Encore

by Monique Raphel High

  She hated herself for these doubts. But her daughter’s birth had left her in pain. It was taking her longer to shed the weight than the first time. Natalia went to the vanity and examined the fine, feathered lines around her large eyes. She had not done anything with her life in so long—the American interlude had been her single season, brief as it was, since 1913. To rely on one’s past reputation for that long was unhealthy. A dancer’s body began to change by the time she turned thirty; at twenty-seven, Natalia was nearing that, and because she had had such scant exposure to the stage in four years, she knew that her performance skills had decreased to a perilously low level. Her only exposure, in fact, had been outside of Europe. She realized all too well that she had become a legend, almost forgotten.

  As soon as she could walk, she went to the company rehearsals at the Costanzi Theatre. At the end of May, they were to travel to Paris for some other performances, including Pierre’s Parade. Meanwhile Natalia sat in the front row, silent and still, watching the present production of The Good-humored Ladies, a paeon to eighteenth-century Venice choreographed to music by Scarlatti. It was a gay, carefree production, based on the play by Carlo Goldini. The action revolved around a series of pranks, mistaken identities, and joyful lovemaking. Massine’s dances were filled with the essence of joie de vivre. Nevertheless, illogically, Natalia’s throat constricted. The quickly paced musical phrases, rolling in repetitive motifs, sentimental and courtly, reminded her of Boris. He had never particularly admired the Scarlatti family. But for her, right now, the expert simplicity of the toccatas and small sonatas rang true of him: all flowing charm on the surface, all cunning imagination underneath. For him, life had been a clever game of chess, which, ultimately, he had lost.

  The only dancer whom she knew well in this production was Lydia Lopokhova. They had been together at the Imperial School and in New York. Now Natalia watched the other small dancer, married to one of Diaghilev’s secretaries, Barocchi, and sudden anguish seized her. Lydia had always been the lesser known of the two, an excellent dancer but not quite on Natalia’s level. Now Natalia thought: She is superior. Shall I ever equal her again? It was not envy, but self-doubt and self-deprecation. She had allowed her career, her better, unique self, to fall by the wayside. Now she was suddenly afraid of becoming like other women, women she had always despised for the narrow scope of their existences, women such as her mother.

  She sat in the theatre and ached. She hurt because she felt shut out from her chosen life, set aside by her husband and unwilling to be bound by her little baby. Perhaps I’ve been wrong about Serge Pavlovitch, she thought, angry at herself for indulging in self-pity. It would have been wonderful to choreograph a ballet, many ballets. But to give up dancing in a fit of pique—I must have been mad!

  On stage, Lydia Lopokhova noticed her and bent down to wave. Natalia held her hands up and made a clapping gesture in mime. Bravo, my dear. If no one cares about Oblonova, it’s because Oblonova doesn’t deserve it. She hasn’t really cared about herself. She’s become a relic.

  Pierre could not sort through his feelings. He knew that she was attending the rehearsals, that she even joined the soloists when they held their practice classes. Maestro Cecchetti had told him—she had not. Pierre chewed on his lower lip and paced the floor. He took long walks. He went to the hotel and startled the nurse by seizing Tamara and bringing her with him to the workrooms. People smiled at him but were also bewildered. Pierre Grigorievitch was behaving erratically again. His exuberance would give way to anger, which in turn became a pure fount of exquisite joy. If he could combine Tama and the paint pots, he was supremely himself, a man fulfilled—almost.

  One afternoon Diaghilev came upon him with Tamara in the hotel gardens. Amiably, the impresario fell into step beside him, and for a moment they ambled companionably together, smiling at the tiny infant in her red nightshirt. Then Diaghilev motioned to a bench, and they sat down, Tamara in Pierre’s arms. “She is very lovely, your daughter,” the older man commented.

  “I wish my mother could see her,” said Pierre. “And I wish Tamara could see our country. But Rome is a good city in which to be born—it’s a city with a heart, a city for artists.”

  “They call it the city of lovers,” Diaghilev said indifferently, but his sharp eyes scrutinized Pierre as he held the child, supporting her flaccid neck. He saw Pierre’s cheek twitch.

  “You are hardly the simpleton you allow others to make you out to be,” Diaghilev suddenly remarked. “You are certainly not a man of words, but genius has many languages, don’t you think?”

