Zadruga

by Margaret Pemberton

  Natalie, clad only in her camisole and lace-trimmed bloomers, made an unladylike grimace. ‘I want to wear the mauve but Helga is being annoying. She thinks it unsuitable and is refusing to fasten me into it.’

  Helga, who had been in service with the family for fifteen years, said without the least trace of apology in her voice, ‘The gown is unsuitable for a seventeen-year-old child. I said so when it was first bought and I still say so.’

  Katerina looked at the gown spread across the bed. It was made of embroidered brocade, had a hideous bunch of silk violets on the shoulder and was plungingly décolleté.

  ‘You’re quite right, Helga,’ she said supportingly. ‘It’s hideous. Natalie would be mistaken for the Tsarina in it.’

  At the thought of being mistaken for the forty-two-year-old Tsarina Natalie giggled, her crossness forgotten. ‘All right, I give in. But do I have to wear white? White is so boring.’

  ‘It may be boring,’ Helga said phlegmatically, ‘but it is suitable.’

  ‘And you must hurry,’ Katerina remonstrated as the sound of carriages could be heard rattling into the courtyard. ‘I can’t wait for you any longer. I’ll see you downstairs.’

  Guests were already filing into the entrance hall as she descended the stairs. Julian Fielding wasn’t among them, but then she didn’t expect him to be. Only family arrived unsophisticatedly early. She took her place next to her parents as Vitza entered in yet another royal-blue creation, this time the silk unflatteringly ruched and draped. Katerina forgave her cousin her appalling dress sense. No word of Natalie’s escapade had reached anyone’s ears but her own. Vitza was being discreet and Katerina was profoundly grateful.

  As Vitza and her mother made their way towards the ballroom, Natalie breathlessly joined the family receiving line. With relief Katerina saw that Helga had won the day. Although off-the-shoulder, Natalie’s gown was demurely white with pink rosebuds embroidered on the bodice and a matching pink silk sash emphasizing her tiny waist.

  ‘Good evening, Great-Aunt Eudocia,’ she said dutifully as the rest of Vitza’s family made their way along the short receiving line. ‘Good evening, Max.’

  A smile touched the corners of Katerina’s mouth. Natalie’s voice was all sweetness and light and without a hint of the irritation it had held when she had spoken of Max earlier. Her amusement at Natalie’s short memory vanished as Julian Fielding was announced. In full evening dress, he looked more handsome than ever. And not only was he handsome; there was an inner strength about him that was almost palpable. As he shook hands with her father she was intuitively sure that he was that rarest of all creatures, a man who, once he gave his heart, would be utterly faithful.

  She could tell by the way her father greeted him that he, too, liked Julian Fielding immensely and suddenly she knew that what she felt for him was far, far more than liking. Far more, even, than infatuation. She was in love with him. Utterly and irrevocably and head over heels in love.

  Her mother was greeting him now. He was so near that she could smell the cleanness of his starched linen and the faint tang of his cologne. Panic flooded through her. What if she had misread the attentions he had given her? What if he had merely been being polite and nothing more? She remembered his remark about the elder sister being the first prize and clung to it with fierce hope. Surely he would not have made such a comment if he had not intended her to interpret it personally? And surely his eyes would not have sought her out whenever they were both at the same social event, the expression in them almost colluding, if he were not as attracted to her as she was to him?

  When he took hold of her hand it took every ounce of her considerable self-composure to be able to meet his eyes.

  He flashed her a dazzling, down-slanting smile. ‘Would it be premature of me to ask now if you would have the first dance with me?’

  Her fears vanished. ‘It wouldn’t be at all premature,’ she said, her heart feeling as if it would burst with happiness. ‘Of course I will have the first dance with you.’

  For the next half hour, as guests made their way down the Vassilovich receiving line, Katerina smiled and murmured greetings, her eyes glowing, her face radiant. Julian would not have asked her to have the first dance with him unless he was on the verge of declaring his feelings for her. She had been too overwhelmed by his request to have paid much heed to his short, subsequent conversation with Natalie, but she had been aware of Natalie’s gurgle of laughter and knew that Natalie liked him just as her father liked him.

