Dead on Your Feet

by Grant Michaels

“Why? Because of what you did to him?”

  “You don’t know what happens here tonight.”

  “I want to know what happened the night Max Harkey was killed.”

  Madame Rubinskaya heaved a weary sigh. “You are like the police,” she said. “First I get us something to eat.” And she shuffled toward her kitchen. “You are hungry?” she said.

  The question must have registered with Verushka, for she wagged her tail energetically and trotted after Madame.

  “No,” I replied, and followed them both.

  “You are sure?”

  I stood in the doorway to her kitchen.

  “Madame Rubinskaya, how can I think of food when I suspect that you might have killed Max Harkey and Rico?”

  “What! What you are saying? That I am killer? Me?”

  “You can save the histrionics. I see through you.”

  “And what you see?” she said. “You see old woman. You see bitter woman. You see tired woman. But do you see killer? Why would I kill that boy?”

  “Because he knew that after you killed Max you took the diary and the musical score.”

  My accusations caused Madame Rubinskaya to grab onto the edge of the kitchen counter to steady herself. “Bozhe!” she said. “You are like dancer who tries and tries until she does it right. You don’t care what else is happening. Only your idea. Only your world. Nothing else.”

  She pulled herself up straight, then filled two tall glasses with hot tea. She put them on a tray with some pastries and walked past me toward her sitting room.

  “Come,” she said. “Now you will have good reward. You will be happy now because you will know the truth.” She put the tray on the coffee table, then sat in her big cushioned chair. Verushka settled at her feet and I sat facing her from the sofa.

  The stage was set for her big scene, and she began.

  She said, “You know what it means, icon?”

  I nodded and then gestured to the Byzantine image of Christ mounted high in one ceiling corner of the room.

  “Yes,” said Madame. “That is icon. But also was my grandmother icon in all Russia. She was symbol for romantic ballet. She was like saint. She was Rubinskaya.”

  Madame put several spoonfuls of sugar into her tea and stirred it.

  “Take tea,” she said.

  I took the other glass, now wary of being captive not to a killer but to a lonely old woman living vicariously through her ancestors, much like our domestic aristocrats from the antebellum South, the people who wrap gifts at Neiman Marcus but manage to apprise you of the glory days when their daddy’s folks owned vast plantations of sugar and cotton.

  Madame Rubinskaya continued her litany. “For my grandmother was created the role of The Phoenix when she was young ballerina, and she dances it for her whole career. In Russia The Phoenix was more famous than Pavlova’s Dying Swan. Did you know that?”

  “No,” I said.

  “Is true. And she was smart in business too. She made—how do you say?—copy and write?”

  “Copyright?”

  Madame Rubinskaya nodded and smiled. “Copyright. My grandmother made copyright on that ballet so no one could dance without her permission.”

  A precedent for a dancer in imperial Russia, I thought.

  “And she leaves to my mother, and my mother leaves to me that copyright, so now only I can give the permission to dance The Phoenix. You understand?”

  “Yes,” I said. “So your mother was a dancer?”

  “No. She had no music in her blood, and such bad feet, no arch. My brother and I have good bodies for dancer, and I became ballerina. But my brother’s daughter, that is Mireille’s mother, she is just like our mother. No music in her blood. But still she keeps the name Rubinskaya.”

  I’d heard the notion among dancers that natural talent often skipped a generation. Madame Rubinskaya’s lineage seem to confirm the myth.

  “You had no children yourself?” I asked.

  “I never marry.”

  “Yet you are called Madame.”

  “It is title of respect for old woman.” She repeated the word as if savoring its irony. “Respect,” she said with a snigger. “That is why I took the music from Maxi’s piano. It is mine. I have the right to take it. The Phoenix is sacred. It was not performed for two generations. So when it comes back on stage, it must be with Russian ballerina. But Maxi was saying that American girl can dance The Phoenix. That was not right. He has no respect for that role. It was for Mireille, only Mireille. No other girl.”

