Year: 2015
Publisher: Eksmo
Age limit: 16+
Genres: Contemporary Russian literature

Dina Rubina has written three wonderful books that unite different generations different families from different corners peace. At the same time, the main connecting link here is musical activity, as well as canaries, which with their beautiful singing were able to connect the souls and hearts of people.

“Russian canary. Prodigal son"is the third part of the series written by Dina Rubina. Everyone should read the work for many reasons. There is a huge love here - for life, for your soul mate, for what you do. The author also added many historical moments, wars, political instability and confusion into the book, which greatly influenced people's lives.

The main characters of the work are the singer Leon and the deaf girl Aya. They are happy together, but there are secrets in their relationship. So, Leon admits to his beloved that he is stalking some of her relatives. He, as an intelligence officer, suspects them of arms smuggling.

Leon and Aya go to her homeland, to her family. There, a young man charms everyone, and he also fulfills an important mission - he must see and find out everything about one person who is hiding within the walls of this house. While traveling, lovers enjoy beautiful views, have a pleasant time together, and also give each other happiness and love. And so Leon manages to find out a lot useful information, and the canary helps him find the criminal - a person who works with plutonium automatically becomes allergic to canaries.

The book “Russian Canary. The Prodigal Son" grabs you from the first lines and keeps you in suspense until the very end. You will worry about the fate of the main characters, and also hope that all crimes will be solved and stopped.

This is the final part that will answer all the questions that you may have had when you started reading the previous two parts. Dina Rubina was able to choose such words to fully express the real feelings of young people, as well as the love of parents for their children. The writer perfectly managed to convey the beauty of the landscapes that you can see through the eyes of the characters.

If you haven't read anything by Dina Rubina, start with the Russian Canary series. You will fall in love with both the books and the writer herself. Of course, it is better to start your acquaintance with the first part in order to fully enjoy the whole story. These books will give you good mood and inspiration.

On our literary website you can download Dean Rubin’s book “Russian Canary. Prodigal Son" for free in formats suitable for different devices - epub, fb2, txt, rtf. Do you like to read books and always keep up with new releases?

Dina Rubina

Russian canary. Zheltukhin

© D. Rubina, 2014

© Design. Eksmo Publishing House LLC, 2014

All rights reserved. No part of the electronic version of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, including posting on the Internet or corporate networks, for private or public use without the written permission of the copyright owner.

© The electronic version of the book was prepared by liters company (www.litres.ru)

“...No, you know, I didn’t immediately realize that she was not herself. Such a nice old lady... Or rather, not old, that it’s me! The years, of course, were visible: the face was wrinkled and all that. But her figure is in a light raincoat, cinched at the waist like a youth, and that gray hedgehog on the back of a teenage boy’s head... And her eyes: old people don’t have eyes like that. There is something turtle-like in the eyes of old people: slow blinking, dull corneas. And she had sharp black eyes, and they held you at gunpoint so demandingly and mockingly... I imagined Miss Marple like that as a child.

In short, she came in and said hello...

And she said hello, you know, in such a way that it was clear: she didn’t just come in to gawk and didn’t waste words. Well, Gena and I, as usual, can we help with anything, madam?

And she suddenly said to us in Russian: “You really can, boys. “I’m looking,” he says, “for a gift for my granddaughter.” She turned eighteen and entered the university, the department of archeology. He will deal with the Roman army and its war chariots. So, in honor of this event, I intend to give my Vladka an inexpensive, elegant piece of jewelry.”

Yes, I remember exactly: she said “Vladka”. You see, while we were choosing and sorting through pendants, earrings and bracelets together - and we liked the old lady so much, we wanted her to be satisfied - we had time to chat a lot. Or rather, the conversation turned in such a way that it was Gena and I telling her how we decided to open a business in Prague and about all the difficulties and problems with local laws.

Yes, it’s strange: now I understand how cleverly she conducted the conversation; Gena and I were like nightingales (a very, very warm-hearted lady), but about her, except for this granddaughter on a Roman chariot... no, I don’t remember anything else.

Well, in the end I chose the bracelet - Beautiful design, unusual: the garnets are small but have a lovely shape, curved drops are woven into a double whimsical chain. A special, touching bracelet for a thin girl’s wrist. I advised! And we tried to pack it stylishly. We have VIP bags: cherry velvet with gold embossing on the neck, a pink wreath, and gilded laces. We keep them for especially expensive purchases. This one was not the most expensive, but Gena winked at me - do it...

Yes, I paid in cash. This was also surprising: usually such exquisite old ladies have exquisite gold cards. But we, in essence, do not care how the client pays. We are also not the first year in business, we understand something about people. A sense of smell is developed – what is and what is not worth asking a person.

In short, she said goodbye, and we were left with the feeling of a pleasant meeting and a successful day. There are people with with a light hand: they’ll come in, buy some cheap earrings for fifty euros, and after that the moneybags will come crashing down! So it is here: an hour and a half passed, and we managed to sell three euros worth of goods to an elderly Japanese couple, and after them three young German women bought a ring each - identical, can you imagine that?

