UNDERGROUND

119

Gargantua rang at exactly six o'clock. Boris has already calmed down, realizing that if the old man spent his efforts on a performance with a camera, then he also needs this meeting. They were sitting in a hotel room when some mournful tune played on the phone. Despite his complacency, Boris felt excited when he heard her. Grabbing the phone, he managed to notice the text "number not defined" before answering.

“Listen carefully,” the clear voice of that old, long-forgotten Soviet teacher, who had sunk into oblivion during his father’s service, spoke up. The voice of a kind but strict teacher. The voice of a man capable of mercilessly, if necessary, killing the enemy, as he did in the war. Boris did not know how this was possible, but now he believed that he really was ninety-eight years old. Listening to this voice, as if from another era, from an old Soviet movie, Boris had some kind of latent respect for its owner. A person of such age, such skills, who at the same time retained his