There was an anonymous hole in the ground for the woman.
There was a coffin for him, a coffin that represented a macabre self-gesture.
He reached the Soviet Embassy in Warsaw at ten in the morning. He was admitted through the gates, and drove round to the rear of the building. One of the embassy officials came out to talk to him. As a consequence of the talk, two servants were called to lift the coffin out of the hearse and carry it in. In a bare room, the lid was unscrewed and taken off. A loose tangle of cord and a limp gag were exposed. Nothing else. Bukov’s eyes seemed frozen.
‘I have heard of Houdini,’ said the official, ‘who has not? I have never heard of his female counterpart. Wait here, Comrade Commissar.’ He disappeared.
Bukov waited. He had to. The door was locked. His face looked as if it had been carved from dark-grey stone, although his lips twitched loosely from time to time. That woman, the woman who had once been a maddening girl, she had slipped him at the very beginning, she had slipped him many times since, and at the very last she had slipped him again and for ever. It did not matter how she had done it. It was final. The bitter salt that encrusted his soul began to slowly consume him.
In one of the embassy offices, the official was talking about him to his superior. ‘One questions if she was ever there,’ he said.
‘Or if she was, he released her? She was of an age and looks to interest him?’
‘One could suggest contamination had weakened him.’
‘He has actually been out of Russia for seven years?’
‘No time limit was laid down.’
‘Certain members of the Ekaterinburg Soviet must have been in default of their senses.’
‘One could readily assume so.’
‘For seven years he has been in contact with capitalist degenerates of Poland and Germany?’ That was not a question, even if it sounded like one. It was a judgement. The official knew it, and so did not answer it. ‘The present Ekaterinburg Soviet are aware of this?’ That was a definite question.
‘They are.’
‘Then see he is returned to Ekaterinburg under escort.’
* * *
The interrogation of Bukov began almost as soon as he arrived in Ekaterinburg. It was conducted by men who were one with Stalin. To Stalin, any Russian who had rubbed shoulders with people of capitalist countries was suspect.
For two days, ceaseless questions were asked about the contacts Bukov had made during the last seven years. Bukov tried to frame his answers around what had been an agreed commitment to bring the girl back. He was repeatedly told not to introduce irrelevancies. He did not become irritated or confused. He behaved like a man whose every emotion was frozen. His insistence that he had made no contacts, except for the man Vorstadt, that he had never needed either contacts or friends, might have been believable of others, but not of a man who had moved among the enemies of Soviet Russia for so long.
The two days of questioning came to an end.
On the third day, two men entered Bukov’s cell and shot him.
He was buried in a shroud made of an old sheet.
The coffin was chopped up and used as firewood.
It was cold in Ekaterinburg.
Chapter Sixteen
‘What’s this?’ asked Mr Gibson, having read a note he had just found lying flat on the living-room mantelpiece.
‘Excuse me?’ said Natasha from the kitchen, where she was preparing breakfast.
‘Are you leaving?’ called Mr Gibson. ‘I mean, have you just written this?’
Natasha came into the living room. She saw Mr Gibson with the note in his hand. She pushed back a falling lock of hair, looked at him enquiringly, and remembered. Everything that had not related directly to the miraculous moment when he pushed the coffin lid aside yesterday, had slipped from her mind. The note had lain unseen by him and forgotten by her. Mr Gibson smiled at her. Her colour rose. She had signed it with all her love.
‘Oh, that was to do with yesterday’s first bad moments,’ she said, and went back into the kitchen so that she could continue in light vein, without having him looking at her. ‘It was all he would let me write, that commissar. I wanted to leave you a message, to let you know in some way that I was being forced to leave. But he would only let me write goodbye. You did not—’ She jumped, for Mr Gibson was at her elbow, and although the kitchen was spacious, she felt parlously hemmed in. She bent her head over a basin and whipped up the eggs she was going to serve scrambled, with toast. Mr Gibson liked scrambled eggs for breakfast. ‘You did not see it?’
