Katerina’s arms tightened around her son. ‘But where to? And what will happen to us? The Austrians behaved barbarically in the few weeks they were in Belgrade. What will they do when they have the entire country at their mercy?’
Zita’s cameo-like features were ivory-pale. ‘Sandro intends leading all remaining troops over the mountains and into Albania, to Scutari. Even though he is ill, the King is going to accompany him.’
Gently Katerina lifted Peter from her breast, holding him in one arm as she fastened her blouse. ‘And Papa and Ivan? Will they be going as well?’
‘Sandro still has no word of Ivan. Your father, however, will be going. As we will be going.’
Katerina felt the blood drain from her face. ‘Across the mountains? In winter? How can we? Peter is only eight weeks old!’
‘And what will happen if we stay?’ Zita asked tautly. ‘I doubt if any of us will survive. This way at least we will all be together.’
As her eyes held her mother’s, Katerina realized there was no choice. A year ago they had barely survived a few weeks of Austrian occupation. As Karageorgevichs they would certainly not survive a long-term occupation. She thought of the mountains and cold terror gripped her heart. The tracks they would have to follow would not be suitable for motorized transport or even ox-wagons. Their only means of conveyance would be pack-horses; their only food would be that which they were able to take with them.
They left on 24 November, part of an exodus over two hundred thousand strong. In a long endless line, the Austro-Hungarian and German armies hard at their heels, they headed south-west. The mountains proper began at Lioum-Koula and that evening, as Katerina tucked Peter in his thickly blanketed crib, she did so by the lights of a hundred scattered fires as all the transport and food wagons that could be taken no further, were burned.
Day after day they trudged through snow and ice, climbing to windswept plateaus several thousand feet above sea-level, descending into narrow gorges running between towering black walls of basalt and then climbing again to yet another plateau of breathtaking grandeur and desolation.
Many died of cold and disease and hunger. Every morning Katerina woke she expected to find Peter dead in his eiderdown-padded carrying-crib. Every morning she was greeted, instead, by healthy crying.
When the mountains were finally behind them a sea of mud lay ahead of them. Exhausted, malnourished pack-horses keeled over and died in their tracks; even Zita could no longer ride but had to toil through an ankle-deep and often knee-deep, quagmire.
When Scutari was reached a sick and exhausted Sandro made the decision to ship the remnants of his army to Corfu. There, still in close vicinity to possible fields of action in Albania and Salonica, his troops could be rested, reorganized and re-equipped. The Italians who were in control of the area refused to assist him or provide him with transport. There was nothing for it but to trek another hundred miles through malarial coastal lowlands to Valone where, hopefully, the French would come to their aid.
To Katerina, time no longer had any meaning. Alexis had obtained fresh pack-horses and an ox-wagon in Scutari and as she sat next to Zita, Peter in her arms, squashed by the many weak and infirm who had been squeezed into the wagon beside them, her mind drifted hallucinatedly to the blissfully carefree days of early 1914. She was again at afternoon tea parties at the Konak; walking in Kalemegdan Gardens with Natalie; dancing with Julian at her mother’s Summer Ball.
When at last they were aboard a French ship bound for Corfu she said reflectively to Zita, ‘Do you realize it’s nearly Christmas again? If Gavrilo Princip had not shot the Archduke, and if Austria had not then declared war on us, Sandro would now be officially engaged to Grand-Duchess Olga.’
‘And thousands upon thousands of people, probably millions, would not have died,’ Zita said thickly. ‘It doesn’t bear thinking about, does it? Do you think Princip will ever realize the enormity of his action?’
‘How could he?’ Katerina looked around at the raggedly dressed, emaciated figures around them. ‘He’s locked away in a prison cell. How could he possibly imagine the depth of the suffering that has been caused? No-one who has not seen it could imagine it. It’s beyond imagination.’
Only days later Sandro told her he had received confirmed reports of Ivan’s death.
