Caught out staring, I offered lamely, ‘Er, yes, it’s about the job…er, post…’
She sat down, and motioned for me to do the same. There followed a long conversation about me, my qualifications, my background, education, etc. It seemed quite thorough, but I had the strangest feeling that she was just going through the motions. It made it easier for me to hedge about certain aspects of my CV and particularly about my immigration status. To my great relief, she didn’t ask to see my passport or enquire whether I had any written references. She was very relaxed and easy to talk to and, in spite of her Slavic-sounding name, spoke excellent French, with perhaps a hint of a Belgian accent; maybe she was from the north.
Presently, Anya served me my first taste of Russian tea from the samovar that I had earlier admired, and must have picked up on my reaction to it, because she laughed and said, ‘Yes, it’s something of an acquired taste! Like our cigarettes.’
She left me to persevere with the tea while she made her report to the Grand Duchess, who it seemed lived upstairs and, being very old, seldom left her suite. It didn’t seem very long before she returned, smiling, and told me that the post was mine. Naturally, I was a little surprised, and it crossed my mind that there might not have been that many candidates.
I looked at Anya and decided that she was really quite attractive, even with her old-style bun, lack of make-up and rather frumpish long dress. Suddenly, she smiled broadly and gave a sort of throaty laugh that somehow belied the serious rôle she had earlier assumed.
‘But…’ She paused; then, smiling again, ‘But you should listen carefully to what I am about to say before you accept.’
The smile vanished and was replaced by a frown and a very direct look.
‘There are several factors that you should consider carefully.’
She paused again, apparently for effect.
‘The first concerns your pupil. Her Imperial Highness Natalya is seventeen years old. She is very intelligent. She has always been educated by private tutors here in this House because she suffers from a hereditary illness that makes it impossible, and undesirable, that she should leave the confines of the House and grounds.
‘Secondly, because the Grand Duchess requires it, we – all of us here – live according to her wishes. What that means is simply that we dress, behave and live in a manner compatible with the era of her youth. For example, though we have electricity here, it is not in use. We have oil lamps, candles, coal fires. There are no televisions and no radios. You would be required to conform to these rules. As the Princess’s tutor, you will be responsible for her study of the English language, but also for more general education related to those studies.
‘You will be considered as a valued member of the household and not as domestic staff. You will eat here in this room with me or, on rare occasions, in the great dining room with the Grand Duchess and her senior staff and companions – we have a doctor, a lawyer and a priest in attendance several days each week.
‘I will show you your quarters in a moment. One thing I really need to explain to you is that, during the period of your contract – which is renewable – you will have a great deal of free time and you will have all the facilities of the House at your disposal, but you are requested not to leave – that is, not to go outside the confines of these grounds.’
She paused to allow the seriousness of this piece of information to sink in.
‘You will find us odd at first, Nicholas – I may call you that?’
I nodded.
‘We live in a rather quaint, old-fashioned way, but it has its merits when you get used to it. Your salary will be saved for you and paid as a lump sum when your contract terminates.’ She looked up at me. ‘I do hope you accept, Nicholas; it really is a unique opportunity to meet some interesting people and live a different lifestyle for a while. The Princess Natalya is an exceptional person. She bears her illness bravely. Do you have any questions for me, Nicholas?’
Again, that warm smile.
‘Er, yes, actually, Anya. You said “Princess”?’
‘Yes. She is the Grand Duchess’s niece and she has royal rank – you know, from Russia.’
I took that in slowly and then asked the obvious question. ‘The illness that prevents the Princess from leaving the House – what is it, exactly?’
The answer was immediate. ‘Oh, it’s nothing you could catch, Nicholas. Really, it’s not that sort of illness.’
I noticed the easy use now of my first name. ‘So what sort of illness is it?’ I persisted.
‘Well, to be frank, no one seems to know exactly. It comes and goes. Sometimes she seems fine for weeks and then she’s confined to her room for days on end…’
‘I still don’t quite understand…’ I said, trying not to sound too obtuse.