The German girls just came out, the door opens, and...

No, first her silver hedgehog swam behind the display case.

We have a window, which is also a showcase – half the battle is luck. We rented this room because of him. It’s not a cheap space, we could have saved it by half, but because of the window – as I saw it, I said: Gena, this is where we start. You can see for yourself: a huge window in the Art Nouveau style, an arch, stained glass windows in frequent bindings... Please note: the main color is scarlet, crimson, what kind of product do we have? We have garnet, a noble stone, warm, responsive to light. And I, as I saw this stained glass window and imagined the shelves under it - how our grenades would sparkle in rhyme with it, illuminated by light bulbs... jewelry the main thing is what? A feast for the eyes. And he turned out to be right: people definitely stop in front of our window! If they don’t stop, they’ll slow down, saying they should come in. And they often stop by on the way back. And if a person comes in, and if this person is a woman...

So what am I talking about: we have a counter with a cash register, you see, turned out so that the display case in the window and those who pass outside the window are visible as on the stage. Well, that means her silver hedgehog swam by, and before I had time to think that the old lady was returning to her hotel, the door opened and she entered. No, I couldn’t confuse it in any way, what, can you really confuse something like that? It was the delusion of a recurring dream.

She greeted us as if she was seeing us for the first time, and from the doorway: “My granddaughter is eighteen years old, and she has also entered the university...” - in short, all this canoe with archeology, the Roman army and the Roman chariot... gives out as if nothing had happened .

We were speechless, to be honest. If there were even a hint of madness in her, then no: black eyes look friendly, lips in a half-smile... An absolutely normal, calm face. Well, Gena was the first to wake up, we must give him his due. Gena’s mother is a psychiatrist with extensive experience.

“Madam,” says Gena, “it seems to me that you should look into your purse, and a lot will become clear to you. It seems to me that you have already bought a gift for your granddaughter and it is in such an elegant cherry bag.”

“Is that so? – she answers in surprise. “Are you, young man, an illusionist?”

And he puts a handbag on the display window... damn, I have this one in front of my eyes vintage handbag: black, silk, with a clasp in the shape of a lion's face. And there is no bag in it, even if you crack it!

Well, what thoughts could we have? Yes, none. We've gone completely crazy. And literally a second later it thundered and blazed!

…Sorry? No, then this started happening - both on the street and around... And to the hotel - that’s where the car with this Iranian tourist exploded, huh? - the police and ambulance came in droves to hell. No, we didn’t even notice where our client went. She probably got scared and ran away... What? Oh yes! Gena gave me a hint, and thanks to him, I completely forgot, but it might come in handy for you. At the very beginning of our acquaintance, the old lady advised us to get a canary to revive the business. As you said? Yes, I was surprised myself: what does a canary in a jewelry store have to do with it? This is not some kind of caravanserai. And she says: “In the East, in many shops they hang a cage with a canary. And to make her sing more cheerfully, they remove her eyes with the tip of a hot wire.”

Wow - a remark from a sophisticated lady? I even closed my eyes: I imagined the suffering of the poor bird! And our “Miss Marple” laughed so easily..."

The young man who presented this strange story to the elderly gentleman who entered their store about ten minutes ago, stood by the windows and suddenly unfolded a very serious official ID, which was impossible to ignore, fell silent for a minute, shrugged his shoulders and looked out the window. There, the flounces of tiled skirts on the Prague roofs glittered like a carmine cascade in the rain, a sideways, squat house stared out onto the street with two blue attic windows, and above it stretched the powerful crown of an old chestnut tree, blooming in many creamy pyramids, so that it seemed as if the whole tree was strewn with ice cream from the nearest cart.

Further on stretched the park on Kampa - and the proximity of the river, the whistles of steamboats, the smell of grass growing between the paving stones, as well as friendly dogs of various sizes, let off their leashes by their owners, imparted to the entire area that lazy, truly Prague charm...

...which the old lady valued so much: this detached calm, and the spring rain, and the blooming chestnuts on the Vltava.

© D. Rubina, 2015

© Design. Eksmo Publishing House LLC, 2015

* * *

Dedicated to Bora

Onion rose

1

The incredible, dangerous, in some ways even heroic journey of Zheltukhin the Fifth from Paris to London in a road copper cage was preceded by several stormy days of love, squabbles, interrogations, love, torture, screams, sobs, love, despair and even one fight (after frantic love ) at rue Aubrio, four.

The fight is not a fight, but she threw a blue and gold cup of Sevres porcelain (two angels look like a mirrored oval) at him, and hit him, and abraded his cheekbone.

“Fir-fry…” Leon muttered, looking at his face in the bathroom mirror in amazement. - You... You ruined my face! I'm having lunch with the channel producer on Wednesday. Mezzo…

And she herself got scared, flew up, grabbed his head, pressed her cheek to his skinned cheek.

“I’ll leave,” she breathed out in despair. - Nothing works!

