Zadruga

by Margaret Pemberton

  ‘Tragically we all assumed wrongly. Though there is to be another baby later this year, it is Natalie’s wish that she and Julian live apart.’ He rested a hand comfortingly on her shoulder. ‘That being the case, when Julian was offered a posting in Belgrade there was no reason for him not to accept it.’

  ‘Another baby?’ Tears began to stream down Zita’s exquisitely-boned face. ‘How can she possibly have wanted an estrangement if she is to have another baby?’ She looked up at Julian accusingly. ‘Even if she wanted one, how could you have agreed to it? What if you’re still here when the baby is born? What about Stephen? He’s only just got used to having you home. How is Natalie going to explain to him that you’ve left him again, this time voluntarily?’

  A spasm crossed Julian’s haggard face and Katerina said in a choked voice, ‘I think you need a drink of tea, Mama. I don’t think we should discuss this any further until the shock has worn off and we can all think rationally.’

  ‘Rationally? How can we be rational about Natalie living in exile without a husband by her side? How is it possible to be rational when I have a grandson who can never visit me and when I am to have another grandchild I shall seldom see?’

  Never in her life had Katerina heard such bitterness in her mother’s voice.

  ‘If Julian had accepted a posting in Romania or Greece it would have been different,’ Zita continued heartbrokenly. ‘Natalie could have changed her mind about the estrangement and joined him.

  We could have visited them, perhaps been there when the baby is born …’

  Her silent tears turned to sobs and she was unable to continue. Alexis said quietly. ‘I think it would be best if you left us alone for a while.’

  ‘Yes, sir. Of course,’ Julian said wretchedly, a pulse beating furiously at the corner of his strong jaw line.

  He turned and began to walk to where Katerina stood in the still open doorway. As their eyes met he saw with a rush of unspeakable relief that her eyes were not hostilely accusing, as Zita’s had been. Instead there was a depth of understanding in them that almost rocked him on his heels.

  As she turned with him and left the room and as the door closed behind them he said tautly, ‘You know, don’t you?’

  She nodded, feeling so much love and compassion for him that she couldn’t trust herself to speak.

  ‘And about the baby as well?’

  The corridor was deeply shadowed and she was grateful. ‘Yes,’ she said thickly, ‘I know about the baby, too.’

  He drew in a deep, shuddering breath. ‘Thank God,’ he said fervently. ‘Thank God there’s one person in the world to whom I don’t have to lie!’ And with a rush of the affection he had always felt for her, he took hold of her hand.

  Chapter Twenty

  Two days later, as they walked together in the spring sunshine in Kalemegdan Gardens, Peter scampering ahead of them bowling a hoop, Julian said, ‘Perhaps it would be more politic if I told you of Natalie’s confession to me, before I ask what she said to you.’

  Katerina nodded. It was the first time they had met since the traumatic moment when her mother had collapsed in floods of tears, weeping not only for the present but for things long past.

  ‘Yes,’ she said quietly, grateful he had realized Natalie might have told her things he still did not know and that she might not want inadvertently to reveal to him. ‘Perhaps that would be best.’

  They walked another dozen yards in silence and then he said starkly, ‘She told me she had been having an affair with a fellow Slav, a Croat, and that she was expecting his child.’

  With great difficulty Katerina kept her eyes straight ahead, on Peter in his pastel-blue coat, on the wobbling hoop, on the distant view across the Sava.

  ‘I take it you were told the same?’ he asked, his pain so obvious that she winced.

  ‘Yes.’ She didn’t trust herself to look across at him. ‘She told me his name was Nikita Kechko, that he was shortly leaving Britain for Belgrade and that she was going to come with him.’

  ‘And was that when you told her she couldn’t do so? That she was persona non grata?’

  Katerina nodded.

  Julian dug his hands deeper in his overcoat pockets. ‘When we returned to London and she told Kechko of her inability to return to Belgrade, he refused to alter his plans for her. For all I know he’s here now and I’m just praying to God that I don’t run into him, because if I do…’

  The pulse at his jaw line began to beat again and inside his pockets his hands clenched into fists.

  Katerina stood stock-still on the gravelled pathway, her eyes wide with shock. ‘He’s abandoned her?’

