Liza clapped her hands.
“That would have been wonderful! All day I would pray and eat nothing, wear a black dress and a cross and kneel. And at night I would fly on my broomstick to a witches’ Sabbath.” She straddled the fire poker. “Haw! Haw! I fly up and down and my feet don’t touch the ground!” she shouted loudly. The red glow of the fire lit up her face.
Andrei shuddered.
“Stop it, you’re too much like the real thing.”
She laughed again and threw more logs onto the fire.
“You know,” he said, “if this is what you’re like, you should write poetry.”
Liza shook her head.
“I don’t want to. Only the stupid and the old write poetry these days.”
“You’re a funny one, Liza. What does it matter what it was like before compared to these days? What would you have us do now?”
Liza lifted her face to his.
“Now, we have to live and not dream about anything.”
He looked at her pale face, at her bright limpid eyes.
“You must find that hard.”
“Well, irrespective of whether it’s hard or not, it’s what we must do.” She shrugged. “It’s too hot. Let’s go and sit on the divan.”
Andrei sat down next to her. They were silent.
“It gets dark so quickly. No, don’t turn the light on, Andrei. It’s nicer like this.”
The logs crackled in the fireplace. The red light of the fire fell on the divan, on Liza. She reached her hands out towards the flames.
“You know, Andrei, I keep thinking,” she said slowly. “I keep thinking how difficult and dreary life must be if childhood is as good as it gets. And if it’s all downhill from here, I don’t want to grow up.” She shook her head. “And, you know, I don’t think I ever will.”
“Nonsense, Liza. It’s only because you’re fourteen. Fourteen is the worst age. You’ll be fifteen in March and it will all be much easier then.”
She shook her head again.
“Oh, no, no. I don’t believe that. It won’t get any easier, or any better.”
He didn’t reply.
“Why are you so sad, Andrei?”
“I’m not sad at all.”
“Yes, you are. Don’t argue. You’re always sad. Right now you look terribly like a sad bird of prey. Like a falcon.” She took his hand. “‘Et alors, parce qu’il était toujours triste, on l’appela Tristan,’” she said slowly and sighed. “Why did you stop loving me, Andrei?”
He kissed the palm of her hand.
“I love you, Liza.”
“That’s not true. You never visit me. You spend all your time with Kolya.”
“We have things to do.”
“What sort of things?”
He leant towards her.
“I love you, Liza. Trust me. I’m not to blame. It’s very difficult for me. I’m sick of it all.”
She enfolded him in her arms.
“If you love me, then I don’t need anything else. It’s difficult for you and it’s difficult for me, too. But it’s a little easier when we’re together.”
He laid his head on her lap.
“Forgive me.”
“There’s nothing to forgive. It happens all the time. Even when you really love someone, you can forget all about them for a while. Like Tristan and Isolde. Do you remember?” She stroked his hair. “In Biarritz, I barely thought of you.”
He raised his head from her lap.
“You forgot all about me then. Because of Cromwell?”
She placed her hand on his forehead.
“Lie back down. It doesn’t matter why, because I love you again now.”
He clenched his fists.
“I hate him.”
She leant down towards him.
“Your face is so angry. Don’t be jealous. It was all so long ago.”
She kissed him.
“It’s so nice being with you. If only we were together always.”
“We’ll always be together, Liza.”
“I don’t believe that. How dark it is.”
“Hold on, let me tend the fire, or else it’ll go out.”
She held him.
“Don’t.”
The fire suddenly flared up, flames darted this way and that, and then it went out. It was completely dark, blissful and silent. Andrei kissed her knees in the dark. Her lips sought out his.
“Is that you, Andrei? Do you love me?”
She sighed quietly and closed her eyes.
“Oh, no, no. It would be too perfect. It can’t be, it never is. You won’t come to see me tomorrow.”
Somebody was climbing the stairs. The door flew open, the light switch clicked.