She, Aya, couldn’t do the main thing: to open it, how tin can, and extract answers to all the categorical questions that she asked, as best she could, fixing her inexorable gaze on the core of his lips.

On the day of her dazzling appearance on the threshold of his Parisian apartment, as soon as he finally opened the hoop of his yearning hands, she turned around and blurted out:

- Leon! Are you a bandit?

And the eyebrows trembled, flew up, circled in front of his raised eyebrows in amazement. He laughed and answered with wonderful ease:

- Of course, bandit.

Again he reached out to hug, but it was not to be. This little girl came to fight.

“Bandit, bandit,” she repeated sadly, “I thought about everything and understood, I know these habits...

-Are you crazy? – he asked, shaking her shoulders. – What other habits?

“You’re strange, dangerous, you almost killed me on the island.” You have neither a cell phone nor an email, you cannot stand photographs of yourself, except for the poster one, where you are like a joyful remnant. You walk as if you killed three hundred people... - And starting up, with a belated cry: - You pushed me into the closet!!!

Yes. He actually pushed her into the storage room on the balcony when Isadora finally came for instructions on what to feed Zheltukhin. He hid it out of confusion, not immediately figuring out how to explain to the concierge the mise-en-scène with a half-naked guest in the hallway, riding on travel bag... And in that damn closet she sat for exactly three minutes while he frantically explained to Isadora: “Thank you for not forgetting, my joy,” (fingers get tangled in the loops of a shirt, suspiciously pulled out of trousers), “but it turns out that already ... uh... no one is going anywhere.”

And yet, the next morning he dumped Isadore all the truth! Well, let's say, not all of it; Let's say he went down to the hall (with slippers on his bare feet) to cancel her weekly cleaning. And when he just opened his mouth (as in the thieves’ song: “A cousin from Odessa came to see me”), the “cousin” herself, in his shirt over her naked body, barely covered... and didn’t cover a damn thing! - flew out of the apartment, rushed down the stairs like a schoolboy at recess, and stood and trampled on the bottom step, staring at both of them demandingly.

Leon sighed, broke into the smile of a blissful cretin, spread his arms and said:

– Isadora... this is my love.

And she responded respectfully and cordially:

– Congratulations, Monsieur Leon! - as if standing in front of her were not two maddened rabbits, but a venerable wedding procession.

On the second day, they at least got dressed, opened the shutters, tucked in the exhausted ottoman, devoured everything that was left in the refrigerator, even half-dried olives, and contrary to everything that his instincts, common sense and profession, Leon allowed Aya (after a huge scandal, when the already filled ottoman howled again with all its springs, accepting and accepting the tireless Siamese load) to go with him to the grocery store.

They walked, staggering from weakness and swooning happiness, in the sunny haze of early spring, in a tangle of patterned shadows from the branches of plane trees, and even this soft light seemed too bright after a day of loving confinement in a dark room with the telephone turned off. If now some merciless enemy intended to pull them in different directions, they would have no more strength to resist than two caterpillars.

The dark red facade of the “Semicolon” ​​cabaret, an optician, a hat shop with blank heads in the window (one with a pulled-down earflap that floated here from some Voronezh), a hairdresser, a pharmacy, a mini-market, completely plastered with sales posters , a brasserie with big-headed gas heaters above rows of plastic tables exposed on the sidewalk - everything seemed strange, funny, even wild to Leon - in short, completely different than a couple of days ago.

He carried a heavy bag of groceries in one hand, with the other, tenaciously, like a child in a crowd, he held Aya’s hand, and intercepted her, and stroked her palm with his palm, fingering her fingers and already yearning for others, secret the touch of her hands, not expecting to get to the house, where they still had to trudge God knows how long - eight minutes!

Now he powerlessly brushed aside the questions, reasons and fears that were pouring in from all sides, presenting some new argument every minute (why on earth was he left alone? Aren’t they herding him just in case - like then, at Krabi airport - rightly believing that he can lead them to Aya?).

Well, he couldn’t lock him up without any explanation arriving bird within four walls, placed in a capsule hastily put together (like swallows make nests with their saliva) by his suspicious and wary love.

He so wanted to walk her around Paris at night, take her to a restaurant, bring her to the theater, clearly showing her the most wonderful performance: the gradual transformation of an artist with the help of makeup, a wig and a costume. I wanted her to be captivated by the comfort of her favorite dressing room: a unique, charming mixture of stale smells of powder, deodorant, heated lamps, old dust and fresh flowers.

He dreamed of going with her somewhere for the whole day - at least to the Impressionist Park, with the monogrammed gold of its cast-iron gates, with the quiet lake and sad castle, with the picture puzzle of its flower beds and lace parterres, with its seasoned oaks and chestnuts, with plush dolls of trimmed cypress trees. Stock up on sandwiches and have a picnic in a pseudo-Japanese gazebo over the pond, to the burr of a frog, to the chatter of frenzied magpies, admiring the smooth progress of imperturbable drakes with their precious, emerald-sapphire heads...

