The Secret Wife

by Gill Paul

  But Rosa knew what to do. About a month after Malevich’s death, Dmitri came home to find a Borzoi puppy scrabbling round the kitchen floor on unsteady legs. It leapt up at him, licking his outstretched hand, eager to make friends. The puppy’s coat was white with brown patches and it was only a few weeks old. He looked questioningly at Rosa.

  ‘It’s a girl.’ She smiled. ‘But she’s not house-trained yet so we’re going to have our work cut out!’

  He crouched and let her lick his face as he ran his hands over the silky coat. ‘Let’s call her Trina,’ he said. ‘She looks like a Trina.’ In his mind, he was thinking of the ladies’ maid who used to take messages between Tatiana and him when she was under house arrest.

  Tatiana was charmed when she met Trina, and pleased at the name Dmitri had chosen.

  ‘I wonder what became of Trina?’ she mused. ‘I hope she found a good husband.’

  Dmitri didn’t like to tell her it was unlikely. Most of the Romanovs’ staff had been imprisoned and several were executed by the Bolshevik regime.

  One sunny September day, when Rosa had told him she would be out until dinnertime, he and Tatiana drove up to the lakes to take Trina for a long walk. Dmitri stopped at a remote spot on the shore of Lake Akanabee and Trina ran into the water, taking to it instinctively. She never tired of swimming for the sticks they threw, bringing them back and soaking the two of them as she shook the water from her coat. They laughed to remember their failed efforts to train Ortipo back in St Petersburg; this Trina seemed either more intelligent or just more obedient than Ortipo had ever been.

  The sun had already set when Dmitri dropped Tatiana back at her cottage and drove home, his forehead pink from the sun. He was late for dinner and hoped Rosa wouldn’t mind.

  ‘Sorry, darling,’ he called as he came in the kitchen door. ‘I was walking Trina and lost count of the time.’

  Rosa was sitting at the table, her head in her hands, and he could tell she had been crying.

  ‘What is it?’ he asked, alarmed. Rosa never cried.

  She took a deep breath. ‘I found a lump in my breast a few weeks ago. I didn’t like to worry you because I was sure it was nothing but I saw the doctor today and he says I have breast cancer. I have to start treatment straight away.’

  Dmitri sat down hard on a chair, the breath knocked out of him. ‘You should have told me.’

  ‘You were depressed. I didn’t want to add to it. But I’m going to need you to be strong now, Dmitri. Is that OK?’

  He got up to put his arms around her, careful not to touch her breasts. He wondered which one the cancer was in, but didn’t like to ask.

  ‘Of course it is. How could you ever doubt it?’

  She rested her head on his arm, eyes closed, and didn’t reply.

  Two days later, Dmitri accompanied Rosa to her appointment with the doctor who was treating her, Dr Eisenberg. He was a bald man with freckles all over his shiny head, and he wore heavy black-rimmed glasses and a dark suit and tie. His manner was businesslike.

  ‘I am recommending a radical mastectomy of the left breast, as is standard procedure. We’ll remove all the breast tissue, the lymph nodes and part of the muscle of the chest wall. That should excise all the cancer cells but as a precaution we’ll follow it up with a course of radiation therapy, which we’ll start as soon as the wound has healed sufficiently.’ His tone sounded as though he was reading from a textbook. He looked up. ‘Any questions?’

  ‘Yes,’ Dmitri said. ‘When will you operate? How long will Rosa be in hospital?’

  ‘I have her booked in for next Monday, and I would expect her to stay with us at least a week.’

  ‘And the radiation? How long will that last?’

  ‘Twelve weeks is standard.’

  Dmitri counted in his head. ‘So she could be cured by Christmas?’

  The doctor sighed, almost imperceptibly. ‘We don’t talk about a cure, Mr …’ – he consulted his notes – ‘Yakovlevich. We talk about being in remission. And I’m afraid Christmas is a little optimistic.’

  He talked on and Dmitri listened hard, latching on to anything that sounded optimistic and memorising the phrases so he could reassure Rosa with them later, reassure himself: ‘state-of-the-art technology’, ‘gold-standard therapy’, ‘I’d recommend the same for my own mother’.