Liza scrunched up her eyes against the light and hurriedly pulled her skirt over her bare knees. Nikolai walked in.
“What are you two doing sitting around in the dark, like a pair of moles?”
Andrei got up and fixed his tie.
“Didn’t anyone teach you to knock?”
“Come off it! Liza’s my sister, isn’t she? Do what you like, you two. I couldn’t care less.”
He sat down on the divan and lit a cigarette.
“We can’t go on like this. We have to get our hands on some more money, no matter what.”
Liza walked over to the mirror and smoothed down her ruffled hair.
“Yes, yes, we’ve heard it all before. You’re like a broken record.”
II
LIZA WAS RIGHT—Andrei didn’t come the next day. She waited for him in vain. But by the evening, she was quite calm. What of it? He could do as he pleased. She should just stop thinking about him, and that would be the end of it. And so everything returned to normal—only she felt that little bit sadder.
It was Christmas Eve. Liza was sitting in her room, on her own. A light drizzle drummed steadily on the roof. A car, gleaming from the rain, was driving slowly down the road. A beaming young woman glanced out of its window. All the seats were covered with shopping bags.
“It’s Christmas Eve,” thought Liza. “Everyone’s out buying presents and having fun.” She could just picture the bustling streets—a sea of wet umbrellas, and crowded shops full of women—exhausted shoppers demanding things from exhausted shop assistants, like one great cheerful hell.
“And later tonight they’ll switch on the Christmas tree lights and have a gay old time. Am I just going to sit here by myself all night?” She shook her head. “No, no, I’m going to go out to the cinema,” she decided. “It’s nice there. I can get some roasted chestnuts on the way. It’ll be warm there, and I’ll be able to think about something else. I can have fun on Christmas Eve, too!”
She ran downstairs.
“What about you? Would you be brave enough?” She heard Nikolai’s loud, forceful whisper. “Could you do it? Or would you lose your nerve?”
“I’m no coward,” Andrei answered resolutely, angrily.
“What on earth can they be talking about?” Liza opened the door.
Nikolai gave a startled jump and turned around to face her.
“Who’s there?” He was very pale. Andrei stood smoking by the window. Nikolai studied his sister with suspicion.
“What do you want?”
“I’m going to the cinema. I need twelve francs.”
Nikolai spread his arms wide and gave a low whistle.
“Twelve francs? Have you been living under a rock? Haven’t you noticed we’ve not had a centime in this house for three days straight?”
Liza shrugged.
“That’s a pity.”
“Oh, please, don’t give me that. You sound like some affronted princess! You could’ve gone to the cinema when we had money. So don’t start complaining now. I’m sick enough of it all as it is.”
“It’s Christmas Eve,” Liza reminded him.
“And? What does that matter? Leave us alone, we have things to discuss.”
Liza went back up to her room.
“Oh,
what a bore, what a bore, what a bore.” She yawned loudly.
She didn’t even have anything to read; she’d read all the books from cover to cover, several times over.
She caught a reflection of herself in the mirror above the fireplace. Her face looked pale and drawn.
“Goodness, I look so miserable. That’s how I’ll look when I’m lying in my coffin.”
She crossed her arms across her breast. All she had to do now was close her eyes.
She shook her head and her fair hair fell over her face.
“It’s Christmas Eve and I’m thinking about death. That’s no good.”
She looked out of the window. It was Christmas time, but it didn’t look like it. The rain was still drumming on the windowpanes. Tired, wet trees were bending in the wind. The street was empty. Through the veil of rain and the screen of water running down the windowpanes, everything looked vague and elusive. Of course, none of it was real. It was only there pour rire. She wasn’t actually real either. And all her life was actually pour rire, too—just for a laugh. Although it wasn’t at all funny.
She turned away from the window. Oh, the slush! Christmas was supposed to be ice-cold and snowy, like in Moscow. Moscow. She drew up her knees and leant into the cushion.