  Now a few feet ahead of her Julian halted and turned to face her. ‘Yes. He apparently disclaimed all paternity for the child into the bargain.’

  Katerina’s eyes widened even further. ‘Then when you led Mama and Papa into thinking that the baby was yours, you weren’t doing so because you felt it was Natalie’s responsibility to tell them the truth about the baby’s paternity? You did so because you don’t intend them ever knowing the truth? Because you intend acknowledging it as your child?’

  His gold-flecked eyes were darker than she had ever seen them. ‘Yes,’ he said, turning his velvet coat collar up against a light breeze that had begun to blow from the river. ‘Unless I do so, Natalie will be publicly seen to be an adulteress. For Stephen’s sake that’s the last thing I want.’

  Slowly Katerina began to walk again, her mind racing at all the implications of his decision. As he fell into step beside her she said, her soft smoky voice cracking slightly, ‘That means that your parents will be deceived into thinking Kechko’s child their grandchild! That the child will grow up believing you to be its father!’

  ‘I’m well aware of all it will mean,’ he said tautly. ‘I only wish I believed Natalie was half as well aware.’

  For a few more moments they walked together in silence, both thinking of Natalie, both knowing she would never appreciate the terrible depths of the deceit that, for her sake, he was going to live with for the rest of his life.

  For the next few months, as Belgrade became a hotbed of political and diplomatic activity, she saw little of him. When they did meet, however, they did so in deep, unconditional friendship.

  Very few questions were asked as to why Natalie had not returned to Belgrade with her husband. An extended family was the basic social unit in Serbia and no-one thought it odd that Natalie should be living with her husband’s family, especially as it was now known that she was having another child.

  When Zita told Alexander that she was to be a grandmother again he responded with relief, believing it meant that Natalie was happy in her hurriedly arranged marriage and happy in London.

  In early May, on one of the rare occasions when Katerina found herself able to talk to Alexander without half a dozen people listening to every word, she said as casually as possible, ‘Do you know of anyone by the name of Nikita Kechko?’

  Alexander frowned slightly. ‘No. Should I?’

  ‘He was a loyal supporter of the Yugoslav Committee and I believe he thought he would be given a position of some kind in the new parliament.’

  ‘The name means nothing to me,’ Alexander said again, ‘but if it’s someone you are anxious to trace the best person to speak to would be Prime Minister Pasich.’

  Katerina didn’t follow his advice. If the name meant nothing to Sandro then she doubted it would mean anything to his aged prime minister. Natalie had been wrong in thinking that Nikita Kechko was heading for a brilliant political future in Belgrade, just as she had been wrong about so many other things.

  Her reaction had been one of vast relief. It meant there was little likelihood of Kechko and Julian meeting and it meant that her father, too, was unlikely to make his acquaintance.

  At the end of the month Zita announced she was going to give a ball.

  ‘It won’t be as grand as the balls I used to give,’ she said as she sat in the Italian room, dr
awing up an invitation list. ‘It will, however, make a lot of people happy. Not least Eudocia and Vitza.’

  Alexis grunted disparagingly and burrowed himself even deeper behind the Serbian Literary Herald.

  Failing to elicit the response she desired from her husband she looked across to where Katerina was embroidering a waistcoat for Peter.

  ‘I wonder if I will be able to persuade Sandro to make an appearance?’ she asked meditatively. ‘It would do him good to relax a little more.’

  ‘I doubt if Sandro will attend anything frivolous while the Versailles talks are still being conducted,’ Katerina said, regret in her voice.

  Alexis lowered his newspaper. ‘He’s not in France all the time and he just might be persuaded to attend. If he does, can I ask both of you not to make the true reason for the ball embarrassingly obvious?’

  ‘What true reason?’ The waistcoat Katerina was embroidering was a traditional one and she snipped off rose-pink embroidery thread and began to re-thread her needle with moss-green thread, genuinely perplexed.

  Zita kept her eyes judiciously on her invitation list.

  ‘That Alexander is being given an excellent opportunity to survey the prettiest girls and to turn his thoughts towards marriage?’

  Katerina’s eyes flew towards her mother. ‘Is that true, Mama? Is that the real reason you are having a ball?’

