By the time the battle was over, Intelligence had confirmed that Valensky had bagged two German bombers and three German fighters. He had never even heard the shouting which filled his earphones as the other pilots warned each other of an attacker or screamed in jubilation when they’d made a hit—the cold, concentrated, lethal rage of his own flying made them inaudible to him. Nor did he realize that each time he shot down an enemy he uttered a harsh war cry which rang in the ears of the other members of his flight. After they’d driven off the Germans, with their tails between their legs, the air was full of comment.
“Christ, what in bloody hell was that?”
“The new chap—can’t be anyone else—no one here but us chickens.”
“Well, it sounded like a bloody condor to me!”
It was as Condor Valensky that Stash fought the Battle of Britain; and later, transferred to the Western Desert Air Force, he flew by day and by night in operation “Crusader” to relieve the port of Tobruk in November of 1941. It was as Condor Valensky that he flew a Hurricane “tank-buster” against Rommel at El Alamein; as Condor Valensky that he won the DFC and the DFO and became Squadron Commander in 1942. He was not called Stash again until the war had ended. And been won.
5
As autumn approached, Francesca and Stash, still deep in the first weeks of their honeymoon, began to plan for the future. They discussed the idea of traveling to India toward the end of November, in order to be in Calcutta for the December and January polo season which would be followed by the matches in Delhi in February and March. But, one day in the middle of October, Francesca became certain that she was pregnant.
“It must have happened that first night in the stables,” she told Stash. “I suspected it three weeks after we were married but I wanted to be absolutely sure before I told you.” She was resplendent.
“Then? In the stables? You’re sure?” he demanded, transported by the sudden joy.
“Yes, then. I know it. I don’t know how I know, but I do.”
“And do you also know that it will be a boy? Because that I know.”
Francesca merely murmured, “Perhaps.” She knew why Stash wanted a boy so badly. He had a son by his brief first marriage, a boy who was now almost six years old. The boy had been born after Stash and Victoria Woodhill had separated. That hasty marriage, product of Stash’s frustrated warrior spirit, had not lasted long into peacetime. They had waited only until after the child’s birth to get divorced. The boy’s mother had no intention of saddling her son with more foreign a name than the one he had been born with, so he was called George Edward Woodhill Valensky. However, as a baby, she had dubbed him Ram, because of his habit of butting his head against the side of his crib, and Ram he had remained. He lived with his mother and stepfather in Scotland and only visited Stash on infrequent occasions. Stash’s hope, so strong that it was expressed as a certainty, that Francesca’s baby would be a boy, was a way of ensuring himself another son, one who would not be taken from him.
Francesca had seen photos of Ram, a straight dart of a boy, with brows knitted together as he stared defiantly into the camera with a stern and unchildlike expression on his handsome face. She recognized little of Stash in this son who had an air of aristocratic coldness, a high-strung, almost bitter expression that already indicated that he would never allow himself to relax into the rough and confident stance of his father.
“He’s a regular horseman, even now, even at this age,” Stash said. “Ram’s a perfect physical specimen, brought up like a little soldier—that damned British upper-class tradition.” He looked at the photograph again, shaking his head. “However, he’s intelligent and as tough as they make them. There’s something … closed off … in him … like all his mother’s family. Or perhaps it was the divorce. In any case, it couldn’t be helped.” He shrugged, put away the photos with the gesture of a man who doesn’t intend to look at them again for a long time, and held Francesca close to him. His eyes searched her face and, just for a moment, his predator’s gaze softened and she felt that it was she who was his rock in a stormy sea.
The villa outside Lausanne was so comfortable and spacious that the Valenskys decided to remain there until their child was born. Lausanne itself, with its excellent doctors, was only a short ride away, and, since there was no longer any question of going to India, Stash sent his string of ponies to be put out to grass in England. After the war, he had taken the larger part of his fortune out of Switzerland and invested it in the Rolls-Royce Company. Born in Russia, brought up in the Alps, a nomad of the polo seasons, he found that his nationality was emotional, dedicated not to a country but to an engine, the Rolls-Royce engine that had, to his way of thinking, surely saved England and determined the course of the war.
In the summer of the following year, when the baby would be a few months old, Stash assured Francesca that they would move to London, buy a house, get properly settled in and make that their home base for the future, but meanwhile they lived those first months of their marriage in a state of such incredulous adoration of each other, such passionate absorption in each other’s body, that neither of them wanted to travel any farther than to Evian, just across Lac Leman, where they went from time to time to gamble at the casino. The trip by lake steamer in the early evening was a dream of pleasure as they stood together at the rail and watched the small boats, their yellow, red and blue sails like huge butterflies, heading for the harbor in the sunset When they took the midnight steamer home to the Ouchy landing stage, they were never sure if they had won or lost at chemin de fer, nor did they care.
