Olga sat still and graceful upon a straight-backed chair, the thick and softly-curling grey hair that was drawn up upon her head making the slender neck look fragile as the stem of a flower. She turned her head, looking out of the window to where Sasha and his sister, the excited dogs at their heels, rode up the snowy drive, returning from their last morning ride. ‘Tomorrow,’ she repeated. ‘How very fast time flies, does it not?’
Margarita said nothing. The week had seemed an eternity to her.
The following day they left to return to St Petersburg. Sasha did not broach the subject of resigning his Commission again.
* * *
Katya was bored. Bored with dancing. Bored with the endless, senseless flirting. Bored with young men who, it seemed to her, all looked and sounded alike, the only noticeable difference between them the colour and cut of their uniforms. She was also aware that her small deceptions were on occasion coming perilously close to discovery; indeed, if it had not been for the fact that her father had been involved in major business negotiations that had involved a great deal of travelling to and around Germany, she doubted she would have got away with her light-hearted prevarication regarding the progress of her relationship with Jussi Lavola for as long as she had. Further, she knew that her father, indulgent or no, was likely to take a terrifyingly dim view of his daughter’s escapades if they came to light. But an odd, unsettled and unsettling dissatisfaction drove her. She was looking for something, she did not know what. She suspected, in her more morbid moments, that it was something that did not exist.
On the evening that she met Major Kostya Illyarovich, an officer of the Volinsky Regiment, in Felicien’s Restaurant, a fashionable eating place reputed to be the most beautifully situated in Europe she was, unusually, actually with Jussi. For each of them it was on occasion politic to appear in public together, though neither took any great notice of the other and the company – all young, all perfectly aware of the ‘arrangement’ – accepted the situation with equanimity.
In the moment of introduction Katya recognized Kostya Illyarovich as quite clearly the most dangerous man she had ever met. Jussi himself introduced them, one eye on a redheaded gypsy girl who was moving from table to table with a basket of flowers, selling her wares to the highest bidder. As the girl reached them he slid a long arm about her waist, his smile angelic, and skilfully steered her away from the next table and into a curtained alcove.
Katya was left facing a pair of coal-black, appraising eyes in a flat, brown face, scarred from jaw to eyebrow on the left side. A heavy black moustache gave the man the air of a bandit, and no fancy uniform could disguise the arrogant power of his stocky body. He was the oldest of the company, in his late thirties, perhaps, or early forties. His features had a mongol cast; he looked a barbarian. She had watched him all evening, and she knew that he knew it. He was not tall, but strong, and his stance was easy; experience showed in every line of his square, all but impassive face. In some odd way, without so much as moving an eyebrow, he had about him an immediate aura of violence that repelled and attracted her in absolutely equal measure. His eyes took mannerless and only slightly interested stock of her face, her jewellery, and then, more slowly, her body.
She should, she knew, walk away now.
‘Good evening, Major,’ she said, and returned a level look with one of her own. Her father was away. When he returned she was certain he would require an accounting; he demanded a son-in-law, and a grandson. He would not wait too much longer. The trap was closing.
The man nodded. Grinned suddenly. Took her hand and carried it to his lips, but instead of the usual formal brushing of lips against the back of the hand he turned it to kiss the palm. His moustache was strong and wiry against the sensitive skin. She opened her fingers, surrendering to the small, outrageous intimacy; shivered a little. ‘Good evening, lady,’ he said. ‘Would the lady care for a drink?’
She was playing with fire. She knew it. But that, she told herself, altogether too smartly, was better than not playing at all. ‘Yes. Thank you,’ she said. ‘The lady would very much like a vodka.’
