madness, but some people like it. It’s not without reason that art connoisseurs throng to Salvador Dali’s villa-museum. I’ve been there, by the way, but for some reason I like it better here, I don’t know why.”

“Is it because of it?” The partner nodded at the central pedestal with an unfamiliar, but so attractive name of the deity.

“Yes. It is because of her.”

Ruslan moved forward toward the shimmering statue. Her golden wings fluttered. How like an optical illusion! It was a play of light and shadow. Ruslan reached out his hand to touch the gilded statue and felt only emptiness. There was no statue on the pedestal. But he had just seen it!

Had he imagined it? Ruslan wiped his eyes. The pedestal was still empty. He could have sworn that a minute ago he had seen a golden silhouette with wings on it.

He should get more sleep, and then he wouldn’t have obsessions. Anything can appear to an overworked or tipsy person.

Dima was worried that there were no beer houses in the neighborhood.

“It would probably take half a day to get to the nearest pub!” He lamented.

Ruslan didn’t like the name pub. It was too English, as if it were London, not the distant Moscow suburbs. Nevertheless, the name “pub” could be seen on a pub even in the bedroom neighborhood of Moscow, where Ruslan’s family lived. For some reason, it became fashionable to give the most unattractive-looking establishments foreign names. The service did not improve. And the degree of alcohol was equally high everywhere. Ruslan preferred not to drink at all. That way you would be soberer and spend less money. The museum exposition of the rotunda interested him much more than the presence of drinking establishments in the neighborhood.

“It’s gorgeous here!” He whistled.

“Imagine how much more chic it will be when the building is completed and filled with all the imported curiosities that are still on their way,” Dima’s voice was filled with undisguised envy. He could be understood. Who wouldn’t dream of living in his own palace!

“What a pity that all this luxury will rot here like in a crypt.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Such rarities should be put on public display, not hidden in a private collection,” Ruslan, though he didn’t have the skills of an archeologist, could determine that many of the statues of ancient gods were ancient, hastily restored. They belong in the Hermitage, not in the countryside.

“The public already has the Tretyakov Gallery and the Historical Museum in the center of Moscow,” Dima obligingly reminded him, who himself, if he had ever been to the above-mentioned places, had only been on a forced excursion when he was a schoolboy. He had never visited museums of his own free will. But it didn’t cost him anything to design a blueprint of a museum building.

“It seems that this mansion is being built for the Tsar,” Ruslan whispered to himself, but Dima heard him.

“Why is it?”

“It’s more luxurious than the Hermitage.”

“Well, the Hermitage is old, it’s been standing on the bank of the Neva River for centuries, but here everything is new and will be furnished according to the latest technology.”

“And if you look around, you can rather assume that it will be a temple, not a palace. Look how many gods are around!”

“There were gods and goddesses from all different countries and religions of the world. Only any symbolism related to Christianity was forbidden in the palace, but the owner ordered statues of all the ancient gods. Their names were already carved on the empty pedestals. There were ancient gods, and Egyptian, and Persian, and Indian, and Chinese, and Slavic. All the names belonged to ancient cults. Ruslan studied a little about the culture of the religions of the world.”

“Will the sculptures be made in the ‘art nouveau’ or glamorous style?” He joked. What else would you expect from a cultureless New Russian? People who got rich by chance did not understand museum values.

“No, they were all copies of historical figures.”

Ruslan whistled. It seemed to be the rare case when a rich man could pretend that he was no stranger to history and opera. Probably a concert hall or a private theater, like it was in old Russian estates.

“Do you need a sketch artist?” Ruslan wanted to recommend an acquaintance.

“All the figures have already been made. Some have arrived, others will be delivered soon. So we’ll have to hurry with the completion of the wings.”

