Dark Silence

17 days (2)

The heavy autumn sky seemed to be carefully painted by someone in a solid gray color, which did not allow the slightest glimmer of sunlight to go through and cheer this shitty day up. Darnell lit a cigarette and blew up a plume of smoke, looking up at the dome of the sky, peering through the golden garlands of leaves, desperately clinging to the branches. The path in the park near his home led Darnell past strollers, young mothers with baby carriages, enthusiastic joggers, walking elderly couples, and dog owners who humbly followed their pets on leashes. Darnell glanced at Madeleine. The girl ran in circles, destroying high mountains of leaves gathered by street cleaners, and chased pigeons. The man cautiously examined the surroundings of the park but did not notice anything that could pose a danger to Madeleine. It was a gloomy day, but rather warm, and an aimless stroll through the park distracted Darnell from the recent meeting to which he no longer wanted to return in his thoughts. 

On one of the benches, he noticed a lovey-dovey couple. Darnell would not have paid much attention to them, if not for the horns located in two rows on the guy's head. A girl sitting on his lap pulled him for a kiss holding those horns, and he pressed her to him in response with the small brown wings. Darnell hummed through his teeth and rolled the cigarette from one corner of his mouth to the other.

“They’re throwing aside all restraint,” he grumbled, pulling his Agency ID out of his inner pocket as he headed to the couple. Coming closer, he addressed the demon. “Hey you, eagle, you’d better hide your wings.”

“What do you care?” The demon answered lazily, pulling away from his girlfriend. Darnell noticed that she was quite beautiful.

“According to paragraph 15 of chapter two of the Treaty, demons are prohibited to publicly display their race,” Darnell said, seeing out of the corner of his eye that Madeleine had stopped scaring away the panicking pigeons nearby and started hunting them instead.

“So what?” the demon laughed, hugging the girl. She clung to his chest and glared angrily at Darnell from under her friend's wing. The man frowned and held out his open ID to the demon.

“Do you remember what punishment follows for breaking this rule?” Darnell took the ID away and opened half of his coat to demonstrate his holster to the demon. He turned pale and quickly jumped off the bench, taking the girl off his knees.

“Let's get out of here,” he muttered, turning into a human form, “cause there’s a boring moral entrepreneur in here.”

The girl also got up and followed him, leaning against his side and grabbing him with her arms.

“What a piece of s**t,” she said, almost inaudibly, talking to the demon, but Darnell heard her anyway.

“What did ya say?!” He barked out at her back. The girl screeched and quickly dragged the demon away, cautiously looking back at Darnell.

He went to the urn and put out the stub on it. Madeleine immediately ran to the man and tugged at his sleeve, attracting attention. When he glanced at her, throwing the rest of the cigarette into the urn, the girl began to wave her hand somewhere to the side with a happy expression on her face. Darnell turned his head and noticed a girl with too familiar red hair sitting on another bench, bent over something in her arms.

“No, Madeleine, we shouldn't…” he started, but the girl had already run off to Agnes and, drawing her attention to herself, began to wave her head, apparently answering her questions. The man approached them quite unwillingly.

“Hi, Darnell,” Agnes smiled, lifting her round glasses at him. “Are you having a walk?”

“Yeah,” the man muttered back.

Madeleine had already lost interest in her interlocutor and ran further, so Darnell had to follow her. To his surprise, he suddenly noticed that Agnes jumped off the bench and joined him. The man sighed and tried to come to terms with the fact that he would not be allowed to be alone with his thoughts. The girl lowered her head so that Darnell could only see the tip of her nose peeking out from under the red curly mane. They walked in silence, and Darnell felt that Agnes was terribly uncomfortable with this, and she probably already regretted going after him, but he did not want to interrupt the silence. He was not bothered by mutual silence, and he did not consider it necessary to be the starter of the conversation only out of politeness.

Darnell took a pack of cigarettes from his pocket and lit one. He noticed that Madeleine, a few steps further down the path, froze and waited for the moment to grab the gaping pigeon. It hid its head under the wing and enthusiastically cleaned the feathers, not noticing that a golden-haired hunter was sneaking up to him.

“Oh, come on,” Darnell muttered. In a couple of wide steps, he reached the girl, who was already ready to make a dash towards the unlucky victim and grabbed her under her arms. “Don't you touch that flying rat!” He said in a hortatory way through clenched teeth with a cigarette in them. “You never know how much stuff it is on it, you can catch something!"

Darnell carried Madeleine to the nearest bench and, giving the girl one last shake, put her in front of him.

