The day before, a girl left me, meanly, treacherously, with practically no explanation. She probably would have said that she didn’t quit, but left in English, but the aftertaste remained. For me, a detective with ten years of experience, it was almost a punch in the gut. If she still went to suffer, it would not be so bad, but she went to rest at sea. Pictures from this vacation flashed through my head, I imagined them, although in order to see them in reality, I only had to go to her social networks. I didn’t want to discuss this with anyone, and there was nothing to discuss here, but I knew one thing for sure: I couldn’t call her and sort things out.

“Goodbye, Malika,” I said mentally, trying to concentrate on my life, but I couldn’t. Every now and then I started thinking about what I did wrong. She had long insisted on living together, but for me, a private detective, it was akin to losing my profession; I cannot live with a woman under the same roof, doing investigations: flies separately, cutlets separately. And yet the feeling of guilt overtook me. It was easier for me to accept the breakup if I knew that she left me not because I was bad, but because she found someone better. Because only in this case did she turn out bad. In order not to stress myself out and not go in circles, I retired to my archive.

The archive was a small room in my apartment, only eight square meters. It was completely filled with small cabinets with small drawers containing files from the time of my grandfather, who was also a detective. When I needed to get ready, I came here.The atmosphere of the wooden, parquet floor and the small boxes filled with cards with handwritten text did their job – I calmed down, caught my breath. When I was feeling particularly bad, I could even sleep here. It was very good to sleep on a warm, wooden floor to reboot. That was exactly what I planned to do that night.

I loved to come here when I needed to think, the very atmosphere created by this wooden floor and these treasures in the boxes made me think correctly or not think at all, but feel, feel, feel. The magnetism of this small room of only eight square meters can only be compared with the evening windows of houses, each of which has its own leisurely life with its own tragedies and moments of truth. Here in the boxes there is the same thing, only multiplied by the fates of people in alphabetical order. And also the smell, it cannot be confused with anything. I could transfer everything that is here into a digital form and store it in the files of my computer, but I will not be able to transfer the smell into a digital form.

On the wall hung a portrait of my grandfather, round-faced, bald, slightly stooped, wearing thick glasses and holding a huge magnifying glass in his hand. He was dressed to the nines: an unchanged three-piece suit and a watch on a chain sticking out from under a dark blue vest. It was a picture that one of his clients painted him in gratitude. I didn’t think that I would ever become as great as him, but his portrait helped me. It was as if he was telling me from a portrait: “Get your act together, you can do it.”

My grandfather was a great professional in his field, my mother’s father, we were friends. He died early, just a year and a half short of his sixtieth birthday, but I remembered him. I was still too young for him to communicate with me on an equal basis about the cases he was investigating, but I learned some rules from him. For example, learning to let go when you can no longer do anything. Now I couldn’t let go.

I comfortably “made myself a nest” on the floor, for these purposes I had a huge checkered blanket in the corner, and began to plunge into the dark kingdom of dreams. “Just don’t dream of me, just don’t dream of me,” I repeated, hoping for a miracle. Sleep began to envelop me, if only for another five minutes I would have fallen asleep like the dead, but then the phone started ringing. I forgot that I didn’t turn it off and left it in the kitchen. I hoped he would shut up now. I closed my last business just a week ago, so I was hoping to spend at least another week to digest it. It was a complex, confusing matter related to money, and always when it comes to money, you have to give it your all.People are very calculating when it comes to money and plan crimes in such a way that we detectives need to try very, very hard to unravel them.

The phone didn’t stop ringing. I waited warily for the phone to go silent, and finally, after two minutes, the long-awaited silence came. I did not want to get up to save the settings for sleep and then move into a new state, freed from focusing on my woman. And just as I closed my eyes, hoping to fall asleep, the phone rang again. I was angry and had no choice but to get up and go see who called me.

Delilah called, it was my new partner. I was introduced to her only recently and, frankly, it was forced on me. It was rumored that our agency belonged to her uncle, but I did not delve into the details. I was almost sure that she would run away from me after the first case.

The code of honor required that I call her back myself; after all, two missed calls were difficult to ignore. I looked at my watch – 21:05. I should have called, but even then she got ahead of my intention. The phone rang right in my hands, and her photograph with her name appeared on the screen: Dalila Dvorzhetskaya.

– Do you know that Lilya Kolyuki has disappeared?! – she blurted out almost immediately.

“No,” I answered quickly. – And who is it?

– Stand-up comedian. Her aunt contacted our agency this morning, I want to take on this case.

I chuckled skeptically.

– Weren’t there any other people willing? This is actually what the police should be doing.

“She’s been doing it, but it’s no good, they’ve been looking for it for a week.” She suspects that Lilya was “removed” by black realtors who were interested in her apartment.

