by Judith Gould
Only Senda was aware of how truly hurt he was. Otherwise he would never have lashed out like that. 'Schmarya . . .' she pleaded one last time.
He whirled around and flashed one last withering glance back at her.
Senda jumped up and ran to the door. She grabbed his arm frantically, somehow feeling that if she couldn't sway him now he would be lost to her forever. 'Schmarya, please? she begged. 'Don't walk out on me and Tamara. We love you. Nothing is worth losing you.'
He stared at her grimly. 'Does that mean you'll turn Princess What's-her-name down?'
Senda hesitated. 'We have to consider her offer. All of us,' she said carefully. 'Don't you see? It's just that. . . well, hers is better than yours.'
'Better, eh?'
She tightened her lips and nodded miserably. 'Come back to the table and talk it out.'
'Bitch.' She barely saw the blur of his hand coming, and even after the slap knocked her backward against the wall, she still couldn't believe it had happened. She looked at him in surprise, her hand flying up to her cheek, where his handprint stood out whitely. Schmarya had never hit her. Never. No matter how angry he might have been.
'Bitch!' he hissed again under his breath. Then a gust of arctic wind blasted into the warmth of the little dining room, causing the candles to sputter and die. Only the dim glow of the electric lights coming from the open kitchen doorway illuminated the restaurant.
When the door slammed, the walls shook. He was gone. She had lost him. Lost him. And through the flood of tears, she couldn't help blaming herself. It was the day her career as Russia's biggest star began. And the day when Schmarya's love for her completely died.
That night Vaslav Danilov summoned Mordka Kokovtsov to the Chinese Room of the palace. 'Well?' he asked his cousin. 'Did all our friends respond to my suggestion?'
'Wholeheartedly, I would say,' the Count replied dryly. 'Of course, I wouldn't have expected otherwise. Especially in light of the fact that you'll be footing the entertainment bill for half the city for the entire season.'
The Prince ignored the pointed jibe. 'Arrange to have the director of the Théâtre Français invited to every palace where she'll perform.'
'Really, Vaslav!' Count Kokovtsov raised his brows. 'She doesn't even speak French. She can only perform in Russian. It's unheard of!'
'She can learn French quickly enough. I would say she is one person who can learn almost anything quickly. You would do well not to underestimate her. Arrange for the director to find her a tutor. And be discreet.'
'Very well. No one will be the wiser that you have contrived it. But you don't really think her acting is good enough for the Francois, do you?'
'I do.' The Prince steepled his hands and sat back thoughtfully. 'She's very, very good. A little unpolished, perhaps, but her performance was spellbinding nonetheless.' He paused. 'She has it within her to become Russia's greatest living actress. Why not speed her on her course? The Français's director can see to it that she is schooled in acting, also.'
'You must want her very badly, my cousin.'
'That I do,' the Prince said mildly. His eyes looked bland. 'And she will be mine.'
'Very well.' The Count rose and walked to the door.
'Oh, and one more thing, Cousin Mordka. Tatiana Ivanova.'
'What about her?'
'She has become rather . . . tiresome.' The Prince gestured wearily. 'She is no longer in favour.'
Which means, the Count mused as he walked the extravagantly inlaid parquet hall on his way back to his apartment, that slut Tatiana is finished.
Mordka was not surprised. He had aided his cousin through countless affairs.
Aloud he found himself murmuring, The Prince giveth, and the Prince taketh away.'
Chapter 11
Senda withdrew from the world and took to her bed, resolved it would be her coffin. Shut out behind the thick, perpetually drawn curtains, the days and nights blended into one single, interminably bleak stretch of timeless agony. She was blinded by tears until there were no more to shed, and for many days thereafter her eyes felt swollen and scratchy from dehydration. She had vague recollections of Countess Florinsky bustling cheerfully in and out of the dark chamber, Inge bringing Tamara on short visits, and listlessly sitting forward to accept spoonfuls of thick, fatty chicken broth fed to her by alternating members of her increasingly alarmed troupe. She waited in vain for Schmarya to come and rescue her from her despondency, but she saw nothing of him. When she asked Inge whether he had tried to see Tamara, the young woman averted her gaze.