  Zita laid down her pen, saying with an air of great patience, ‘Sandro is now thirty. If he doesn’t marry soon he’s going to turn into a confirmed bachelor. It’s important for the dynasty, as well as for his own happiness, that he doesn’t do so.’

  ‘At thirty, a man has plenty of time in which to find himself a wife and obtain an heir,’ Alexis said, mild amusement in his voice.

  ‘For some men, maybe,’ Zita said placatingly, ‘but not, I think, for Sandro.’

  Alexis’s amusement vanished. ‘I hope to God you’re not insinuating…’

  ‘Of course not!’ There was loving ridicule in her voice. ‘If I thought that I certainly wouldn’t be encouraging him to marry! Sandro’s problem is that he is serious-minded by nature and the problems he now faces as Prince Regent are making him even more so. He needs the comfort and companionship of a wife and finding a wife is quite obviously not one of his present priorities. The only people being received in that ghastly house in which he has chosen to live are politicians, generals and delegates.’

  ‘And you would like to see a few women being received?’

  ‘I would like to see some feminine interest in his life,’ Zita retorted, unabashed. She picked up her pen again but before she returned her attention to her invitation list she looked across at Katerina, adding gently, ‘And I would like to see some masculine interest in your life, Trina. You’ve been a widow long enough, my dear. It’s time you made us all happy and provided Peter with a loving stepfather.’

  The announcement of the Vassilovich ball sent a frisson of excited expectation through the city. Even for those with no hope of being on the guest list it was a welcome indication that life was returning to normal.

  ‘What a pity it’s still a month too early for roses,’ Zita said to Katerina, casting a satisfied look around her refurbished ballroom. ‘Another month and we could have filled the house with them.’

  ‘The house looks wonderful,’ Katerina said truthfully. ‘I never thought I’d see the ballroom so beautiful again.’

  ‘No,’ Zita agreed quietly, remembering the mayhem when hundreds of terrified Belgraders had taken shelter there and then the later horror, when their home had been occupied and vandalized by the enemy. ‘Neither did I.’

  They fell silent, thinking of all the terrible events that had taken place since the last Vassilovich ball; the occupation of the city, the typhoid epidemic, the deaths of dear friends.

  Alexis strode up behind them, resplendent in white tie and tails. ‘Why the deep introspection?’ he asked, putting his arms around their shoulders. ‘The house looks wonderful. The ballroom is a vision of splendour. Alexander is to be guest of honour. What more could you both want?’

  ‘Nothing,’ Zita said with a wide smile, banishing the wave of melancholy that had swept over her. ‘Prince Paul is coming too. Ever since Sandro returned to Belgrade Paul has been his constant companion and closest adviser. I’m not sure whether Prime Minister Pasich approves. I rather think he would like Sandro relying on him alone for political advice, but Sandro and Paul have always been as close as brothers and it is a situation with which Mr Pasich is going to have to learn to live.’

  ‘Prince Paul’s presence will undoubtedly set a few feminine hearts beating faster,’ Alexis said, guiding them both gently out of the ballroom and towards the head of the grand staircase. ‘And talking of hearts beating faster, I’ve just seen Cissie and could hardly believe my eyes. She’s wearing a ball dress of scarlet chiffon and is looking very Mata Hari and not at all sensible and British.’

  ‘Good,’ Zita said, unperturbed. ‘Cissie has been sensible for far too long. Perhaps tonight she will make a conquest.’

  Vitza, too, was dressed to make a conquest. Her gown was of embossed indigo brocade, the neckline swoopingly low, the skirt as stiff and regal as a coronation gown.

  Later, when everyone had been formally received, she said casually to Katerina, ‘Is it true that King Peter and your father once discussed the possibility of a match between Sandro and Natalie?’

  Katerina’s eyebrows rose slightly. ‘Yes,’ she said, wondering where on earth the conversation was leading, ‘a long time ago.’

  Vitza’s eyes gleamed. ‘Then if Natalie was once considered as a possible bride, there’s no reason why I shouldn’t be considered as well.’

