The Lost Souls of Angelkov

by Linda Holeman

  “I see what you’re doing,” she whispers to him. “You can’t live with your guilt, and so are choosing the coward’s way out. You lost our son because you wouldn’t listen to me, and now you choose to leave me to deal with the aftermath. To leave me alone to hope, to watch at the window for Misha, to pray until my knees bleed. And as you force me to carry this unbearable weight, you also wish to put on me the burden of widowhood.”

  Of course, he doesn’t respond, and there is nothing for Antonina to do but rise and return to her chair.

  The next morning, Antonina doesn’t allow herself any more of the laudanum—she needs to be alert—although later in the morning she quickly drinks one glass of wine. She has sent for Grisha, and the wine is just to steady her hands while she waits for him in Konstantin’s study.

  “What now, Grisha?” she asks when he arrives, noticing the dark blotches of colour on his bruised face. She’s sitting on a chair in front of the fire, and Grisha stands near the fireplace. “What do we do now?”

  Grisha concentrates on kicking some ashes back towards the grate. “We will continue to search for Mikhail Konstantinovich, of course, madam. We were out all of yesterday, and Lyosha and the others are out again today. There were many issues for me to deal with here, but I gave instructions for the men to spread out in wider and wider circles among the hamlets and villages. And we have reported the kidnapping to the authorities in Pskov.”

  “Is there any news at all, Grisha?” Antonina speaks quietly. She has no energy to raise her voice.

  He doesn’t answer immediately. “No one has actually come forward and said they have seen the young master,” he says at last. “But the villagers are frightened. Of course, they may have been threatened and are afraid to speak up. And so we will continue to look. We won’t give up, madam. And you know your son is strong, and clever. You must comfort yourself with that thought, madam: that he is all right. He is all right,” he repeats, more loudly.

  Antonina nods, but doesn’t look convinced. “Perhaps they took him to the city—to Pskov. Or even all the way to St. Petersburg.”

  Grisha shakes his head. “I feel strongly that he’s nearby, but well hidden. We will search the whole province, madam.”

  “Will they send another note? Will they ask for more money?” This is the question Antonina has been wondering about since yesterday. She hoped Grisha would mention it first, in his usual firm way. “Because Konstantin foiled the first attempt, will there be another chance?”

  Does his expression change, ever so subtly, now? Antonina remembers how Konstantin had murmured Grisha’s name in the night. Grisha knows.

  “It is certainly a possibility, madam. Men like these … they’re corrupt and greedy.”

  His answer doesn’t bring as much relief as she’d hoped. “So we just wait?”

  “And continue to search, madam.”

  There is silence, except for the snapping of the fire. Grisha stares at the flames.

  “Last night, Grisha, Konstantin spoke to me,” Antonina says.

  Grisha doesn’t react for a moment, then turns from the fire to face her. “He regained consciousness?”

  “For a moment.”

  Grisha is very still.

  “He said your name. It sounded like he said, Grisha knows. What did he mean, Grisha?”

  Grisha doesn’t answer immediately. “I thought I recognized one of them. The Cossacks. As they came for me, I called out a name.”

  Antonina rises from her chair. “You know him?”

  But Grisha shakes his head. “As I said, madam, I thought so for a moment. I could only see his eyes, and as they beat me, his scarf came away, and it was not the man I thought. But Konstantin … he heard me call a name. This is what he must have spoken of.”

  Antonina, standing in front of her chair, studies Grisha’s dark eyes. “Thank you,” she finally says, when a log drops heavily. “You may leave, Grisha.”

  Grisha bows and turns. Once out of the study, he leans against the closed door. As negative as his feelings are for Konstantin Nikolevich, he doesn’t want him to die.

  The kidnapping had not gone as he expected.

  And death was not part of the plan.

  Had Grisha suspected how terribly wrong it would all go, how Soso would deceive him, he would never have agreed to it.

  He now knows—although he had never seen it in all the time he’d known Soso, Lilya’s husband—that in the same way he hates Konstantin, Soso hates him. Konstantin had no clue of the deep, dark anger Grisha felt towards him for his superior air and expectations, the casual demands. And now Grisha is having done to him exactly what he wanted done to Konstantin. Soso is punishing Grisha, as Grisha sought to punish Konstantin—by blackmailing him, extorting money.