On some of the pedestals there were indeed slender figures of Athena, Nemesis and Hecate. The goddess of war was threateningly aiming her spear at those who entered. The three-faced Hecate was conjuring. The Slavic Chernobog squinted menacingly, the leaden face of Loki frightened away with an unpleasant cunning expression, Thanatos was terrifying. The five-headed dragon goddess Takhisis was depicted with one female head and four snake heads. Keto, goddess of sea terrors, crawled across the pedestal dragging a mountain of metal tentacles behind her. Her webbed hands of silvered copper bent over the pedestal and clung to the floor. Ker, the goddess of misfortune, stood between three empty pedestals. Ruslan did not know the Persian gods by name. But the black marble angel made him think of a lie. Was Christian symbolism allowed here?

The suspicion was premature. The black angel was Cupid. Psyche was missing. There was no pedestal for her. The unfinished halls were chaotic. Empty niches were covered with heavy red drapes. Many-armed Indian gods alternated with ancient and Egyptian figures. Ruslan recognized Anubis and Ptah, Seth, Sebek and Kebhut. For some reason a pedestal was prepared for Pharaoh Ehnaton. Did he belong to the pantheon of gods too?

Dima lagged behind, and Ruslan realized that he was lost in the labyrinth of unfinished halls and corridors. From somewhere far away came the clatter of hammers and quiet chants. The radio must be on somewhere.

“It’s a hymn to Aton,” someone whispered behind him.

Ruslan turned around.

A brunette woman stepped down from the pedestal of the goddess Kali, which had recently been empty. Ruslan recognized her immediately. She was the one he had seen at the medical center they had passed. But where had the nurse’s uniform gone? Why was she dressed like an Indian goddess? Her eyes and lips are thickly lined with scarlet. Instead of medical instruments, a gilded sickle gleams in her hand.

A sickle is definitely not an attribute of the goddess Kali. It would be more like a Slavic midwife.

The girl was barefoot. For a second it seemed for some reason that she was treading not on the floor, but on skulls and bones.

“Who are you?” Ruslan felt his lips go numb. Instead of a question, there was only a whisper. He felt as if he were being frozen like a corpse sent to the morgue’s refrigerator.

The girl wasn’t cold, though; there were droplets of sweat on her bronzed skin. On her naked shoulder, a wound glowed. Did the girl herself carelessly hit with a sickle?

“Shall I call an ambulance for you?” It was probably a foolish question to ask a nurse. She could have already taken some painkillers if she’s not paying attention to the wound. And there’s something tearing out of the wound, like some insect living under the skin and pulling the limbs through the edges of the cut.

“Are you sure you don’t need any help, bandages, medication?”

The girl whispered a couple phrases in an unfamiliar language in response and swung the sickle around. He must be imagining things. Ruslan covered his eyes, and when he opened them, he found that the girl in front of him was multi-armed like a goddess. Second and third pairs of hands emerged from the folds of the sari like white insects. A surgical instrument was clutched in each hand. Ruslan barely dodged the scalpel.

“Ah, there you are!” Dima’s voice brought him out of his daze. There was no girl with a sickle. But on Kali’s pedestal was a multi-armed bronze figure. Had she been there a moment before? She looked ominous. As, indeed, it should be. A necklace of skulls around her neck and bronze skulls under her bare feet added to the sinister image. There’s nothing to be surprised about. Kali is the goddess of blood.

“I hope we won’t be sacrificed to her,” Ruslan joked awkwardly, and immediately felt a strange chill as if all of Kali’s bronze hands had closed around his neck.

“Oh, come on! Who does that now? People believe in something like this just for the sake of ticking boxes or to create a museum like this at home.”

“It’s odd that they dragged the sculptures into an unfinished building. Wouldn’t it have been better to wait until the end of construction?”

“Maybe there was nowhere else to store them. Or maybe we are meant to be inspired to be more creative than just building.”

“Or it could also be that they’re all stolen.”

That’s the most obvious suggestion as to why rarities should be hidden.

Matvey Gennadyevich Vereskovsky, Ruslan’s employer and oligarch, knew a lot about expensive things. But did he know about art? In any case, someone among his relatives or his staff had an excellent knowledge of art.