It was the most entertaining evening she had spent in a very long time. Secure in this most crowded of public places, stimulated in equal measure by vodka and an excitement not unmixed with a quite delicious if very real trepidation, she teased and tempted the man in a manner not unlike the child who will poke a stick through the bars of a wild animal’s cage knowing that retribution cannot possibly fall upon it. And exactly like that same animal, he watched and he waited, allowing her her moment, his square, mongol face impassive, an expression flickering occasionally in the hot eyes that sent a shiver of warning through her, and then served simply to provoke her into greater indiscretion. When the restaurant dimmed and the spotlighted gypsy singers and musicians appeared, he was sitting next to her at the table. As if to get a better view she moved her chair a little, closer to him, leaned forward, her elbows on the table. Almost casually, quite openly, he reached a hand to her breast, cradling it in a strong hand, his thumb moving over her nipple. For a moment she allowed it, trembling, sudden fire in her veins. Then abruptly she sat back, folding her arms across her bosom.
She heard his laughter in the darkness, above the music. He turned from her then, his broad, insolent back to her, eyes and attention on the gypsy girl who stepped into the circle of light, arms raised, fingers clicking.
She burned with humiliation. And with something else. Something she recognized as being very dangerous indeed.
In the sledge on the way home Jussi, unusually, attempted a warning. ‘He’s a dangerous man, Katya. He isn’t a child, to be played with. He’s not one of your pretty boys who’ll dance to your tune and thank you for it.’ He was unwontedly serious.
Katya cocked her head provocatively. ‘Oh? You think I can’t manage him?’
‘I know you can’t,’ Jussi said, simply. ‘He’s –’ He stopped.
‘What?’
‘There have been – stories.’
‘What kind of stories?’ She was innocently and deliberately obtuse.
He turned to face her. The runners hissed on a new fall of snow, bells jingled on the harness. ‘You know well what sort of stories. For heaven’s sake, Katya, don’t pretend to be stupid! Just believe me, Kostya Illyarovich does not play this game by the same rules as most of the rest of us. He has no fear, no respect for anything or anyone. He is a law unto himself. He’s a gambler. He’s a born fighter. He cares about nothing and no one but his regiment and his men. And he’s a brute with women.’
She settled back into the furs. ‘How very interesting,’ she murmured.
‘Katya!’
The vodka and the cold air were making her dizzy. She giggled a little.
‘Please. Don’t be any sillier than is absolutely necessary.’ Jussi was more brusque than she had ever heard him. ‘Stay away from Illyarovich.’
‘But, Jussi – you introduced me to him yourself!’
‘A mistake,’ he said, grimly, his pleasant face for once unsmiling.
She let a small silence develop. Then she turned. ‘Jussi, we have an arrangement. You remember?’
He nodded. ‘I remember.’
She pointed a gloved finger an inch from his nose. ‘You look after your sheep,’ she turned the finger to point to herself, ‘and I look after mine. That was it, wasn’t it?’
He held out for a moment longer, then relaxed, laughing more than a little ruefully, into his seat. ‘Yes, Katya. That was the arrangement.’
The sledge glided on through the snow-sculpted countryside of the Islands towards the lights of St Petersburg.
* * *
Illyarovich did not contact her, though for those first few days she looked minute by minute for some kind of message, so certain was she that he would. A week went by. Another. She was furious. The more he ignored her the more she thought about him; the more she thought about him the more fascinating he became. She would lie in bed at night and build his image
before her; the bull shoulders, the strong, stocky body, the flat, terrifying mongol face. She looked for him at the skating parties, the sledge rides, the concerts and the parties; but he did not come.
Her father arrived home, busy and distracted, left again. Her mother was involved with a new charity, a smarter and more demanding set of friends. Katya danced and skated, laughed and flirted, kept up the pretence of her association with Jussi Lavola, watched constantly for Kostya Illyarovich.
And in the end, of course, the fish played to perfection and begging to be caught, he came.
The occasion was Jussi’s sister’s birthday.
It was late March, still cold, the river and Gulf still ice-locked, and likely to be for a month or more longer, but with the faintest suggestion of change in the air. Snowstorms still swept from the wastes of Siberia, the bitter wind still sliced down the streets of the city, cutting through clothing like a sharp-honed blade, but on occasion in the lengthening days the sun shone, glittering on the iced and frozen world with a tentative springlike suggestion of warmth. Elisabet’s birthday fell upon such a day, and so the sport that Jussi and his friends had arranged in her honour was the more flamboyant, the more enjoyable for the bright beauty in which it was couched.