  “Is that why you killed him?”

  “He was destroying Mireille’s career. He makes love to her, and then he deserts her.”

  “But he didn’t,” I said. “Max was going to—”

  “I know what happens in London,” she said. “I have strong connection to my great-niece. She would never fall, never. But Maxi comes back from London, and I know what happens over there. He breaks her heart. I know how he is with girls, but I never thought he would do that to Mireille.”

  “But Mireille isn’t broken-hearted.” I said.

  “She says she loves Maxi, but in her heart she knows he ruins her career and her life. She falls on her knee, and she will never dance again.”

  “But it will heal, Madame.”

  “When the knee is hurt you never dance the same.”

  “Madame, you don’t understand. Mireille is—”

  “No! You don’t understand. Now you listen to me! No one ever listens to old people. We are not crazy. We are just tired. We see too much pain. I was young girl once too. I had dreams, just like you, maybe more. I had scholarship in St. Petersburg at Imperial Ballet School. I have everything there—warmth, food, security. I learn new ideals, ideals of art. Ballet was my survival. Ballet was my life. It comes before my friends or my family or even God.”

  She paused to sip at her tea, and I attempted to hasten her story. I had a killer to convict, after all.

  I said, “And you lost everything in the revolution.”

  “I escape with my brother to Europe. My grandmother gave me the music for The Phoenix, piano score and full orchestra. I still have. Then I became character dancer. You know what is?”

  “Yes,” I said, recalling that she had already told me that during an earlier visit here. “It’s very exciting stuff.”

  Madame gave a modest shrug. “Is mostly tricks.”

  “That’s not true. There’s a lot of passion in character dancing. The best of it makes your blood boil.”

  “But is not romantic, not like The Phoenix. ”

  “Did you ever dance that role?” I asked.

  She pondered the question as if she had to recover a lost answer. Then she said sadly, “I was not good enough.”

  “But Mireille was?”

  “Mireille was perfect. Her debut will be first time the name Rubinskaya is onstage in America. The Phoenix will make her famous around the world.”

  No wonder she was so angry over Max Harkey’s decision. He’d cast Alissa Kortland in the role almost whimsically, while for Madame Rubinskaya, her grandniece’s debut was to revitalize a long-dormant line of great artists.

  “When did you meet Max Harkey?” I said.

  “I was teaching already in France. Forty-five I was, and I was not dancing anymore.” Then she added somewhat proudly, “Character roles are very strenuous.”

  “I know,” I said agreeably.

  “Maxi was young dancer from America. He was trying to make his career in Europe. His looks and temperament did not suit American taste at that time. He was too …” Something caught in her throat, and she coughed harshly until it cleared. “Too much cigarettes,” she said. “My lungs will be smoked ham.”

  “You were saying about Max?”

  Madame Rubinskaya raised her eyebrows. “Maxi was too sexual. His face was all beautiful angles, eyes so bright, and his body—even when he died he was like a god. And it was rare, just like now in ballet, that he likes girls. Really likes. Not pretending l
ike in Russia, where some men must hide their true feelings.” She added quickly, “I hope I don’t offend you.”

  “Hardly,” I said. “I freely acknowledge the existence of good-looking heterosexual men.”

  “That was Maxi!” she said. “When he is partnering a girl, he holds her, and supports her, and caresses her like he is making her ready for him. Like he is going to make love.”

  Madame placed her glass of tea on the table and sighed quietly.

  “How long did he study with you?” I said.

  “He was already good dancer. He wanted to be choreographer. I encourage him, but his talent is too big for me. He makes many friends with wealthy men, and sometimes their wives too.” She smiled playfully. “So many times he is almost caught. But he is serious too. He forms a small company, and it makes a big success.”

  “When did he meet Marshall Zander?”

  Madame’s brow furrowed. “Sometime then,” she said. “That is when we come to America to make the Boston City Ballet.”

  “That was about twenty years ago.”