Senda's heart echoed listlessly: his capacity for cruelty was not such that he would desert his daughter. Was it?
No, he loved Tamara. He had to return soon.
But he didn't. It was as though he had died, and something inside her whispered that he had left her forever. She could only hope she was wrong. She loved him so deeply, profoundly, and needed him desperately. She could not come to terms with the fact that he could turn his back on that love.
Living without him was not even an existence. She felt empty. Desolate. Lifeless. It was as if when he had stalked out of the restaurant, he had stolen her soul, taken it with him. Which in a way was what he had done.
Over and over she found herself cursing her decision to put Princess Yussoupov's offer above him. She should never have hesitated at the door of the restaurant. She should have told him his decision had been the right one. If only she had.
But she hadn't. And now the joy of living had gone out of her.
It was on the afternoon of Senda's sixth day of self-imposed mourning that Countess Florinsky panted into the Prince's drawing room. Her face was unnaturally white and drawn, and for once her gushing, inherently ebullient nature was subdued. As though to emphasize this fact, she was dressed in black bombazine, her huge black hat, as wide as her own generous girth, loaded down with an impossibly abundant bush of shiny black satin roses.
She found Vaslav Danilov seated behind the desk centred squarely in the midst of a palace-size Aubusson carpet. She did not like this room. In fact, it chilled her spirits even further. The polished furniture was classically austere, not at all to her liking, and even the parquet floor lacked the arabesque splendour of the rest of the palace. But the oval room itself, with its succession of three domed ceilings supported by columns at each end and two sets of caryatids facing each other mid-room, was an architectural tour de force. Nothing was allowed to detract from this monumental magnificence.
'Have a seat,' the Prince offered, pushing aside a thick sheaf of documents. He looked mildly surprised. 'If I didn't know better, I would say you look slightly . . . agitated.' He frowned.
Sniffling, she glanced around for the chair offering the most upholstery, found one to her liking, and plopped into it. She produced a handkerchief and dabbed ineffectually at her eyes.
She sniffed. 'I won't beat around the bush, Vaslav,' she declared stiffly. 'Frankly, I'm quite worried.' She nodded tremulously, as though to herself. 'She still hasn't begun to snap out of that horrible depression. When I speak to her she turns away. I was told she even has to be hand-fed.'
'She will snap out of it soon enough,' he said casually, pushing his chair back. 'She is a woman of reason.'
'Well, I hope to God you are right. She is heartbroken, the poor dear.'
He rang for a servant, and after the Countess was ceremoniously poured tea, she blew on the steam and took a sip. She sighed appreciatively and set her cup and saucer on the desk. 'Nothing like hot tea to take away the winter chill. Now. I take it there is something you would like me to do, eh?'
'There is. First, here is the balance of what you're due for the ball.' He slid an envelope, weighed down by a narrow velvet box, across the desk toward her.
For a moment, her tears were forgotten. She seized upon the box with pudgy fingers and pried it open. 'Oh, Vaslav!' she breathed. Her giant, magnified eyes shone mistily.
'Well, put them on. Let us see what they look like.'
> Countess Florinsky made a production of slipping off her old metal-rimmed spectacles and looping the new gold-framed ones carefully over her ears.
'Even the prescription is correct!' She appeared deeply moved.
He waved his hand negligently. 'A token of my gratitude for a delightful fete.' As he spoke, she placed her old spectacles in their case and slid it and the envelope of money into her black satin bag. When she yanked the tasselled string shut, the gaping mouth of the bag closed hungrily over its treasures with the speed of a gulping fish. She let the bag drop to the floor beside her and settled back, suddenly brusque and businesslike. 'Now, my dear. You didn't ask me here to give me the glasses, I take it?'
He stared at her. 'My dear Flora! You wound me,' he said, as if offended. 'You can't believe that I don't find the pleasure of your company reason enough?'
