The Secret Wife

by Gill Paul

  When the last questioner had taken her turn, Dmitri announced that he would sign books at a table in the corner. A waiter brought him a glass of sweet wine and a cream cake, and he signed twenty-one books – rather more than he had sold at any of his other European events. The Czechs liked their literature, he mused.

  The last book had been signed, and Dmitri was sipping the wine, waiting to say goodbye to the publisher, when a shadow fell over the table.

  ‘Hello, Malama,’ a soft voice said.

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  Prague, October 1947

  Goosebumps broke out all over Dmitri’s skin and the hair stood up on the back of his neck. He looked up and it was her. Tatiana. Utterly herself after all these decades.

  He couldn’t speak, but tears welled up. He pressed his knuckles to his eyes in an attempt to stop them.

  ‘We had best get out of here,’ she said in Russian. ‘Come with me.’

  When Dmitri stood, his knees almost gave way beneath him. Tatiana took his arm and led him down a side street into the Old Town. Neither of them spoke, but Dmitri breathed the cold night air deep into his lungs in an attempt to compose himself, surreptitiously wiping his eyes. She turned down a short flight of steps that led to the wooden door of a cellar bar. It was dark and quiet inside, with only three other customers. They took a corner table and asked the waitress to bring two glasses of red wine.

  ‘Is it really you?’ Dmitri breathed, gazing at her face. She looked almost exactly the same, apart from a deep furrow between her brows and little grooves, like symmetrical scars, on either side of her mouth. Her long hair was pinned into an old-fashioned bun at the back of her head.

  ‘I brought something so you would be sure it is me,’ she said, and fumbled in her pocket before producing the jewelled dog tag she’d commissioned Fabergé to make for Ortipo.

  ‘How could you think …?’ he began, a fist squeezing his heart.

  ‘I heard there have been many people pretending to be my sisters or brother and couldn’t bear it if you hadn’t believed me.’ Her voice was the same as ever, soft and low.

  He shook his head in amazement. ‘I would have known you anywhere. You haven’t changed a bit.’

  ‘Oh, I have.’ She raised an eyebrow. ‘Of course I have. So have you.’ She looked at his crumpled face, his receding hairline, with a fond smile. ‘I think you are more handsome than ever.’

  He felt the tears welling again and blinked rapidly. The wine arrived and they raised their glasses to each other in a silent toast then drank, and he was glad of the warmth in his throat.

  ‘I’ve read all your books,’ she said. ‘They’re wonderful. I would have known they were yours no matter what name you put on the cover.’ They had been published under the name Dmitri Yakovlevich.

  ‘Why did you not contact me before?’ he asked. ‘You could have written to my publishers. They would have forwarded a letter.’

  ‘I only discovered you were a writer just before the war. I saw a newspaper article, with a grainy photograph alongside, and couldn’t believe my eyes. I had been told you were killed at Tsaritsyn in 1919 so my shock then was similar to yours tonight. I rushed out to buy your books straight away and when I read Interminable Love …’ She sighed deeply. ‘It was as if your soul spoke to me through the pages.’

  ‘It was a love letter to you,’ he said. ‘I prayed you would read it one day.’

  Her face lit up. ‘Really?’

  ‘Of course. Oh, I wish you had got in touch then.’

  Her face clouded over. ‘The years under Occupation were difficult. The Germans would have considered it suspicious if I tried to write to the author of The Boot that Kicked at an address in New York. People were executed for less.’

  A spasm of pain twisted her mouth and suddenly Dmitri couldn’t bear any more casual chat. He grabbed her hand and looked into her eyes. ‘Are you all right, Tatiana? Is everything all right?’

  She gave a little laugh. ‘No, not really.’ She was struggling to contain her emotion but her face gave her away, the way it always used to when she was younger. ‘But seeing you, I am more than all right.’