  “Yes,” said Madame. “Maybe more.” But her storytelling fires had been extinguished by my mention of Marshall Zander. “I like very much to live in Boston, especially in winter. It reminds me when I was student in St. Petersburg, all those clothes, and the snow, and the cold, and the frost on the window glass.”

  “Not the summer?”

  “Ach! Too hot.”

  “So you’ve been with the company here ever since its beginning.”

  “Maxi and me, we start it! We do everything. He did choreography, and he has good head for business. But I train the dancers. I give Maxi his material. Like artist has paint or sculptor has clay, Maxi has dancers. And I make them for him.”

  “And now the Boston City Ballet has an international reputation for changing the shape of classical dance.”

  “Maxi and I never have such ideas. We never try to make progressive ballet. But the whole world was always looking at Maxi for what they should do next. That is what change him. Now he has reputation, one that comes by surprise from outside. If Maxi stayed on his own ideals, he would be all right.”

  Maybe even still alive, I thought.

  “But instead he follows what the world is saying about him. He believes everybody else, and forgets about his art. And that is when he becomes a monster.”

  “A monster? What do you mean?” I said. I wanted to hear more of these suppressed feelings. “Please tell me more, Madame. How was Max Harkey a monster?”

  She said, “Suddenly Maxi sees I am old woman. He wants to throw me away. He has no more humor. He runs away from me. So I leave him alone. I don’t bother him. I do my job. I give good class. But now Maxi thinks he is God.”

  “Madame Rubinskaya, what happened that night?”

  “You were there. You saw. It was wonderful party, big success, until Maxi makes announcement about The Phoenix, even though Mireille cannot dance. That was proof he turns against me. I never think he would do that, give role to young American girl. He deceives me, and in my heart I want to show him how angry I am. But I go home.”

  “And then you went out again, to the ballet studio.”

  “Yes …” she said tentatively.

  “What?”

  “Something else happen that night I don’t tell anyone.”

  “But you want to tell me.”

  “Yes,” said Madame Rubinskaya. “I will tell you to prove that I kill no one. Maybe I feel the passion to kill, and maybe I make many mistakes, but I did not kill Maxi.”

  “What happened, then?”

  She offered me a plate of sweets. “You want cookie?” she said. Was she trying to distract me? Or did she simply need a brief intermission for herself?

  “No,” I replied. “Please go on.”

  “So,” she said. “After I come home, then later I hear noises from Maxi’s apartment upstairs. Part of his big room is over us here.”

  I pressed her. “What kind of noises?”

  “I hear loud angry voices. Then becomes quiet. Then more shouting again.”

  “Men’s or women’s voices?”

  “Eh?”

  “Were they men or women who were shouting?”

  Madame’s eyes narrowed as she tried to recreate the sounds of that evening in her head.

  “I hear Maxi, and then I hear a girl. Then I hear crash on floor. Big sound, like maybe the statue is falling. Even Rushka was nervous then. She was running and barking. Then all is quiet up there. Quiet, quiet. So …”

  “So you went up to see.”

  “Yes,” she said.

  “And Max was on the floor lying against the big sculpture.”

  “How you know about that?” said the old woman. Yet her question confirmed at least one part of Alissa Kortland’s version of the events that night.

  “Alissa told me that she fought with Max.”

  “So she kill him!”

  “No, Madame. They fought because Max had changed his mind later that night. He realized his error in casting Alissa as The Phoenix, so instead he was canceling the piece altogether.”

  This news seemed to strike the old woman like a blow.

  “Maxi change his mind?” she said.

  “Yes. You see, Max had kept his promise to you after all. The Phoenix would not be performed without Mireille. And when Alissa left him, Max was still alive. He was only unconscious. Someone else dragged him to the piano and killed him there.”