‘I’m sorry, Trina,’ he said gently.
They were on the balcony of the villa that was now the Vassilovich home. In the distance, beneath a diamond-bright winter sky, the Aegean glittered like glass.
‘Thank you for taking the trouble to tell me yourself, Sandro,’ she said stiltedly, not daring to analyse the emotions roaring through her.
‘It was the least I could do.’ His voice was bitter.
As she looked into his familiar, now haggard, face, she felt a shaft of pain that was not for herself or for Ivan. On the terrible trek across the mountains Sandro had been very ill, so ill that he had had to undergo surgery under the most primitive of conditions. His illness and the crippling burdens, military and political, that he had shouldered over the last eighteen months, had taken a savage toll. He was no longer the handsome young man who had teased her and who had laughed and joked with Natalie and played with Bella. Careworn and still physically fragile he looked a man in his late thirties, not his mid-twenties.
She said with sudden passion, ‘Oh God, Sandro! When will this war be over! When will things be as they used to be?’
‘Things are never going to be as they used to be,’ he said bleakly, ‘the entire world has changed and it’s never going to be the same again.’
‘But surely some things will be the same!’ she protested, appalled. ‘When the war is over we’ll be together as a family again. Natalie will come home and…’
At the expression in his eyes the words died on her lips.
‘What is it?’ she asked fearfully. ‘Why are you looking at me like that? What have I said?’
He blanched, saying tautly, ‘I thought your father would have told you…’
‘Told me what?’ Never, during all the horrors she had experienced since the war had begun, had she been more terrified. ‘Has something happened to Natalie? Something that’s been kept from me?’
The pale February sunlight gleamed on his dark hair and his gold pince-nez as he said awkwardly, ‘During the last days of peace the Austrians demanded Natalie’s extradition. They suspect her involvement with Gavrilo Princip. They suspect she met him the day before the assassinations in Sarajevo.’
Behind her, in the villa, Peter began to cry. For the first time since he had been born Katerina did not rush to his side.
‘But what the Austrians suspect doesn’t matter now!’ she protested bewilderedly. ‘When the war is over and they are defeated they won’t be in a position to do anything about their suspicions!’
‘Maybe not, but whatever the situation after the war one thing is certain and that is that questions are going to be asked by the entire world about the true nature of Serbia’s involvement in Archduke Franz Ferdinand’s assassination. If Natalie’s association with Gavrilo Princip comes to light it will be seen as evidence that the House of Karageorgevich, and therefore Serbia itself, instigated the assassination plot and are responsible for triggering off the bloodiest war the world has ever seen. If that happens my only defence on Serbia’s behalf will be to show that ever since the assassination Natalie has been persona non grata. There mustn’t be the faintest suspicion that, knowing of her involvement, I and my government condoned it.’
‘I don’t understand …’ Katerina could feel the blood draining from her face. ‘What do you mean, persona non grata?’
‘Natalie can never again be received at court, Trina. She can never return to Belgrade.’ His voice was unsteady. ‘She can never, ever, come home.’
Chapter Sixteen
Natalie ran up the steps of the Fielding home, her heart hammering as if it were about to burst. She had never been given her own key to the house and she had to ring the be
ll and wait in frantic anxiety for the butler to open the door.
When he did so she hurtled past him into the hallway. From somewhere upstairs came the sound of weeping. She wondered if it was her mother-in-law or Diana; if it was for Edward or for Julian.
Now that the moment had come when she could ask and have her question answered, she couldn’t force the words past her lips. Her throat was so tight she felt as if she were about to choke. Gasping for breath she came to a halt outside the drawing-room door and the butler said, his voice betraying his inner distress, ‘Sir Archibald and Miss Diana are in the drawing-room, Mrs Fielding.’
She grasped hold of the door knob, her palm slippery with sweat. She could ask the butler whether it had been Julian or Edward who had died, but she didn’t want to hear the news from a butler. If Julian was dead, she wanted to be told by someone who loved him.