Ruslan paid attention to the figure of the Scandinavian Loki, who had a cunning expression on his face. It seemed that evil gods were honored here, as well as gods of funerary cults. The statue of Anubis in the corner glittered with gilt. The three-faced Hecate occupied a separate niche lined with alabaster skulls. Several painted wood figures depicted fox demons. The kimono-clad beauties had tails and fox masks in their hands. Looking at the collection, Ruslan approached the empty pedestal in the center again. It was obvious that it had a special place. So there must be a special deity standing on it. It would probably become the head of the local pantheon.

Ruslan stopped near the central pedestal with golden letters and the inscription “Alais”.

“I don’t know of such a goddess,” he admitted.

“It seems to be a goddess from Ancient Egypt,” illiterate Dima suddenly showed erudition. “I saw a teaser of a movie about her.”

So that’s where his erudition comes from! From a primitive movie! Ruslan grinned crookedly.

“Is the pedestal made of real gold?” He was genuinely surprised when he touched the ornament.

“I think so.”

Ruslan whistled.

“When people have easy money, they don’t know where to put it, and everything becomes gold!“444

“A lot of money has been spent on this palace,” Dima agreed.

“My husband doesn’t even give me money for doctors,” a slender blonde woman suddenly came out from behind the column. “But the statue of his favorite will be made of gold of the highest standard.”

The blonde looked enviously at the statue of Alais. Apparently, this blonde is the oligarch’s wife.

Ruslan felt embarrassed. A loose tongue could get him fired and cause a lot of trouble. It’s better not to argue with rich people, they have the courts and the police under their thumb. Everyone knows that the one with the most money is always right. But the pretty blonde was angry at her husband’s spending, so she looked at Ruslan with approval and sympathy.

Usually blondes do not like light-haired guys. They prefer brunettes. But the oligarch’s young wife was not a blonde. There were dark roots in her dyed platinum hair.

“I’m Valentina Vladimirovna,” she introduced herself. “But for you it’s just Valentina when we’re in private. In public, however, you’d better address me by my first name and patronymic.”

And she is a rather prim person. Any young girl would just call herself Valya.

Dima introduced himself and Ruslan. The conversation seemed to take place in an ordinary company of young people, but it gave off the novelty of aristocratic arrogance.

Valentina Vladimirovna had something to be proud of. She had a figure and appearance like a photo model, even better. The sequined dress would have been more suitable for the evening, but she wore it now. Probably she is going to some kind of reception after she’s given the building a hostess’s eye.

“Is your husband going to visit us?” Ruslan asked politely.

“Why is it?” The blonde was genuinely surprised and flapped her painted eyelashes.

“Well, to see how things are going here…”

“There’s a solicitor and managers for that.”

“I suppose you must like the building first and foremost? Your husband’s building it for you, isn’t he? Is it a wedding present?”

“It is more like a temple for them,” Valentina looked at the statues with distaste.

As if they could come down from their pedestals and become her living rivals! Ruslan marveled at the lady’s nervousness. It must be hard to keep a rich husband under her thumb.

Valentina took out a pack of cigarettes and a lighter from her shiny clutch. She wanted to smoke, but for some reason she came to her senses and put everything back in her purse. Either she remembered that cultured men did not approve of women smoking, or she was afraid to smoke in the presence of ancient gods. Probably it is the second. Wives of powerful husbands are often very superstitious. Ruslan would not have been surprised to hear that Valentina traveled to psychics, mediums, and other charlatans for sessions. But she suddenly brought up the subject of the old medical center.

“There is an amazing medical center nearby. I’ve been urging my husband to donate to it for a long time, but he refuses. Sometimes superstitious fear is more powerful than common sense.”

“Is it because of the angels at the entrance?” Ruslan guessed. After all, the angels are from the Christian religion, which is not supported here. If they were Egyptian gods, the hospital would have gotten grants long ago. He chuckled at his own impressionability.

