“Your Highness is a flatterer,” Anna riposted.
“By no means, Countess. All the men in this room are at this moment jealous of me. Were they to suspect for a moment that you had confided any of your secrets to me, they would go mad.”
“Secrets, Your Highness?” She looked up at him. “Have you not more secrets than any woman in Russia, Countess?”
“If I have, Your Highness, they were all concerning matters before you were born.”
“That does not make them any the less exciting. Their Majesties would speak with you privily, Countess.” Anna’s heart began to pound. She could not believe the Tsar and Tsaritsa of Russia were interested in thirty-year-old gossip, or that their original invitation had been anything more than politeness. “Will you take tea, tomorrow?” the Prince asked.
*
The room was crowded, as was to be expected, but Anna found herself sitting at a table in a huge bay window, overlooking the Prospect, and between the Emperor and Empress. The rest of the party was also out of earshot, although there were sufficient curious and envious glances. “As I remarked last night,” the Tsar said, “you are a woman of so much legend, Countess Bolugayevska, that one scarce knows where to begin.”
“But the past is only of value where it can affect the future,” Alexandra put in.
“Of course,” Nicholas agreed.
“Absolutely,” Anna also agreed. She could only agree, until she discovered what the two rulers had in mind.
“Yours is a tragic return to Russia,” Alexandra remarked. “I would have preferred it to be different, yes, Your Majesty.”
“Prince Bolugayevski...the late Prince Bolugayevski, was once married to your sister, is that not so?”
“That is correct, Your Majesty.”
“But there was...I am sure you’ll forgive me, Countess, some scandal, was there not?”
“I became the Prince’s mistress, Your Majesty,” Anna said.
The Tsaritsa’s head gave a little jerk; she had not expected quite such frankness. But she recovered quickly. “And so, even after more than thirty years, you hurried back from America to be at his deathbed.”
“I did not know it was his deathbed, Your Majesty. Prince Bolugayevski sent for me, and I came.”
“Just like that?”
“I was recently widowed, Your Majesty, and, shall I say, Russia held more for me than America.”
“That is very patriotic of you, I am sure,” Alexandra remarked.
“Tell us of Port Arthur, Countess,” the Tsar invited. “You spent a considerable time there, did you not?”
Anna was surprised. “Some weeks, Sire. Not very enjoyable weeks.”
“Because of the war. Should the Japanese have taken it so easily?”
“I am not a soldier, Sire, but I am sure they should not. The Chinese defence was not of the best.”
“Then you do not suppose a Russian garrison would have collapsed so readily.”
“Certainly not, Sire.”
“Good.”
“But equally, Sire,” Anna added, “I imagine the Japanese will put up a sterner defence than the Chinese, should they ever have to.”
“They will never have to. They will never have Port Arthur,” the Tsar explained.
Once again Anna was surprised. “But the Chinese surrendered it, Sire. It is the ideal base for the Japanese fleet. They will not return it.”
“They will have to return it, Countess. We are making them do so. We are backed by France and Germany in this. Japan shall not have Port Arthur.”
“Will they agree to that, Sire?”
“They will have no choice, faced by the concerted opposition of three great powers. Oh, the Chinese indemnity will have to be increased, to sweeten the pill, as it were. But they will not surrender Port Arthur. At least, to the Japanese.”
Anna frowned. “You mean we...Russia, will take it from the Chinese?”
“Good heavens, no, Countess. We are going to lease the port, for twenty years. At least to begin with. Do you not think that is a good idea? It was the brainchild of my late father. It is absolutely essential for the Russian Navy to have an ice-free base in the Pacific. In ten years time the trans-Siberian railway will have been completed, and we will dominate all north Asia. By every logical determination, Manchuria belongs to us. But we must have a fleet at the end of it. We will build a branch line down to Port Arthur.”
“And so Colin was sent to Port Arthur, as consul.” Anna mused, half to herself.