'I'm afraid I find that very difficult to believe,' she sighed. 'I do know you, Vaslav.'
His face was a mask, but his voice bore grudging respect. 'You're a shrewd woman, Flora.'
She waited, sipping her tea.
'As I said before, Madame Bora is strong, but severely depressed. Which is why I am counting on you.'
'Indeed.'
'Yes. You, if anyone, can help speed her recovery.'
'Ah, but it isn't her health that concerns you.'
He shrugged eloquently. 'Her health concerns me, of course. As does anyone's under my roof.'
The Countess wasn't fooled. 'I see,' she said, folding her plump pink hands in her lap.
'You are her only friend, I think?'
It was the Countess's turn to shrug.
'And as such, her speedy recovery is of interest to you as well.'
'She is going through a great personal crisis, and crises are hardly the stuff of which good health is made. She is dying inside. A man has deserted her, Vaslav. A tragedy . . . if ever there was one. I'm afraid we shall find it rather difficult to give her life new meaning.'
He nodded. 'Difficult, perhaps. But impossible, no. I think I have come up with the antidote she requires.'
'Which is?'
'We will arrange for her to do that which she loves best: acting. She will be doing something constructive which will take her mind off her present situation. She will have no time to languish in her depression.'
Countess Florinsky thought it over before nodding approvingly. She permitted a slight smile to appear on her lips, 'I think you are right.'
'Good. You will help with it then, Flora. Give her moral support. Urge her to get to work, to forget that man, and so on. I think you understand?'
She nodded.
He smiled. 'Then it is settled. Come to think of it, I am rather pleased. Not only will Madame Bora benefit enormously, but you also.'
'How?'
'There will be many fetes and performances for which you will receive considerable commissions.'
'I am her friend, Vaslav,' she said gravely. 'As such, it is my duty to protect her.'
'From what?'
'You.'
'Me!' He laughed, but his voice bore a trace of amused respect. 'Even if it is not in your own best interests.'
'That depends. She is lovely, marvellously naive, and dangerously impressionable. And despite your noble veneer, Vaslav, you are a shark.'
He regarded her thoughtfully. 'I have been called many things,' he mused, rubbing his chin, 'but never a shark.'
'A shark who needs constant feeding. I don't need to mention that Tatiana Ivanova has left the Théâtre Français?'
'Oh, has she now?'
'She has indeed,' the Countess sniffed, 'as if you didn't know.'
He nodded and rose to his feet, towering above her. 'Then I can count on enlisting your help?'
She sighed deeply. For once her hugely magnified eyes were sad and lacklustre. 'What choice do I have?' She looked up at him.
He smiled tightly. 'You are always free to do as you choose.'
'Am I, now . . .' she murmured. 'I wonder, sometimes.'
'I think you know what is best for you both.' He paused. 'You have always trod the line between duty to others and duty to yourself with remarkable agility. I do not think that that particular talent will desert you now, of all times.'
'This is different ... I have to think it over. She could get hurt in the process. I prize her friendship, and I have no desire to jeopardize it.'
'Of course not.' He stared blandly at her. 'There is no need to.'
She returned his gaze.
'I am convinced that within the week you will have her up and about. She will be grateful to you for having helped her.'
The Countess tightened her lips. 'Well, I do hope you know what you're doing,' she said agitatedly.
'Flora, as long as things work out as planned, she will get what she wants, namely a career onstage, you will get what you want, a deepening friendship . . . and a little money. And I . . .' His voice trailed off.
'You will get her ,' she finished pointedly.
He smiled easily and showed her to the door. 'I am counting on you, Flora. You know that.'
She nodded and stepped out into the cool hall. Before he closed the door she turned to face him. 'What I'm going to do,' she said softly, 'is not for you or the money, but for her. Because it is as you said. She needs something to occupy her mind.'
'Does that mean you don't want money?'
'Thirty pieces of silver for delivering her to you?' Her giant hat wobbled precariously as she shook her head. 'No, I don't want any money for this.'
