Militza would have admonished her sister then and there had she not been so anxious to get on. She was worried that Peter might return, and she’d been warned by him before not to get involved with the servants. Quite apart from the fact that it was unseemly for a woman of her position ever to venture below stairs, it was dangerous to tell the servants too much of anything, he insisted. That way gossiping lies.
“Well, let’s see, then, shall we?” asked Militza, cracking the egg swiftly down on the edge of the white plate. Everyone stared as she forced her sharply filed thumbnails through the fissure in the shell and pulled them apart. The egg broke and spilled its bloody contents all over the plate. In silence, the maids watched the writhing gasps of the premature chick as it slithered around on the cold plate in its own womb sac. Unable to breathe, its unformed eyes still firmly glued shut, it frantically opened and closed its pale beak as it panicked and snatched at the air. Its puny legs and soft-boned feet skidded back and forth on the smooth porcelain until, eventually, its brief life and struggle was over and, as its beak shuddered open one last time, it died.
Natalya glanced across at the shocked faces of her friends, covering her own mouth with her hand to prevent herself from vomiting. The wave of nausea was immediate. She had not really thought through what she had asked. It was supposed to be a bit of fun, something to while away the boredom of a cold gray afternoon, finding out the sex of her unborn child, but she certainly had not expected anything quite so visceral.
“Poor chick,” she whispered.
But neither Stana nor Militza appeared to notice the servants’ reactions. Accustomed to such sights since early childhood, they were more intent on finding out the sex of the bird. Militza picked up the flaccid chick and, turning over its soft body, she pressed her thumb hard between its legs.
“Boy,” she announced. She nodded down at Natalya’s stomach. “Congratulations.” She smiled before dropping the dead bird back down on the plate.
“Well done! A son!” added Stana, giving Natalya’s broad shoulders a small squeeze.
Natalya promptly burst into tears.
“I really must go,” declared Militza, anxiously glancing up at the wooden clock above the large open fireplace. “The grand duke will be home soon.”
IN FACT, HE WAS SITTING IN THE RED SALON, SMOKING A CIGARETTE, leafing through a copy of What Is to Be Done? by Leo Tolstoy, having just returned from a luncheon. His face lit up as she walked into the room.
“Where have you been?” he asked, getting out of his chair to embrace her. His question was not accusatory, but his eyes were inquiring.
“Just been upstairs to check on Marina,” said Militza, with a little wave of her hand.
“But the nurse said she’s been out in her perambulator all afternoon.”
“Did she?” Militza frowned. “She’s mistaken. We have just been up to see Marina.” Militza turned and smiled at Stana.
“And what a sweet fat thing she is too,” replied Stana.
“Elegant fat thing,” corrected Peter, flicking his ash into a small silver tray. “Soon to be just elegant—oh, and extremely intelligent; fortunately, she has her mother’s attributes.” He smiled. “Are you well, Stana?” he asked.
Peter was extremely fond of his sister-in-law, only he wished she’d spend a little more time in that rented mansion of theirs on Sergievskaya Street, for it was rare for him to find his wife alone.
“Just as well as I was yesterday,” she said, smiling.
“Is George still angry about not being invited to Minny’s birthday at the end of the month?” he asked.
“What do you think?” replied Stana, helping herself to a small sugared almond from a silver bowl on the gilt table in front of her. “He’s known the tsar ever since he was a child, and now the tsarina won’t invite him to her birthday party.”
“It is supposed to be a small event.”
“Since when has the Empress Maria Fyodorovna ever done anything small? She and the Grand Duchess Vladimir rule this city.” Stana crunched the almond and stared out of the window.
“I think it’s smaller this year. The tsar’s not well; he’s traveling south at the moment to recuperate,” said Peter.
“He hasn’t been well for a while,” agreed Militza.
“It’s his kidneys. Ever since that accident at Borki, when he held the train roof aloft to save Minny and the children,” agreed Peter. “I think that must have broken something in him.”