Moscow. She closed her eyes and tried to picture it in her mind’s eye. Snow, snow, snow. White, light and bright. It made everything white and sparkling. Snow on the ground, snow on the rooftops, snow floating in the air. She remembered that much, but other than that… other than that it was all a muddle. She could picture Moscow quite clearly, the Moscow of her childhood, but that wasn’t the real Moscow either. Wide boulevards blanketed in snow, the Kremlin, and next to it—a tall yellow Chinese pagoda. Slightly farther off—a garden, and palm trees laden with coconuts. Under the palm trees stand bamboo huts and a grey five-storey building. In a pond are ships, goldfish, swans and crocodiles. The streets are filled with crawling trams, flying horse-drawn sleighs and sprinting long-legged ostriches. The pavements are bustling with people dressed in fur coats and fur hats—officers and ladies—and also strolling Indians with feathers in their headdresses and naked Negroes riding giraffes. And over by Kuznetsky Bridge, down on the ice, lives a white polar bear, and the sky sparkles pink all night long with the dancing Northern Lights.
That’s the Moscow Liza remembers. Moscow filled with tigers, torpedo boats and parrots from her father’s stories, gathered on his travels. Liza’s father had been a naval officer. She loved him more than anything, but he kept going off to war. One spring there had been a lot of shouting in the street, right under their windows. Mama (that was Natasha’s name back then) said that it was a revolution. Mama looked very frightened and Liza started crying. And then there came a letter. It was delivered in the morning, while they were drinking tea. Mama read it and fell to the floor—and her teacup fell, too, and smashed into pieces. When Mama got up, she said that the sailors had drowned Papa in the sea and that he was up in heaven now. Liza couldn’t understand how Papa could be up in heaven if he was in the sea. Unless he’d turned into a flying fish? Then he’d be able to live both in the sea and up in heaven.
It was when they arrived in Constantinople that Liza realized that Papa lived far, far away on the horizon, where the sea met the sky. Liza spent day after day lying on top of a dusty suitcase in a dark corridor of their hotel. Directly above the suitcase was a small window, with a small patch of sea and a small patch of sky. In the evenings, a star would light up in the small patch of sky, and the small patch of sea would grow dark and restless.
Liza gazed through the window all day long. That’s where Papa lived, where the sea met the sky. Perhaps he would swim over to see Liza, just for a minute? Surely, he hadn’t forgotten her? She didn’t tell anyone about this, not even Kolya. And on the rare occasions when she was taken to the beach, she’d secretly throw crumbs into the water for Papa.
Mama (she was still “Mama” then) worked in a restaurant. She used to cry, “I can’t do this any more, I’m so tired. My feet ache.” Liza would sit down on the floor in front of her and stroke her feet. How could such beautiful feet cause so much pain? Kolya used to kiss Mama. Mama would embrace them both. “My poor little orphans. I wouldn’t put myself through this if it weren’t for you. I’d just lie down and die.”
Two years later Liza understood that Papa was dead and felt ashamed when she recalled the flying fish. She felt those thoughts must have been sinful. She never told anyone about the flying fish.
They moved to Paris. Mama began working as an assistant in a shop. And that’s when it all happened. All of a sudden she became happy again and was singing all the time. One night, when Liza was nine and Kolya was twelve, when they were already at school, Mama told them to never call her “Mama” again, and to call her Natasha instead. She said that all their troubles were over. She said that she’d run into her cousin once removed, Uncle Sasha, who was very rich.
Nobody had heard anything about Uncle Sasha before. But the very next day he appeared—a fat, dark Armenian with a large diamond ring on his finger. They moved out of their single hotel room and into an apartment in Passy. Kolya was sent to boarding school—he was disrespectful to Uncle Sasha. Liza cried a lot when that happened. That summer, they went to Trouville.
Without bothering to open her eyes, Liza plumped up the cushion under her head.
Trouville. Trouville, she remembered it well.
…The tide was out. The sea had retreated to reveal a wide white sandbank. A rowing boat bobbed up and down on the grey waves. A fisherman in a red jacket sat in it. An ashen pink sun hung high in the grey sky.
