Chapter 21

Magister Konstantin entered the conference hall, where all the department heads of the SRSS were already awaiting him at the long oval table.

"Rather cold, don't you find?" With these words, the Magister walked over to the convector behind his desk and switched it on. He took his place at the head of the table and proclaimed solemnly, "The weekly assembly of the Society of Representatives of Sound Skepticism is now open."

Several heads of scientific departments in which new discoveries had been made commented on them in turn. Afterward, the assembly summarized the month's scientific activities.

"Honestly speaking, we are making rapid progress," said Konstantin, rising from his chair and beginning to pace about the hall. "Well then, all that is very good, but what news have we of that visiting English illusionist who frightens people by claiming he summons genuine spirits? Maxim, you were handling that matter, were you not?" the Magister addressed the physicist.

"Yes, Anton and I were. There's really nothing extraordinary there. He has, I must admit, achieved considerable proficiency in the optical branch of physics, but nothing more," Newton replied matter-of-factly.

"Additionally, he's a rather competent mechanical engineer," Anton added. "Though truthfully, had it not been for Valeria, we wouldn't have made sense of anything—he speaks absolutely none of our language."

"Very well, finish up with him and have the report on my desk," he addressed Max and Anton, then glanced at Valeria and said with a smile, "And to you, Valeria, my particular thanks."

"Don't mention it. I'm always delighted to help shatter humanity's hope in the existence of a mental world," came Valeria's ironic reply.

Valeria had appeared at around the fourth or fifth meeting of the SRSS. Alexander Rogatyuk had brought her. Konstantin had not interrupted the assembly then, had not demanded to know who this previously unannounced stranger was. He waited patiently until the meeting concluded, though Alexander was clearly distracted by the companion he had brought—something Kostya found most disagreeable. After the assembly, he summoned Rogatyuk first:

"Who is that young lady, might I inquire?" Konstantin asked quietly, suppressing his irritation.

"This is Valeria. I believe she will be useful to us. Besides, she is my girlfriend," Rogatyuk replied calmly.

"So will she be useful to us or to you? What else is she, besides being your girlfriend?" Kostya asked, his voice lower still.

"She is a gifted philologist. She has excellent command of several foreign languages," Alexander answered proudly. Konstantin was compelled to agree that such a person was needed. Foreign languages had been and remained his weak point. He did not know them not because he could not learn them—he simply did not wish to. This antipathy had been with him since childhood.

Subsequently, Valeria came to head the foreign languages department, the urgent necessity for which had only recently arisen. She was a tall, fair young woman of pleasant appearance with a creative mind. She alone among all the representatives of sound skepticism continued to believe in the possibility of supernatural manifestations. Once, Konstantin noticed a tattoo on her leg. "Try to guess—is she a strict English teacher or a loose young thing," he mused over the dilemma that presented itself to his gaze.

Today Valeria sat far from Alexander. "Could they have parted ways?" Kostya wondered, betraying nothing of this latest thought.

"Well, if that is everything, we might as well conclude," Kostya suggested.

"No, there's one more thing," Henry spoke up. "There was an anonymous call from some village... Migovo, it's called. Something strange is supposedly happening there—sounds coming from an abandoned house, and they even say people have been disappearing. The locals are frightened to death, and I believe that when people disappear, it's a bad omen," Henry concluded the news with a jest.

"Very well, it must be investigated. Let only the Illuminati go on this inquiry. You, Evgeny, Nina, Sergei, and you, Henry—I may assign someone else to you as well. Agreed?" Konstantin addressed the people he had just named.

After those authorized for the SRSS investigation gave their consent, Konstantin concluded the assembly with the words, "Well then, that is all. Thank you for your attention. Until next week."

"Valeria, I should like to ask you to remain for a moment," Kostya unexpectedly addressed Valeria when half of the society's representatives had already left the hall. Alexander cast a malevolent glance at the Magister but raised no objection.