“Anyway, George is still furious at not being invited and blames me, naturally,” said Stana. “Much as he blames me for all his ills.” She sighed. “I’m quite sure I don’t know why he married me in the first place. Are you invited?”
“If we are, I shan’t go,” declared Militza. “I am not sure I want another evening of being stared at, giggled at, whispered about, or almost entirely ignored. I don’t know what to tell Father. All those letters and requests badgering me to ask the tsar for help or a bit more money—it’s not as if Maria Fyodorovna allows us anywhere near him!”
“Anything to help shoe that barefooted army of his!” added Peter, stubbing out his cigarette. “What?” he said, looking up and catching his wife’s eye. “We all know your country is perfectly charming, but the roads are impassable, the peasants don’t want to work—frankly, its only use is its warm-water ports. Am I not speaking the truth?”
“Sometimes the truth is not necessary,” replied Militza.
“Well, personally, I think you need to make more of an effort,” he said, glancing from one sister to the other. “Get out of the palace. When was the last time you went skating, for example?”
“My darling, we are not children.” Militza smiled.
“All the ladies skate on the Neva in the morning,” he said. “It’s excellent exercise. And Minny’s in the Crimea!”
So the next day, November 1, 1894, Militza packed the elderly skates she hadn’t used since her days at the Smolny Institute and met Stana, just in front of the house, on the English Embankment.
In contrast to the dull, moribund afternoon before, that day was bright and crisp. The snow was dazzling, and the ice crystals that hung in the air sparkled more brightly than the Grand Duchess Vladimir’s latest tiara. And the air was cold, so cold it cut like a knife as Militza inhaled. But it was, at the same time, so delightfully pleasurable. After days spent cooped up in her palace with only her sister and the servants for company, there was something incredibly liberating about filling her lungs with little sharp daggers of cold and feeling her eyes water in the brightness.
“Glorious, don’t you think?” she said as she found her sister waiting for her by the river. Sporting a white mink hat with a matching muff, trimmed with little white mink tails, Stana looked particularly beautiful in the surprisingly warm sunshine. “Do you have your skates?” asked Militza, shielding her eyes with her black-gloved hands. She too had made an effort with her attire. Dressed in a bitter-chocolate-colored suit, trimmed with sable, with a matching hat and muff, she felt excited and braced for any eventuality.
“I couldn’t find mine,” said Stana. “I looked through all the pairs we had at home and I couldn’t find any to fit. I shall hire some when we get there.”
“Perfect. Shall we take a troika to the Winter Palace?”
“I think I’d rather walk.”
So they walked alongside the river, up the English Embankment towards the Admiralty, in the bright blue sunshine. After days of gray blizzards, the streets were surprisingly busy. The roast-chestnut sellers were out, their smoking stalls sending curls of toasted deliciousness into the air. The postcard painters had taken up their spots, trying to catch the beauty of the frozen Neva in the glorious winter sunlight. Others were wrapped up against the cold, their heads determinedly looking at the ground as they marched along, focused on the day’s business. Occasionally a child would pass by, pulled along on a sledge, bundled up tightly against the cold, arms and legs rigid; the only thing exposed to the elements were
their bright pink cheeks.
On past the Bronze Horseman rearing at the river and the giant golden dome of St. Isaac’s Cathedral they walked, towards the Winter Palace, eventually stopping at the two giant bronze lions on either side of the Palace Pier.
Below, at the bottom of the granite steps, the Neva was frozen as solid as steel, and all the recently fallen snow had been swept aside into large mounds, clearing the way for skating on the smooth, shiny ice underneath. To the left of the steps were simple wooden chairs and tables and rugs thrown across the ice, creating what appeared to be the most commodious of salons in the open air. The tables were laid with glasses and a giant silver bowl of punch, while servants in scarlet livery, with black leather gloves and boots, were handing around small shots of fruit-flavored brandies and vodkas on the gleaming silver salvers. To the right was a brass band, complete with accordion, playing the sort of jovial, upbeat, oompah music one might hear at a country fair.