But so far Leon has not found out his intentions friends from the office, the smartest thing was, if not to run away from Paris to hell, then at least to sit behind doors with reliable locks.

What can we say about forays into nature, if on an insignificantly small segment of the path between the house and the grocery store, Leon constantly looked around, stopping abruptly and getting stuck in front of shop windows.

It was here that he discovered that Aya's clothed figure was missing something. And I realized: a camera! It wasn't even in the bag. No “specially trained backpack,” no camera case, no those scary lenses she called “lenses.”

-Where is yours? Canon?- he asked.

She answered easily:

- I sold it. I had to get to you somehow... They stole your bags from me, bye bye.

- How did they steal it? – Leon tensed.

She waved her hand:

- Yes, yes. One unfortunate drug addict. Stolen while I was sleeping. Of course, I brushed him aside - later, when I came to my senses. But he’s already spent it all down to a penny...

Leon listened to this news with bewilderment and suspicion, with a sudden wild jealousy that sounded like an alarm bell in his heart: what kind of drug addict? how could steal money while she was sleeping? What kind of shelter did you find yourself in at such a good time? and how much is it near? or not in a shelter? Or no drug addict?

He briefly noted with gratitude: it was good that Vladka had taught him from childhood to humbly listen to any incredible nonsense. And I realized: yes, but this the person doesn't know how to lie...

No. Not now. Don't scare her away... No interrogations, not a word, not a hint of suspicion. There is no reason for a serious skirmish. She already sparkles with every word - she’s afraid to open her mouth.

He put his free hand around her shoulders, pulled her towards him and said:

- Let's buy another one. - And, after hesitating: - A little later.

To be honest, the absence of such a significant sign as a camera, with the threatening trunks of heavy lenses, greatly facilitated their movements: flights, crossings... disappearances. So Leon was in no hurry to make up for the loss.

But hiding Aya, uncontrollable, noticeable from afar, without opening up to her at least within some reasonable (and within what?) limits... was not an easy task. He really couldn’t lock her in the closet during his absences!

He was spinning like a snake: you know, baby, you shouldn’t leave the house alone, this is not a very calm area, there are a lot of different bastards hanging around - crazy people, maniacs, full of some kind of perverts. You never know who you'll run into...

Nonsense, she chuckled, “the center of Paris!” On the island, yes, there: one crazy pervert lured me into the forest and almost strangled me. It was very scary there!

- OK then. What if I just ask you? No explanation yet.

“You know, when our grandmother didn’t want to explain something, she shouted to dad: “Shut up!” - and he somehow sank, he didn’t want to upset the old woman, he’s delicate.

- Unlike you.

- Yeah, I'm not delicate at all!

Thank God, at least she didn’t answer the phone. Jerry Leon ignored calls and one day simply did not open the door for him. Philip was led by the nose and kept at a distance, twice declining invitations to have dinner together. He canceled the next two rehearsals with Robert, citing a cold (he sighed into the phone in a shameless voice: “I’m terribly sick, Robert, terribly! Let’s reschedule the rehearsal to... yes, I’ll call you when I come to my senses,” - and it looks like the sky should have fallen on the ground so that he came to my senses).

Well, what next? And how long can they sit out like this - animals surrounded by dangerous happiness? She can’t hang around from morning to evening in the apartment, like Zheltukhin the Fifth in a cage, flying out for a walk under Leon’s supervision along the three surrounding streets. How can you explain to her, without revealing yourself, the strange combination of his secular artistic life with the usual, at the level of instinct, conspiracy? What words, measured in homeopathic doses, can be used to describe office, where a whole army of specialists is counting the weeks and days until the hour X in an unknown bay? How, finally, without disturbing or frightening, can she feel the Bickford cord into the secret world of her own fears and endless flight?

And again it hit me: how defenseless they both are, in essence - two homeless children in the predatory world of a worldwide and multidirectional hunt...

* * *

“We’ll go to Burgundy,” Leon announced when they returned home after their first business trip with the feeling that they had traveled around the world. “We’ll go to Burgundy, to see Philip.” I’ll sing the performance on the thirteenth, and... yes, and the radio recording on the fourteenth... - I remembered and groaned: - Oh-oh-oh, there’s also a concert in Cambridge, yes... But then! - in a captivating and cheerful tone: - Then we will definitely go to Philip for five days. There are forests, roe deer and hares... a fireplace and Françoise. You will fall in love with Burgundy!

I was afraid to look beyond the foggy edge of these five days; I didn’t understand anything.

He couldn’t think at all right now: all his attention, all his nerves, all his miserable intellectual efforts were aimed at maintaining an all-round defense against his beloved every second: who didn’t care about the choice of words, who bombarded him with questions, without taking their demanding eyes off from his face.

– How did you find out our address in Almaty?

- Well... You called him.

- Yes, this is the simplest task of the help desk, my beloved tick!