  I wondered again, Could this old woman have done it? It would have been a kind of infanticide. Yet all that unexpressed passion between them might have driven her to kill him. But was she that kind of person? Did she possess that ability to kill someone knowingly? Or had it been done in a moment of ultimate and literal carelessness, when a person cares about nothing but the action at hand. Even if the act was not premeditated, Madame had been under grave emotional stress that had reached its peak that night. Passion might have spurred her on.

  Finally she said, “I know. I know Maxi was still alive. How I know? I check his breathing.” She sounded as though she was ready at last to tell the truth. “So I am making call to the police, and then I see on his piano the score for The Phoenix. And I think what Maxi wants to do, and I think what that role is for me and for Mireille, and then I think I will not help him. I will leave him there. He gets what he deserves. I did not know that he change his mind. How can I know that? So I take the music and come back here. Then I smoke cigarettes and think what to do next.”

  “And that’s when you decided to go to the ballet studios.”

  “Yes. I want to be away from him.”

  “And that’s when his killer arrived.”

  “Ach, what a mistake I did!” Her eyes were filling with tears, and for the first time I believed they might be real. She continued, “Maybe I did not kill Maxi with the knife, but now I see that I leave him there for his killer. So I kill him too. I should help him that night, and instead I was cursing his soul.”

  She got up from her chair and I asked where she was going.

  “I will light candle for him now.”

  She went to a credenza and opened one of the top drawers from which she produced a small votive candle. She brought it back and set it down on the coffee table between us, then lit it.

  “Perhaps it is too late,” she said, “but I pray that Maxi will understand why I did not help him. I thought he was betraying me. I will pray for his soul.”

  “There’s a part of him that’s still alive,” I said. “You wouldn’t let me tell you earlier, but I have other news from Mireille in London. She is pregnant. And Max intended to marry her.”

  Madame Rubinskaya then let out a long horrible cry, and broke down into violent sobbing. And here I thought I’d told her some good news. Her crying continued, and I began to feel awkward about sitting there. Like I said before, I don’t seem to have what it takes to bear up under other people’s real pain and sorrow.

  Finally Madame stopped cryi
ng. Then she picked up her head and blew out the candle. She gave a small shiver.

  I said, “Since you didn’t know about Max and Mireille, I guess you don’t have Max’s diary either. I thought you did.”

  “Marshall say that too, that I have diary.”

  “When?”

  “I told you, he was here tonight.”

  “No, you didn’t, Madame.”

  “He comes to tell me about his love for Maxi, like he is making confession to his mother. Then he tells me that he loves Maxi so much, but Maxi always likes girls, so he gets mad at him. Marshall tells me this! He is like brokenhearted girl. And then he says he will go to the police and tell them everything.”

  “He’s going to confess?”

  Madame shrugged weakly. “I have no more strength to think. I am too tired.”

  “Madame, I think you might be in shock. I’m going to call for help.”

  “No,” she said. “I will be all right.”

  “But I’m concerned you might …”

  She looked at me quizzically. “You are thinking I will hurt myself? I am not a coward. Perhaps I made big mistake—many mistakes. But I will face them. I never run away.”

  That was a relief. One thing this case didn’t need was a dramatic suicide attached to it, some meticulously executed act of self-retribution, Madame Ekaterina Rubinskaya’s last show.

  “I’m going to leave you now. Just lock the door and don’t let anyone in. Promise?”

  She nodded quietly, then followed me to the door. When I’d left her, I heard all the mechanical sounds of security as Madame resealed the door to her apartment. While I was waiting for the elevator I checked my watch. It was just after eight o’clock. Rafik would be rehearsing. Branco was probably dining with Nicole. I decided to go to Station D anyway. I’d report everything I’d just found out to one of Branco’s assistants. Then I’d go home and have a quiet night with Sugar Baby.

  Just as the elevator arrived I heard a voice behind me.

  “I missed your soirée at Max’s place.”

  19

  Totentanz

  “DID YOU FORGET TO INVITE ME?”

  More than the suppressed anger that tinged his voice, it was the sickly smell of rotting fruit that identified Marshall Zander standing behind me.