Militza stood next to her sister, clasping her hands under her muff, searching the crowd of spinning skaters for anyone familiar. It was difficult to tell under the fur hats in the bright sunshine, but she thought she saw Zinaida Yusupova in a floor-length sable cloak, and next to her was the distinctive figure of the Grand Duchess Vladimir.
“I see simply tout le monde is here,” said Militza, watching the two women on the other side of the crowd notice their arrival.
“Oh, really,” exhaled Stana, following her gaze. “I suppose it was too much to ask just to be able to enjoy oneself a little, for once.”
“Let’s ignore them.” Militza smiled, looking around the rest of the crowd. “Over here,” she said, indicating a small hut. “He looks as though he rents skates.”
They walked over to a small wooden hut erected on the ice. Inside, an elderly man with cheeks the color of beetroot was leaning on the diminutive counter, gazing at the skaters.
“Excuse me,” said Militza. “We were looking for some skates?”
He turned slowly and looked them both up and down. “I do skates for gentlemen,” he sniffed. “Ladies have their own.”
“Well, this lady has lost hers.” Militza pointed down at Stana’s feet.
“Well.” He wiped his nose on his large black mitten and looked over the counter at Stana’s feet. “I’m not sure what I can do about that.”
“Do you have anything, sir?” asked Stana, placing her white-tailed muff on the counter.
“Well . . .” He turned and looked under the counter before grabbing hold of a pair of skates and slamming them down on it. “These?”
They all looked at the skates. They were black, old, and well used, the blunt blades in need of grinding. They looked like a pair of workman’s boots with metal rods attached. Stana took a small step back and hesitated. Militza glanced over her shoulder; they had an audience. The Grand Duchess Vladimir and her small entourage of ladies were all watching; their smiles were tight, and the sisters could hear the whispering over the noise of the band.
“Perfect!” Militza declared loudly. “How much are they?”
“Three kopeks,” he replied.
IT TOOK STANA ABOUT FIFTEEN MINUTES OF HUFFING AND pulling to get the skates on, and even then they were distinctly too big.
“They’re enormous,” she hissed. “I can’t possibly skate in these.”
“Of course you can,” said Militza, her head high, pretending to take in the view. “Everyone’s watching.”
So the band played, the silver salvers circulated, and Militza and Stana took to the ice. Within seconds, as they skated side by side, Militza rather more successfully than Stana in her rented skates, the ice began to clear. First some rather indignant ladies left; then a few children were dragged out of their way. By the time the sisters had been around the small circuit five or six times, they more or less had the rink to themselves.
“What’s happening?” asked Stana over the slicing sound of her skates as she glided left and right.
“It looks as if everyone is having a break,” replied Militza.
“Of course,” said Stana. “Nothing to do with our arriving.”
“Nothing at all,” said Militza as they continued to skate around and around the empty rink. “If we keep going, they’ll soon get bored.”
“I’m sure they will,” agreed Stana. “Although I have to say my feet are killing me!”
“So are mine!” Militza replied, and they both laughed.
Neither of the sisters had ever skated so long and so determinedly in their lives. Their feet were freezing, their breath was landing in small crystals of hoarfrost all over their furs, but still they carried on.
“I am not sure how much longer I can do this,” muttered Stana, her ankles beginning to burn.
“I shall skate until the aurora borealis comes dancing up the river,” declared Militza, clasping her hands a little firmer in her muff.
It was the children who returned to the ice first. Unable to hold them back any longer, reluctant mothers and governesses released them, scrambling and skidding, back onto the ice. They were rapidly followed by the young couples and giggling groups of girls. The day was too beautiful and too rare not to be taken advantage of. In fact, it was only the old guard, sitting on their benches, stiffening in the breeze, who seemed able to smell the heady lemon musk at all.
At just after 3 P.M., the ice began to empty. The Grand Duchess Vladimir was one of the first to disappear, along with her silver salvers and gloved servants.
“I am not sure I have ever seen skates like those!” she declared as she walked past the sisters. Stana and Militza simply smiled in reply.
