Age of Ice by J. M. Sidorova

Author:J. M. Sidorova
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Scribner

I finished the ritual and let her under her blankets, patted the goose down all around, and planted a cold kiss on her forehead. “Did Nadya say what Dr. Merck is working on all the time?”

“She was not certain. She said he was talking about some kind of a— pump? Maybe I haven’t heard it right. Such a peculiarity.”

I straightened up and was about to leave but she held my hand. Somewhat sheepishly, she played with my fingers. “My lord? . . . What does your magic candy emporium offer today, do you mind me asking?”

And eagerly, I said, “Orange sorbet . . . I’ll be right back.”

I would, after all, get to make love to my lady.

• • •

I should have gone to see Merck the very next day, not months after, when I finally gathered courage to do it. I was a coward. Meanwhile, he wrote letters to Nadya, begging her to come back. Nadya showed some of them to Anna—they were profuse, melodramatic. So unlike him. Besides, Nadya’s knowledge of German was not exhaustive, why wouldn’t he write in Russian? Some words were particularly tough, she needed help with them, could we please take a look? Anna, then I, would spread our hands. Perhaps Smertempfindungschwelle was just a misspelled Shmertzempfindungschwelle, and did not contain a reference to death— smert, in Russian. But what was this “I feel pajwaq at myself”? It was neither German nor Yakuti.

Nadya went back to St. Pete’s. Then a letter from her arrived, urging me to come and convince Carl to go to the doctor. “He does not listen to me, but he will listen to you, his benefactor and guardian,” she wrote.

So I finally went.

When I reached the academy, he was in lecture. I watched his delivery from the back of the auditorium; unseen, I watched and worried for him, expecting some kind of accident. Yet he was quite in control, and if he occasionally made a blank pause, it was no more remarkable than a pause of any German naturalist obliged to describe, in Russian, the anatomy of slugs and snails. His chalk scratched the blackboard, pews creaked or a student coughed from time to time—otherwise a sleepy lull prevailed in the hall, with me seemingly the only anxious person in attendance. Finally, he finished the last sketch of a garden snail’s gut, said, “That will be all for today,” and abruptly headed out, chalk still in his hand.

I followed, at a distance. Up the stairs we went, down the dark corridors. He reached his door, unlocked it, entered. I waited for a while, then knocked—no response. I listened—all quiet inside, the quietness of held breath—if I hadn’t seen him come in, I would have concluded he was away. I opened the door—he stood straight ahead, chalk still in his hand, and he did not look me in the face, but down, at my feet. I followed his stare and saw something—a glyph drawn in chalk on the floor right in front of the threshold.

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