Chapter 141

Although it felt a little rude not to participate in the fireside gathering, Ivan somehow managed to drag me halfway down the ground floor to the main study and library. The bookcase was relatively small and didn’t have many books (most of them in Russian and very old, perhaps first editions of Tolstoy’s classic works), but the study room was beautiful. It had large armchairs that were still covered with white sheets like most of the other furniture, and huge windows with beige curtains, very in keeping with the decor. But the important thing about the study was not the decoration or the furniture, but the narrow bookcase.

Ivan went straight over there and reached between the leather-bound volumes.

“Now, look at this,” he told me, with a mischievous smile.

I think he pressed something on the wood of the bookcase; for a second I expected the entire piece of furniture to move to one side, but no. I heard the sound of a lock unlocking, of course, but nothing else happ