First there was the inevitable splendid luncheon at the Turnakov mansion, situated in a small square off the Nevsky, early so as to leave as much time as possible for the races and games on the ice that Jussi had arranged for the short afternoon. Jussi had his own small apartment in the west wing of the mansion, a privilege obviously available only on the grounds of his sex – a sister, Katya had often pointed out, tartly, would have been allowed no such freedom – and one that Katya much envied. The luncheon was for the selected few, and Katya was resigned to the fact that necessarily she was seated next to Jussi with Elisabet’s eyes uncomfortably sharp upon them.
She smiled a small, wry smile at him over her crystal glass. ‘How’s your plump little widow?’
He grinned. ‘Plump. And very widowed. On Tuesdays and Thursdays, at least.’
Katya could not prevent a small, spluttering shout of laughter. ‘Poor man!’
Jussi was injured. ‘Not at all. It’s preferable to being dead every day of the week, isn’t it? And, by the Cross!’ He rolled his eyes. ‘That’s what he’d be if I didn’t relieve him of some of his – husbandly responsibilities.’
Her laughter was genuine. The one thing, possibly the only thing, she had to admit to liking about Jussi Lavola was his sense of humour. His lean face was the picture of put-upon innocence. She caught her mother’s eye upon her, lifted her glass in salute, breathed a small word of thanks that she could not hear what the two supposed love-birds were talking about, then laughed again at the thought.
‘And you?’ Jussi asked.
Katya shrugged. ‘All right. I suppose.’
He affected surprise. ‘But – didn’t I hear that young Marushki and Ivan What’s-his-name of the Corps de Pages were on the point of a duel over you?’
It was an exaggeration, and more than an exaggeration, as he well knew. She grinned her appreciation. ‘As I said: all right, I suppose.’
The many courses finished, more and yet more food packed into sledges and taken to the banks of the Neva to feed the wider party invited to the afternoon’s celebrations, they repaired to the ice. Braziers were lit. Passers-by hung over the bridges, watching. Wooden benches and seats were provided, with footwarmers, handwarmers and blankets for the knees. There were sledging races and skating races. There was what seemed to Katya to be an excessively silly game involving officers from two rival regiments and the bladder of a pig, which unfortunately ended with at least one broken leg, a near-serious challenge to a duel the following day and – uncounted – several black eyes. The climax of the afternoon, to be followed by fireworks and skating, were the horse races; and if what had gone before, broken leg and all, had been comparatively light-hearted, there was no pretence here at anything but a deadly resolve. The young men, dashingly uniformed, expensively horsed, milled about the starting line, pushing and jostling for position.
Katya, standing by a brazier on the ice, sensed someone behind her, turned to find Jussi, towering above her, his eyes on the riders. ‘Why aren’t you out there?’
He shrugged without looking at her, smiled his disarming smile. ‘I am not an army man.’ He paused for a moment, flashed a quick grin. ‘And I can’t ride. Not in the way that is necessary to keep body and soul together out there, anyway.’ He slanted a laughing glance down at her. ‘My soul is very precious to me. I don’t want to part with it. Not yet.’
She laughed outright. ‘I sometimes forget you aren’t a Russian –’ She stopped.
There he was. On a sturdy Cossack pony that he rode as if he were born into the saddle. A single rein, a light bit. That same careless, arrogant stance; she would have recognized him anywhere. The pony was smaller than most other horses in the race. She saw him speak, remembered the things she had heard about these animals; that they were controlled entirely by the knee and by the voice of the rider. Despite the uniform, the gleaming decorations, the trappings of civilization, here was a rider from the steppes, a Mongol of legend. A disciple – a reincarnation – of Genghis Khan. She watched, suddenly, with bated breath.
He turned the pony with perfect timing, was on his way like an arrow just as the signal shot was sounded. No man saw anything of him but his back.
Two heats he ran, two heats he won, with the rough-coated little horse barely blowing. Katya neither cheered nor waved, as others, newly discovering an outsider, did. She stood like a statue, watching intently. The final race involved half a dozen horses, each the winners of the heats. Two in particular were splendid beasts, aristocrats ridden by men who knew both their own worth and their animals’. Their riders exchanged good wishes, leaning from their saddles before they raced, shaking hands, laughing.
