“I don't know…. It is so far away…. And what if your cousin doesn't want us?”
“He will. He is a kind man. He is older than I, widowed, and he has no children. He has invited me to visit him for years. If I tell him we need his help, he will do it. He has a big house, and some money. He owns a bank, and he lives alone. He would welcome us there. Danina, it is the only hope we have for a future together. We must begin again somewhere, and forget everything we have known here.” But as much as she wanted to be with him, she wasn't sure she could do it. “You mustn't think about it now. Get healthy and strong, and we will talk about it again. I will write to him in the meantime, and see what he says.”
“Nikolai, no one would ever forgive us.” The mere thought of it filled her with terror, and grief.
“And if we stay here? What will we have? Stolen moments, a few weeks a year when the Czarina invites you to Livadia or Tsarskoe Selo? I want a life with you. I want to wake up beside you every morning, to be with you when you're ill. … I never want something like this to happen to you again…. Danina, I want our children.” She also wanted the life he described to her, but they each had to hurt everyone they had ever loved in order to be free.
“What about my father and brothers?” She had a family here, a history, a life. She could not turn her back on all of it because she loved him. And yet he was willing to do that for her, and he had as much to lose as she did. He had to abandon his children, his wife, and his career in order to be with her.
“You told me yourself you never see your family,” he reminded her. And for nearly the past two years, her brothers and father had been at the front. “They would be happy for you.” Nikolai did everything he could to convince her. “You cannot dance forever, Danina.” But as he said the words to her, she remembered everything Madame Markova had ever said.
“I can teach afterward, like Madame Markova. “
“You can teach in Vermont. Perhaps even start a school of your own. I will help you.” He seemed so sure, and so strong.
“I must think about it,” she said, exhausted by the prospect of such an enormous decision, and all that it entailed.
“Rest now. We will talk about it later.” She nodded, and drifted off to sleep again, but she had nightmares of terrifying, unknown places. She kept dreaming of losing Nikolai there, of wandering the streets, looking for him, and never finding him, and when she awoke in the hospital, he was gone, and she was crying and alone. He had left her a note that he had gone to check on Alexei, and would return to see her in the morning. And as she read it, she was lost in thought.
She stayed in the hospital for two weeks, and when she left, the doctor ordered her to stay in bed for two more. Nikolai wanted her to stay at the Czar's cottage with him, at Tsarskoe Selo, but Madame Markova was violently opposed to it. She wanted Danina back at the ballet, and said the trip to Tsarskoe Selo was too far. This time, Danina didn't have the energy to fight her. The mistress of the ballet was too determined, and unwilling, to let Danina slip out of her hands again. She didn't want her to spend another four months “recuperating” in the cottage with her lover. She was intransigent this time, and in the face of the ferocity of her objections, Danina returned to the ballet.
And as Nikolai had when she was ill when they first met, he came to see her every day, and stayed for as long as he could, a few hours at least, before he went back to his own duties. He sat in her dormitory room with her while she rested in bed. And while she walked slowly around the small garden at the ballet with him, he talked to her of Vermont, and his cousin there. He was convinced it was the only way, and he wanted to go with her as soon as they could both get away. He suggested early summer, which was only a few months away.
“Your season will be over then. You can complete what you are doing. We must pick a time, and then go through with it. There will never be a perfect moment to leave, we must seize the moment while we can.” She would be twenty-two by then, and he would be forty-one that year, time enough for both of them to start a new life in America, as countless others had done before them, some for reasons as complicated as theirs.
She promised to think about it, and she did, constantly. All she could think about now was the terror of moving to Vermont. Madame Mar-kova sensed easily that something was happening to her. Danina was still tired and pale, and she looked deeply unhappy at times after Nikolai's visits. He was asking her to cast her lot with him, follow him to the end of the world, and trust him completely. And in spite of her love for him, it was a great deal to ask.
“You are troubled, Danina,” Madame Mar-kova said cautiously one afternoon, when she came to visit her, and sat beside Danina's bed while she rested. Nikolai had just left her, and as always they had spoken of the same things. Their future. Vermont. His cousin. Leaving Russia. And the ballet. “He is asking you to leave us, isn't he?” she asked wisely, and Danina didn't answer her. She didn't want to lie, or tell her the truth either. “It always happens that way. They fall in love with who you are, and then want to take it away from you,” she persisted. “I promise you, Danina, if you leave us, it will kill you. You will be nothing. And when he casts you aside one day for someone more fascinating, or perhaps even younger, you will regret all your life the part of your heart you left here.” She made it sound like a death sentence, and it was, in a way. But it was also an exchange for something Danina wanted desperately. It would be the end of her life as a ballerina, but the beginning of her life with Nikolai, a real life with him, which she also wanted. But to have it, she had to sacrifice everything she had now, just as he did. “If he truly loved you, Danina, he would not ask you to leave us.”
“And when I am old, what will I have without him, if I stay here?”