With her chest still hurting from her long, agonized run, she opened the door and entered the room.
Her father-in-law was standing near the marble fireplace, the telegram still crushed in his hand. Diana was sitting on one of the sofas, silent tears streaming mascara down her face. The minute Natalie entered the room she sprang to her feet, running towards her.
‘Oh, Natalie! I’m so glad you’re here! Do you think there could possibly be a mistake? Do you think Edward could be alive after all?’
All through spring the house remained in deep mourning. Lady Fielding retreated to her bedroom, displaying a passion of grief of which Natalie had not thought her capable. Sir Archibald withdrew into long, sombre silences. Diana no longer partied when not on duty at Guy’s but instead went for long lonely walks in the park.
Natalie, too, grieved for Edward, but she had not known him long or intimately and her grief was not as savage and as all-consuming.
As the weeks went by and Diana remained wretchedly solitary, Natalie’s loneliness increased until she could hardly bare it. She had Stephen, of course, but Stephen was only nine months old and though she loved him with all her heart, he couldn’t yet be a companion to her.
Inevitably she began to spend more and more time with Nicky. From the moment she had met him, heavily pregnant, she had been physically attracted to him. Within weeks of Stephen’s birth she knew it was an attraction fully reciprocated. Her problem was what to do about it.
She knew what she wanted to do about it. Julian’s love-making had made her more than aware of her capacity for sexual enjoyment and it had been six long months since he had been home on leave. Deeply sensual by nature she was finding her celibacy an increasing burden, and she wasn’t at all sure that it was necessary.
As she took Stephen for a daily walk in his pram in the park, she pondered on the oddness of her marriage. She had not chosen to marry Julian. Surely, then, she wasn’t as morally bound to be faithful to him as she would have been if she had fallen in love with him and married him in a normal manner? She thought of her mother and Katerina and knew that far from being in agreement with her reasoning, they would be deeply horrified by it.
As Stephen sat in his pram, chewing happily on an ivory teething-ring, she looked out over the park lake, frowning deeply. Was there any real reason why they should be? If she hadn’t agreed to marry Julian her mother would be embarking on her third year of living in Geneva. As it was, thanks to the sacrifice she, Natalie, had made, her mother had been able to remain in Belgrade. Under those circumstances, surely her mother was in no position to censure or criticize her?
As for Katerina … Natalie sighed. Katerina was so naturally honourable she couldn’t imagine her ever doing anything of which she need feel guilty or ashamed. And how could Katerina understand the cataclysmic demands of instant, unreasoning, overwhelming sexual attraction? Katerina had never been in love and when the time came when she did fall in love, Natalie doubted that it would be a case of love at first sight. Katerina was too coolly sensible to let her heart rule her head. When Katerina married it would be to someone eminently suitable and she would do so only after a long, decorous courtship. Katerina would never have to wrestle with her conscience in the way that she, Natalie, was now having to do. Katerina’s love-life was never going to be anything but serenely uncomplicated.
Satisfied that she need not trouble herself about the opinions her mother and Katerina might one day have of her if she were to have a love affair with Nicky, her frown cleared. Whatever her decision, it was one over which she need not torture herself. The bizarre circumstances of her marriage were such that behaviour that would normally be regarded as outrageous was, in fact, only to be expected.
She watched a duck as it skimmed low across the surface of the lake, the sun glinting on its jewel coloured plumage. The main problem was, of course, that Julian would not be in agreement with her.
A child on roller-skates raced past her. She was so deep in thought she hardly noticed. Where Julian was concerned, surely the solution was simply never to confide in him? It wasn’t, after all, as if he intended selflessly putting her happiness over and above his own. He had told her quite categorically that when the war was over he would not be applying to return to Belgrade; that instead he was hoping for a posting in Paris or St Petersburg. That being the case, surely she was entitled to embark on a relationship with a man she had begun to think of as her soulmate; a man who, if circumstances had been different, she would have chosen to marry?