"What is the matter between you and Alexander? You usually sit beside each other, yet here you won't even look at one another. Pray do not misunderstand—I simply wish to know whether this will affect your work," Konstantin dissembled once all the others had departed.

"There is nothing between us, and hasn't been for quite some time. Perhaps you simply failed to notice, but we have not been together for a long while," Valeria replied.

"Well then, I am compelled to take a risk and invite you to dinner at a restaurant this evening," Kostya said, and after a brief pause added, "purely in the interest of business."

"But of course," Valeria remarked with a measure of sarcasm. "I accept—only now we shall address each other as 'ty.'"

No sooner had the colleagues taken their seats at the table than Konstantin's telephone rang.

"Forgive me," he addressed Valeria, and picked up the receiver. "I'm listening."

"So, the monthly edition has been successfully printed. And shipment is already in full swing," Nikita Pirozhkov's voice reported the news to Konstantin.

"Good. Here's something else—a book club has been asking me to print another 300 copies of Roman's new book, what's it called... 'Reading Between the Lines of a Person,'" Kostya recalled.

"Yes, yes. Very well, we'll do it," Nikita agreed. Konstantin hung up and turned to Valeria. "We'll need to expand your department. We're becoming popular abroad as well. Therefore, starting next month, I shall raise the question of increasing funding specifically for your department at the meeting," Konstantin spoke in a businesslike manner.

"I agree," Valeria said, after which the conversation shifted to more casual topics.

"And how did you, most esteemed Konstantin Avgustinovich, achieve such success?" Valeria asked with her characteristic irony, to which Konstantin had already begun to grow accustomed.

"It's a long story—if you had seen me a year ago. In short, a pitiful sight. But that which must rise to the very top begins at the very bottom, as Publilius Syrus once proclaimed," Kostya spoke, recalling his former self.

"So the chief skeptic was once a nobody?" Valeria continued to needle him.

"I shall have to quote again, but this time John Milton: 'He was great even in his fall,'" Konstantin displayed his literary erudition. "But you, as I understand it, despite finding yourself in the society of skeptics, do not consider yourself one, do you?"

"First of all, this is a society of sound skeptics," Valeria interrupted, not letting Kostya get a word in, "and secondly, yes, I do believe in supernatural manifestations."

"Then why, in more than half a year of our investigations, have we found nothing authentic? Everything we've discovered to date has been susceptible to logical and scientific interpretation, to say nothing of the number of fraudsters we've uncovered," Konstantin enumerated the facts.

"The fact that we haven't found it yet doesn't mean it doesn't exist," Valeria reasoned logically. "Besides, the SSPI charter states that we must observe the presumption of possibility. Do you believe in anything at all?"

"No... I do not believe. Do you know why?" Konstantin paused, then continued. "Because when I needed it... when I was searching for something that might console me in my moral torments, nothing manifested itself. I thirsted, I pleaded for even the smallest hint of the existence of something greater than these... than these people with their meaningless lives. In those moments of boundless spiritual anguish, I would have been equally glad for a manifestation of good forces as of evil ones." Kostya, feeling himself losing control, thought: "It is unseemly for the Magister of the SSPI to lose his head to emotions." He composed himself and continued calmly. "I've told you why I don't believe. Now tell me—why do you continue to believe?"

"There have been certain incidents in my life that I cannot relegate to the category of 'coincidences,'" Valeria answered without particular emotion.

"Very well, and as for the presumption of possibility," Konstantin continued, as if letting Valeria's last words pass, "in short... I honor the charter, which is why I send only Illuminati on suspicious investigations. As now, for instance—I think you should go on this investigation as well."

"Very well," Valeria agreed without any particular fear, adding with a smile, "I suppose I shall somehow manage to cope with demons."

"Then we shouldn't linger here too long." Kostya rose from the table. "I'll call Henry and tell him you're going with them tomorrow."

# PART III

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