“Sit for at least five minutes!” He said, falling onto the bench. Madeleine frowned and shook her head. “When will your wind run down?! Fine, go, but so that I can see you. And don't touch the pigeons and dogs!” he shouted after her.

Madeleine went to the other side of the path and began to enthusiastically collect a bouquet of wide yellow maple leaves. Darnell crossed his legs and straightened his crumpled coat. Agnes sat down quietly and cautiously beside him. He noticed that the girl put a book on her lap. How lonely can one be to sit in the park and read on a day off?

Darnell took a drag on his cigarette and blew the smoke up. Agnes snorted quietly but did not say a word again. She sat upwind and all the smoke was blowing on her, but she made no attempt to change the situation, and Darnell was not going to jump around her. She followed him of her own will.

“Madeleine is a very good girl,” Agnes finally broke the silence. Darnell nodded slowly back to her. “So, what will you do after?..”

The man pursed his lips. What will he do after? Agnes meant if he was thinking of keeping the girl with him? And how did she imagine that? The question was completely inappropriate, and Darnell did not want to answer it. As well as he didn’t want to reflect on what would inevitably happen when he was done with Madeleine's case.

“I don’t know,” he replied shortly.

“She likes being with you very much,” smiled Agnes.

“What’s with that confidence?” Darnell frowned. Agnes had not seen Madeleine for a long time, and they could not communicate much.

“Oh, I shared my Wi-Fi for her, and we texted with her!” Agnes confessed happily. "She's using her tablet..." The girl stopped short under Darnell's heavy frowned glance and lowered her eyes.

“Well, thanks for breaking my attempt to conduct the educational process,” he growled, which made Agnes shrink even more, clutching her fingers into the book. Darnell rolled his eyes and leaned back on the bench. No matter how much he tried to keep track of everything, so many things still happened behind his back that he could not even imagine.

The girl began to nervously shuffle the edge of the book with her fingers, making a loud rustling sound with its pages. Darnell sighed accepting the fact that he will have to lead a conversation and asked her:

“What are you reading?”

“Nothing special... I'm trying to prepare for the courses. I'll go there next month.”

“Do you want to change your profession?”

“Not actually,” Agnes shrugged. She moved the book, and Darnell noticed the word “accountant” on the cover. “I used to want to do an audit, I went to study it, but then I got bored and eventually I quitted those studies. And now I decided that I should finish what I started.”

“The key to achieving your goal is not to lose the will to reach it,” Darnell chuckled.

“Yes! Exactly!” Agnes exclaimed enthusiastically. “I lost it for a while, but now I have regained it!”

Darnell got startled because of her excessive enthusiasm, and he could hardly make himself not jump and go to catch Madeleine to take her home away from Agnes. He looked around for the girl and saw her nearby in another pile of leaves. Looked like she was making a wreath out of them.

“Are you reading anything at the moment?” Agnes interrupted Darnell’s thoughts and intentions to leave.

“I’m afraid you are not allowed to know about the books I’m studying,” he grumbled, regretting once again that he went outside today. It wasn't so bad at home after all.

“Are they from our restricted section?” the girl asked.

“Some of them are.”

“Oh, you know, once I went there out of curiosity, when no one saw me,” Agnes confessed.

“Yeah?” Darnell raised one eyebrow. “And what did you do there?”

“I just went in and took the first book I could reach from the shelf. And I was so scared! It had a lump on the cover, and it was all so uneven, covered with crooked protruding stripes. They looked like roots on the surface of the ground. And then that lump twitched. And a burning yellow eye stared at me! The cover was with an eye! A blinking one!” Agnes waved her hands in fright, and almost dropped the book from her knees.

“And what was next?” The man asked.

“Nothing. I just shoved the book back into its place and ran away.” Agnes exhaled loudly and hunched over on her knees. “I was so terribly scared.”

“It's a good thing you didn’t read it,” Darnell said in a bored tone. “Otherwise, I would have to drag you to the Agency, make a request for the withdrawal of knowledge, conduct a check, look for that book, register you…”

Agnes turned pale and looked at Darnell with horror in her eyes.

“I really didn’t read anything! I was very scared! I didn't even remember how the book was titled…”

“Take it easy,” the man chuckled. “I know that book, it is for summoning one demon, and it is no longer relevant. Even if you read it, you still would not be able to achieve anything with its help. And the eye is the spirit that was supposed to guard the book. However, I think that its creator was mistaken somewhere because the only protective property of this cover turned out to scare away young curious girls who stick their noses where they never should.” Agnes blushed and started to mumble apologies in embarrassment as if Darnell needed them. “By the way, that spirit could have already been released,” the man said thoughtfully. “It is no longer needed there.”