Anya sighed. ‘Well, it’s a disorder of the mind…a sort of severe depression that overcomes her and changes her personality. Sometimes it’s hard to know which symptoms are caused by the illness and which are caused by the treatment…which is sedation mainly, I believe. She’s been seen by all sorts of specialists, professors, psychiatrists, and no one seems to know how to cure it. But it won’t be a problem for you, Nicholas. We get a warning when it’s about to happen and then Dr Voikin looks after her. Now, let me show you your quarters before you finally decide.’
She led me back to the great entrance hall and up the grand, red-carpeted stairs on the left side of the horseshoe and then along a wide passage to a door on the left. ‘The whole of the left wing on this first floor is yours. It includes this schoolroom.’ She pointed into a large room overlooking the front grounds of the House. ‘And this is your sitting room.’ We crossed an adjoining room, with a sofa and corner fireplace. ‘And this is your bedroom.’ We entered another small room with a double bed and wardrobe. I noticed a jug and ewer on a stand and a small bedside table with a candlestick. ‘You see, Nicholas, it’s self-contained, as they say. This door connects with the sitting room and then the schoolroom, and this door is to the main passageway; the bathroom is just across the corridor.’
During this monologue, I made general noises of approval, all the while thinking it a far cry from sleeping on the floor at Bruno’s.
Anya seemed to be getting more animated and enthusiastic as we went along. ‘Now,’ she said archly, ‘I’ll introduce you to the staff.’
Leaving the bedroom by the corridor door, she led me to a dark-painted door right at the end of the passage. Here, at the back of the House, the narrow, winding stairs were uncarpeted and the painted walls a dirty cream. Carefully we descended, first to the ground-floor landing, and then a further four or five steps to a sort of semi-basement. It was a huge, stone-flagged room lit only above head height by ground-level windows and a big fire in a sort of walk-in stone fireplace.
At the window side, facing the back garden, were cookers and a great sink with slate worktops and, behind them, walls hung with copper kitchen utensils. Opposite, the fireplace had a few battered leather armchairs and a huge, scrubbed wooden table with benches either side.
Gathered in the middle of this room were the ‘staff’ in whose company I was about to spend several months of my life.
CHAPTER 3
Introductions, and the Veiled Lady
‘The world of reality has its limits; the world of imagination is boundless.’
JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU
‘Madame Amélie, this is Nicholas, our new tutor.’
A short, heavily built middle-aged woman stepped forward, wiping her hands on her apron. She shook hands with me, staring intently with tiny black eyes set in a broad red face. There was something incredibly porcine about this Amélie, and she could only ever have been a cook, in this life.
Behind her, eyes downcast, was a young girl with frizzy blonde hair, wearing a black uniform over a high-collared white blouse.
‘This is Agnès, our parlourmaid.’
Anya pulled her forward and she shyly shook hands without looking up.
Lastly, it was the turn of the tall, gaunt man who had admitted me earlier.
‘This is Monsieur Serge, or Sergei Alexandrovitch.’
She smiled at him. He leaned forward and extended a hand towards me, and again I caught that whiff of saddle soap and tobacco.
‘Serge is our chauffeur and handyman.’
‘Groom and steward!’ he corrected in a gruff voice, looking at Anya angrily. His handshake was stiff and strong, conveying, as he no doubt intended, the idea that he was the man of the house.
After all this excitement, each went back to his or her duties. Serge flopped in the old leather chair nearest the fire and began to roll a cigarette using Balkan Sobranie and liquorice paper. Agnès busied herself with the dishes. Only Amélie and Anya remained with me.
‘He looks half-starved,’ Amélie said to Anya as though I weren’t present. ‘He needs some decent Russian grub,’ she added in her coarse French. ‘Don’t worry, Monsieur Nicholas, I’ll look after you, fatten you up. You’ll see.’
Anya smiled and guided me out. ‘They’re nice people once you get to know them. Now, Nicholas, go and fetch your belongings and come back as soon as you can. You won’t change your mind, now, will you?’