‘I didn’t look for it. But thank you for the thought. I’ll grill some toast, shall I?’
‘No, no, I will do it,’ she said, relieved that he was not making embarrassing comments, but wanting him to understand that she loved doing all she could for him, as a wife would. ‘Go away, please, and write up your notes. You are not to interfere with my cooking—’ She broke off, dusky red. ‘Oh, I am sorry, that was so impertinent of me. It is your apartment, you are paying for everything, and I – oh, how could I say such a thing, that you are interfering?’
‘Well, I probably am,’ said Mr Gibson equably. ‘It’s accepted that one cook is enough in a kitchen. You’re so accomplished in the use you make of this one that you’re entitled not to have me get in your way. That’s scrambled egg you’re doing? Good.’ He watched her pour the mixture into the hot pan, then slide bread under the grill for toasting. Her movements seemed nervous. She jumped again as he moved past her, brushing her elbow. Her awareness of the fact that she was living with him in this apartment was more sensitive each day. He treated the relationship in a comfortable way, as if it was entirely the most practical thing, which it was, but to Natasha it was an intimacy of a very disturbing kind. It disturbed not only her emotions, but her physical being. It heated her body at times, especially if he was close to her. For the first time in her life she was in love, passionately so, and it induced in her the kind of physical need that made her blood rush. The sweetness of being with him, of living with him, was so painful, for she knew they would not be together like this for much longer.
Over breakfast, she asked, ‘It is satisfactory?’
‘The scrambled egg? It’s delicious, Natasha, it always is. By the way, I think we might drive to Switzerland. It would be an adventure.’
‘We are to go in the car? But it isn’t ours.’ The idea appealed to her, all the same. They would be more together than on a train. ‘Count Orlov will—’ She bit her lip.
‘I don’t think it’s Count Orlov’s car. I think it belongs to his friend, the gentleman who bundled you into it. However, when we’ve finished with it, we’ll let the count know where it may be recovered. We don’t know the name or address of his friend.’ Mr Gibson sounded cheerfully casual. ‘Yes, it’s the count we’ll contact.’
‘Yes,’ said Natasha, willing to go along with anything he suggested. Anything.
‘You agree?’ Mr Gibson smiled. ‘But I thought you didn’t know either of the two men who tried to carry you off that day at the clinic. Now you think it would be correct to refer to Count Orlov in respect of the car?’
‘Oh, that is not nice,’ said Natasha heatedly.
‘What isn’t?’
‘It is an act of deceit.’
‘What is?’
‘What is? What is? To lead me into a trap, that is what is.’
‘And you’re angry with me?’
‘Yes.’
‘Very right and proper,’ said Mr Gibson.
‘Oh, I am only angry on top,’ said Natasha. ‘Underneath I am still devoted to your goodness. Also, not many men can perform miracles. One should not let one’s anger affect one’s gratitude.’
Mr Gibson laughed. That made Natasha look a little put out.
‘I am comical?’ she said.
‘No, very sweet,’ said Mr Gibson.
‘Oh,’ said Natasha, and bent her head in the familiar way to hide her swimming eyes.
Mr Gibson thought it would not be long before she was a quite beautiful young lady.
‘We’ll leave for Switzerland tomorrow, immediately after breakfast,’ he said.
‘Yes,’ she said.
She brought a letter to him a little later, one that had been slipped under the apartment door. It bore an English stamp.
Mr Gibson read the letter. It was from a lady called Mildred Thornton, a close and charming friend. She had, she said, received his own letter concerning a well-mannered and intelligent Russian girl with a linguistic gift. It caused her much interest and astonishment. What was he doing in Berlin, and what was he doing in finding Russian girls down on their luck? He could find all kinds of people down on their luck in London, without going to Berlin to look for hard-up Russian girls. It was all very intriguing. However, she had, she said, noted his call for help, and was able to say that providing his Russian protégée was not too long in arriving, Mrs Hall at Stoneleigh Manor could take her on as a maid. If that was not quite the kind of position he had in mind for the girl – and Mildred said she had a feeling it wasn’t – had he thought about a governess for his sister’s twins? His sister Jean had lately considered sending them to a boarding school to curb their tendency to anarchy, and allow her to devote herself undistractedly to her increasingly successful career as a portrait painter. Mildred wrote that she had suggested a governess-tutor as an alternative to a boarding school, and Jean was giving it favourable thought. If the young Russian lady in question had some teaching gifts and could take care of the twins’ education for a few years, there were prospects for her. Meanwhile, said Mildred, she awaited his return with interest and curiosity.