“You can come to our library whenever you wish,” Agnes suggested flabbily. “I'll let you into that section.”

“There’s no need in that,” Darnell sighed and threw his hands behind his head, straightening himself on the bench. Something cracked loudly in his back returning into place, and the man winced. “I need to intentionally go in there and stay all day long to study through the whole literature and recheck it one by one for relevance. This will take more than even a week, I suppose. I remember at least a dozen useless ones. And in order to define all of them, I would also need the help of a demon.”

“Would Cyril be able to help you with this?” Agnes asked suddenly. Darnell glanced at her with one eye, and she nervously adjusted the round glasses that made her look like a teacher.

“He would, but I don't want to contact him once again. And by the way, I advise the same to you too. Even though it’s too late…”

Agnes shuddered and shuffled nervously on the bench. She sighed convulsively several times as if going to say something but never uttered a sound.

“Yes, I know,” Darnell chuckled. “He's a chatterbox. And the ladies' man. So don't expect him to appear in your life again. This guest actor does not visit the same city twice.”

The girl obviously felt down on the bench showing how upset she was. It seemed to Darnell that even her curls unwound in disappointment and sagged lifelessly, like the pulp of a pumpkin taken from a fruit with a spoon. At least now she will not try to contact the demons again: the bitter experience will be imprinted in her memory forever.

Darnell was too late in his thought that he shouldn't have been so harsh with Agnes. After all, he was used to the fact that Cyril dumped him all kinds of information about women as if he was retelling the content of a recently read book. It was impolite on his part to give the girl such advice.

Happy Madeleine appeared next to the bench. She had already finished her wreath of leaves, and it now rested on her head in a huge heap sticking out in all directions. It seemed to Darnell that right now the girl personified the autumn itself. A happy smiling face, golden hair peeking out from under the wreath, and, of course, a huge amount of bright leaves that steal sunlight from trees in order to carry it with them to the ground until spring.

“Oh, how lovely!” Agnes exclaimed suddenly. Her mood changed so quickly. Madeleine looked back at her and smiled happily.

“Yeah, did you gather the trash from all over the park?” Darnell said reasonably. The girl gave him a scornful look and showed her tongue in resentment.

“Let me take a picture of you!" Agnes suggested, pulling out a worn phone from a small brown leather backpack. Madeleine nodded actively several times, making a loud rustle of leaves on her head. To Darnell's surprise, she turned and, filled with stubbornness, began to climb on his lap.

“Oh, no, I did not agree to be involved in that!” he exclaimed, trying to dodge the voluminous wreath, getting into his eyes and face, and at the same time to catch Madeleine, who was jumping over him like a nimble ferret.

“Excellent, I’ll take a picture of you together!” Agnes supported the girl’s idea, pointing the phone at them. None of them took Darnell's opinion into account. Madeleine froze for a moment, and the man almost managed to grab her in order to take her off. “Done!” Agnes proclaimed, turning the screen to the surprised Darnell.

“When did you?..” he tried to ask, but Madeleine interrupted him. She turned to Agnes clumsily and shoved a heap of leaves into his open mouth. While Darnell was spitting irritably, Madeleine had already looked at the photo and got off his lap.

“Look!” Agnes drew his attention, still holding out the phone. Darnell glanced at it. The photo turned out great. Madeleine smiled sincerely, occupying almost the entire space with her wreath, and seemed to radiate pure light. Darnell was dark in the background, looking slyly at her with one eye, but for some reason, he did not look irritated, as he thought, but rather good-natured.

“Send it to me,” Darnell blurted out unexpectedly, and took out his second phone.

“Sure,” Agnes agreed happily.

“Have you thought about becoming a photographer?” He asked while the photo was being sent to him. Madeleine poked her wreath at him again, watching him open the photo on the screen.

“What kind of photographer am I…” Agnes became embarrassed.

“You caught the moment pretty well,” Darnell praised the photo, still staring at it. Usually, he did not like to be photographed, and always looked frowned and gloomy as a result. But here he was completely different. As if he was... alive.

“But I am already going to…” She lifted the book, letting him understand that she had made a choice, and Darnell, perhaps, tried to shake one of her pillars of life in vain.

“Who prevents you from combining profession and hobby?” Darnell asked, hiding the phone. “One is for money, the other is for the soul.”

He got up from the bench, and Agnes followed him. She looked somewhere past the man, apparently inspired by his sudden idea.

“We've got to go,” Darnell said, but Agnes didn't answer, still being deep in her thoughts. Looked like not even realizing this, he accidentally gave her an impulse to her dream. “Okay, we’re leaving,” he chuckled and called Madeleine to follow him.