  A blast of love for her knocked Dmitri sideways as though he had been struck by a giant wave in the ocean, as though someone had kicked the chair from beneath him. His face felt hot and he could hardly breathe. The love he felt was every bit as vast and overwhelming as it had been on the night they married in St Petersburg, on the night she disappeared from his cottage in Ekaterinburg. How could that be, when it was more than thirty years since they last saw each other? His ears were buzzing. He even wondered if he might be having a heart attack. He picked up his wine and took a gulp, then another, yearning for intoxication to still his rampaging emotions.

  Tatiana put a hand over his and asked, with a smile, ‘Would you like to lean your forehead against mine so we know what each other is thinking?’

  He put his arm around her and leaned forwards till their heads touched. She smelled different now. Not jasmine, but a muskier, more womanly scent. Lust swept over him, causing a stiffening in his groin. It was extraordinarily erotic, sitting in that darkened bar with their foreheads pressed together.

  It seemed Tatiana felt the same way because she asked quietly, ‘Shall we go to your hotel room?’

  He nodded and they rose immediately, leaving the rest of the wine.

  Dmitri was nervous as he made love to Tatiana for the first time. He felt shy as he undressed, scared that he would disappoint her. He reached out tentatively, watching her face for signs that it was all right to do so. She was still slender, with long limbs and cool skin, like a china doll’s, although her hands were rough and red, her nails short. He explored her, kissing tiny scars on her arms, noting the softness of her breasts, which were fuller than they used to be. Her tummy was rumpled and he guessed she had had a child. He felt a stab of jealousy. Whose child? Between her legs was warm, with a few grey hairs nestling amongst the brown. He laid his head on her belly and explored with his fingers, while she stroked his back, breathing deeply, pulling gently on his hair.

  When at last he parted her legs and pushed inside her it was so excitingly different that he couldn’t last long. With a cry from the back of his throat he came then clung to her in embarrassment. He began to apologise but she pulled his face to hers for a long, tender kiss.

  ‘My wife,’ he breathed as he pulled away.

  ‘But you have another wife,’ she said, not accusing but factual. ‘I read about her in an article.’

  ‘No. Rosa and I never married,’ he told her. ‘I would never have married while there was a chance you were alive.’

  ‘Poor Rosa,’ she mused.

  ‘What about you?’

  ‘I got married,’ she told him. ‘I had to. Besides, I thought you were dead.’

  ‘Where is your husband now?’

  Tatiana put a finger to his lips. ‘Can we please not ask these questions? Not yet. Perhaps never. Some things are too painful to revisit. Can we just pretend that we met for the first time tonight, at Café Slavia?’

  That floored him. He was desperate to know where she had been all those years, what had happened the night she disappeared – and yet, perhaps she was right. Certainly it would be better left for another time.

  She rose to wash at the basin in the corner of the room and he saw that she was more than slender; her ribs and hipbones protruded as if food had been scarce. He instinctively sucked in his own midlife paunch.

  ‘Have you had dinner?’ he asked. ‘We could go for a late dinner.’

  She shook her head. ‘Breakfast tomorrow will be fine.’

  ‘I’m supposed to catch a train to Istanbul in the morning to stay with my sister Valerina. She and Vera live there. But I’ll telephone and say I’ve been delayed.’

  ‘I’d like to spend some time with you, if possible. It’s been so long …’

  She unfastened her hair from its pins and he saw it was almost waist length. It suited her. Sh
e came back to lie in his arms, her face on his chest, and he marvelled at how well they fitted together, like a familiar pair of gloves.

  A question came to his lips and he blurted it out before he could stop himself. ‘Did any of the others survive? Do you know?’

  ‘I don’t think so. I don’t see how they could have. I only survived because of you – and for a long time I wished I hadn’t.’ Her voice was flat.

  Dmitri felt the weight of his old familiar guilt. ‘I looked everywhere for you – all over Russia. When Anna Tschaikovsky appeared in Berlin, claiming to be Anastasia, I went straight there to see her.’

  ‘And?’ she asked, without hope.

  ‘Definitely not.’

  ‘You didn’t go to see any of the people who claimed to be me?’ There was a spark of irony in her voice.

  ‘I saw photographs. There was little resemblance.’

