It was ghostly quiet on the bus, where even the steward no longer wanted to talk. All that could be heard was the quiet squeaking of the engine and the occasional snoring of the drunken Pande. Nobody slept. The fact that in ten days two of those with assigned roles from the striking “Hamlet” were gone seemed terrifying and Borjan was already forging a strike in his mind to end this tour which he maliciously thought was useless, but given that it offered to visit countries he would never afford, he offered no resistance, although, frankly, no one paid the slightest attention to his opinion, the Bulldog the least of all. “Now,” thought Borjan Sterling, whom his opponents called Bed Bug in their secret gossip, “is the right time for a coup.” To put an end to this useless madness that might cost us our lives and finally get on the right track.” He stared around his constrained colleagues and counted those who would stand by him, terrified, wondering who might be the next to be eaten by the wolf.
It was getting dark slowly, and Lindita, who had fallen asleep with a few sleeping pills, was awakened by the vibration of the phone. It was Pampurov. She immediately answered the phone and listened, saying only: “Good. Bye” to which Bozho startled, followed by Vule doing the same. Bozho and Lindita looked at each other in silence and she gave him a hint that later they would speak, accompanied by a movement of the hand which meant that everything would be sorted out, to which he muttered under his nose: “Well, everything should’ve been fine so far, but someone’s picking out my people. Who knows what will come out of this.” Vule swallowed and turned around just to show Bozho that he was here and that he was on the alert. The steward, disinterested in the group, waited for his term to end with his last trip to Russia, after which they would continue their flight to Beijing. He sighed, meaning: “Never again with you” and continued playing games on the phone. The least interested was the driver who sang Serbian folk songs routinely doing his job “strictly professionally.”
The ghostly atmosphere on the bus was similar to that of the Adams Family – ominous but life-giving. Entering Russian territory, all the characters from Shakespeare’s most famous tragedy began to come to life, and with them their bearers: Toci and Boci would just pop their heads to see what was happening and return to their cheerful and mysterious world, Eeeej played with the fingers of both her hands somnabulically speaking incoherent sentences, which indicated that she still somehow managed to smuggle light opiates that allowed her to go into dimensions unfamiliar to others, which in turn somehow adapted to the constantly fermented state of Pande who slept as always with one eye a bit open to be constantly in tune with everything happening around. Borjan and Bojan had already swapped places due to the quiet clash between Bed Bug and Bojan over winking with the beautiful Seda Gjungor in Istanbul, while Lavinia treating the young and cute Bojan motherly and patronizingly to avoid the tense atmosphere after Dimko and Filka vanished, began to discover some of his qualities that inflamed something she didn’t even believe in, and his presence somehow pleased her very much. At first he comforted him about the lost knife, telling him that it would be found somewhere and that when they arrive they’ll look for it “together.” She wondered if the young Bojan Shtrkovski, whom she hadn’t noticed before in the theatre corridors, considering him a hopeful child, could awaken that erotic Gorgon in her that some ten years ago was burning in the public space in Macedonia, where affairs with politicians and businessmen were her addition to every morning coffee in luxury hotels and on yachts on Lake Ohrid. She took a deep breath and smiled at her feeling that she had to admit has long since fallen asleep inside and now… it was time to wake it up. With that statement, she drew her palm into Shtrkovski’s palm and squeezed it hard, to which he turned and sweated a little, awakening the erotic fantasies he had towards her as a student while watching her in the naked scenes in some theatrical performances. It looks like they were already on the same wavelength. Somehow, the actor who played Laertes was staring at him all the time. He was always absentminded, and as such he caught Pande’s eye with the slightest thought that he might be the “still water running deep.” Isn’t it so? He will explain that at the next meeting with Bozho, but alone when Vule won’t be among them. This time Gundur and Bowie got tired of playing cards, which meant that they too were gripped by tension and lay on the back seats by the table staring at the ceiling. “It’s a lot of money… for sure… I left Tokmak and Anjar to wander around the theatre, and I gave them a list of people to follow. No answer from them. Someone filled them up, since they’re fucking me like this. We gave so much and in so many places to make things be as they should be. And whose throat is not full?” Bozho thought convulsively, sweating to find the connection of the people who were disappearing and the underground currents that enthroned him in a place that was certainly a few sized bigger, but he had a lot of experience and the structures turned a blind eye on him. “There were two auctions where everything was fine, but…” He jumped up and looked at Laertes, who with half his face came out from behind the seat in front of him and was already staring ahead for hours. “He was there… I never asked him what he was doing there. He had no money for such things, and walked among the people. We managed to buy the props from the time of the Ottoman Empire, but…” She looked at him again, and the actor stepped back and leaned back in his seat, lowering it completely, waking Toci and Boci, who were fast asleep. “But what has this got to do with all this…” Bozho grunted and stretched unhappily.
Translated from Macedonian: Zorica Teofilova