‘ ? life you can be proud of in remembering. No one can ever take that from you. Instead of a life of shame, which is all that he can give you. He is a married man, and his wife will not leave him. You will always be his mistress, the little ballet dancer he sleeps with, nothing more.”
But there was so much more between them, even now, and Danina knew that. “You make it sound so tawdry, and it isn't,” Danina said sadly.
“It is precisely what these things always are. Extremely romantic in the beginning. A dream you think you will have. And when you wake up from it one day, you will find it is a nightmare. This is the only life you will ever have that means something to you, this is the life you have worked hard for and trained for. Can you throw it all away for a man who cannot even marry you? Look what has just happened to you. How beautiful was that? How romantic?” It was a cruel thing to say and it unnerved Danina just listening to her. What if she was right? If Nikolai threw her away one day, if she regretted giving up the ballet all her life, and hated Vermont, if they were not happy together? Who could know the answers to those questions? There was no certainty to his plans, only promises, and hopes and dreams, and wishes. Hers as much as his own. Yet he was willing to give up medicine for her, the security he had, the life he had known for over fifteen years with his family. He was willing to sacrifice all for her. Why couldn't she do the same for him?
“You must think about it very carefully,” Madame Markova reminded her, “and come to the right decision.” The right decision to her, of course, was staying at the ballet and forgetting Nikolai, but Danina also knew she couldn't do that. Leaving the ballet now might destroy her life, but losing him would kill her. Just thinking about it, she felt under the blouse she wore for her locket, and was comforted to feel it there. She was deeply in love with him. Perhaps even enough to risk everything and follow him. Now all she could do was think about it, and look into her heart.
Madame Markova left her alone after that, to her own thoughts. She had planted the seeds she wanted to, and hoped that they would grow and take hold. She wanted Danina to feel the loss and terror of leaving the ballet, of perhaps a lifetime of regret and sorrow. It was certainly something to ponder. It was the only life Madame Markova knew, the only one she ever wan
ted, it was the legacy she wanted to give Danina now, the sacred bond, the holy grail, the wand passed from hand to hand, from teacher to student to teacher and back again, endlessly, the almost holy vow they took when they came, the love too deep to escape in the end, the sacrifices endless. To stay here now meant giving up all hope of a future with him. In a sense, it meant giving up hope. But to leave Russia with him meant giving up who she was forever. It was an agonizing choice, and whichever road she chose would require sacrifices almost too agonizing to think of. And all Danina could do now was pray that the right answer would come.
Chapter 8
Danina did not dance for a month, and began taking class again on the first of April. There was still snow on the ground outside, and once again she had to work harder than before to regain what she had lost, but this time the return to full strength was swifter. She was stronger now, and in better health.
She was back in rehearsals within a week, and performing again in early May. It was over a year since she had left Nikolai after their long, idyllic stay in the Czar's guest cottage during her convalescence from influenza. And in a year, little had changed between them. They were still deeply in love with each other, he was still married and living with his wife and children, and she was still at the ballet. But they were no closer than they had been a year before to a solution to their problems. If anything, Marie Obrajensky was more firmly entrenched than she had ever been in not leaving him. And in the past year, the two lovers had been able to save very little money for their future together. All they knew for sure was that a life together was still what they wanted. How to achieve it was the obstacle they constantly struggled to overcome. And Danina could not bring herself to agree to join him in Vermont. It was too big a change, she felt, too far away, too unknown, too foreign to her. And Nikolai continued to try and convince her, as gently as he could.
One of the Grand Duchesses fell ill in June, and kept both Imperial physicians busy. Nikolai had little time to visit Danina. He wanted to, but he couldn't get away, and she understood. And in early July, she had another tragedy when her oldest brother was killed in Czernoivitz. She had lost two now, and she knew from his letter that her father was beside himself over the death of his son. He had been with him when they were shelled, and miraculously he had been spared, but his firstborn was killed instantly. Danina took the news hard, and for weeks afterward she felt drained and lifeless. The war was taking a toll on all of them, even at the ballet. Dancers had lost brothers, friends, fathers, and one of their teachers had lost both her sons in April. Even in their cloistered world, it was impossible to ignore the war anymore.
The only thing she had to look forward to that year was another vacation with Nikolai and the Imperial family in Livadia. And this time Madame Markova made no attempt to oppose it. She had come to an uneasy truce with Nikolai after Danina's last illness. She knew that he would have gladly stolen Danina from her, but the young prima showed no sign of going anywhere, or giving up the ballet for him. And Madame Markova felt secure now in her belief that Danina would never be able to bring herself to leave. Just as it was, and always had been to Madame Markova, the ballet was Danina's life.
The Czar was not in Livadia that year, he was with his troops in Mogilev, and felt obliged to stay with them. So it was only the women and children and both physicians who were there, and Danina. The Czarina and her daughters had allowed themselves to take a brief time off from nursing the soldiers, and were happy to be in Livadia again. They were all old friends now, and she and Nikolai were happier than they had ever been. It seemed a perfect time to both of them, a magical moment suspended in time, protected from a dangerous world seemingly far from them. In the safety of Livadia, they were shielded from the realities that had already engulfed everything else.