  ‘Huh! Such a strange thing to do.’ She tilted her face to kiss his lips, savouring the luxury, then asked, ‘Tell me about your children. You have two, don’t you? What are they like?’

  She laid her head on his chest to listen as he described them. ‘They’re in their early twenties, and both at college, where they live in residence. Marta is very popular and has dozens of boyfriends, who call on the telephone or arrive on the doorstep at all hours when she’s at home. Nicholas is more of a loner, like me. I worry about him more …’

  He couldn’t think what else to say. The children never confided in him, the way they did in Rosa. He’d catch them sitting in the kitchen chatting about their friends, their classes, but they’d change the subject when he entered. He did not have Rosa’s facility for making them open up.

  ‘I have a Borzoi as well,’ he added. ‘A beautiful animal called Malevich.’

  ‘After your army friend,’ she remembered.

  He shivered, a vision of what happened to Malevich flashing to mind. ‘He’s a sensitive creature, very smart and affectionate. There’s something about his nature that reminds me of Ortipo. He’s no longer a puppy but he still runs after birds, even though he knows they will take off at the last minute. It’s a game he plays with them. He’s a happy creature.’

  ‘I loved Ortipo so much,’ she said with passion. ‘You’d be surprised how often I think of her, even now.’

  ‘How did you come to have her tag with you?’ Dmitri asked, stroking her hair.

  She cuddled closer, burying her face so he could hardly hear her words. ‘Those last weeks, we sewed jewels into the seams of our clothes. The tag was in the boning of one of my undergarments. I escaped with a few more gemstones but had to sell them over the years to get by.’

  ‘Why didn’t you …’ he began, but Tatiana hushed him by kissing him. It was a long, hungry kiss that touched him deep inside and soon they were making love again, this time for much, much longer.

  Chapter Fifty-Five

  Lake Akanabee, New York State, 10th October 2016

  Rebecca Wicks, the editor at Random House, emailed Kitty a couple of days later with a response to her question about Dmitri’s translator:

  Our accounts department has two letters on file from your great-grandfather regarding Irena Markova. In the first, dated July 1958, he asks that in the event of his death a monthly payment of $300 should be paid to her from his royalty account, and gives an address in Albany. In the second, dated May 1975, he tells us that Irena has recently passed away, and that his royalties should be held in an interest-bearing account until one of his descendants gets in touch to claim them.

  That’s me! Kitty thought, with a start. It felt as if Dmitri expected her to find out about him one day, as if he was reaching out a hand to her from the past.

  The second shock came when she calculated that Irena Markova had died forty-one years earlier so that meant she really could be the body at the cabin. The dates fitted. But why would Dmitri have buried her there? Did he murder her? There was still so much she didn’t know about him …

  Why had he been so concerned to keep paying Irena in the event of him dying first? The blackmail scenario didn’t fit. She wondered if they had maybe fallen in love after Rosa’s death. Perhaps that was the case, and Nicholas and Marta couldn’t forgive him for it. That might explain the rift between them.

  But it seemed implausible that the grandmother she remembered as generous and fun-loving could have been so cold-hearted as to cut off her own father. She must have had a stronger reason. Kitty remembered her mum saying that Marta and Stanley were short of money after Stanley’s business failed. Why did she not ask Dmitri for help? And then it occurred to her that maybe Dmitri had been the one to break off contact. Could it have anything to do with the body found in his cabin? He didn’t want to risk them finding out … Kitty felt as though she was going round in circles.

  She logged in to her genealogy forum to find there were some replies to her question, and scrolled down the list. Several mentioned websites in the Czech Republic but these would only be useful if she could post in Czech. She’d need to find a translator. One came up with a link to the immigration papers of Irena Markova, which gave an old address in Brno. But then, near the end of the list, she found a post in English, from a woman called Hana Markova, which said, ‘I think I am the person you are looking for. I am the stepdaughter of Irena Markova and this week I had a call about her from the New York state police. I work as an interpreter at a conference centre in Brno’ – she gave the telephone number – ‘and it is best to catch me between 12.30 and 2 p.m.’