  When Soso invited Grisha to a game of cards in the servants’ quarter one night early in January, Grisha should have been wary. Because of his lofty position at Angelkov, the other men treated him with cautious deference. It was he, after all, who supervised all the serfs on the estate, who reported their infractions or disobedience to the count, and who meted out their punishments. Grisha knew he made the serfs uneasy; when he was around, they had to be on their guard. He wasn’t a man who needed the company of either men or women, and he had never particularly liked Soso, but the winter had been harder than usual, each evening long, dark and frigid. The idea of a night of cards and vodka unexpectedly appealed to him, and so he let down his guard. He said yes.

  By the time they started the second bottle, Soso was talking about his burning resentment towards the count, citing recent incidents that still angered him: selling two of the storeroom workers to another estate, which put an extra workload on Soso, and berating and humiliating him about a spilled bag of oats—even cutting his wages over it.

  “He acts as though we’re of less importance than his bloody horses,” he ranted.

  And Grisha agreed. Count Mitlovsky was pig-headed and cruel. Some landowners treated their serfs with kindness and patience. Mitlovsky did not: to him, they were, as Soso said, little more than animals. “He thinks,” Soso said, throwing down his cards, “that tossing us a handful of extra rubles at Christmas and a few bottles of vodka a year—the man has his own distillery, for God’s sake—makes him a saint.” He spat on the floor.

  Grisha drained his glass, feeling his own anger growing. “I’m the one who runs Angelkov, who makes sure he understands the accounting. He asks my opinions on matters dealing with his finances. Was the estate this successful under the last steward? No. He has much to be thankful to me for, and yet he acts as though I’m the one who should be thankful.” He didn’t mention that the count used his home—and Grisha’s own bed—for his trysts with Tania. Yes, the blue-shuttered house belonged to the count, but that he would take this liberty was, to Grisha, the most despicable affront.

  He reached for the bottle and filled their glasses, then raised his. “To honesty,” he said. Aware that it was inspired by the vodka, he nevertheless felt camaraderie with Soso as they sat in the chilled dimness of his room in the servants’ quarters. Soso was one of Angelkov’s hardest-working serfs. He looked after the storehouses, ensuring they were properly stocked with food to supply the huge estate. Grisha had known him since he’d come to work on the estate with Lilya and her little brother a decade earlier, just before the count’s son was born.

  Grisha had always had a grudging admiration for the man. Soso was a few years older than him, strong and tireless. He worked without complaining—usually—and so to hear him talk so freely about the count made Grisha feel that Soso also trusted him enough to confide in him.

  “Freedom is coming, and I’m not going to walk away from a lifetime of work with nothing,” Soso said, his glass raised towards Grisha’s. “If Mitlovsky thinks he can get the same amount of work out of us once we’re free men, he’s wrong.” He drank. “I’m working on a plan, something that will give us—you and me—what we deserve. Something to help start a new life.” He stared
at Grisha, frowning, his eyes almost disappearing under his heavy, short-lashed eyelids. He dug his little finger into his ear and rotated it. “We’ll get money from him, a lot of money. You don’t plan to stay and work for the old bastard, do you?”

  Grisha shrugged. “I’m not a serf. It’s different for me.”

  “He treats you like one. I’ve seen it. You want to keep taking it? Eh? Are you in?”

  Grisha didn’t respond for a moment, thinking of Tania emerging from his bedroom with the dirtied linen. “It depends,” he finally said. He knew he was drunk, and wiped his mouth with his sleeve. “What are you thinking of?”

  “I haven’t worked it out yet,” Soso said. “But if I know you’re with me, it will make it easier. And I have some friends … they’d help us.”

  Grisha shrugged and rose, leaving the servants’ quarters and walking unsteadily back to his own house down the road.

  The next day, his head sore, Grisha remembered the conversation as simply the drunken solidarity of men puffing themselves up with random thoughts of revenge.