  That evening they telephoned Nicholas and Marta to tell them the news, one after the other, and both insisted they were coming home to help look after their mother.

  Rosa protested a little but gave in with a smile. She wanted her children by her side. Dmitri’s first thought was that it would be difficult for him to slip out to see Tatiana with them there, but immediately he felt ashamed of himself. That was hardly the most important thing.

  The operation lasted six hours and Dmitri was shocked to see how ill Rosa looked when she came round afterwards, her chest bandaged like an Egyptian mummy and tubes draining fluid from her sides. It took all her energy to speak, and he ushered the children away after half an hour, realising that she needed to rest. As they walked down the antiseptic-smelling hospital corridor, Dmitri looked at the dusty overhead pipes, the bright lights, the peeling paint on the walls, and knew they were going to become very familiar over the next few months.

  That evening they were all invited for dinner with Rosa’s mother and sister but Dmitri cried off, saying he had a headache, and drove to Tatiana’s instead. She took him in her arms and ran her cool fingers through his hair, massaging his scalp.

  ‘I got a book from the library about cancer,’ she told him. ‘It is important that she eats lots of good food to stay strong. The X-ray treatment is very successful but it will take a lot out of her.’

  Somehow it seemed natural that Tatiana should be comforting him during Rosa’s illness, helping him to present a strong front at home. She had never shown any jealousy of Rosa; instead she was curious about her, wanted to see photographs of her, asked about her likes and dislikes, her hobbies and volunteer work. Once she said that if circumstances had been different she would have liked to be Rosa’s friend. That was an odd thought, but Dmitri could imagine they would have got on. Rosa got on with everyone.

  Over the weeks and months of her treatment, Dmitri remained positive in front of Rosa and the children, but he was able to express his fears when he went to Tatiana’s. Sometimes he cried when he described to her the agonising burns the radiation caused on Rosa’s already raw flesh. Often he talked through his worries about the side effects: the fatigue, the inability to taste food any more, Rosa’s tortured breathing when she finally managed to get to sleep, and his own sense of helplessness that there was little he could do. She had become so thin that clothes were falling off her so he bought new ones in loose, soft fabrics, garments that could be slipped on and off without aggravating her wounds. He couldn’t bear to watch while she changed or bathed; couldn’t bear to see the jagged line where her left breast had been. He used to love her pert, shapely breasts.

  ‘It will pass,’ Tatiana told him. ‘Life will go on.’

  As the new year of 1955 dawned, it seemed Rosa was in hospital more than she was at home. Things kept going wrong. She grew so tired she could barely get out of bed; her blood counts were poor; she collapsed with a blood clot in her lungs. One day, when Dmitri visited, she clutched his hand suddenly.

  ‘There is something I must say and I want you to listen.’ She couldn’t raise her head from the pillow but she sought his eyes, forcing them to meet hers before she continued. ‘When I am gone, I don’t want you to feel guilty about anything. I know you torture yourself with guilt for all kinds of things that were never your fault but don’t ever feel guilty about us. Please believe me when I say that I have loved our life together. You have been a good husband – although we never married.’ She gave a little smile.

  Tears began to gather in Dmitri’s eyes. ‘Rosa, please don’t talk that way. I want you to fight this thing and get well. You mustn’t give up. We need you.’
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  She reached for his hand. ‘I don’t think I’m going to beat this, my love. I’m too tired and running out of fight. But I can’t bear to think of you being miserable when I am gone.’ She took a deep breath that made a rattling sound in her throat, then said, ‘Dmitri, I know you found her. I know you found Tatiana. And when I am gone I want you to be together, and I want you both to be happy. Do you promise me you will?’

  A sob burst from his throat and the tears flowed. He wanted to say ‘sorry’ but couldn’t even form the word.

  ‘Promise me,’ Rosa insisted fiercely, her fingernails digging into his palm, and he gave a little nod.