Somehow it turned out that he could not give a truthful answer to any of her questions. Somehow it turned out that his whole twisted-twisted, twisted, cursed life, like a pig’s tail, was woven into an intricate carpet pattern of not only personal secrets, but also completely confidential information and pieces of biographies - both his own and those of others - the presentation of which, even he simply had no right to hint. His Jerusalem, his adolescence and youth, his soldier’s honest and other, secret, risky, and sometimes criminal by the standards of the law life, his blissfully dissolved in the throat, gutturally fingering the ligaments forbidden Hebrew, his favorite rich Arabic (which he sometimes walked like a dog on a leash, in some Parisian mosque or in cultural center somewhere in Rueil) - the entire huge continent of his past was flooded between him and Aya, like Atlantis, and most of all Leon feared the moment when, having flown with the natural ebb, their quenched bodily thirst would leave traces of their defenselessly naked lives on the sand - the cause and a reason to think about each other.

For now, the only saving grace was that the apartment on Rue Aubrio was filled to the brim with the authentic and urgent present day: his work, his passion, his Music, which - alas! – Aya could neither feel nor share.

With cautious and somewhat aloof interest, she watched excerpts from opera performances with Leon’s participation on YouTube. Characters bleached with makeup in togas, caftans, modern suits or the uniforms of different armies and eras (a mysterious outburst of the director’s intention) opened their mouths unnaturally wide and remained stuck in the frame for a long time, with idiotic amazement in their rounded lips. Their stockings with garters, over the knee boots and ballroom slippers, fluffy wigs and a variety of headdresses, from wide-brimmed hats and top hats to military helmets and tropical helmets, simply dumbfounded a normal person with their unnatural strain. Aya screamed and laughed when Leon appeared in the female role, in a baroque costume: made up, in a powdered wig, with a flirtatious black spot on his cheek, in a dress with figs and a neckline that revealed too prominent female image shoulders (“Did you wear a bra for this costume?” “Well... I had to, yes.” “I stuffed it with cotton?” “Why, there are special devices for this.” “Ha! Some kind of nonsense!” “Not nonsense.” , but theater! And your “stories” - aren’t they theater?”).

She carefully leafed through a stack of posters hanging behind the door in the bedroom - from them she could study the geography of his movements in last years; bowing her head to her shoulder, she quietly touched the keys of the Steinway; made Leon sing something, intensely watching the articulation of his lips, every now and then jumping up and putting her ear to his chest, as if she were applying a stethoscope. Thoughtfully asked:

– And now – “Faceted glasses”...

And when he fell silent and hugged her, rocking her and not letting go, she was silent for a long time. Finally she said calmly:

-Only if I always sit on your back. Now, if you sang in bass, then there is a chance to hear... as if from afar, very far away... I’ll try it with headphones, later, okay?

And then what? And – when, exactly?

She herself turned out to be an excellent conspirator: not a word about the main thing. No matter how he started cautious conversations about her London life (he approached her gradually, in the image of a jealous lover, and God knows, he didn’t pretend too much), she always became isolated, reduced to trifles, to some funny incidents, to stories that happened to herself or with her careless friends: “Can you imagine, and this fellow, waving a pistol, barks: quickly lie down on the ground and drive mani! And Phil stands there like a fool with a hamburger in his hands, shaking, but it’s a pity to quit, he just bought a hot one, he’s hungry! Then he says: “Could you hold my dinner while I get my wallet?” And what do you think? The thug carefully takes the bag from him and waits patiently while Phil rummages through his pockets for his wallet. And finally leaves him a couple of pounds for travel! Phil was amazed later - what a humane gangster he came across, not just a bandit, but a philanthropist: he never vomited from a hamburger, and financed the way home ... "

Leon even doubted: maybe office were mistaken - it is unlikely that she would have survived if one of the professionals set himself the goal of destroying it.

But what is true is true: she was damn sensitive; responded instantly to any change in topic and situation. He admired himself: how does she do it? After all, he doesn’t hear intonation, nor the pitch and strength of his voice. Is it really only the rhythm of the movement of the lips, only the change of expressions in the face, only gestures that give her such a detailed and deep psychological picture of the moment? Then it’s just some kind of lie detector, not a woman!

“Your posture changes,” she noticed one of these days, “the plasticity of your body changes when the phone rings.” You approach him as if you were waiting for a shot. And you look out the window from behind the curtain. Why? Are you being threatened?

“Exactly,” he responded with a stupid laugh. – They threaten me with another charity concert...

He joked, made jokes, chased her around the room to grab her, twist her, kiss her...

Twice he decided on madness - he took her out for a walk in the Luxembourg Gardens, and he was taut like a bowstring, and was silent the whole way - and Aya was silent, as if she felt his tension. It was a pleasant walk...

Day by day, a wall grew between them, which they both built; with every cautious word, with every evasive glance, this wall grew higher and sooner or later it would simply shield them from each other.

* * *

A week later, returning after a concert - with flowers and sweets from a midnight Kurdish store on the Rue de la Roquette - Leon discovered that Aya had disappeared. The house was empty and lifeless - Leonov’s genius ear instantly probed any room to the last speck of dust.