I sighed.

“I don’t want to take this case,” I said firmly. “I think the police are doing a better job of investigating it than we are.”

I was about to hang up, but Delilah was not going to give up.

– Let me come and we will discuss it with you. Don’t rush to conclusions until you know all the details.

“Well, come,” I said sadly, but immediately regretted it. The spoken word is not a sparrow; if it flies out, you won’t catch it.

I decided to get ready. I remembered the name of the missing woman that Dalila said, but initially I thought that she said Lilya Kalyuka, because kalyuka was the name of an ancient Russian musical instrument, something like the current flute.

I went online, and indeed the news that a stand-up comedian had disappeared had already leaked to the media, it was Lilya Kolyuki. She, apparently, was not a famous comedian, and even the news of her disappearance did not cause much public outcry. Through a search engine, several videos surfaced where she performed not alone, but as part of a group called “Fifteen Shoes.” It was a comedy show consisting of eight participants. I was especially struck by the screensaver of this show, where multi-colored shoes fell from the ceiling, participants came running, hurriedly put them on, and one of the participants was missing a shoe. She looked around and grabbed her head, eagerly feigning confusion. This is where the cutscene ended.There were few comments under the video, mostly written by the participants themselves, but there were also those who expressed genuine sympathy that Lilya Kolyuki had disappeared. These were isolated comments.

I took a break from the video and needed a break. I turned on the coffee machine to make myself a cappuccino. The time was late, but I didn’t feel it. Looking at the clock built into the coffee machine, I saw that it was already 22:15.

“Is Delilah really coming this late?” In my mind I imagined her getting into the car and driving towards me. Her portrait began to emerge little by little. This means that, after all, investigations are not just a whim for her, but a matter of life, since she is ready to come to me at any time to discuss the details.

I looked around the kitchen room. I wouldn’t say it was a mess, but it was still worth cleaning up. I love doing it myself, it allows me to relax and concentrate on the task at the same time, but at this moment cleaning was not part of my plans. In principle, I don’t like it when women come to my house, this is not the place where I would like to see them, but Delilah was not really a woman, or rather, I did not perceive her that way, she was my new partner whom I wanted to get to know better. Initially, when it was presented to me, I was not delighted. She seemed very pompous to me, poking her nose into everything and very young, as if she was not yet twenty-five. With what surprise I learned that she was thirty-five, that is, she was three years older than me, but she looked like a desperate teenager with her ultra-short haircut and voluminous ripped jeans.

Taking a sip of a freshly brewed cappuccino, I sat down on a chair and fell back on the laptop, trying to make inquiries about Lilya Kolyuki. I clicked the arrow under the video again and rewinded until her performance began. She competed sixth. Her exit was accompanied by applause, which was clearly superimposed on the video. Lilya looked impressive. She contrasted strongly with all the other members of this female group, and despite her young age – twenty-nine years old – she looked old-fashioned. She looked as if she was very concerned about this topic: she spent half a day steaming these trousers with a crease, this light green jacket, this purple blouse. In addition, she was wearing shoes while all the other members looked more relaxed in sneakers and sneakers. Only one of them was wearing high heels.

I didn’t understand whether this image was a stage one, or whether she transferred it to the stage from life, but she clearly stood out from everyone. Lilya was very large and joked about being overweight, like all overweight stand-up comedians. The first performance I saw of her was jokes on this topic:

– Hi people! – she joyfully greeted the people in the hall. – So, now it will be about “feeling sick.” Who knows what “feeling sick” is?

Laughter and exclamations were heard in the hall.

– What? “Trough”, “cattle”? No, I’m talking about crying today. In fact, you all know what crying is. In short, I’m sick of it. A friend said: I want, she says, something grass-colored, it’s the hit of the season. This is what I think: she can still choose something, the reptile. Here I am, for example, what grass color do I need? “Take whatever you can fit into” is my motto! There is no time for choice anymore. If it’s fastened, thank the Almighty; if not, hi to the suppliers and the store director. So I say to her: “is it May now?” She says: “May”. So go ahead, I say, don’t be foolish, roll around in the grass, you’ll be grass-colored, and you’ll save a lot of money, and it’s all natural. She looked at me like that! Well, at least I said that I had some herbal tea left, just brewed it, pour it over it – and it’s immediately on trend.

Artificial laughter and applause were heard in the hall. And at the same moment Delilah rang the doorbell, several times, as if she was afraid of being late for the meeting.

I opened the door.

In front of me stood a very energetic, short-haired Dalila Dvorzhetskaya, a slender brunette, in whose appearance everything betrayed a perfectionist. She had a pizza in her hands, as well as a package, a small suitcase and a shoulder bag.