Liza waded ankle-deep into the water. A fat green crab gingerly picked its way between the seashells. Liza bent over it and flipped it onto its back. The crab started waving its claws around frantically, trying to bury itself in the sand.
He was so big! Should she take him to their pension and have it cooked for dinner? She shrugged. There wasn’t any need for that, they were hardly going to starve. She picked up the crab and threw it back into the water. “Go home, silly, go and live another day…” She had been there almost a month, but she still wasn’t used to it all. She sighed and looked out into the distance. How strange the sea looked, and the sky. It was all so pale and misty. Even the sun, too. And the breeze—it was like nothing else, so light, humid and barely palpable. And the sand was grey. Never had she imagined that such a place existed.
It was like living in a dream.
Natasha was sitting by an orange-and-white tent, reading a French novella. Liza quietly walked over and sat down beside her.
“Natasha, tell me about Moscow.”
Natasha looked up at her absent-mindedly.
“Go and play, Liza.”
“I’m bored.”
“Go and catch some crabs.”
Liza shook her head.
“I don’t want to. I read that in Russia people go out to pick mushrooms. That must be fun!”
“Nonsense. Catching crabs is much more fun. Go and play with the children. Stop disturbing me.”
Liza got up obediently and left.
A boy was pulling a toy ship along on a string.
“Are you the captain?” Liza asked him.
“I am. I have gold buttons, see?”
“So why aren’t you sailing on your ship?”
“Nonsense. It would sink with me on it.”
Liza nodded.
“Precisely. You could go down with your ship.”
The boy turned away from her angrily.
After that, some of the children started building a sandcastle. Liza stood and watched them for a while. What was the point of going to all that effort when the tide would wash it all away anyway? Liza ran back to her mother.
“Natasha, what’s the best way to get to the Kremlin from Tverskaya?”
“What?”
“What’s the best way to get to the Kremlin?”
“Oh, you’re on about Moscow again.” Nat
asha smoothed out her skirt over her naked legs. “I don’t remember. You can find out for yourself when you go to Moscow. Stop disturbing me now.”
Liza squinted her eyes and looked out over the pale waves.
“Natasha, can I go for a swim?”
“You’ve been in the water already this morning. It’s bad for you to go in twice.”
“Please, Mama! It’s so hot. Please!”
Natasha frowned indolently.
“Very well. You can go in, but be careful.”
In the tent, Liza quickly undresses and pulls on her yellow bathing costume. It’s still damp.
She runs across the wide sandbank. Faster, faster! The water is so warm. Liza throws up her arms and dives in. She’s swimming. The waves are so wonderful. It’s lovely.
She turns over to swim on her back. Of course, like this she could last around six hours, perhaps even longer.
The fisherman in the red jacket is now wading waist-deep in the water, watching the swimmers.
“You swim like a fish,” he tells her.
She blushes with delight.
“I’m training.”
“Training for what? Are you planning on swimming across the Channel?”
“No. I’m doing it just in case.”
She dives down, then resurfaces and shakes the water from her hair.
“In case of what?” He sounds surprised.
“In case of a shipwreck,” she says earnestly, before swimming off.
They have dinner at a table of their own.
“Liza, take your elbows off the table.”
Uncle Sasha and Natasha are arguing quietly, as usual.
“So, you’re going to the casino again?” Uncle Sasha is asking her.
“Why wouldn’t I?”
“Because I’m asking you not to.”
Natasha’s grey eyes well up with tears. Uncle Sasha angrily moves the mustard pot across the table.
“Here we go again. You’re so unhappy. You’re such a victim. We’re leaving the day after tomorrow, you could at least…”
Liza drops her fork on the floor.
“As soon as that!”
Uncle Sasha turns to look at her.
“Manners, Liza. You’re a big girl now.”
Through the window she can see white roses, green grass and a pale sky.
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