  Surprised and wary, Pierre stared at him with his deep black eyes. “What do you mean, Serge Pavlovitch?” he demanded. Somehow he knew that this had some bearing on Natalia. His body went rigid.

  “I helped launch you. I like you and I find your work outstanding. I am proud to call you my friend. Once, too, I was Natalia’s friend. I had a father’s affection for her.”

  Pierre’s jaw set, and over his daughter’s body his fingers were clamped together, white at the knuckle. “I wish to God you had put it to her in those very words,” he finally said.

  “I felt like a father to her—a guide, a mentor,” Diaghilev continued. “She is still dear to me in those ways. But she rejects my overtures at reconciliation. You know of our old quarrel?”

  “Quarrel? Oh yes, certainly I knew of it, Serge Pavlovitch. I am sorry if my wife has offended you. I’m certain she meant nothing of the kind. Natalia is very proud—”

  “Yes, she is. It is a Kussov trait never to forget the smallest slight. You and I both had the ill luck to find ourselves more than once on the wrong side of the cannon in the Kussov camp. Of course, Natalia is only—a Kussov in-law. But don’t worry: I am not insulted by her behavior. I am merely concerned. Natalia is no longer a young girl—for a ballerina, that is. Unless she dances soon, she will never again live up to her name. Do you want her to dance again, Pierre?”

  The painter was startled by the directness of this query. He licked his upper lip. “Frankly, I don’t know,” he replied. “There’s Tamara. I want my daughter to have a mother. And I want to have a wife.”

  “Most of my dancers are wives, my dear boy. One hardly precludes the other. The point is, Natalia wants to dance again. Any day now she will ask me to take her back. I’m not certain what my answer will be.”

  Pierre’s jaw dropped in frank amazement. “You’re not? But no one is a better ballerina!”

  Diaghilev inclined his massive head. “True. But right now you are the Riazhin that I need more. There are Lopokhova, Sokolova, Chabelska. But I cannot continue these ballets without my Riazhin. You are necessary to me, Pierre.”

  “Thank you, Serge Pavlovitch. I am most flattered.”

  “And I am most sincere. My single problem has to do with financing. Always, always the same rigmarole, the same convoluted entanglements. That was where Boris was most useful to me. I am sorry, dear boy, to keep bringing up his name, as I’m aware that you two had your share of disagreements. But during these lean times I am constantly reminded of how precious all that Kussov savoir faire was—not to mention the money.”

  “For a profligate hedonist, he managed it quite well,” Pierre remarked coldly.

  Diaghilev laughed. “We are all profligate hedonists, aren’t we, though? Now that you are a wealthy man yourself, aren’t you the least bit of a spendthrift?”

  Pierre’s hands began to tremble slightly. “I am not a wealthy man. My wife, as you well know, is a wealthy woman.”

  Diaghilev’s eyebrows shot up quizzically. “But I didn’t know. Surely all’s equal between a man and his wife?”

  “I could not take the Kussov money,” Pierre said. “It would not have been right. Our marriage contract specifies a separation of goods. Natalia still controls her inheritance. Now, of course, she’s one of the few wealthy Russians left. Boris Kussov had his funds transferred to France and Switzerland years ago.”

  “I see. You are a generous
man, Pierre. I trust that Natalia appreciates that. Most people would be shocked to hear that you are not a joint tenant to her estate. After all, you are the head of your family. And, as I stated before, you are far from being a fool.” He started to chuckle, shaking his head amiably from side to side. “You will now judge me to be the fool. For you see, I was going to come to you on bended knee to beseech you to invest some of your money in the Ballet. Now I fear that the money I plead for is not yours to offer.”

  White-faced, Pierre rose, his daughter clutched in his arms. “I shall speak to Natalia,” he said shortly. “If, as you say, I am no fool, then she will do as I ask. After all, the Ballet may be yours, Serge Pavlovitch, but it is also mine. I could not let it go to ruin because of foolish—yes, foolish—pride. Kussov or not, the money is solvent.”

  “And if she truly wishes to rejoin our company, a father’s arms will, of course, be wide open. I do not generally allow older stars to make comebacks—but for Oblonova, I might make an exception. If she works very hard, and if her husband gives her his permission.”