She looked up and I felt that she was almost imploring me. I reassured her and told my first lie: I said that I was staying locally and would be only a short while.
Once I’d retrieved my suitcase from the café, I sat down on a bench and listened to the roar of the Paris rush-hour traffic on the nearby boulevard for about an hour and then returned to the House, suitcase in hand. There was a look of relief in Anya’s eyes as she led me upstairs and left me in my room, with instructions to wear the new suit that I would find in the wardrobe and meet her for dinner downstairs in the library.
Never before had I possessed such a beautiful suit: dark grey, double-breasted, hand-made worsted. It fitted me absolutely perfectly, as did the white silk shirt, which felt wonderful against my skin. Even black leather brogues had been provided, and a selection of dark, tasteful silk ties. I had almost forgotten how to knot a tie.
I sat on the bed – my bed – and waited impatiently for the time to pass until dinner. Anya had made a positive impression on me. It was almost like meeting a sister I hadn’t known existed. Less than eight hours earlier, I’d been sitting in a squalid café, penniless, without papers or a job and nowhere to sleep, talking about revolution; little better than a tramp. Now I was Monsieur Nicholas, tutor to a princess, staying in my own suite of rooms and wearing a hand-cut suit, new shoes and a silk shirt and tie! The total unpredictability of my life took my breath away.
To pass more time, I tinkered with the oil lamps so that I would know how to use them when it got dark. A few minutes before 8 p.m. I left my rooms by the passage door and, feeling rather self-conscious in my new clothes, made my way towards the huge horseshoe of the double stairways. From the landing of the double-height first floor, the main hall and entrance lay below in front of me, the black and white floor tiles sweeping up to the heavy crimson curtains now concealing the huge stained glass windows. The soft glow of the numerous oil lamps and the smell of the lamp oil pervaded the House.
As I descended slowly, taking in the splendour, the front doors opened and a woman swept hurriedly into the hall. As she turned to close the doors, I saw that she was wearing a long, dark, Edwardian-style dress with matching elbow-length gloves and an old-fashioned wide-brimmed hat of the sort that I always associate with the aristocracy at weddings. She turned and began to climb the stairway opposite to mine. We reached a point where I, descending, and she, ascending, were parallel, and she looked across at me. It was only then that I noticed that her face was completely hidden by a dark veil. I expected her to speak but, when she did not, I muttered a hesitant, ‘Bonsoir, madame,’ not thinking until afterwards that I should perhaps have used a more elevated form of address. She did not reply and, reaching the central landing, walked off down the passage leading to the right wing of the House.
The library was bright and welcoming, at least the area near the fire where Anya was sitting, formally dressed, at a table for two.
‘Good evening, Nicholas,’ she greeted me in French. So far she had not asked me about my knowledge of Russian, and I certainly did not want to encourage any enquiry.
I sat down opposite her, feeling strangely shy in the rather intimate setting. She was too busy with the samovar to notice and soon broke the tension by swearing softly as she accidentally touched a finger to the hot metal. Eventually, she succeeded in providing me with a glass of hot, sweet, milkless tea which tasted better than it looked.
Agnès served dinner and we ate well. In fact, compared to my recent poverty-imposed diet, we ate better than I had eaten for months. There was wine and coffee and, of course, glass after glass of tea. I was ravenous but tried not to show it, as Anya was eating slowly and wanting to use the time to give me more information about the House and my rôle in its workings. Finally, during a pause, I remembered to ask her about the strange veiled lady I’d seen on the stairs.
Anya’s smile disappeared for a moment and she looked at me straight in the eyes, her face very serious. ‘That, Nicholas, was Madame Lili.’
‘Madame Lili,’ I repeated mechanically, pleased that at least my unanswered greeting had been correct.
Anya seemed to think that the mere utterance of the name explained everything, and fell silent.
‘So?’ I asked. ‘Who is Madame Lili and what does she do here?’
Anya remained serious. ‘She is the Grand Duchess’s companion and her spiritual guide.’