Kostya Illyarovich circled his small beast away from the milling contestants, some of whom it must be admitted had partaken quite copiously of the hospitality on offer. Katya watched. Saw him lean to the little horse’s ear, short, powerful legs lifting him in the saddle. Restless, eager to be off, the animal pawed the ground. Its rider, watching the starter, wheeled to the line.
One of the contenders was down before the race was truly begun. How such an unfortunate accident occurred was impossible to tell. In these icy conditions, anything could happen. Even Katya, who saw the incident from start to finish, since it quite clearly involved the rider upon whom the whole of her attention was focused, could not for her life have sworn to what happened. Certain it was that the little Cossack horse, apparently avoiding the falling animal, leapt clear of the melee and was off in pursuit of the race leader like a hound on scent of the prey.
The onlookers on the bridge suddenly decided to take sides. ‘Come on, the Volinsky!’
The Volinsky, a fascinated Katya saw, came on, and with a vengeance. He streaked up behind the bigger horse, dogged him for long enough to unsettle the beast, then shot past him like a bullet out of a gun to pass the finish line a good two lengths ahead.
‘Well,’ Jussi said behind her, very dry, ‘justice is done again, I see.’
The prizes were presented. The fireworks began, a spectacular show. Katya waited, watching the sparkling, jewel-like colours reflected in the snow. Sure enough a solid, stocky figure detached itself from the crowd and came to stand beside her. Jussi had gone.
‘Congratulations,’ she said.
Kostya shrugged.
She could see her mother, fur-draped, elegant as ever, chatting animatedly to an acquaintance. She stepped back a little, into the shade of an overhanging tree.
‘A prize for the winner?’ he asked.
As she had expected his arms and his body were strong, overwhelmingly so. His kiss took the very breath from her body.
She struggled free. ‘Stop it! For heaven’s sake! Are you mad?’
He laughed, very quietly. Out on the ice
flares were being lit against the darkness, a band struck up. He kissed her again, very fiercely, forcing her back against the tree trunk. There was a soft sound behind them. They jumped apart. Jussi stood there, in his hands a pair of skating blades, that without comment he handed to Katya. As she bent to put them on he said, coolly, ‘People are wondering where you are,’ and was gone.
She straightened. Kostya stepped back, a shadow in the shadows. ‘Meet me on Thursday,’ he said, quietly. ‘Two o’clock. By the bandstand in the Summer Gardens.’
She hesitated. Prudence, or perhaps fear, unexpectedly won. ‘I – can’t,’ she said. ‘Not Thursday.’ She could not see his face. She wanted, immediately, to deny the words, to tell him she’d meet him anywhere, any time –
‘Katya? Katya – there you are! We’ve been looking for you everywhere!’ A group of laughing youngsters were skating towards them. ‘Come on, do! Come and skate.’
He looked at her for a long, calm moment. ‘You meet me Thursday, or you meet me not at all,’ he said, and turned and left her.
* * *
She met him. She told no-one, not even Jussi. He had hired a sledge and a driver; they drove out along the shores of the Gulf, into the winter forests. They talked a little, but only a little; she questioning, he replying with laconic brevity. Yes, he had seen active service, both in Japan and in the Ukraine. No, he had no family. And no, he had no interest in possessions; what above a good horse, a sword and a gun did a soldier need? She resisted neither when he kissed her nor when, beneath the furs, his strong, hard hand slid beneath the bodice of her dress to caress her breasts: nothing in her life had ever excited her so. The sheer brute strength of the man both fascinated and repelled her. As unlike the young men who usually danced attendance upon her as he could possibly be, he drew her like a magnet; yet at the same time if she were honest she had to admit that he truly frightened her. And what frightened her more was that at that moment, absurdly, she knew that had he asked she would have gone anywhere with him, risked anything for him, done anything, absolutely anything that he required of her.
Strange Are the Ways Page 26