“Exactly. Not only was he one of my grandfather’s, and my father’s, most trusted aides, but as an Englishman he also had a high understanding and appreciation of the importance of sea power. He was sent to Port Arthur to study and report, and also to undertake some secret negotiations for us.” Anna swelled with pride. She had always known there had to have been an ulterior motive in sending Colin to the Far East. “I may say,” the Tsar went on, “that both his reports and his negotiations were eminently successful. Indeed, the lease was almost ready for signing before the Japanese started the war. It is even possible that they had got hold of news of what was impending and were determined to forestall us. Unfortunately, Prince Bolugayevski, with his unfailing devotion to duty, never reported to us that he had contracted a cancer, and so his work has gone unrewarded.”
“He never told me either,” Anna murmured.
“Quite. I am telling you these things, in the utmost confidence, because I wish you to know that both you and your nephews and nieces will always be high in our esteem. That is the least we can do for the late prince.”
“I thank you, Sire.” She was close to tears.
“Well, now,” Alexandra said. “Let us talk about your nieces and nephews. Do you not suppose it is time they were married?”
“Oh, indeed, Your Majesty,” Anna said.
“The eldest is quite old, is she not?”
“Sophie will be twenty-seven this year, Your Majesty. But she has been married before...”
“No, no,” the Tsaritsa interrupted. “I have been informed that the marriage was annulled. An annullment cannot count as a marriage. Twenty-seven. That is a sorry age not to be married. What of the younger girl. She is a very lovely child.”
“Patricia will be eighteen this year, Your Majesty. But she at least will not be a problem. I have found her a husband.”
“So soon?” The Empress’s eyebrows arched.
“With your approval, of course, Your Majesty,” Anna hastily added.
“Well, may we ask the name of the prospective husband?”
“Colonel Count Pobrebski of the Cossacks, Your Majesty.”
“No, no,” Alexandra said. “That is quite impossible, my dear Countess.”
Anna frowned. “Is the Colonel not suitable? I have been told he will soon be a general.”
“Indeed he will. The appointment is to be gazetted in the summer. That being so, we have already chosen a wife for him.”
“Oh!” There goes plan number one, Anna thought.
“That is to say,” Alexandra went on, “the Colonel chose his own wife. I believe he fell madly in love with her at first sight. But when he approached us to request our permission to marry, and we learned her name, we were delighted to agree.”
“I am sure, Your Majesty. May I inquire the name of the fortunate lady?”
“Why, yourself, of course, Countess.”
*
Anna was so taken aback she could not speak. “Countess?” Alexandra was solicitous. “He has not proposed to you?”
“No,” Anna muttered.
“Ah, well, no doubt he is awaiting a propitious moment. He tells us that he is visiting with you at Bolugayen, this summer.”
“Yes,” Anna said, still muttering. “I invited him.”
“Then that will be the time. By then he will have been gazetted general, and be ready to take up his new appointment.”
“But...I can’t marry Count Pobrebski,” Anna protested.
Alexand
ra frowned. “There is an impediment?”
Yes, Anna wanted to shout: I do not love him. But how could a twenty-two-year-old Empress, who was undoubtedly deeply in love herself, understand that a woman thirty-four years her elder could also seek love...and indeed had found it, even if it was more being directed at her than from her. “I am considerably older than the Count, Your Majesty,” she said.
“A matter of some ten years. I know. But this does not seem to concern the Count in the least. And, Countess, I would like to say, that you are still a most beautiful woman.”
“Thank you, Your Majesty.”
“It would, of course, greatly disappoint us were this marriage not to take place,” the Tsaritsa said. “You should always remember that while we wish, and indeed intend, to assist you and your family in every way, there are matters in your past of some embarrassment to us, the most recent being that document you signed for General Nogi when last you were in Port Arthur.” The two women gazed at each other. Twenty-two years old, Anna thought, and fully equipped with claws. “It would be greatly to your advantage, and ours, Countess,” Alexandra continued. “Were we able to make it known, discreetly, of course, that in signing such a confession you were but continuing your role as our agent, as you would be in returning to Port Arthur.” Anna gulped.