To mark the passage of the weeks, Stash gave Francesca more of the Fabergé rock-crystal vases from his mother’s collection. Each one held a few sprays of flowers or branches of fruit worked in precious stones, diamonds and enamel: flowering quince, cranberry, and raspberries, lily of the valley, daffodils, wild roses and violets, all fashioned with the most imaginative and delicate workmanship, so that the rich materials never overwhelmed the reality of the flower and fruit forms. Soon Francesca had a flowering Fabergé garden growing by her bedside, and, when he learned of the coming child, Stash gave her a Fabergé egg made of lapis lazuli mounted in gold. The egg contained a yolk of deep yellow enamel. When this yolk was opened it activated a mechanism that caused a miniature crown to rise up out of the heart of the egg, a perfect replica of the dome-shaped crown of Catherine the Great, paved with diamonds and topped by a cabochon ruby. Inside the crown still another egg was suspended, formed from a large cabochon ruby, hanging on a tiny gold chain.
“My mother never knew if this was an Imperial Easter egg or not,” Stash told her as she wondered at it. “My father bought it from a refugee after the Revolution who swore that it was one of those presented to the Dowager Tsarina Marie but he couldn’t account for how he happened to have it and my father knew too much to insist … however, it bears the Fabergé mark.”
“I’ve never seen anything so perfect,” Francesca said, holding it on the palm of one hand.
“I have,” Stash answered, running his hands down the length of her neck until they found her breasts which were growing fuller and riper with each passing day. The egg fell to the carpet as he fastened his lips on her darkening nipples and suckled as demandingly as any child.
In Lausanne, as winter closed in on the great villa, Stash exercised the large bays in his stable during the afternoon, and Francesca napped under a light, mauve silk eiderdown, waking only when she could tell, from the subtle smell of snow that invaded their room, that he had returned.
After tea, if the early evening was not too windy, Stash took Francesca for a horse-drawn sleigh ride, and often, seeing the moon rise as they returned to the huge villa, as welcoming, cheerful and brightly lit as an ocean liner, listening to the snuffling of the horses and tender music of the sleigh bells, warm under the fur-lined lap robe, with the hood of her full-length sable coat drawn up over her chin, Francesca felt tears on her cheeks. Not tears of happiness, but rather te
ars of that sudden sadness that comes at those rare moments of perfect joy that are fully realized at the exact instant at which they are being experienced. Such knowledge always carries in it a premonition of loss, a premonition which needs no reason or explanation.
Just as Francesca grew expert in the ways of the great silver samovar that occupied its traditional place of honor on a round, lace-covered table in the salon, she became accustomed to the ways of Stash’s crowd of servants who treated Francesca with a mixture of irrepressibly loving concern and overbearing curiosity. She found herself virtually engulfed in—not “staff” she thought, nothing that starchy, not “help,” nothing that casual, certainly not “domestics,” nothing that removed, but rather a tribe of what she could only think of as semi-in-laws.
She had married into a way of life, a life which included Masha, who, as a matter of course, invaded Francesca’s lingerie drawers in order to fold each object with exquisite care, Masha who hung up her bathrobes and then tied the sashes and buttoned the buttons, so that it was no longer possible to put on a robe quickly, Masha who had her own way with scarfs, arranging them according to color rather than according to utility or size, so that old favorites had a way of disappearing into the spectrum, Masha who appeared in Francesca’s bathroom as she got out of her tub, with an enormous warm towel unfolded and ready to wrap around her.
Within a few weeks Francesca felt entirely comfortable with Masha’s ministrations and allowed her to brush her hair and even help her into her underwear, quite, Masha told her, as she had been allowed to do for Stash’s mother, Princess Titiana, when the Princess’s own maids were unavailable for one reason or another.
“Is that so, Masha,” said Francesca with lazy interest, but as she relaxed and gave herself over to the gentle brushing, she saw herself vividly, lying there on the heap of lace-covered pillows in a velvet dressing gown with her hair being tended devotedly. She had only to ask for a luxury in order to have it brought to her immediately—or, in the case of the men who came from Cartier to show Prince Valensky jewels for his wife, she had only to indicate which of the jewels pleased her, to own it. Yes, now when she walked, she walked like a princess, Francesca thought, and didn’t even ask herself what she meant.
The inquiries Stash had made among his friends in Lausanne had indicated that Dr. Henri Allard was the most highly considered specialist in the city. He ran a private clinic which was, in effect, a small, extremely well-run, modern hospital, much favored by wealthy women from all parts of the world.
Dr. Allard himself was a compact, beaming, competent and energetic man who grew tulips almost as well as he grew babies. He told Francesca that she could expect her child sometime at the end of May. Her monthly visits to Allard were a small and mildly annoying interruption of the great dialogue on which she and Stash were embarked until February. That day Dr. Allard bent over Francesca’s belly with his stethoscope for an unusually long time. Afterward, in his consulting room, he was more cheerful than this perpetually jovial man had yet been.
“I believe we have a surprise for the Prince,” he announced, almost bouncing in his chair. “Last month I was not completely certain so I said nothing, but now I am. There are two distinct heartbeats, with a difference of ten beats a minute. You are carrying twins, my dear Princess!”
“A surprise for the Prince?” Francesca’s voice rose in astonishment.
“Is there no history of twins in your family then?” he asked.
“History? I don’t … no, no history. Doctor, is there anything special … is it harder to have twins … I can’t believe … twins … you’re sure? Don’t you have to make an X ray to be sure?”