  ‘Please, please, please, fall in love with me,’ she whispered to herself as her father decided that any further guests would have to enter the house without benefit of being formally received.

  It would all be so perfect. Julian had already shown patience and kindness in his dealings with Natalie and would be an ideal brother-in-law for her. His political knowledge would make him an equally ideal son-in-law, for her father would be able to have long, stimulating conversations with him and her mother would surely be gratified by his English good manners and sensible level-headedness.

  As she followed her parents into the ballroom she was sure that the next few hours were going to be hours she would always remember; hours that would live in her heart for ever.

  It was tradition for Vassilovich balls to begin with a waltz and for that waltz to be the ‘The Blue Danube’. As the music began, and as her father led her mother out on to the ballroom floor, Katerina had never been happier. Cousins and second cousins were politely converging on her in order that she could fill her dance card with their names, but the first gentleman to reach her side was Julian. Ignoring her prospective dance-partners she allowed him to lead her on to the dance floor and as her parents completed their solo circuit of the ballroom, Julian took her lightly in his arms and began to waltz with her to Strauss’s timeless masterpiece.

  ‘Are Vassilovich balls always so illustriously attended?’ he asked as Prince Paul, the son of King Peter’s only brother, danced past, a Montenegrin princess in his arms.

  ‘Always.’

  The room was mirrored and she could see their reflections as they danced. Julian, tall and broad-shouldered in his exquisitely-fitted tailcoat, his sun-bleached hair brushed to a high sheen; herself, her pearl-embroidered white tulle dress looking almost bridal, her mahogany hair an unswept cloud of deep, gardenia-decorated waves and curls. Other dancers swirled around them. White glacé dance gloves gleamed, tiaras glittered, medals shone. As they waltzed past the orchestra the fragrance of the flowers banking the rostrum was headily intoxicating. More flowers cascaded from lavishly placed wall vases. Through the many french windows opening on to the terrace her mother’s roses could be seen, milkily pale in the moonlight.

  Natalie danced past them in the arms of an elderly Karageorgevich uncle and Julian’s brows pulled together in a slight frown as he said, ‘Isn’t Natalie’s partner a little old for her?’

  ‘Her partner isn’t a suitor,’ Katerina said, amused by his concern and not wanting him to think Natalie unseemingly precocious. ‘He is both her great-uncle and her godfather.’

  ‘A Karageorgevich uncle?’ Julian asked, an eyebrow quirking interestedly. ‘An offspring of your great-grandfather? The legendary Black George?’

  ‘Not directly,’ Katerina said, unable to remember exactly her great-uncle’s paterfamilias. ‘I think he is descended from one of great-grandfather’s brothers.’

  They waltzed past a sea of seated aunts and great-aunts and Katerina was aware of several raised eyebrows. She wondered if it was because she and Julian made an extraordinarily handsome couple or if it was because it was obvious they were dancing together for reasons other than social politeness.

  ‘I find your family history extremely intriguing,’ Julian was saying. ‘To have regained a throne after losing it once is unusual enough, but to regain it after losing it twice is remarkable.’

  ‘If great-grandfather had regained the throne himself it would never have happened,’ Katerina said, happy
to tell him all he wanted to know about her family. ‘He was on the point of doing so when Milos Obrenovich, who had usurped him, had him murdered and sent his head to Istanbul as a present to the sultan. After that the Obrenovichs ruled in collusion with the Turks until great-grandfather’s eldest son regained the throne in 1842.’

  ‘And lost it again sixteen years later?’

  If there was a hint of amusement in his voice Katerina was unaware of it. ‘The Obrenovichs never ceased plotting and trying to overthrow him,’ she explained, wanting him to understand that losing the throne a second time had not been mere Karageorgevich carelessness. ‘They created such unrest in the country and such distrust that eventually they succeeded, but they didn’t do so with popular support. Eleven years ago Alexander Obrenovich and his queen were murdered and parliament invited Uncle Peter to return from exile as king.’

  It was a bizarre, bloody story, made all the more bizarre because of the sumptuous surroundings in which it had been told and the Mona Lisa-like beauty and grace of the story-teller.