– Hello, Wilhelm! – she said joyfully. – So, I decided to take pizza with me so that I have something to munch on. “Sit all night,” she puzzled me from the doorway. “And there’s a change of bed linen in the suitcase, because I’ll have to spend the night with you.”

“However,” I thought, trying to maintain equanimity.

I got the impression that with such a large amount of things she decided to stay with me for at least a week. In addition, she was the only one who called me by my full name – Wilhelm, because my colleagues called me Willie, and my relatives preferred to call me by my fatherly name – Gena.

Delilah looked asthenic: a short but fashionable woman’s haircut, constant stud earrings, one on her left ear and many on the other, a small shiny piercing in her nose. Apparently a diamond, but I didn’t confirm that with her. It was generally strange to me how this small, fragile, short-haired woman contained so much femininity, especially when she began to speak or gesticulate. And she gestured a lot, which spoke of her intense emotionality. Her eyes were dark, narrow, but very moving, in them I saw thousands of shades of feelings when she began to tell something.

“She probably takes sleeping pills before bed,” I thought, “after all, she needs to somehow tame her emotionality.”

But even here a surprise awaited me. As it turned out, Delilah pacified her in a different way: she was also a runner who participated in athletics competitions. And I just don’t know how many kilometers she ran. Apparently, it was extremely large, but with such a complexion it was not surprising. It seemed that if she walked faster, she would take off, despite the lack of wings.

One day recently in the office, she looked at my colleague, who had the imprudence to boast about the number of steps taken per day. This step note was on his phone. Delilah didn’t say anything, but her very emotional face showed that this was just childish pranks. We must give her credit: she didn’t even smile contemptuously – this was due to her good upbringing and the self-restraint that she had cultivated in herself.

She was not like me, a voluntary homebody. I tried not to spill my energy: “Well, why? I’ll go out into the street, they’ll kill me, and a lot of cases will remain unsolved, and I won’t be able to help people.” I’ve invested too much in my brain and my detective work to take that risk. Therefore, I considered even going out to buy bread an exhausting procedure that did not require my attention; I ordered everything home. Let the courier leave it near the doorstep, then I’ll pick it up.

***

At my home, Delilah behaved like she was at home, but without violating my boundaries. She did not look for anything, did not examine anything in the apartment, but behaved simply and naturally. She put the pizza down, quickly took off her shoes, and went into the kitchen. I offered her coffee and she agreed. In the first fifteen minutes spent at my house, she managed to briefly introduce me to the situation, telling me about Aunt Lily Kolyuki, who contacted our agency.

“I was surprised that none of our detectives want to take on this case,” Delilah said indignantly, throwing up her hands.

I shrugged, although this was not at all surprising to me, because the detectives in our department preferred something more attractive in terms of complex moves and intricate stories. And here is something incomprehensible, or rather indistinct. It was quite possible that in a week or two the girl would have turned up on her own, because there was no body or signs of abduction.

– What attracted you to this business? – I asked.

“It seems to me that she has a complex character,” Delilah answered unexpectedly.

– From the missing woman? – I asked again.

“Yes,” Delilah answered firmly.

“She’s not as simple as she seems,” I thought about Delilah.It wasn’t what she said that attracted me, but the fact that she answered my question without thinking for a second. She didn’t pause for long and said what she thought. Unexpectedly for myself, I noticed that I would feel comfortable working with her.

And the more I talked to her, the more I realized that I would take on this case. My grandfather, a great detective, told me that cases are attracted to us by distribution from above. If a case is attracted to you, it means you are ready, you need it.

All the following time, we watched videos with Lilya Kolyuki and analyzed her behavior, trying to create a psychological portrait. I especially remember one video:

“So, I won’t be a stand-up comedian if I don’t talk to you about sex,” Lilya Kolyuki said from the stage.

(Laughter)

“Yes, yes, the eternal topic, His Majesty – sex. Come on, clap, who has it?” – a roar of applause was heard in the hall. – Thank you, I have never been applauded like that. Maybe I went down the wrong path? (Laughter in the hall) Well, there is a lot of applause. You live well! Now clap, whoever doesn’t have it.

(Pause, rare applause)

– What’s so weak, huh? Here’s a girl, why don’t you have it? What? Are you waiting for love? That’s good, and how long will you wait? Ah, there’s still time… Well, our problem is that we think there’s still time, that we’ll still have time to do everything. But what if we suddenly die, and we haven’t had a single rest.

(Laughter in the hall)

Delilah and I looked at each other. This monologue did not evoke much sympathy; there were few comments and few likes under the video; they mostly discussed the other participant. But considering that Lilya Kolyuki disappeared, these words now sounded mystically honest, although not at all funny.

You have finished the free preview. Would you like to read more?