  Kitty was amazed. The Internet had come up trumps after all! She googled and learned that New York was six hours behind the Czech Republic, so that meant calling between 6.30 and 8 a.m. in the morning. While packing her bags to move back to the cabin for her last few nights at Lake Akanabee, Kitty made sure her mobile phone was fully charged. This might be a long call.

  Chapter Fifty-Six

  Prague, October 1947

  The following morning, Dmitri opened his eyes and turned to look at Tatiana breathing quietly beside him, her soft auburn hair fanned across the pillow. It was the most precious moment of his life. He raised himself on an elbow to examine the curl of her lashes, the curve of her ear, the slender neck, and he was choked with the enormity of his love for her.

  As if she could feel his gaze she opened her eyes and smiled up at him. In that instant there was no past, no future, nothing but the two of them. Without words they kissed then began to make love and it was glorious, the fulfilment of all Dmitri’s yearnings since 1914 when, at the age of twenty-three, he first set eyes on Tatiana in a hospital ward.

  They bathed and dressed slowly, with many kisses and caresses. By the time they got downstairs the hotel had stopped serving breakfast so they went out to a café in Wenceslas Square and ordered dark bread, cold meats and cheeses. They sat close, their knees pressed together, as they ate.

  ‘Where is your home?’ Dmitri asked, smoothing a loose strand of hair from her brow and tucking it behind her ear. ‘Am I allowed to ask?’

  He still couldn’t quite believe it was her, and kept touching her, gazing at her, making sure.

  She finished chewing a mouthful. ‘I don’t have a home any more. This is something I need to discuss with you. I have a proposal.’

  ‘Anything you want. You only have to ask.’

  ‘I need money to rent a place … but I don’t want to take a gift from you – although I know you would offer without hesitation.’

  He was automatically reaching for his chequebook but stopped.

  She continued: ‘I don’t know if you’re aware that the English translation of your first three novels is dreadful: clumsy and wordy and not an accurate reflection of the delicacy and precision of your Russian prose. I was going to ask if you might consider hiring me to retranslate them. I know I could do much better.’

  ‘Oh God, of course! I’d love you to do that.’ He was excited at the thought.

  She continued. ‘Once I have a track record as a translator, I hope
I can find enough work to earn a living. I have been doing farming work till now’ – she held out her roughened hands to show him – ‘but I have trouble with my back and can’t work long hours any more.’

  He couldn’t bear to think of her farming, of her back aching. She was a Romanov, a grand duchess. ‘Tatiana, I have plenty of money. You don’t need to work ever again. Please let me give you a regular sum, whatever you need. You’re my wife, after all.’

  She leaned across to kiss him then pulled her chair round so that she was close enough to wrap her arms around him and hold him so close he could feel the beating of a pulse in her neck.

  They spent the day walking around the town: across the famous Charles Bridge lined with lifelike statues of saints, up to St Nicholas Church and the atmospheric old Castle, back to the Jewish cemetery with its thousands of tombstones all toppling over each other, and around the majesty of Wencelas Square. Tatiana spoke fluent Czech so Dmitri imagined this must be where she had been living. Perhaps she had been rescued from Ekaterinburg by the Czechs in the White Army. Bless them, whoever they were. He’d be forever in their debt.

  Towards evening they collected her belongings from the left luggage office at the railway station – a battered holdall containing a few items of clothing and her copies of his books.

  ‘Do you want to stay in Prague?’ he asked later, over dinner. ‘I’m worried about the growth of the Communist Party here. It feels like St Petersburg in 1917, with people checking who is listening before opening their mouths to speak.’

  ‘I know. I’m worried too, but I don’t have anywhere else to go.’

  ‘Do you have children?’ he asked, tentatively.

  ‘No,’ she said quickly, not meeting his eye.

  He hesitated, sure she was lying, but she didn’t continue. ‘You don’t want to get in touch with your family? I met your Aunt Irene in Berlin, and I know there are still Romanovs in Denmark.’