For several moments he stood in the hallway, without undressing, still not believing, still hoping (a machine-gun belt of thoughts, and not a single sensible one, and the same aching horror in the “breath”, as if he had lost a child in the crowd; it’s not enough - he lost, so he, this child, and if you don’t shout enough, he won’t hear).

He rushed around the apartment - with a bouquet and a box in his hands. First of all, contrary to common sense and to his own hearing, he looked under the ottoman, as in childhood, foolishly hoping for a joke - suddenly she hid there and froze in order to scare him. Then he searched all visible surfaces for the note left behind.

He opened the closet doors on the balcony and returned to the bathroom twice, automatically looking into the shower stall - as if Aya could suddenly materialize there out of thin air. Finally, throwing on washing machine a bouquet and a box of buns (just to give freedom to his hands, ready to crush, hit, throw away, twist and kill anyone who gets in the way), rushed out into the street as he was - in a tuxedo, in a bow tie, in a raincoat thrown over but not buttoned up. Despising himself, dying of despair, silently repeating to himself that he probably already lost his voice on the nerve bud(“To hell with him, and congratulations - the music didn’t play for long, the guy didn’t dance for long!”), for about forty minutes he hung around the area, well aware that all these pathetic throwings were meaningless and absurd.

On the streets and alleys of the Marais quarter, the nightly bohemian life had already awakened and stirred: the lights above the entrances to bars and pubs were blinking, streams of blues or the uterine hiccups of rock fluttered out of the open doors, around the corner fists were pounding on someone’s plump leather back, giggling and sobbing, from inside this centaur someone shouted curses...

Leon looked into all the establishments that came his way, went down to the basements, scoured the tables with his eyes, felt the back-profile figures on the high stools at the bar counters, stomped around the doors to the ladies' rooms, waiting to see if she would come out. And he very clearly imagined her arm in arm with one of these... one of these...

In the end, he returned home in the hope that she had gotten a little lost, but sooner or later... And again he found himself in deadly silence with a sleeping Steinway.

In the kitchen he downed three cups one after another. cold water, not thinking that it was harmful to the throat, he immediately rinsed his sweaty face and neck over the sink, splashed the lapels of his tuxedo, ordered himself to calm down, change clothes and... finally think. Easy to say! So: in the hallway there was neither her cloak nor her shoes. But the suitcase is in the corner of the bedroom, it...

What does she care about a suitcase, what does she care about a suitcase, what does she care about suitcases in the world!!! - this is out loud, an alarmed scream... Or maybe she slipped away, sensing danger? Maybe some Jerry came here in his absence (by what right did Nathan drag this guy in, giving him complete freedom to appear in my private life - damn, how I hate them all! My poor, poor persecuted girl!).

...She returned at a quarter past two.

Leon had already developed a search strategy, became collected, cool, knew where and through whom he would get weapons, and was fully prepared for any scenario in his relationship with office: blackmail them, bargain with them, threaten. If necessary, go to the last line. Waited until three o'clock in the morning to go to Jerry's first thing - in the right way…

And then the key cracked in the castle innocently and casually, and Aya entered - animated, in an open cloak, with a bouquet of crimson chrysanthemums (“from our table to your table”). Her cheeks, flushed by the breeze, also soft crimson, responded so wonderfully to both the chrysanthemums and the half-untied white scarf on her white neck, and the wide spread of her eyebrows soared so victoriously over her Fayum eyes and high cheekbones...

Leon called on all his strength, all his restraint to calmly remove her cloak - with his hands shaking with rage; he restrainedly touched his lips, which were ice-cold, and not immediately, but half a minute later, he asked, smiling:

- Where have you been?

- I was walking. – And then willingly, with playful pleasure: imagine, I looked around and discovered that four years ago I was brought here to the studio of a photographer. Maybe you know him? He works in such a blurring style like “romanticism”, a mysterious flight in rapid speed. I personally never liked these tricks, but there are fans of such old crap...

Rubina has an incredible density of text - sounds, colors, smells, sensations, feelings are described so voluminously, concisely that sometimes you want to emerge from this stream and just relax on some word in simplicity. But Rubina hardly gives the reader this simplicity and relaxation in her books, especially in the third part of this trilogy. Sometimes I want to quickly “skip” some story about an ancient castle and find out what will happen next, but it is precisely this detail and vividness of the life story that for me forms the writer’s style. I am amazed at her skill: how many completely different words she finds to describe often the same thing - sunset, sea, voice, love. And in the third book, it seemed to me, the “objectivity” of the world of Rubina’s characters and, one feels, the writer herself is most evident: with what love and attention the details of the furnishings of Leon and Little Liu’s apartments, the antique shop, Friedrich’s house are described... “Objectism” here - not Plyushkin syndrome or stupid consumerism: the individuality of the heroes is manifested through things, things are a clot of memory, a concentration of meaning, like Ariadna Arnoldovna’s wig for Leon. In ordinary life I am rather indifferent to things, but this book made me look at them differently.