  The teasing irritation in Diaghilev’s voice finally made Pierre angry. The painter’s cheeks reddened, and his muscles tensed. ‘That’s enough, Serge Pavlovitch,” he said in a furious undertone. “Or I shall know once and for all how much of a fool you deem me.”

  Tall and massive, he turned on his heel and marched away toward the hotel. The baby began a bleating refrain of protest, but for once he ignored her totally. His mind had become a churning tide of fury. But, oddly enough, the focus of his hatred was, once again, Boris Kussov.

  Natalia leaned her head on her arms and closed her eyes. The letters and business documents she had been working on were starting to depress her and she was trying to avoid despondency by keeping safely to the factual and the obvious. How strange, she thought, that I have thus turned out to be a financial manager—I, who wanted only to dance! But someone had to keep track of the family estate. Pierre had neither the head nor the inclination for it, and in a way she was relieved. Doing things herself had always been her particular approach to life, apart from the few years when Boris had been there to do them for her.

  Boris. How long ago that had been! She wondered briefly what he would have thought of the new ballet, Parade, that had premiered hours before at the Châtelet in Paris. From her box she had watched those strange, modernistic, cubelike figures drawn by her husband: the Stage Managers. He had worked on the designs in conjunction with Pablo Picasso, the Spanish artist, and she remembered how difficult it had been for them to paint the huge curtain, which had dwarfed them. Tonight she had seen it rise majestically before the public, its painted guitar player a living example of the triumph of art over the limitations of time and space. She had been proud of Pierre Riazhin, proud to be his wife.

  It was May already, springtime. Yet how few young men had sat in the audience! They had all gone to war, all wasted their lives. Natalia felt herself harden and thought: Somehow, there is never enough protection against pain. She looked at the assembled legal papers and said to herself: Boris wanted to be a hero, and all I have left of him are these. And Pierre? What had he been trying to prove, with Vendanova? Had he hoped that his conquest would make him more of a man in her eyes?

  The door opened noiselessly, and a sliver of golden light streamed over her shoulder, falling on the paper in front of her. Pierre stood framed in the doorway in his bathrobe of crimson silk, a man of rich tastes and rich colors, with boundless, gluttonous needs. He looked well there, framed by the luxury in this house. It was her house, her riches, her husband—yet not hers, never fully. Did he know that Boris had bought and furnished this Paris house for him, as a gift of love?

  “You are not coming to bed?” he asked.

  She hesitated. He occupied the master bedroom in style, his paintings on the wall, his bottles of scent on the dressing table, his cravats scattered over chairs and small stands. He had taken possession of it with riotous joy, another expression of his hedonism. Now she avoided going there at night, seeking to oppose his magnetism in any way she could—the only way she knew how. There was pain there and she could not give to him, could not let him love her. I shall not fight for him that way, Natalia thought with sudden, defiant anger. He must come to me of his own accord.

  “I still have work to do,” she answered quietly, avoiding his bottomless black eyes. It was better if she did not look at him. She could pretend to be calm if she did not look. His face, his eyes were the keys that unlocked an unbearable vulnerability in her. His own weaknesses were less discernible these days. Pierre seemed more a man and less an impetuous child—and therefore more complex, less understandable.

  “I wanted to talk to you,” he said. He came into the room and sat down on the low, ornamented sofa. “Do you have time?” he asked.

  She nodded, and pushed aside the stationery. “Of course.”

  “It’s the Ballet. You know Diaghilev’s in financial trouble, don’t you? This damned war has taken every last sou, every last kopek, from the reserve of funds.”

  She uttered a short, harsh burst of laughter. “What reserve? Serge Pavlovitch has never had any reserve of funds, my dear Pierre. Has he been wheedling you about it now?”

  His body tensed. She could see the undulating muscles tighten under the silk of the bathrobe. “Give me more credit than that, Natalia. The company’s in trouble and I’m aware of it, all right? Why couldn’t you help? It’s my future—my present.”

  “And my past.”

  Their eyes met now, cold and level, and she raised her chin. He stood up and began to pace the room. “You’re hurting me, do you know that? Hurting me, as a by-product of some silly game with Serge Pavlovitch, left over from the days of Kussov versus Diaghilev. That’s childish, Natalia. To hurt your own husband and to stamp out his future because of false pride. How can you expect things to work out between us?”