“It’s all because of old stories,” Valentina muttered.

“What stories do you mean?” Ruslan and Dima asked in unison.

“Those silly stories that go back to the serfdom era, when there was not wasteland here, but villages, hamlets, and some noble manor, which was destroyed during the revolution.”

Ruslan remembered from the stories of his ancestors that the estates were not destroyed, but taken away in favor of red commanders and party chairmen, but he kept silent. His family’s traumas did not concern Valentina Vladimirovna or Dima.

“What was going on here?” Ruslan asked for the sake of politeness.

“Well, I don’t know anything for sure, I’m not from here,” the oligarch’s wife began to justify herself. “I myself moved to St. Petersburg from the Rostov region at a young age, and later moved to Moscow. It is boring to live in the suburbs. I like noisy megacities, spas, restaurants, clubs, entertainment. From the very beginning, I was against building a house in the middle of nowhere.”

“So, what was going on in the middle of nowhere?” Ruslan interrupted her.

“Rumor has it, a lot of things. Are you interested in local superstitions?”

“I am just curious.”

Valentina crumpled, not wanting to speak, and then she blurted out in one breath:

“Allegedly, out of love for angels in this wilderness a lot of creepiness created.”

How strange it sounded! Ruslan instantly remembered the black-covered notebook he had found. There were notes about evil angels in it too.

“Did you find any broken angel figurines here?” He asked, focusing on the notes.

“I wasn’t looking for any!” Valentina was extremely surprised. “I’m not going through the garbage.”

“That’s not what I mean,” Ruslan objected hastily. How do you tell a woman you barely know that someone else’s notebook was thrown into his car, and instead of throwing it away, he started to read it like an idiot. Now he wants to check the information.

The oligarch’s wife was no longer listening to him, but was fixing her hair. A bob haircut with small snaking curls suited her very well.

“By the way, here’s my business card, in case you need anything,” Valentina rummaged in her purse and held out a thin rectangular card, filled in only on one side.

Ruslan accepted the card. He was already aware that if the name and contacts on the back of the card were not duplicated in English, it meant that the person had no international connections. All influential people have business cards on both sides: one side in the usual Russian, the other in English. Apparently, her husband keeps Valentina Vladimirovna in tight grip. He is the influential person here, not she. For some reason, the business card had Verbina’s last name on it, not Vereskovskaya. It was probably Valentina’s maiden name, but it was awkward to ask. Ruslan did not encourage those who lived in unregistered marriages and thought it was humiliating to talk about such topics aloud. If you ask about something, people will immediately have to justify to everyone why they consider a receipt in the Registry Office unnecessary. Many even call such a marriage civil, but this is a mistake. Although also do not want to explain to anyone that civil marriages are those that are registered, but not married. Otherwise you have to get into discussions with people. Ruslan didn’t like to argue or have someone point out his place.

It was likely that Valentina Vladimirovna’s surname was a well-known one, and the woman didn’t want to change it when she got married, but there was a one-in-a-hundred chance of that. Most married women prefer to take their husbands’ surnames so that the marriage can take place according to all the rules.

“And what will be on this pedestal?” Ruslan decided to check Dima’s assumption.

“Some Egyptian goddess,” Valentina Vladimirovna confirmed.

“Is it another one? It feels like the leading figure of the whole multinational pantheon should stand here.”

“This goddess is special. She’s more heavenly than Egyptian,” Valentina sounded so jealous that Ruslan stopped asking. Only a mad woman could be jealous of a statue. Or a completely desperate woman, completely deprived of male attention. Valentina Vladimirovna didn’t look like the latter. Her appearance was above all praise, but her manners left much to be desired.

“I’ll go!” Valentina Vladimirovna checked the time on the electronic clock in her iPhone. “I have a session at the massage parlor and then the gym. You should know how far it is to drive from here to the nearest fitness center.”