“The Countess is overwhelmed,” Nicholas said, soothingly.
“I was but thinking, Sire,” Anna said, “that General Count Nogi will regard me as the most treacherous of women.”
“Will that not serve him right, for his crime against your family?” Nicholas asked. “In any event, he will never have the opportunity to do anything about it. Now tell me you are pleased with the future we have outlined for you.”
There was one last possibility. “I assume Count Pobrebski is aware that I can no longer be a mother?”
“Oh, indeed. But he looks forward, in the course of time, to meeting your children, and being a father to them.” My children! Anna thought. What in the name of God are they going to think? And say? And do!!
“Now, Countess,” Nicholas went on, still speaking in a conspiratorial whisper. “This marriage needs to be more than a love match.” More, she thought. Much more. “I have explained to you the political situation in the Far East. The lease is still under preparation, but I am hoping it will be signed by the end of this year. As soon as this happens, Colonel Count Pobrebski, who will then be General Count Pobrebski, will take up residence as commander of the Port Arthur garrison. With his wife, of course.”
Back to Port Arthur? To such horrible memories? She had returned to Russia to be in Russia. “Sire, if you are suggesting that I may be able to assist my...husband, in any way, I should remind you that I spent only a few weeks in Port Arthur, and for much of that time was either confined to Prince Bolugayevski’s house or working in the hospital.”
“But no one except you, and us, knows exactly what you did with your time, Countess. It is the fact that, having been there, you are returning, that matters.”
Anna inclined her head. She was defeated. She could, of course, defy them, but that would entail abandoning Russia finally and forever, and that she was not prepared to do. At the same time, she was well aware that the Tsar maintained a secret police which was as vicious as any in the world, and she had no intention of becoming involved with them. “Then I look forward to my marriage, Your Majesties. There is one more thing: you have said our conversation is confidential. However, I feel I must inform my nephew, the Prince.”
“There is no need to conceal your approaching marriage, Countess.”
“I will have to acquaint the Prince with my reasons for undertaking such a marriage, Your Majesty. The Prince and I have no secrets from each other.”
The Tsar gazed at her, and she gazed back. Then Nicholas glanced at Alexandra. “I am sure Prince Bolugayevski can be trusted with state secrets,” the Tsaritsa said. “But nobody else.”
*
“But that is impossible!” Peter protested. “Pobrebski? Oh, he is a splendid fellow. There is no one I would rather have at my shoulder when going into battle. But as your husband...”
“They seem quite determined. My marriage is virtually an affair of state.” She told him of Port Arthur.
“Politics on a grand scale,” he muttered. “You do realise that Russia intends to smash Japan, one day. One day quite soon. Indeed, I would say as soon as the railway is completed.”
“But why? How can Japan harm Russia?”
“My darling, we live in a constantly changing world. Twenty years ago Japan was a quaint little group of offshore islands, so in-turned upon itself that it was three hundred years behind the rest of the world. People wrote operettas about it. Now those quaint little islands have crushed one of the world’s great empires, in a very brief campaign. Who knows where they will be in twenty years from now, if they are not stopped? I can tell you this: they are negotiating with British shipbuilders for the laying down of battleships which will be the equal of anything in the world. Those ships will be used to dominate the Pacific, and thus all East Asia. We cannot permit this.”
“As you say,” Anna remarked. “Politics on a grand scale. With me in the middle. Oh, Peter! What are we going to do?”
“When is the wedding to take place?”
“Later on this year, or early next. My God! I shall be fifty-eight!”
“And as beautiful and virile as ever you were. Well, we have that time to enjoy each other.”
“That is all you have to say?” But, she was realising, he probably thought things were working out very well. For all his declarations of undying devotion, he knew that after another year he would tire of her. But there were other matters. “What of the girls?”