  But when Soso came to him after emancipation had been declared, and asked if he had been serious about extorting money from the count, Grisha told the man he would have to think about it.

  “I told you, I have friends. I can vouch for them—they’re decorated former Cossacks,” Soso said.

  Grisha didn’t even know if he could trust Soso, and didn’t know anything about the man’s friends, Edik and Lev. But it appeared Soso already had a plan in place: they would kidnap the count’s son. Kidnap him, demand ransom, get the money, give the boy back. Simple.

  Grisha didn’t like it. He told Soso to come up with another plan. Not kidnapping. He didn’t want to think of Mikhail Konstantinovich put into a dangerous situation. He had watched the boy grow up. Misha took after his mother in both appearance and character, and he was a winsome child. Grisha liked him.

  He wouldn’t be a part of it if it involved Misha.

  Soso assured him that the boy wouldn’t be mistreated, and would be fed and kept warm for the one or two nights he was held. That was all—a few nights, and then, when Grisha brought the money demanded by the ransom note, it would be divided four ways. They would each have more than enough to buy themselves what they needed to start their new lives: a plot of land or a small business. They would never again answer to a master.

  Soso said he, Edik and Lev were ready to go forward. Still Grisha refused. But only Grisha could make sure the kidnapping went smoothly, Soso argued. Only he had inside information as to the count’s movements. If Grisha wouldn’t go along with them, they would still carry out the plan, but might have to resort to violence to take the child. There might be bloodshed. Who knew what might happen to the boy? “Lev and Edik won’t wait forever,” Soso added. It was on Grisha’s head now—did he want this guilt?

  Guilt. Without knowing it, Soso had chosen the right tactic. And so Grisha agreed that he would alert Soso when the circumstances were right—when there was an opportunity to take the boy. “But,” he told him, “I’m going to make sure you don’t harm Mikhail Konstantinovich.”

  He also stressed that while the boy was still a few months from turning eleven years old, he was very clever. And while he wouldn’t recognize the Cossacks, he knew Soso; he was Lilya’s husband. There could not be even the slightest indication that Soso—or of course he—was involved.

  Soso told Grisha he understood, and would comply.

  “And what of Lilya?” Grisha added. “Will you share this with your wife?” Grisha knew how dedicated the woman was to her mistress, and to the child. He so often saw the three of them—Antonina, Lilya and Misha—together.

  Soso slowly shook his head. “Lilya? I couldn’t trust her with this. She will know nothing.” He wiped his nose with his fingers. “Nothing,” he repeated. “Only the four of us are in on it.”

  The actual kidnapping—Grisha had been sitting back, watching through the trees—had not gone as smoothly as Soso had promised. Grisha was angry over the count’s injury. He had been promised, hadn’t he, that no one would be hurt.

  After that, it had all grown far worse. When he took the ransom money to Soso and the others a few days later, Mikhail had been there.

  It haunted him how the child’s face had lit up when he appeared in the clearing; the old memories from Chita flooded back. “Grisha!” Mikhail had cried out. “Grisha! Take me home!”

  Grisha had nodded. “Yes, yes, Mikhail, you will come back to Angelkov with me now.” He had ridden towards Soso, who, like Edik and Lev, had his face hidden.

  But when Grisha held out the packet of money, the men surrounded him, dragging him off his horse and beating him. It happened so unexpectedly that he wasn’t prepared. He fought back, hearing Misha calling his name, then crying Papa, and then there was nothing more. As he regained consciousness, he found his horse gone and the count on the ground near him, his Arabian nosing about in the half-frozen undergrowth.

  He was furious with Soso, and confronted him later that day. Soso, lifting heavy bags of grain in the storehouse, simply shrugged when Grisha demanded to know where Mikhail had been taken.

  “You have your money,” Grisha said. “I don’t care if you won’t give me my share—just give me the boy.”

  With his take, he’d planned to add a last piece of good land to the versts he had already bought. He had come to understand, many years ago, that he needed to possess something of his own. And now he did. He would build a house and hire some of the former estate serfs to work for him. He’d been training Lyosha to be his steward. He planned to leave Angelkov as soon as the wretched business with the kidnapping was over. It wasn’t about the money for him; it was only about his anger towards Konstantin. Now he wondered why he had been so vindictive.