It is also interesting that the three volumes of “The Canary” are a real encyclopedia of everything in the world. You can call it a “cosmopolitan encyclopedia.” Rubina immerses in detail the life and customs of several countries and many places. I learned a lot of new things about Israel. I saw Portofino. I drank soju and ate lamb ribs. I know how much pluto weighs. The author manages to write about a lot, but at the same time very accurately, so there is no feeling of superficiality. Maybe it’s precisely because of the abundance of details that you live “Russian Canary” as if it were your own life, and this doesn’t happen so often with books.

As for the plot: yes, I agree with some reviews, in the third part it “sags” somewhat. More precisely, the plot is developing rapidly. But in the end there is some disappointment: it is difficult to believe that such an experienced fighter as Leon would not think about the consequences when going alone on a yacht full of dangerous opponents. Recklessness, stupidity, naivety? The canary itself ended up in a cage, where the same hot wire was waiting for it. I didn’t really like the ending: the pairing of a blind singer, who became even more brilliant after losing his sight, and a deaf girl photographer - it seems to be too much. It seems that the author somewhat artificially leads the plot to the equation of both heroes: now each of them has a physical deficiency that is compensated by the overdevelopment of another physical feature, which is the basis of talent (voice for a singer and vision for a photographer).

At first I wanted to compare the entire trilogy with a waterfall - powerful, deafening, dense and at the same time scattered into small drops, but then I realized that best comparison- this is a "fountain". A singing, dancing, man-made fountain, because Rubina’s prose is not a natural element, but a harmonious narrative, coming from the heart, but still verified in every word. Yes, the feeling from reading it is something like this: you dive into a fountain. You swim and breathe in the fountain. And when it’s all over, you come out of this life-giving water so helplessly dry, and gradual withdrawal begins. Otkhodnyak. Thirst.

Aya and Leon enjoy love in his apartment on Rue Aubrio. The hero is trying to protect his beloved from danger, and the girl suspects him of illegal activities. The singer is forced to admit that he is an intelligence officer and is tracking down her English relatives Bonnke, Friedrich and Gunther, in connection with arms smuggling. The heroine tells everything she knows about the criminals.

The singer persuades Aya to ask to visit his uncle - he definitely needs to see Gunther, whom Israeli intelligence does not know by sight and has been tracking for a long time. Leon hopes to learn “about a small, inconspicuous bay, about a private, venerable yacht whose final destination will be the port of Beirut.” For Leon, this information is a ransom, “an exchange with the office... I give you... Gunther, and you give me peace and freedom. That is, IU...” Leon proposes to the girl, and in the role of engaged couple he has to go to London.

Taking Zheltukhin, they drive a rented car across half of Europe, enjoying the tourist views and each other’s company; this is a true love journey. The heroes spend an amazing night in the Flemish castle of Leon's acquaintances.

After the concert in London, the heroes visit Friedrich, who is having a reception in honor of his birthday. In the house, besides his uncle and his wife, there are several guests, the bodyguard Chadrick, the maid Bertha and Gunther, hidden from everyone in his room. Friedrich is sincerely happy about his niece and her fiancé. Leon charms the owner's wife Elena, quietly eliciting from her the necessary information about the family yacht, on which, as he suspects, smuggled plutonium is being transported to the Middle East.

In the owner's bookcase, the hero notices an old family book by Big Etinger, which Jacob Etinger once sold to the old antique dealer Adil. The book disappeared after the murder of the old agent, in it there is a danger sign left by the antique dealer. In the holiday salad, Leon sees an onion rose, which was once prepared by the “terrible Nubian” Vinay, who served at Immanuel’s. All these warning signs point to some kind of threat awaiting the heroes in the house of the arms dealers.

The maid Big Bertha brings Zheltukhin to Gunther, who is hiding in the house, and with that an allergic attack of suffocation occurs. This is the canary reaction of a person dealing with plutonium. When Gunther is taken to the hospital, Leon finally sees him for the first time - it is Vinay, who has been working under the nose of Israeli intelligence for many years.

Love in Portofino

Leon plans an operation to track plutonium smuggling routes and destroy Gunther. He decides to carry out everything secretly, alone, and then send the result to Israeli intelligence. The hero hides Aya in the village and prepares for a dangerous task.

After talking with ex-lover Nicole and Leon's analytical thoughts determine the place where Bonnke's father and son will load the stolen plutonium onto a yacht to transport it to the Middle East. This is the Italian port town of Portofino, where Bonnke and Nicole have villas. Not wanting to part with his beloved for a long time, the singer takes her with him, planning a colorful “spy performance”. In addition to them, Gunther is secretly being monitored by Israeli intelligence services, who recognize Leon in the make-up of an old woman.

On the day of the operation planned by the hero to destroy Gunther, Aya is overtaken by an attack of a long sleep. Leaving the girl at the hotel and writing two letters - for her and for intelligence, Leon sails into the bay and, having tracked down the yacht, drowns the enemy. Upon surfacing, he is captured by Gunther's guards and taken to the Middle East.