Ruslan wonder why she even came here. Was it to see the statues from all over the world? Or was she more interested in the empty pedestal? Valentina Vladimirovna seemed to be waiting not for a statue of a goddess, but for a rival.

“Are you driving yourself?” Ruslan asked reluctantly. The woman he was talking to gave the impression that she was not sober.

“No, I have a chauffeur. He’s waiting downstairs.”

That was to be expected. A rich man’s wife has no reason to get a driver’s license, and certainly she would never use public transportation. Ruslan was embarrassed that he had asked a stupid question, but the beautiful blonde was not offended by it. She looked absent-mindedly at the empty pedestal.

“Goodbye!” She said goodbye. But to the pedestal or to her companions?

In a minute Valentina’s heels were already tapping on the steps of the rotunda.

:She is a gorgeous woman!” Dima whistled.

“And her maintenance costs her husband, most likely, not cheaper than this palace,” Ruslan said pessimistically.

“Hush! Or she’ll hear you.”

But the guest had already left, and the pedestals and evil gods remained. As soon as the living interlocutor disappeared, Ruslan felt trapped in the company of pagan gods. It seemed as if the statues were watching him.

Fatalism

There was noise coming from the construction site. It was chaotic. Carts, wheelbarrows, cranes, all jumbled into a confused picture. What a mess to work in! Ruslan had a headache from having to rearrange other people’s drawings. It would have been better if he had been allowed to make his own, but then the rotunda would have to be destroyed and the foundation would have to be rebuilt. The employer won’t allow it.

Vereskovsky himself came to the construction site a week later to visit the new architects. The conversation with him was not the most pleasant. Vereskovsky had a lot of requirements that were difficult to fulfill. Everything had to follow his instructions stupidly, and he did not promise a bonus in case of successful completion of the construction.

Many of Vereskovsky’s conditions were extremely stupid. It seems that he is a fantasist. So the construction is going on like a bedlam. Ruslan was extremely happy to kick the oligarch out of the construction site.

“He ought to have been a serf while working in the fields,” complained Dima. “Next time you’ll meet him alone, and I’ll pretend that I’m too busy with urgent problems.”

“It’s not good to put everything on your friend’s shoulders!”

“I know, but I don’t want to feel like a slave!”

Dima muttered to himself for a long time something like that all the money he earned here would have to be spent on psychologists to calm him down from his boss’s tyranny. Ruslan silently looked after Vereskovsky, who, accompanied by his bodyguards, was walking toward the luxury car. The oligarch appeared to be an unassuming type.

“What did Valentina Vladimirovna see in him, I wondered?” Dima also looked at the way Vereskovsky was driving away.

“It was money,” Ruslan answered without hesitation.

“Are you joking?”

“It is absolutely not. If a beautiful woman gets mixed up with someone who has only wealth among his virtues, it’s immediately clear what she found in him – a voluminous purse, well, maybe some connections. All beauties strive for a high social status through marriage or love affair.”

“You’re a pessimist!”

“I’m a realist!”

“Don’t you get any attention from women?” Dima scrutinized his handsome colleague.

“They do, but not for long. I don’t have much to offer them,” Ruslan bitterly remembered that all the romances that had started in high school and at the institute had ended there. How is it that in the modern world you can get acquainted only at school and at work? And if in the circle of colleagues found no one suitable, then there is nowhere else to look. There are, however, dubious dating sites, where you can pick up a promiscuous person or a fraud.

“Once I met a pretty girl by giving her a cheat sheet for an exam,” Ruslan recalled.

“And how did it all end?”

“She lived in the Moscow suburbs, and I lived in Moscow. While we were going to school, we met. Together with the studies, the affair ended.”

Ruslan doesn’t even want to think about those times. It was impossible to live on a scholarship or to buy a bouquet of flowers for a girl. Many students worked part-time after classes, and they had no time to meet someone. During the school years, only children of rich parents live well. If Valentina has children, they will be able to have fun and go on dates between classes, spending parental money on flowers and visits to cafes.