‘“Spiritual guide?” Aren’t they supposed to be Red Indians…?’ I repeated, unable to keep the hint of amusement out of my voice.
Anya didn’t laugh. She didn’t even smile, and I knew that I’d made my first gaffe. While I searched about for some way of redeeming myself, she remained silent and thoughtful. Suddenly she put her hand on my arm.
‘Nicholas, we are the same age and we are both, in a way, strangers in this House. I hope that we can be friends and support each other so I feel I must warn you. Do not do anything to upset Madame Lili. Not only does she have the ear of the Grand Duchess, but she is a very, very dangerous woman.’
‘Dangerous? How?’
‘She has powers – don’t ask me to explain, I can’t – but she is capable of much harm. Please believe me.’
Her absolute seriousness impressed me and I mumbled some sort of reassuring remark.
Things went a bit quiet for a time but, after Agnès had cleared away, Anya suggested that we go to the kitchen. There, it was even more cheerful than the cosy library. Sergei sat next to the huge open fire, smoking some foul-smelling Russian tobacco, and Amélie sat opposite, still wearing her cook’s apron, her huge face flushed even redder by the fire. Anya and I sat down on the benches and listened as Sergei recalled tales of his time as a Cossack with the White Army. His French was slow and heavily accented, adding to the atmosphere created by his words. It wasn’t until much later, when I found out his age, that I realised that he could have been no more than a child during the Russian Civil War.
As the evening progressed, more tea was served and I had trouble keeping my eyes open. Eventually, Anya noticed this and told me gently that perhaps I needed to try out my new bedroom, an idea that I accepted gratefully.
I felt a strange light-headedness as I mounted the back stairs, almost as though I had had a lot to drink. Putting this down to the fumes from Sergei’s cigarettes and pipe, I collapsed into bed and slept soundly for the first time in weeks, waking only when Agnès tapped on the door the next day with yet more tea and a pitcher of hot water for the washbasin. I felt slightly hungover, but the curiosity of meeting my seventeen-year-old royal student livened me up. And so, much greater was my disappointment when I was told that she was unwell.
With nothing to do all day, I turned to my own studies, broken by periods of exploration of the great old House.
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The tall window of the schoolroom overlooked the front drive and was furnished only with a blackboard, bookshelves, a few armchairs and a couple of tables. The best room of my suite was certainly the little sitting room between the schoolroom and my bedroom. Although it was May, Agnès still lit fires and, sitting in a leather armchair reading Bergson, I felt as at home as anywhere I’d ever lived.
It took only a few minutes to lay out my possessions on the bed, and as I put my alarm clock on the bedside table I was amused to find a candlestick and matches, in addition to the main oil lamp hanging from the ceiling on a weighted pulley.
Having nothing further to do to complete my moving in, I set to exploring my new domain. My first discovery was a real surprise: one of the large cupboards in the schoolroom was actually the entrance to a narrow spiral stairway, and when I followed it down, groping in the dark, I came out via a wooden panelled door in the library, on to a sort of mezzanine floor where the top shelves of books could be reached from a narrow landing. Forward from here, another spiral stairway, this time wrought iron, continued to the floor. The entrance to the first stairway from the schoolroom was concealed on the library side by a hinged bookcase so, in effect, I had my own ‘secret passage’ to the library! I could tell from the copious cobwebs that no one had passed that way in a very long time. Anya had certainly not mentioned it, and I wondered whether she actually knew about it.
After that, things seemed a bit disappointing. The hallways of the House were rather grand, wide, carpeted and hung with a dark red embossed paper and, here and there, a pool of light cast by oil lamps on wall brackets, their soft yellow glow adding warmth and a distinctive smell to the heavy Victorian atmosphere.
The House seemed very quiet, with few comings and goings. Noises from other parts of the building seemed lost and muffled by the thick carpets and heavy drapes and, anyway, I soon realised that I was virtually alone on this side of the House, all the main living and sleeping quarters being in the right wing, separated from me by the cross-landing and another long passageway similar to mine and running parallel to it.
The Spaces in Between Page 3