Then the bartender cheered up and repeated the question:
So what do you want to drink?
I I dont have any money with me.
Is this your first time with us?
Yes Louis replied in a timid voice.
Then for the first time at the expense of the institution.
Thoughts of the loss of the family again burst into my head. He replied in a dead tone:
Lets get something stronger.
One minute the bartender said cheerfully and with a satisfied smile, raising his index finger.
The bartender began to rearrange the bottles from the shelves behind him into the work area. He set a small glass in front of him, into which he began to pour a bunch of all sorts of drinks in different proportions.
While the bartender conjured his drink, Louis looked around. Suspicion did not disappear from his face, and at the same time, the intrigued mind did not free itself from surprise at the picture that appeared in the seemingly dense forest. He didnt understand anything. More recently, this place was a continuous thicket of trees.
How long has your establishment been operating? Louis asked.
The bartender looked at him with a grin and replied:
Youre asking the wrong question.
What should I ask?
You should not be interested in «WHEN?» we opened, but for «WHO?»
At the end, he slightly swirled the liquid along the transparent walls of the glass, stirring the ingredients a little, and placed the transparent vessel in front of Louis, while saying in a cheerful voice:
Ask.
Louis was still suspicious of everything that was happening. And the most suspicious was the liquid that rested at the bottom of the glass in front of him and was a mixture of who knows what. He examined the contents of the glass. It was a cocktail of a light golden hue. With some hesitation, he took a small sip, which was very hard. Louis coughed and asked:
What is the name of this drink?
Actively wiping the glasses to a shine with a towel, the bartender replied:
«Hell Ride».
Louis confirmed the bartenders words:
The taste is truly infernal.
The bartender laughed.
This is the strongest thing I can do. As you asked.
Still coughing, Louis suddenly remembered:
Oh, sorry. And how to contact you?
Call me Albert, Louis.
Louis looked at the bartender in surprise.
How do you know my name?
It just suits you.
Ignoring this, Louis continued to ask:
Tell Albert, is it always so empty here?
I wouldnt say its empty. After all, there are at least two people here. An empty room or a full one does not depend on the number of its inhabitants, but rather on how alive they look. Sometimes there is more life in one person than in a whole crowd.
With a blank look, Louis looked into the glass and, having prepared himself, took another sip, after which once again he felt this incredibly daring burning taste.
Whats on the second floor? Louis asked, face twisted with bitterness in his mouth.
There are numbers. Our establishment is both a bar and a hotel.
So all the visitors are probably now in their rooms.
Albert smiled and shrugged. He kept wiping the glasses endlessly.
Louis continued to take sips until he drained his glass.
Excuse me, Albert?
Yes?
Can I drink something else like that? And I would bring the money later. My home is not far from these places.
Well, the bartender drawled, I never refuse a client such a request. After all, we cant foresee everything, and even more so when we need money. Sometimes unexpected things happen in life. It is so?
«Exactly,» Louis answered in the affirmative. But he said it in a healthy voice. In those moments, a kind of serenity and malicious resentment against the whole world settled in his soul at the same time. Moreover, the second feeling gradually faded away. He suddenly almost forgot about the dead children and wife. Now I remember them again. He remembered, but for some reason did not feel bitter sorrow, as if everything happened too long ago to grieve about it. And it didnt feel like being drunk. He had never experienced such a feeling that everything bad would stop tormenting his soul so abruptly. And this is strange, because Louis has never stood out as callous in his life.
Even if you drink a barrel of wine, the effect will be much weaker than one glass of this «Hell trip» Louis thought.
He drank three more glasses of liquor. The first was called «Flight to the Stars», the second «On the way to ecstasy», and the third «Living Blood».
Apparently, you have come a long way politely uttered Albert after the fourth glass lost the last drop of contents.
Louis nodded jerkily several times, as if something was preventing him from uttering even one word sound.
Lets go. You need rest. Ill show you the number.
The bartender politely escorted Louis to the stairs and took him to a spare room on the second floor.
2. WELCOME
Louis was awakened by some noise that came from below. He woke up and his first thoughts were connected with his family. The day began with a soul-depressing sorrow. He wanted to shed tears again, but something prevented him.
He left his room and went down the stairs to the first floor.
The bar was full of customers. There were no free tables. Louis looked around and wondered how such a crowd could accommodate in an institution. The apple had nowhere to fall. From their appearance, he knew that the visitors were not from this area. It was hard to believe that they were from neighboring villages or nearby cities. Most of them were dressed somehow atypically for the present times, and many spoke in unfamiliar languages and strange dialects, and often used long-outdated words. Then it turned out that most of them are not French at all and their native language is different, hence the strong accent. It also looked interesting that among the visitors there were both representatives of the working classes blacksmiths, grocers, fishermen, carpenters, butchers and other commoners, as well as people from the upper classes nobles, merchants, close aristocratic families and even those who looked like boyars or patricians of the distant past.
Now it was a completely different place. It didnt seem to Louis as nice and peaceful as it had looked yesterday. There was an atmosphere in the bar that he did not like at all. He wanted to get out of this place as soon as possible, and if he did return, it would be solely to repay the bartender. This place made him feel intense discomfort, so strong that he even forgot about the loss. How could such different people gather in one place, and even sit with each other at the same table and talk heart to heart over a glass? Rich with rich, poor with poor. It had always been that way, and what Louis eyes saw, any normal person would have considered unnatural and wrong. This is contrary to the established norms of society. But in some incomprehensible way, nevertheless, these persons coexist quite harmoniously within the same premises and, it seems, neither one nor the other is in any hurry to leave the building or at least somehow protect themselves from representatives of another class.
In the village where Louis lives, there are no rich people and they are not treated with respect. Each villager imagined a wealthy person as the result of doing business in which there is no place for decency and justice, but only selfishness and greed.
Be that as it may, he decided that he should return home as soon as possible.
Um Louis drawled as he walked up to the counter, squeezing between two customers Albert?
Yes?
Thank you for yesterday. If you dont mind, Ill go home and bring the money in by tonight.
Oh, sure.
It was noisy all around. Everyone was talking about something. At a table in the corner, four people took turns playing backgammon for elimination. A couple of tables gathered those who were puzzled by the search for answers to the questions of the universe, the existence of a certain balance regarding karma for misdeeds, which expresses human freedom, where lies the line between the forbidden and the permitted, and other philosophical topics. Among the rest were those who washed down grief with the cheapest alcohol; someone diligently read something; at the foot of the stairs, a couple of moderately sober and very brave clients suddenly had an insight that it was time to sort things out, but not with empty chatter, but exclusively in a fistfight with an admixture of strabismus under the influence of a liter of bourbon. There were also those who threw the dice, after which the loser drank one hundred grams from a personal bottle that stood near the glass, and the winner was the one who had more contents in the bottle.