  ‘Except that there has never been any special relationship between the two of you,’ Katerina said cautiously. ‘I also think it likely that Sandro will do as he did before when choosing a bride. I think he will choose the daughter of a ruling house. Princess Marie of Romania perhaps or …’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous, Katerina. Princess Marie isn’t even Slav! She’s all Höhenzollern and Saxe-Coburg.’

  ‘She’s part Slav,’ Katerina corrected gently. ‘On her mother’s side she’s descended from Tsar Alexander II as well as Queen Victoria.’

  ‘A smidgeon of Russian blood doesn’t make her a Slav,’ Vitza said obdurately.

  Katerina sighed. She liked Vitza and didn’t want her to be hideously disappointed, and disappointment was most certainly lying in wait for her if she continued to believe that Sandro might ask her to be his future queen.

  The band began to play the ‘The Blue Danube’and as her father took her mother in his arms and began to dance with her Katerina had the dizzying sensation of having been transported back in time. It was 1914 again and she could smell Natalie’s light, flowery perfume; hear her infectious giggle. At any moment Julian would dance past, Princess Militza in his arms; Max would ask if he could mark her dance-card; Great-Aunt Eudocia would be heard, making disparaging remarks about the Tsarina.

  ‘Prime Minister Pasich certainly won’t want Sandro marrying a non-Slav,’ Vitza continued, shattering the heart-aching illusion. ‘I think perhaps I should engage him in conversation this evening. I think I shall say that …’

  Katerina never did learn what Vitza intended saying to the prime minister. At that moment Cissie danced past in the arms of one of Alexander’s equerries and Vitza’s jaw dropped.

  ‘Great heavens! Is that Natalie’s ex-governess?’

  ‘In the scarlet chiffon?’ Katerina asked, keeping amusement out of her voice only with the greatest difficulty. ‘Yes. She looks wonderful, doesn’t she?’

  ‘She looks nothing of the kind! She looks …’ Vitza sought vainly for a suitable adjective. ‘She looks fast! It’s the kind of dress a Russian ballerina might wear! And why is she still in Belgrade? Even more to the point, why is a governess at such an occasion as a guest? I know your mother is eccentrically radical but…’

  ‘Cissie is in Bel
grade because she has chosen to make Belgrade her home,’ Katerina said equably, ‘and she’s a governess no longer. She’s Papa’s secretary and Mama bought her the dress for her birthday.’

  ‘Then I don’t think Aunt Zita showed her usual impeccable taste when she did so,’ Vitza said frostily, trying to keep the envy she felt from her voice. ‘A gown like that can’t help but draw attention. She must be feeling acutely uncomfortable.’

  As the music changed from Strauss to Lehár and as Katerina danced with Sandro, she caught several glimpses of Cissie. With her mousy-brown hair brushed to a burnished bronze and swept into an elegant knot in the nape of her neck, she looked anything but uncomfortable. She looked serene and quietly composed and very, very feminine.

  ‘Do you remember asking me if I knew of anyone by the name of Kechko?’ Sandro asked her suddenly.

  Katerina returned her attention to him. ‘Yes. I wondered if he was a member of the new parliament or perhaps even a junior minister.’

  ‘He’s very far from being either,’ Sandro said grimly. ‘He’s Dr Josip Frank’s chief henchman.’

  ‘I’m sorry, I don’t know Dr Frank …’

  Sandro waltzed her past the band. Out of the corner of her eye she could see Vitza dancing with a junior aide from the French Embassy.

  ‘Josip Frank is leader of an extreme Croat nationalist party known as the Party of Croat Rights and is militantly anti-Serb. I’m curious as to how you know him. He’s not the kind of man with which any Karageorgevich should have dealings.’

  ‘I don’t have dealings with him,’ Katerina said, trying to keep the shock she felt out of her voice. ‘Someone I met in Nice asked me if I knew him. They said he had been a supporter of the Yugoslav Committee and that he expected to have a position in the new government and so obviously I thought him loyal to yourself…’

  Sandro made a disparaging sound and then said, ‘Whoever your informant was, they didn’t know their man very well. Kechko might very well have been a loyal supporter of the Committee and its aims of uniting all South Slavs into one state, but now those aims have been achieved he, and a handful of other extremists like him, want more. They want Croatian dominance within that state and they want a republic, not a monarchy.’