  As he held her lightly and securely in the curve of his arm, Julian wondered if she had heard any other version of her family’s history. Before he had left London he had been given a far more graphic and much less biased account of the Karageorgevich saga.

  ‘Bloody barbarians,’ his foreign service officer had said to him succinctly. ‘Not the present king perhaps, but certainly the whole previous tribe of Karageorgevichs and Obrenovichs. Black George would have killed his mother if it had been to his advantage and all the Obrenovichs ever did was quarrel over women.’

  When he had arrived in Belgrade his minister had been even more scathing. ‘London may have decided to recognize King Peter’s legitimacy, but it only did so after three years of haggling. Not surprising when you consider the hideous manner of Alexander Obrenovich’s death.’

  ‘But the present king wasn’t responsible, was he?’ he had asked, baffled. ‘I thought Peter Karageorgevich was in Geneva when Alexander and Draga were murdered.’

  ‘So he was. And he certainly didn’t personally plan the murders. That was done by Captain Dragutin Dimitrievich. What you have to bear in mind, however, is that instead of being executed as a regicide Dimitrievich was promoted to colonel and is now head of Serbian Army Intelligence. His nickname is Apis and my advice to you is to give him a wide berth. He’s a ruthless man and a dangerous one.’

  As the strains of ‘The Blue Danube’began to come to a close Julian wondered if Katerina had ever heard of Apis, or of the suggestion that her uncle had condoned the assassination of King Alexander and Queen Draga. Whether she had or not, her family was certainly volatile and had often been notorious and he wondered if he was right in his head, wanting to marry into it.

  As the waltz came to an end Katerina said hesitantly, ‘I wonder, sometimes, if diplomats ever really know all they should about the countries in which they serve.’

  He had been scanning the glittering room and it was a second or so before sharp-edged diplomatic intuition surged into life. ‘They probably don’t,’ he said frankly, immediately giving her his full attention. ‘I certainly wish I knew more about Serbia and about Serbian aspirations.’

  People were leaving the dance floor. Out of the corner of his eye he could see Natalie being escorted by her elderly kinsman. The Montenegrin princess swept past, the jewel-secured plumes in her hair quivering and swaying.

  Katerina’s cheeks were flushed. Now that it had come to it she did not see how she could possibly suggest to him that they talk further on the subject and in relative privacy. The suggestion would have to come from him.

  He said perceptively, ‘Let me mark your card for the supper dance. We can walk on the terrace instead of going in to supper. It will be easier to talk there.’

  She nodded agreement, overcome at how easy it had been. As he escorted her back to where her father was standing she smiled to herself. It had been easy because they intuitively understood one another. They were in mental accord, just as her parents had always been in mental accord.

  ‘The French minister is quite a Lothario,’ her father was saying in easy informality to Julian as he watched the gentleman in question sweep yet another pretty girl on to the dance floor.

  Julian, knowing better than to make an indiscreet remark in return, merely murmured, ‘A niece I think, sir.’

  ‘Ah, of course.’ Beneath Alexis Vassilovich’s waxed moustaches was a hint of a smile. ‘Some senior diplomats have so many nieces and god-daughters that I quite lose count.’

  Julian, mindful of Katerina’s description of Natalie’s aged dance partner, scanned the thronged ballroom once again in the hope of catching sight of her.

  She was with Vitza Karageorgevich and heading towards him. Everything about her shone; her hair, her eyes, her wide dazzling smile. She exuded health and vitality and every head turned as she passed, relations and foreign dignitaries alike gazing after her with appreciative eyes.

  ‘Papa!’ she exclaimed with almost child-like pleasure as she approached, ‘You’ll never believe it but both the French minister and the Russian minister have asked for my dance card.’

  ‘They would be fools not to have done,’ her father said with amusement. ‘I trust you still have some dances free?’

  ‘Not many,’ Natalie said with immodest truthfulness. ‘I can’t remember a ball being so much fun before. Mama said I was not to dance with any Cossack officer without her permission, but I keep losing sight of her and it’s very aggravating. Can I have your permission to accept the next time I am asked, Papa? I feel quite juvenile having to refuse.’

