I tormented myself in this fashion for a good while. A month, maybe two. In that time I dropped twenty kilos of live weight and acquired atrophy of the brain. My gray matter began delivering to the surface one single thought: what kind of seal were the Russian villains after from Anyuta? What kind of seal were the Russian villains after? What kind of seal were they after? What kind of seal did they want? What kind of seal? What kind of…?
What was it all about? What sort of little thing had cost my unforgettable Anechka her life?
Surely not a simple one. She wasn’t the kind of woman to lose her head in a foreign land over the blue-inked stamp of some limited-liability partnership. And if that was so, then what sort of paper could be rubber-stamped all over with that seal and put to its intended use? Not toilet paper, surely. Wasn’t it the one that had been in Anya’s little handbag… Hold on. Where is it?
A couple of days after our close acquaintance began, Anechka pressed some little bag on me with the words: «Let it sit at your place.» As I recall, I got a bit frightened. I thought: what if there’s some catch in there, a time bomb or an ampoule of poison that will evaporate and slowly kill me. I did want to live, after all. I rummaged through the little bag thoroughly and, to my enormous relief, found nothing drastic. Its contents were a small notebook, a crumpled sheet of paper covered in intricate squiggles, and a key of indecent configuration, flat and thin. You couldn’t open a door with a thing like that.
I ran it through my head once more: notebook, scrap of paper, key.
Hm, one of those things might help solve a big and mysterious secret. Now then, where did the handbag get to? Where did I toss it? Where?!
Bah!
All sorts of rubbish always climbs into your head when your stomach is on fire, your arms are shaking, and there are a hundred push-ups left to reach a thousand. Oof.