  “I don’t expect them to,” she replied, surprised by the cool clarity of her response. He turned around then, his eyes widening with amazement, and she continued hotly: “Pride! What do you know of pride, Pierre? It’s one thing you’ve never had, not now, not ever! ‘Take care of me, Natalia,’ you always say. And who will take care of Natalia? Jacqueline Vendane? Serge Pavlovitch?”

  He closed his eyes on her anger, and she saw shame and contrition on his face, but also outrage. Her own fury burst out of her then with a ferocity she could not restrain. “You want to be the golden boy in Diaghilev’s stable. With my money! You still despise Boris Kussov, yet you expect that his funds will save your work, will make magic for you! And that you won’t have to pay, because you’re a genius! Well, I’m sick of it, sick to death of it! What pretensions you have, because you’re an artist! The world owes you nothing—not one thing. I owe you nothing. Because you see, Pierre, you give me nothing in return! In life one has to pay. Learn that, once and for all.”

  “I have paid,” he said quietly. “For years and years I paid, in waiting. I’m not going to wait anymore, Natalia. Everything you give me you consider a favor. I am not a protégé, begging. I came to ask you as a man, as a husband. Well, I don’t want your favors anymore.”

  The words resounded with odd strength in the small room. Natalia’s lips parted. She rose, a terrible cry tearing through her chest but never quite making it to her mouth. I shall not lose my pride to him, or whatever’s left of it, she thought. He will not strip me of my dignity, he will not. “Pierre,” she asked, and he barely heard her, “what do you mean?”

  “I’m through, Natalia. Through with not being loved enough.”

  “Not loved enough?” Again she was outraged. “Not loved enough. You can speak to me this way, after everything? After Tamara? I had her for you, for God’s sake. You were the first man I loved, and the one I came back to. But when I did come back, I truly came back. There is no one else for me, Pierre. No one backstage, no one to prop me up, to stroke my hand. I don’t care about the marriage vows, but I do care about the comm
itment. Without commitment love has no meaning. Why, Pierre? Why Vendanova? Why the need for a Vendanova, whoever she may be?”

  The answer came to her in his eyes. She said, “Are you that much in need of constant reassurance? Of—of applause?”

  “I have to get it somewhere,” he retorted, his hand on the doorknob.

  “Please go away,” she whispered. “Go now, Pierre.”

  When he had left, she sank back into the pillow. We all need reassurance, she thought miserably. We all need applause.

  Too much had been said, and yet not enough. When June came, Pierre went to Spain with Diaghilev and the Ballet, and Natalia remained alone in Paris. More than ever, she missed her profession, and in the house on Avenue Bugeaud, she practiced until her aching muscles glistened with sweat, until she had exercised her yearning for Pierre out of her very consciousness. Summer passed, and then fall.

  World events began to intrude on the life that Natalia was carefully erecting for herself and her small daughter. In November Lenin’s Bolsheviks took over Russia, driving out the more moderate Provisional Government of Alexander Kerensky. Suddenly the March Revolution paled by comparison, and Natalia sat home and trembled, wondering what could have happened to her family and friends. There seemed no adequate way to find out, and in her isolation she imagined the worst. More than ever during these days of estrangement from Pierre, Natalia thought of Nina Stassova and her daughter, Galina. Nina had been Boris’s beloved sister, she and her daughter had become Natalia’s only family. Now she felt as if part of herself were somewhere in Leningrad—her St. Petersburg—hiding from the Bolsheviks. What else would a wealthy aristocratic family be doing during these troubled times filled’ with rumors of bloodshed?

  But, much as her thoughts converged on her native country, another revolution became a more pressing concern. In the winter Diaghilev and his small band of followers found themselves in Lisbon, a city under civil strife. As she read the news, Natalia saw Pierre’s image vividly in her mind. She sat in the English-style parlor of her elegant stone house on Avenue Bugeaud and pictured her husband cowering behind barricades, or walking across a street, calm and majestic in his dark solidity, being hit by a volley of exploding shells. Crumpling, crumpling. The male beauty of him destroyed, bloodied. Her fingers trembled so that she could no longer hold the newspaper, which was illegible through the curtain of her tears.