  ‘No, you may not,’ her father said, having no desire to see his younger daughter’s head turned by Russian military glamour. ‘You can, however, allow me to mark your dance card. If you can endure dancing with both the French and the Russian ministers you can surely endure a dance with your father.’

  From where Katerina was standing she could see Vitza’s dance card and it was pathetically barren of names. Julian had obviously also seen it and he now said chivalrously, ‘Would you allow me to mark your card, Mademoiselle Karageorgevich?’

  Vitza flushed and rather clumsily handed him her card.

  ‘And if you can spare a dance for me, Vitza,’ her father said with equal gallantry, ‘I would much appreciate it.’

  After doing his duty where Vitza was concerned, Julian turned towards Natalie.

  ‘Not being a Cossack, perhaps you could dance with me without having to seek your mother’s permission first,’ he said teasingly.

  Natalie flashed him her wide, generous smile. ‘I have very few dances left, Mr Fielding. I do, however, have this next dance free.’

  Together, watched indulgently by her father and Katerina, Natalie and Julian stepped out on to the marble dance floor.

  ‘I like that young man,’ her father said, grateful that Katerina was not yearning for Cossacks and that he had no need to promise her a dance in order to protect her from unsuitable partners. ‘He has a nice manner, easier than the majority of Englishmen and yet not overly familiar.’

  ‘I like him too, Papa,’ Katerina said, her eyes on Julian’s barley-gold hair as he whirled Natalie around the room to a tune from Franz Lehár’s ‘The Merry Widow’. Never before, in any situation, had she behaved impulsively or rashly and she did not believe she was doing so now. He was as swashbuckling in looks as a Slav and yet as dependable in character as the most archetypical Englishman. It was a rare combination and it suited her romantic, yet fundamentally sensible personality, perfectly.

  For the next few dances she caught only brief glimpses of him. Max Karageorgevich danced with her and had the good sense not to mention Natalie’s foray to the Golden Sturgeon. The French minister, determined to dance with every pretty girl in the room, also danced with her as did the Russian minister, the Russian chargé d’affaires and Monsieur Quesnai.

  Her attention was held by none of her partners. After Julian’s waltz with Natalie h
e danced with Vitza, and then with the Russian minister’s wife, and then with Natalie again.

  Katerina, mindful of the Cossacks, was grateful. Her parents’ long years of exile in the heart of Europe had given them a Bohemian attitude towards life and it showed in the unusual amount of freedom they allowed both Natalie and herself. Because Natalie had thought it adventurous to attend the Conservatoire rather than to have her music lessons at home, they had allowed her to do so and, unknown to them, it had proved almost catastrophic. What would happen if Natalie were to become infatuated with a Cossack was anyone’s guess and Katerina was glad that her father, usually so lenient, had upheld her mother’s decision that Natalie must ask permission first before dancing with any of them.

  When it was the supper dance she stood discreetly near one of the french windows until Julian approached her.

  ‘Let’s go outside,’ he said without preamble. ‘It’s unbearably hot in here. I can’t imagine what it must be like when the ball is held in August.’

  As the orchestra began to play and the ballroom floor began to fill, they stepped unobtrusively outside on to the terrace. The moon was full, the garden silvery-pale, the scent of the roses thick as smoke. Excitement spiralled through her as he led the way across the terrace and down the shallow stone steps leading to the lawn. He was ensuring that no-one from the ballroom would be able to see them; that they would have the maximum privacy.

  ‘I had the feeling you wanted to talk to me without being overheard,’ he said as they stepped on to the gravelled pathway leading to the rose garden.

  ‘Yes.’ Her mouth was so dry she could hardly force the word past her lips. When they had finished talking about the Black Hand would he propose to her in her mother’s rose garden? When she re-entered the ballroom would it be as his unofficial fiancée?

  ‘It occurred to me, at the Konak tea-party, that there were aspects of Slav nationalism of which you might be ignorant,’ she said, forcing herself to concentrate on the pretext for their being together. ‘There is a new nationalistic organization, for instance, that is causing Papa and his friends a lot of concern. It is supposed to be secret but Papa says the more people who become aware of it, the less harm it will be able to do.’