  “Give back the boy,” he said, making a fist, although he involuntarily winced. Two of his ribs were broken, and in spite of his bluff, he knew he wouldn’t be able to stand up to Soso.

  “The others want more money.”

  “More? They got what was agreed upon.”

  Soso dropped the bag with a grunt. “It’s not enough.”

  “Then send another note and ask for more ransom. But don’t think I’ll deliver it without getting the child back first this time.”

  Soso leaned against a stack of filled sacks and lit his pipe. “A bit more money is all they want.”

  “And where is Misha?” Grisha asked him again.

  “Safe. Get me money, and I’ll get you the boy.”

  “Do you think I’ll get you more money if the child is already dead? Am I that much of a fool? Unless I have proof he’s alive, there will be no more money. Get me some proof.”

  “I’ll talk to the others,” Soso said, and sucked on his pipe. He crossed his arms over his chest and stared at Grisha. “When I’m ready.”

  Grisha knew then that Soso had him in exactly the position he wanted. He saw that it wasn’t only about the money for Soso, just as it hadn’t been for him. It would bring Soso pleasure to make him wait.

  A week after the kidnapping, Antonina sits beside Konstantin’s bed.

  He is in a deep sleep, his lips cracked and peeling, his cheeks sunken. Antonina wonders what he is capable of thinking, of understanding, in this fevered state. Is he suffering over his son? Of course, he loved his child, even though he was not the son he had dreamed of.

  His first marriage had been long and childless. He had wanted the son Antonina gave him to be more robust. He urged the boy to take chances, to ride difficult horses through the meadows and to practise dives, over and over, in the lake on the estate. Konstantin forced Mikhail to skate on that same lake, frozen in winter, until the child’s face was ghostly with exhaustion. He had been proud of the boy for his outstanding musical ability, yes, proud that by the age of five Mikhail could compose melodies. But it wasn’t enough for Konstantin.

  “Is that all he’s interested in?” he asked Antonina when Mikhail was seven. “It’s abno
rmal for a boy to care more for music than the thrill of the hunt, the horses and dogs, rifles and hunting bows. Look at Lilya’s brother from the stables. Lyosha. He’s still a boy, and yet already so accomplished. Grisha told me that only last week he got three grouse and a fox within an hour.”

  “Lyosha is much older than Mikhail. Don’t compare him to our son.”

  A few years earlier, Konstantin had seen Lyosha kicked by one of the horses. Luckily, it was a small filly, and it was just the edge of her hoof that caught the boy or he might have been seriously injured, even killed. Lyosha was knocked unconscious for a few moments. As he came to, with two of the older stablemen kneeling over him, he grimaced but insisted on getting to his feet. Konstantin later learned that the child’s collarbone and arm had been broken, but he hadn’t made a sound. He had been impressed by the boy’s strength and stoicism.

  “Mikhail should spend more time outside, instead of all the hours at his lessons or at the piano,” he said.

  “Misha is extremely musically gifted,” Antonina had argued. “You’re aware of that.”

  Konstantin grunted. “I’m not suggesting the boy give up his musical studies. But I want a son who can ride and hunt with me, not just compose piano trifles. I want him to have a career in the army.”

  “The army?” Antonina was dumbstruck.

  “The training will be good for him. He can join one of the noble cadet schools in St. Petersburg when he’s thirteen. It will guarantee him entrance into an elite branch of the Russian military service. By the time he’s twenty, he could be a lieutenant, and move steadily forward. I have always dreamed of a son who becomes a general.”

  Antonina knew that nothing would be gained by arguing with Konstantin. Mikhail was only seven; she had a number of years to change her husband’s mind. She would not let him give up his musical career for a rifle, no matter what Konstantin said.

  I despise him, Antonina thinks, looking at her husband. For all his self-indulgent life Konstantin has done whatever he wanted to do, regardless of the cost to others. Even worse than taking Mikhail out against her wishes the day he was kidnapped, he did not obey the Cossacks’ demands, and as a result destroyed the chance of her child’s safe return.