They had picnics every afternoon, went on long walks, rowed boats and swam, and Danina felt like a child again, as she played the old familiar games with Alexei. His health had been frail that year, and he didn't look well, but surrounded by his family and the people he loved, he seemed happy to be with them.
Nikolai tried to speak to her of Vermont, but she was vague when she answered now. She had been given important roles in every ballet they were doing that year. Madame Markova knew exactly how to keep her in St. Petersburg. And Danina and Nikolai had finally agreed not to discuss Vermont again until Christmas, at least until the end of the first part of her season. It was an agreement that pained Nikolai to make, but he did so for her sake.
It turned out to be a blessing that he never left, when his youngest son came down with typhoid in September, and nearly died. And it took all of Nikolai's expertise, and that of Dr. Botkin, to save him. Danina was terrified for the boy, and sent Nikolai letters daily, worrying about the child, and aching for Nikolai's terror as a father, knowing how much he loved his children. It would have been disastrous, she told herself, if they'd been in Vermont and the boy had been ill, or worse. Nikolai would never have forgiven himself, or her, for the tragedy, and would always have blamed himself. And it only made her more certain than she had ever been that it would have been wrong for them to run away to America. There were too many people they loved here, and too many obligations that could not be ignored or abandoned.
Despite her illness of the past year, her dancing had improved even beyond where it had been before. Whenever she danced, people talked about her for days, and her name was known now all over Russia. She was in fact the greatest young ballerina of her day. Nikolai was desperately proud of her, and more in love with her than ever. He came to her performances whenever he could, and in November met her father and one of her brothers. There were only two left now, and the other had been recently injured, but was in Moscow, recovering well.
Her father and brother had no idea who Nikolai was to her or how much she loved him, but the three men seemed to enjoy meeting each other. Nikolai wished them luck when they left, and congratulated the colonel on his very talented and remarkable daughter, and the elderly colonel beamed proudly at her. It was easy to see how much he loved her, and he had always known that bringing her to the ballet as a child had been the perfect answer for her. He fully anticipated her being there forever, and it never dawned on him that she was considering leaving it one day.
And when at last Christmas came, Danina couldn't wait to go to Tsarskoe Selo to stay with Nikolai in the little cottage that had begun to seem like their own. It would have been so simple for them if living there could have been a possible solution for them, but it wasn't. They could only be together, on borrowed time, for a few days, or weeks, now and then.
She attended the Czar's Christmas Dance with him. They did not give the grand balls they had before the war, but nonetheless managed to invite over a hundred friends.
Danina shone like a bright star in a gown the Czarina had given her as a gift. It was red velvet trimmed in white ermine, and she looked every bit as regal in it as the Czarina did in hers. Guests all over the room were commenting on how beautiful she was, how elegant, how talented, how gracious, and Nikolai beamed like a handsome prince as he stood beside her, holding her hand.
“I had fun tonight, didn't you?” She smiled as they rode back to the cottage after the party in his sled. They were to have lunch at the palace again the next day. It was a life she loved sharing with him, and she felt almost married to him, standing at his side at the dance. They had been together for nearly two years.
The only thing that had marred the evening at all were the small groups here and there, talking quietly about the echoed rumors of revolution. It seemed absurd, yet the unrest among the populace was exploding regularly now in the cities, and the Czar was still refusing to control it. He said that people had a right to express themselves, and it was good for them to let off steam. But there had been several riots in Moscow recently, and the army was growing increasingly worried. Her father and brother had mentioned it the last time they met.
Danina and Nikolai were talking about it as they walke
d into the cottage, and this time he admitted to her that he was slowly getting worried about the state of their world.
“I think it's a much greater problem than most of us realize,” he said with a worried frown. “And I think the Czar is being naive in refusing to stop them.” Or perhaps he couldn't. He had so many other things to worry about with the war, and the tremendous losses they had sustained in Poland and Galicia, riots in Moscow seemed insignificant compared to the war and what it had already cost them in men.
“The idea of a revolution seems so extreme,” Danina said quietly. “I can't even imagine something like that here. What would it mean?”
“Who knows? Maybe not much. Probably nothing. It's a few malcontents making noise. They may burn some houses, steal some horses and jewels, give the rich a spanking, and go back to the way things were. Probably nothing more serious than that. Russia is too big and too powerful to ever change. Although it could make life unpleasant for a while, and dangerous for the Czar and his family. Fortunately they're well protected.”
“If anything happens,” she admonished him, as he helped her take off her gown in their bedroom, “I want you to be careful.” She realized full well that it could be dangerous for him here.
“There is a simple solution to that problem,” he said, broaching the subject of Vermont again. He had promised not to ask her about it again until Christmas, and now the time had come again. And he had given it even more thought since they'd last discussed it in September. It was a recurring theme with Nikolai, and he still hoped to convince her of the wisdom of his plan.
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