Mr Gibson passed the letter to Natasha, and she read it.
‘There, you see,’ he said, ‘the possibilities are not impossible.’
‘Mr Gibson, such possibilities are so much more than I ever dreamed of that I cannot think of them as anything but quite impossible,’ said Natasha. ‘So I must compose myself for disappointment in such a way that it will hardly be a disappointment at all.’
‘I want a much more self-confident outlook from you than that,’ said Mr Gibson.
‘But, you see,’ she said, ‘I should be only too happy to work in a kitchen or to look after chickens.’
‘I’m sternly opposed to either of those jobs,’ said Mr Gibson.
‘Truly, I don’t mind that work is found for me, because it will be bliss to be in England, my mother’s country. The lady who wrote the letter is a very good friend of yours?’
‘I’m entertaining hopes,’ said Mr Gibson, ‘but she’s a bewitching woman and the competition is fierce.’
‘Mr Gibson,’ said Natasha, pulses racing, ‘you are entertaining hopes?’
‘In my modest way,’ said Mr Gibson.
‘Modest?’ Natasha felt giddy.
‘I’ve been standing aside from the arena,’ said Mr Gibson. ‘I feel it’s a disadvantage to be merely one of a crowd.’
Natasha sat down, for her knees were failing her. ‘But I thought – Mr Gibson, your family, your wife and children—?’
‘Pardon?’ said Mr Gibson, opening his notebook and uncapping his fountain pen.
‘You said—’ But no, he had never said. She had assumed. She had assumed because she had been unable to imagine otherwise. She had been wrong? He was not married? He was only entertaining hopes? He was not even promised to anyone? What was she like, the woman who allowed him to stand aside while ordinary men surrounded her? Natasha drew a breath and said, ‘I would like to visit a hairdresser.’
‘A hairdresser?’
‘For my hair to be styled before we go to Switzerland. I can use some of the money I still have.’
Mr Gibson regarded her tolerantly. Her hair, rich and thick, was full of soft, natural waves.
‘You’re not going to have it cut and bobbed, I hope,’ he said. Bobbed hair had a boyish look, but was very fashionable. So was the shingle, with its crimped look.
‘I’m not going to have it cut, no,’ said Natasha.
‘Well, a hairdresser is necessary to the happiness of every young lady, I suppose,’ said Mr Gibson.
‘I have never been to one,’ said Natasha.
‘That must be put right at once, then. But you can’t go by yourself. You can’t go anywhere by yourself. You’ve a habit of disappearing or nearly disappearing. If you don’t mind waiting ten minutes or so, I’ll take you.’
‘Thank you,’ said Natasha, who had decided all was fair in love and war.
The doorbell rang. She stiffened, and Mr Gibson looked thoughtful. ‘Who can that be?’ he said.
‘Don’t answer it,’ begged Natasha.
‘I wonder,’ said Mr Gibson, ‘could it be the gentleman who owns the car? If it is, I’d like to meet him. We’ll see.’
‘Please don’t,’ said Natasha. ‘If it is him, I’m sure he won’t be alone.’
‘We’ll see,’ said “Mr Gibson again. He went to the door and opened it a little, using his left foot as a firm stop. Outside stood two uniformed policemen, one of them a sergeant.
‘Herr Gibson?’ enquired the sergeant.
‘Good morning,’ said Mr Gibson pleasantly.
‘We should like a few words with you, mein Herr.’