  Chapter Sixty-One

  Albany, New York State, 1955

  Around ten o’clock one February evening, a nurse rang to tell Dmitri that Rosa was very weak and unlikely to make it through the night. Nicholas and Marta piled into the car and they collected Rosa’s mother and sister then drove to the hospital. Rosa was no longer conscious but lay with her mouth open, gasping for every breath like a fish lying on a riverbank. They all spoke to her, told her they were there and that they loved her, but there was no reaction. She was too far along the journey to the next place. Chairs were brought, cups of coffee offered, and they sat with her as the breaths became fainter and further apart.

  Dmitri perched close to Rosa’s head, whispering to her, wetting her cracked lips with a damp sponge, as he had learned to do after her bouts of vomiting. He felt panic welling inside him at the thought of life without her, but at the same time he couldn’t bear her to suffer any more. He must be strong tonight for the sake of his children. Marta was crying and Nicholas was white-faced. Somehow they would get through this.

  ‘You should take the wedding ring off her finger now,’ a nurse advised. ‘It’s harder to do once she’s gone.’

  Rosa’s mother and sister glared at him as he slid off the gold band and slipped it in his pocket. They both knew, although the children did not, that there had never been a wedding.

  When the end came, none of them recognised it at first because the breaths were already so far apart. They listened, scarcely moving a muscle, watching her throat for a tiny flicker, but after several minutes with no movement Rosa’s mother sobbed, ‘She’s gone.’ A nurse came to confirm it and recorded the time of death as 3.20 a.m.

  Dmitri wanted to be on his own with her, to whisper his last private messages of love, but he couldn’t; she belonged to all of them, not just him. He was dry-eyed, shocked, and extraordinarily tired. He failed to smother a yawn, and Rosa’s sister shook her head and tutted.

  Before long, the nurse came to tell them that the body must be moved: that’s what Rosa was now – a body. They trailed out to the car and Dmitri dropped off Rosa’s mother and sister then took Nicholas and Marta back to the house. They were exhausted and went up to their rooms to sleep, but Dmitri sat at the kitchen table, head in his hands, feeling utterly bereft. He couldn’t bear the emptiness, the terrifying hole Rosa had left in the universe. He wanted to cry but at the same time was scared of crying because it might make him fall apart completely.

  On a sudden impulse he got up and slipped out the back door, closing it quietly behind him. He climbed into his car, pulled out of the drive and headed across town to Tatiana’s, knocking on her door at five o’clock in the morning. She answered, wearing a long satin dressing gown, wiping the sleep from her eyes.

  ‘She’s gone,’ he said, a frog in his throat. ‘I had to see you.’

  She pulled him inside and held him close for several minutes. ‘I’ll get some vodka,’ she said. ‘Sit down.’

  He took off his jacket, loosened his tie, which suddenly felt as though it was choking him, and kicked off his shoes.

  ‘To Rosa,’ Tatiana toasted, handing him a shot of vodka.

  As Dmitri drank he heard a banging on the door. ‘Who can that be?’ he asked. ‘I hope I didn’t wake your neighbours.’

  Tatiana shrugged that she didn’t know and went to see. He heard a voice in the hall – ‘Where the hell is he?’ – then Marta burst into the room, her face scarlet from crying.

  ‘You bastard, how could you? Mum’s not even cold!’ She picked up a glass of vodka from the table and threw it over Dmitri.

  What could he say? He took a handkerchief from his pocket to wipe his cheek.

  Tatiana gathered her wits. ‘You must be Marta,’ she said. ‘I am an old friend of your father’s, from Russia. Please sit down.’

  ‘Forget it! I’m not accepting hospitality from a whore!’ Marta cried.

  ‘Marta!’ Dmitri rebuked. He was too exhausted, too drained to deal with this.

  Marta was hysterical, spitting out her words. ‘Nicholas and I followed you in my car because I suspected you might come to your other woman. Oh yes, I’ve known for ages: all those long walks with the dog, and mysterious errands, and fictitious meetings. I warned Mum there was someone else, but she would never hear a word against you. All the time she was struggling with cancer you were coming here … I just thought you might have the decency not to come tonight. Have you no respect at all?’