AFTER THE GRAND DUCHESS, THE OTHER SKATERS DISSIPATED quickly, leaving the sisters among the last out on the ice. They sat on a wooden bench, untying their skates as the sun slipped behind a cloud.
Suddenly, it was deeply cold, and the drop in temperature was accompanied by a sudden rush of wind. Militza looked up. Flying towards them, at low level, was a flock of starlings, some two to three thousand strong. They swarmed past her and up in the air over the spires of the Peter and Paul Fortress on the opposite bank, beating their wings, swooping overhead, sounding like the smacking of waves or the gentle clapping of applause. They curled up like smoke, spun like a top, flowed like a great river. Militza had never seen a murmuration like this before. They dispersed; they came back together. They seemed to disappear completely and then gather like a large, dark, ominous cloud over the golden spires, snaking around the spires like a giant serpent. They ebbed and flowed, morphing from the shadow of a great black beast into a disparate cloud of nothing, only suddenly to reappear, racing across the river like a swarm of locusts. Once, they flew so low and fast over the ice, Militza could feel the wind of their wings on her face. She closed her eyes and inhaled slowly. She could feel their energy. It made the hairs on her arms stand up. She felt a sudden rush of adrenaline.
“The tsar is dead,” she muttered under her breath. “He’s dead,” she said, turning to look at her sister sitting next to her on the bench.
“Who?”
“The tsar is dead.”
“Long live the tsar,” replied Stana, staring across the frozen river at the heaving black swarm. “Long live the tsar.”
Chapter 4
January 10, 1896, St. Petersburg
IT WAS ON A NIGHT IN EARLY JANUARY 1896 THAT THINGS began to change. There was a significant shift in power. The moment, Militza later remembered, that she and Stana slowly and determinedly, like a couple of well-rehearsed chess pieces, made their opening move.
The Nicholas Ball was the first and the largest of the season. Just after Orthodox Christmas, it was the precursor to almost three months of solid parties and dancing. The balls themselves decreased in size and increased in importance as the season wore on. The final Palm Ball, just before Lent, was therefore the most exclusive, most intimate evening. For a mere five hundred guests, it was the most sought-after soirée in town. However, since the death of Alexander III, t
here had been no parties, there had been no soirées, no balls, and very few had managed to make the acquaintance of the new tsarina, Alexandra, fresh from her little provincial town of Hesse. No one outside a very select circle had managed to meet her face-to-face.
But tonight was her social debut. Expensive court dresses had been ordered from Madame Olga Bulbenkova’s workshop on Yekaterinsky Canal. Bolin and Fabergé kokoshnik tiaras had been unpacked and dusted down, and now troops of hairdressers and manicurists were speeding from palace to palace, trying to keep warm between appointments.
With as many as eight thousand guests attending the Nicholas Ball, with carriages and drivers to accommodate, an early arrival in Palace Square was essential. Not only was the carriage jam unbearable, sometimes lasting up to three hours, but also the flaming braziers closest to the Winter Palace were at a premium for the thousands of coachmen who had to wait around for hours in the stamping cold, braving the arctic winds gusting up the Neva.
“The streets are full tonight,” remarked Militza, pulling her white ermine stole a little tighter around her shoulders, gazing out of the window of the carriage as they drove along the embankment. Through the falling snow she could see gangs of shadowy figures trudging along the pavements, bent against the wind.
“Haven’t they got homes to go to?” asked Peter, lighting a cigarette and flicking the dust off his sharply tailored black trousers. “Ever since the famine they’ve been pouring into town. It’s desperate. I heard the slums around Sennaya Ploshchad are full to groaning.”
“Who is going tonight?” asked Stana, her large diamond earrings catching in the light.
“Anyone who is anyone,” replied Peter, exhaling. “Half of Moscow is here, calling on their old friends, begging long-lost cousins for introductions and invitations. Poor old Count Vladimir Freedericksz has never been so popular in his entire life as head of the court! He’s had endless provincial souls begging him to put them down on his list. I think he is finding the whole thing terribly amusing.”
The Witches of St. Petersburg Page 5