‘Come in,’ said Mr Gibson, sighing. They came in, and Natasha stared at them in apprehension. She felt the sweetnesses of life were never allowed to linger. There was always something unpleasant or uncomfortable lurking in the background, waiting to intrude and interrupt.
‘I am Sergeant Hertz. Herr Gibson, there’s a car parked outside, an English car. May I ask if you are the owner?’
‘I am not,’ said Mr Gibson.
‘Do you know how it got there?’
‘I drove it there.’
‘But you are not the owner?’
‘No.’
‘Herr Gibson, the car is registered in the name of a gentleman who we believe to be the legal owner. He has informed us that the car was stolen.’
‘Confiscated,’ said Mr Gibson in English.
‘Excuse me?’
‘I confiscated it in order to prevent an abduction,’ said Mr Gibson, again in English.
‘Mein Herr?’ said the uncomprehending police sergeant.
Natasha repeated Mr Gibson’s statement in German.
‘Our information,’ said the sergeant, ‘is that it was removed without the owner’s permission. Do you understand that, Herr Gibson?’
‘Yes,’ said Mr Gibson. ‘I speak in English sometimes when German words escape me.’
‘You are a citizen of Great Britain?’
‘Yes.’
‘A visitor to Germany?’
‘Yes.’
‘May I ask who this young lady is?’
‘A friend,’ said Mr Gibson.
‘So? May I see her papers, please, and your passport?’
Natasha quivered. She was always reluctant to see her papers in the hands of other people, including the police. Without her papers, she was a nobody. Mr Gibson gave her a reassuring nod. She produced the identity document, and Mr Gibson produced his passport. Police Sergeant Hertz examined them.
‘You are Russian?’ he said to Natasha.
‘An émigré,’ said Natasha, and because Mr Gibson seemed as calm as ever, she squared her shoulders and said, ‘Herr Gibson saved me from—’
The sergeant interrupted. ‘You are both requested to accompany us to Police Headquarters,’ he said, but he handed back the documents.
‘Now?’ said Mr Gibson.
‘If you please, mein Herr. Inspector Moeller wishes to see you.’
‘Very well.’
At the main Berlin police station, Mr Gibson and Natasha were escorted into the presence of Inspector Moeller. Sergeant Hertz remained, presenting details of his examination of them. Inspector Moeller, a thin and shrewd-eyed man, nodded.
‘Herr Gibson,’ he said, ‘is it true you have admitted taking possession of a car not belonging
to you?’
‘Would you repeat that, please?’ asked Mr Gibson, his apparently unruffled calmness commending itself poignantly to Natasha, who knew he might be in desperate trouble now, unless he could convince the police they were interrogating the wrong man.
Speaking deliberately, Inspector Moeller repeated his question, and Mr Gibson said, ‘I’ve admitted removing it. I had good reason. It saved my friend, Fräulein Chevensky, from being removed herself, against her will.’ His German came through well enough.
‘Who is Fräulein Chevensky?’
‘This young lady.’
‘I think not,’ said the inspector. ‘Your papers, Fräulein, if you please.’
Again Natasha handed over her identity document. ‘I—’
‘You are Natasha Petrovna Alexeiev?’ he said.
‘Yes,’ said Natasha, ‘but sometimes I say my name is Chevensky because of the Bolsheviks, who are always looking for émigrés whose names they know. When one meets strangers in Berlin and they ask what is your name, how is one to know they are not the agents of Moscow?’
‘Is Herr Gibson an agent from Moscow?’ asked the inspector.
‘No, no! Of course not! He is a fine man. It is just that when I first met him, I did not know who he was, so I said my name was Chevensky.’
‘There are émigrés here with twenty names,’ said the inspector. ‘Herr Gibson, please explain what you meant when you said you saved Fräulein Alexeiev, alias Chevensky, from being removed against her will.’
Mr Gibson explained. Natasha helped him. Together they told the story of what had happened at the clinic. Sergeant Hertz listened blank of face, and the inspector lightly nodded from time to time.
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