'You are a strange woman, Flora,' he said.
'And perhaps a foolish one. Time will tell.'
'Time always tells.'
'Just don't hurt her, Vaslav. That's all I ask. She's special. She's not another Tatiana Ivanova.'
He stared at her and closed the door softly. Slowly she made her way along the giant hall. For once she was vaguely frightened. The Danilovs wielded too much power.
Too much, it occurred to her now, for their own good.
And far too much for the good of many others.
Chapter 12
A week later, Vaslav Danilov summoned Count Kokovtsov to the Chinese Room. He was leafing through a sheaf of documents, occasionally making notes in the margins. 'What have you to report?' the Prince inquired mildly, seated behind his big tulipwood bureau plat.
'Madame Bora's friend has moved into an apartment above a bookstore on Zaytsev Street,' the Count intoned in his usual lugubrious manner. He crossed to a cabinet, poured himself a generous glass of vodka, and downed it in one swallow.
The Prince did not look up from his pages. 'And?'
'We have stumbled upon a hornet's nest. The apartment is leased to a student. A radical student, I am told,' the Count added distastefully. 'It is suspected that as many as ten or twelve students, all involved in varying degrees in anti-Czarist politics, may be sharing the same premises.' He visibly shuddered at the thought.
'Men?' Vaslav asked, 'Women? Or both?'
'Both.'
'I see.' The Prince pushed the papers aside thoughtfully. 'That many people will make surveillance difficult.'
'On the contrary.' The Count took a seat, the huge shiny surface of the desk between them a visible barrier between their separate stations. 'As you ordered, Captain Dimitrov of the Okhrana has taken over surveillance duties. He now has his men stationed in an apartment they have temporarily . . . ah, appropriated . . .'—the Count coughed discreetly into his cupped hand—'. . . directly across the street from the bookstore. I am but the liaison, as planned.'
'Good,' the Prince said with a nod. 'And our star-to-be? Has she been placed yet?'
Count Kokovtsov nodded, his normally pained expression unchanged. 'She has,' he answered, 'although she does not know it yet. I might add that Monsieur Guerlain was quite unhappy about the arrangement. I received a rather pompous dissertation on artistic integrity and other such nonsense. Of course, it all boiled down to the fact that, the Count paused and then mimicked Mon
sieur Guerlain's patrician French vowels, his own voice taking on a high-pitched, effetely fluent tone—' "The Théâtre Français can never, never allow its standards to be lowered, or its integrity to be compromised. Never, Monsieur le Comte, under any circumstances or for all the money in the world!" '
'One never says "never",' the Prince murmured pontifically with an idle wave of his hand. 'I take it that what we wanted is precisely what was agreed upon, in the end?'
'It was.'
'It is amazing, is it not, Cousin Mordka, what a difference a little money can sometimes make in a person's outlook? How it can tempt the most conscientious of men?'
The Count nodded again. 'Money and death, the great equalizers. At any rate, Madame Bora will become the understudy for Olga Botkina within a month's time. That does not give us much time, considering that she does not speak so much as a word of French.'
The Prince was not bothered by simple logistics. With enough money to smooth the way, such things could be seen to easily enough. 'Acting is but the memorization of words and emotions,' he said. 'She will learn fast.'
'I hope so,' the Count said unhappily. 'If not, we will become the laughingstock of St. Petersburg.'
'Indeed not!' the Prince said haughtily. 'Secrecy is of tantamount importance. You have stressed that, I take it!'
'I have.'
'And you have also seen to it that the arrangements cannot be traced back to me?'
'I have done that too. However . . .'
'However, what?' The Prince sat forward and stared at his cousin keenly.
'Countess Florinsky.' The Count's lips curled in distaste. 'Your having involved that woman in the project makes secrecy . . . well, less than . . .'
'Are you trying to tell me that she has trouble holding her tongue?'
'Precisely.'
'You needn't worry about Flora. Since her utmost concern is not for any commissions she might earn, but for Madame Bora's welfare, her silence is assured.'