The answer was so obviously in the affirmative that a delicious shiver of anticipation ran down her spine. She wouldn’t, of course, hurt Julian. He was her best friend and she was very, very fond of him. She would take great care that he never became aware of her changed relationship with Nicky. There was, after all, no reason why he should ever do so. All she had to be was careful.
Nicky sensed the decision she had taken the instant they next met. His white teeth gleamed as he flashed her a dazzling smile of supreme satisfaction.
‘We will not stay to the meeting,’ he said with typical male Slavic high-handedness. ‘We will go to bed.’
It was what Natalie had intended but she had not expected the matter to be put quite so bluntly. Reminding herself that there was a world of difference between the passionate, impatient temperament of a Slav and the restrained, refined temperament of the average Englishman she forgave him his unromantic directness.
Nicky was being true to himself as she was now going to be true to herself. For the first time in her life she was head over heels in love. Her affair with Nicky was going to be a taste of what her life would have been like if she had never met Gavrilo; never gone to Sarajevo; never been obliged to marry an Englishman. It was going to be a union of minds as well as bodies for they shared the same political dreams and aspirations in a way she and Julian would never do. She remembered Julian’s adamant intention never to apply for a return posting to Belgrade. How could there be the least mental affinity between them when he was so uncaring as to the central passion of her life?
There were no such barriers between herself and Nicky. Nicky understood utterly her fierce love of home and country; he understood why she had had no choice but to give Gavrilo and Trifko and Nedjelko all the moral support possible; he understood why she could never reconcile herself to self-imposed exile in London or Paris or St Petersburg. He was her soul-mate; her other self.
With adrenalin coursing through her veins she turned her back on the meeting and, accompanying him to the small bedsit he rented above a shop in Camden High Street, turned her back also on marital fidelity.
In July came horrific reports of the fighting on the Somme. Natalie waited in terror for a telegram informing her that Julian was among the dead. Instead, towards the end of August, she received a pencil written postcard from him telling her little else but that he was still alive. She had cried with sheer relief, at first mystifying Nicky and then annoying him.
‘Why are you reacting like this?’ he asked crossly when, tears glittering on her eyelashes, she told him the news. ‘It’s me you love, remember? Not him.’
‘He’s my best friend,’ she said truthfully. ‘How else should I react?’
‘He’s a man you were forced into marrying,’ he said exasperatedly. ‘An Englishman. How can anyone be best friends with an Englishman?’
Natalie had laughed at his idiocy and been pleased by his jealousy. ‘If you knew him you would easily understand.’
‘Well, I don’t know him,’ Nicky said dismissively, pulling her close against him, ‘nor do I want to talk about him.’
Afterwards, back home at Cambridge Gate, Natalie sat on her bed with her legs curled up beneath her, Bella by her side. When she had embarked on her affair with Nicky she had not anticipated complications. Now, however, because of Nicky’s attitude towards Julian, she could see complications looming. What would happen when Julian came home on his next leave? What if Nicky insisted on a confrontation with him? She shuddered at the very thought, putting her arm around Bella and hugging her closer, wishing that, just for once, life could be problem-free.
In September life became, if not problem-free, decidedly more optimistic. A new offensive was launched by the allies from Salonika and in the forefront were Serbian troops, well rested and well drilled after their months of recuperation in Corfu. Led by Alexander, the army’s advance was rapid. Soon they were again on Serbian soil, fighting the Bulgarians, and Natalie was euphoric, certain that both her father and Max were with them.
In November came news that Emperor Franz Josef had died and that his successor was to be his great-nephew, the young Archduke Karl. Natalie wondered if Gavrilo would be told of the emperor’s death and, if so, what his reaction to it would be. As always when she thought of Gavrilo she wondered where he was being imprisoned, whether it was in Bosnia or Austria; if he had contact with Trifko and Nedjelko; if his cough was still troubling him.
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