“We shall have to start looking seriously for husbands.”
Anna shuddered. “And when Count Pobrebski comes to call?”
“I am sure you will be able to cope with him, my dearest Aunt.”
*
Peter had returned to duty by the following afternoon, and Anna was taking tea with the two girls, who were in a state of high excitement. “There are all sorts of rumours, Aunt Anna,” Patricia ventured. Already? Anna wondered.
“Is it true that you are to marry again, Aunt?” Sophie asked.
“As a matter of fact,” Anna conceded, “I am considering the matter.”
“Oooh,” Patricia commented. “At your...” She bit her lip. “Will your husband come to live with us on Bolugayen?”
“That remains to be determined,” Anna said. “However...” She looked up as Dmitri appeared in the doorway.
“There are two...men here to see you, Your Excellency.”
She caught his hesitation as to whether or not to use the term “gentlemen”. But two...she was expecting Pobrebski, certainly. Had he brought a second? “Well,” she said, “show them in,” and stared in amazement at the two men, well if shabbily dressed, who followed Dmitri into the room. The older was clearly the father of the younger, although he wore a beard, while his son was clean-shaven. But there was something familiar about the older man.
Who now bowed, revealing that he was nearly bald. “Countess Anna! This is a great pleasure. I had heard you were back in Russia, and I could not believe my ears.”
His voice gave him away. “David Fine! But...I was told you were in Siberia!”
“I was, Your Excellency. But I was released in a general amnesty, following the Tsar’s wedding.”
“Good heavens!” Sophie commented.
“I hope you will forgive this intrusion, Your Excellency,” David Fine said anxiously.
“Of course I do. It is so good to see you again.” David Fine, she thought. He looked a lot like his father. Just as the son looked a lot like the boy David she remembered, whose attempt to elope with her younger sister Alexandra had turned out so tragically. “And this is your son?”
“Joseph, Your Excellency.”
Joseph Fine bowed. “My father has often spoken of you, Your Excell
ency.”
Anna raised her eyebrows. “And do you have a wife, David?”
“My wife died in Siberia, Your Excellency.”
“Oh, that is sad.”
“But if you have been in Siberia...you mean you were exiled? You are a terrorist?” Sophie was scandalised.
“I was convicted of sedition, Your Excellency,” David acknowledged. “But that was several years ago.” He turned to Anna. “Is it possible that I may be allowed to return to Bolugayen, Your Excellency?”
“Of course you may return to your home, David,” Anna said.
“A convicted terrorist?” Sophie demanded.
“So was your mother, once, a convicted terrorist,” Anna pointed out. Sophie bit her lip. “Sit down, David,” Anna invited. “And take some tea. And you, Joseph.”
“Well, really!” Sophie snapped, and flounced from the room.
“My niece is rather highly strung,” Anna explained. “Are you leaving too, Patricia?”
“By no means, Aunt.” Patricia seated herself on a settee, close to where the younger Fine had perched himself on a straight chair. “And are you a terrorist, too, Mr Fine?”
*
“Well, that really is a remarkable thing,” Anna said, when the Fines had left. “After all these years.”
“They’re Jews, aren’t they?” Patricia asked.
“Well, of course they are Jews. David’s father was our doctor on Bolugayen in the old days. He was a great friend of your father.”
“How do you know they won’t start being terrorists again?” Patricia asked.
Anna smiled. “I do not think there is much probability of that. Several years in Siberia should have cured them of ever taking any chance of being sent back there. Besides, David only truly became a terrorist after my sister Alexandra was killed. They were eloping together, and the Cossacks shot at them, and Alexandra was hit. I think they were very much in love.” She gave a wry smile. “It’s a tangled world. Alix was then married to Charles Cromb. But she never loved him. Or he her, I think. It was one of those arranged businesses.”
The Masters Page 14