“I would prefer not to do so yet. Perhaps next month. But both heartbeats are there, each quite separate, so there can be no doubt.” He beamed at her as if she had just won a gold medal. Francesca was unable to sort out her feelings. It was almost impossible to imagine the reality of one baby, let alone two. Lately she had been dreaming of a baby, always a boy, who lay in her arms looking a great deal like Charlie McCarthy, and spoke to her as if he were an adult—happy, funny dreams. But two!
“So, my dear Madame,” the doctor continued, “you will now come to see me every two weeks for the next month and then, just to be on the safe side, once a week until the babies begin to manifest a desire to enter the world. Yes?”
“Of course.” Francesca hardly knew what she was saying. Suddenly the bewitched dream of her world had been destroyed as easily as an iridescent soap bubble. She wanted only to leave and drive back to the villa and try to absorb this invasion, this new reality.
The entire chalet beat rapturously to the rhythm of the news. Twins! Stash, in his incredulous delight, hadn’t been able to resist telling his valet, Mump, almost immediately. Mump had told the housekeeper, the housekeeper had told the chef, the chef had told Masha, who, bursting with excitement, ran to find Francesca in the library and reproached her mistress for not having announced the news herself.
“I should have been the first to know, Princess. After all … and now everyone knows about it, right down to the old laundry women and the men in the stable.”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake, Masha, I didn’t even know it myself until yesterday. Why, oh why, do you all gossip so much?”
“Gossip? Why, Princess, we never gossip. We only say what we have happened to overhear or observed or have been told.… That’s not gossip!”
“Of course not. Now Masha, we’re going to need twice as much of everything now. Two layettes, dear God, even one seems too much! Bring me some paper please, and I’ll start making lists.”
“I think the Princess should lie down,” Masha insisted.
“Masha, the Princess has work to do!”
February and March passed gaily, except for Francesca’s ever increasing discomfort. At night she could lie only on her side, Stash behind her. Often, for hours, he stayed pressing closely the fragrant length of her body, his arms around her so that he could feel the movements of her swollen belly.
“They push you like two little horses,” Stash murmured proudly. “When I was a baby Masha used to tell my mother that she had never heard of a child who suckled with such strength. She said no man had dared to treat her with such impudence, not even the one who gave her a bastard. My God, imagine two like me!” He gave a lofty chuckle.
Francesca smiled to herself at his absolute conviction that he was simply going to be reproduced in miniature, not just once but twice.
He took it for granted that the babies would be no less than extensions of himself. Already he had made plans to teach them to ride and ski, as if they would be born at the age of four, each a precocious Hercules.
One day, during the third week of April, Francesca’s back ached particularly badly. That night she woke up as if she had been tapped on the shoulder in the dark. “Who …?” she said, not really awake, and then she knew. “Well … well … what do you know?” she asked herself in a whisper and lay quietly, waiting. Half an hour later, after two more contractions had gripped her, she woke Stash gently.
“It’s probably nothing, darling, but Doctor Allard said to phone him if anything happened at all. This must be false labor, nothing to get excited about, but would you call him for me, please?” She felt shy about waking the doctor in the middle of the night.
Woken from depths of sleep, Stash jumped out of bed with the instant reactions that had become second nature in the RAF.
“Wait, it’s not a scramble—take it easy,” Francesca said, basking in a feeling of heightened well-being.
Stash returned from the phone in a minute.
“The doctor said to come to the clinic immediately. Here’s your coat and your handbag … oh, your boots.”
“I’ll brush my teeth and pack a nightgown and …”
“No,” Stash ordered, bundling her into her coat and bending down to put her bare feet into her fur-lined boots.
“At least wake somebody and tell them we’ve gone,” Fra
ncesca gasped.
“Why? They’ll figure it out in the morning.”
“I feel as if we’re eloping.” Francesca’s laugh spilled out as she watched Stash plunge into his clothes. She continued laughing quietly as he led her through the quiet villa to the garage, clumsy as he tried to support her weight when she was perfectly capable of walking by herself.
By the time they reached the clinic Dr. Allard and his chief assistant, Dr. Rombais, were waiting for them right inside the door. Francesca was surprised to see her dapper obstetrician dressed in loose white pants and a matching smocklike top. She had never seen Dr. Allard without a vest immaculately piped in white under his excellently tailored jacket.
“So, Princess, we may have less time to wait than we thought,” he greeted her, with his usual cheer.
“But it’s too soon, Doctor. It must be false labor. You said not till May,” she cried.
“Perhaps that is all it is,” he agreed, “but we must make sure, must we not?”
From then on everything else was forgotten as Francesca was settled into a bed with side rails on it. As soon as she was comfortable Allard entered and closed the door behind him.
Allard knew his statistics. Any woman faced with the delivery of twins faces a twofold or threefold increase in the possibility that the birth will be fatal to her. However, this remote chance was not his chief concern, although his operating-room staff was prepared for all possibilities. Francesca was not exhibiting high blood pressure or any signs of a toxic condition. However, by his calculations, labor was five, perhaps even six weeks premature, and under such circumstances, particularly with twins, he had every reason to be cautious.
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