The Day Watch

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THE ENTRANCE DID not inspire respect. The coded lock was broken and not working, the floor was littered with the trampled butts of cheap cigarettes. Inside the lift the walls were covered with illiterate graffiti, in which the word ‘Spartak’ figured as often as the usual crude obscenities; the plastic buttons had been burned through with cigarettes and painstakingly plugged with chewing-gum that was now rock-hard.

The door into the apartment on the fourth floor was a good match for the entrance: some hideous old kind of Soviet artificial leather, cheap aluminium numbers barely held up by their crookedly inserted screws.

Natasha hesitated for a moment before she pressed the doorbell. She must be insane to hope for anything from a place like this. If you were so crazy or desperate that you decided to try magic, you could just open the newspaper, switch on the TV or listen to the radio. There were serious spiritualist salons, experienced mediums with internationally recognised diplomas … It was all still a con, of course. But at least you’d be in pleasant surroundings, with pleasant people, not like this last resort for hopeless losers.

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