Having woken up and read her lover’s letters, the heroine does not follow the instructions, but begins to look for Leon on her own. In a cafe on the coast of Portofino, Iya is seen by Nicole, discussing with her relative the strange death of the Bonnke family: Elena and Friedrich crashed in a car when they went to identify the body of Gunther, who drowned while drunk. This is the official version for the police.

Return

Leon is beaten on the yacht, finding out why he killed Gunther. According to the version he composed, he is taking revenge for the bride, who was supposedly once raped by him. Chadrick, the bodyguard of the murdered Gunther, joins the tormentors. He tortures the hero, not believing in the legend he invented about the avenger groom.

Nathan Kaldman and Shauli discuss the rescue of Leon from captivity. According to intelligence information, he is hidden in different places in Syria and Lebanon by bandits of Islamist groups. From their conversation, it turns out that Aya sent a letter to Shauli, which presented the entire criminal scheme for transporting plutonium to the Middle East and the role that the Bonnke family played in this. According to Nathan, the Israeli intelligence services will not rescue Leon from captivity, since he disrupted their important operation and is no longer an active agent. The men also mention that the plutonium ended up in the hands of Arab terrorists, and Aya disappeared.

Nathan turns to the old intelligence officer Zara with a request to bring up his old connections and assist in the liberation of Leon. She names the lawyer Nabil Azari, who has the most incredible contacts and often acted as an intermediary in prisoner exchanges. Ironically, the lawyer is Leon's uncle, the brother of his biological father.

Aya rushes around Europe in search of Leon, with whom she is expecting a child. Nobody can help her. Believing that Leon is alive, she meets with Philippe Gueshard, the singer's impresario, and tells him that Leon is probably an intelligence officer, which incredibly surprises him. She goes to Bangkok and works in a hotel almost until she gives birth.

In Israel, intelligence officer Meir Kaldman has a difficult conversation with his wife Gabriela. She is depressed about Leon's capture. The husband notices that the special services will not rescue the singer, since he disrupted a very important operation. To this, Gabriela vindictively tells him that their third child, Ryzhik, is Leon’s son, and that his adored mother, Magda, cheated on her husband while he was in captivity. An enraged Meir almost kills his wife, but his father stops him. As a result, Nathan has a heart attack and dies in the arms of Magda, to whom he forgives his long-standing betrayal.

On the day of Nathan's funeral, Magda comes to the intelligence office and blackmails deputy chief Nachum Schiff in order to force him to free Leon. Israeli intelligence services are still taking steps to find and ransom Leon. At the same time, lawyer Nabil Azari receives proposals from three interested parties - Israeli, French and Iranian intelligence - to participate in negotiations on the exchange of the French singer Etinger for the Iranian captive General Mahdavi. The negotiation mechanism starts.

News agencies report the imminent release of the famous singer. After reading this news, Aya goes home to Alma-Ata, expecting Leon to find her there.

The night before the exchange, a drunken Chadrick secretly enters Leon's cell and blinds him, avenging his murdered lover Gunther. In Cyprus, under the auspices of the UN, an exchange of a singer for a captured general is taking place. Leon's friend Shauli accompanies the hero to Israel, where he is met by Avram, a long-time family friend. The singer is being treated in hospital.

Aya has a strange dream that she gave birth to a four-eyed boy. Waking up, she reads the news about the exchange that took place and the release of Leon. Overcoming her father's resistance, she flies to Israel. Shauli accompanies her to the hospital room. When they meet, Aya learns that Leon is blind, and Leon learns that he will become a father.

Epilogue

St. Mary's Abbey, near the Israeli village of Abu Ghosh near Jerusalem, hosts the annual music Festival. The oratorio “Prodigal Son” is sung by the famous countertenor Leon Etinger together with his eight-year-old son Gavrila. The boy has a viola, like his father had in childhood. He's a bit like Leon, but without his father's fierceness. Rather, he resembles Big Etinger - Herzl. The hall is full. Magda, who is present here, reflects on the vicissitudes of fate and nature, which gave one son Leon hearing and voice and deprived the other of talent. She regrets that Meir will never allow her to introduce the children. The woman admires Aya, admitting that the singer is happy with her.

Aya meets Shauli at the airport, who has arrived to listen to the oratorio. On the way to the abbey, the heroine enthusiastically talks about her work as a documentary filmmaker. The old bachelor Shauli admires Aya and is jealous of Leon. He compares the heroine to the biblical Ruth, a symbol of righteousness and devotion to her family.

On the stage “soars, intertwining, a duet of two high voices... Two figures, Leon and a boy, so close standing friend to each other, as if they had grown together, in an indissoluble connection of two voices they lead the party of one rebellious, but humble soul...” Aya thinks she hears her husband and son singing. The heroine recalls that when Gavrik was little, she and her husband heard each other, holding the baby’s heels, and called him “the guide of happiness.”