  ‘Have a drink,’ Tatiana urged. ‘You are overwrought. You don’t know the facts but we will explain if you sit down. I’ll go and invite your brother inside …’

  ‘You must be joking,’ Marta screamed. ‘Sit down for a chat? In your house? Frankly, I never want to see either of you again.’

  She turned to leave. ‘Marta, wait!’ Dmitri called, and stood to go after her, feeling utterly useless.

  Tatiana put a hand on his arm. ‘Leave her. You can explain tomorrow when she has had some sleep and calmed down a little. Talk to both of them. I don’t mind what explanation you give. It’s up to you.’

  A few hours later, Dmitri drove home. He expected to find his children sitting in the kitchen over breakfast, but neither of them was there. Trina whined and nudged his leg, desperate to be let out to empty her bladder, and equally keen for her breakfast. There was a short note on the table telling him that both Marta and Nicholas had gone to stay at their grandmother’s house. He sighed, imagining the character assassination that would be going on over that breakfast table. It would all come out now. How could he talk to his son or daughter with the disapproving in-laws present?

  He made the necessary phone calls to tell friends of Rosa’s death and spoke to an undertaker about organising a funeral then called his mother-in-law’s house to consult them on the date. Neither Nicholas or Marta would come to the telephone and Dmitri didn’t know what to do, short of driving round and forcing his way over the threshold. Tatiana suggested that he write to them, and he did: ‘We need to stick together to get through this terrible loss,’ he wrote. ‘After we have buried your mother, I will tell you anything you want to know about my long friendship with Tatiana. Be assured it is not what you imagine.’

  Worrying about the rift with his children stopped him grieving for Rosa. He went through the motions of ordering flowers, choosing a coffin, and picking hymns for the service, with only brief phone calls to his mother-in-law’s house to ask their wishes. On the day of the funeral they made their way separately to the church and when Dmitri walked in, he saw that his children, their partners, and Rosa’s family had occupied the front row, forcing him to sit one behind. After the service, they huddled together at the graveside leaving no room for him, just glancing across red-eyed and accusing when the minister called Rosa a ‘beloved wife and mother’. From their sneering expressions, he suspected Nicholas and Marta had been told he never married their mother: one more sin that would have to be explained.

  In his head Dmitri asked Rosa, ‘What should I do?’ She would have known how to fix this, just as she had smoothed over every family argument through the years, but there was no reply because she was in the cold earth.

  He telephoned that night and Nicholas answered the call.

  ‘Won’t you meet me, son?’ he begged. ‘We need to talk. Please let me explain …’

  ‘I don’t care about
your private life, Dad,’ he said wearily. ‘Nothing will bring Mom back. I can’t come out tonight because Pattie and I are flying to California in the morning and I’d like to spend the evening with my grandma.’

  ‘What about your sister? Is she there?’

  ‘Marta and Stanley have gone back to their place. I’d leave her to calm down a while if I were you. She’s taken it hard.’

  Dmitri couldn’t stop trying though. The day after the funeral he drove to Marta’s house with Rosa’s jewellery box. Stanley opened the door but refused to let him in.

  ‘Please,’ Dmitri begged. ‘She’s my daughter.’

  Stanley was immoveable. ‘She’s been telling me some horror stories about her childhood, about how you used to beat them both, and to be honest I’m surprised she didn’t disown you long before now. She kept her feelings to herself because she didn’t want to hurt her mother, but now she says she just wants you to leave her alone.’

  Dmitri was surprised by the accusation. Didn’t everyone smack their children? ‘I’m the first to admit I wasn’t a great father, but surely I deserve a chance to explain myself? Tell Marta that her mother knew about my relationship with Tatiana – she had always known.’

  ‘I don’t reckon that’s going to help, somehow.’ Stanley folded his arms. ‘It don’t make it right that you went to see her before Rosa’s body was cold, when your own children needed you.’

  ‘I thought they were asleep!’

  There was no sense in arguing with this pig-headed man, who seemed to have positioned himself as Marta’s new protector. Dmitri begged to be allowed to see her, but Stanley would not budge.