CHAPTER 50
“In Russia one can only believe.”
Fyodor Tyutchev
THE COURT OF PRINCE IVAN
STRATTON MOUNTAIN
Her eyes searched the darkness for her niece.
Please, Jules, be here.
The room was paneled in dark pine with a steep, beamed cathedral ceiling. Glass cups and an antique Russian Samovar sat in the center of a small table. In a shadowed corner, an arched bow with its quiver of silver arrows hung next to a spiral metal staircase that rose twenty feet to a loft and disappeared. Animal trophy heads hung above the dark fireplace. The north wall was a huge expanse of glass filled with night sky, making it seem as if the room were suspended out over the edge of the mountain.
No Juliet. The man was alone.
He’d risen from his seat and was walking slowly toward her. Her eyes locked on his face.
“Alexandra Katya Marik,” he said in his low, cultured voice. “I’ve been expecting you. It seems you are too smart for your own good, Dr. Marik. After we spoke at Anthony’s gala, I knew it was only a matter of time until you found me. So. Welcome to the Court of Prince Ivan.”
She realized that she was shivering uncontrollably. She gripped the ski-pole, wrapped her arms across her chest - more for warmth or protection, she couldn’t say - and skirted around him, not speaking and never taking her eyes from his, until she had her back to the stove. She tried to slow her breathing and waited for the warmth of the embers to seep beneath her clothes.
The lamplight caught the planes of his jaw, sharpening the edges, turning his skin and beard to gold. Standing so still and tall in front of her, he resembled no one so much as a Prince from the old Russian legends.
His face, the aged face from the old photograph, stared back at her. Eyes the color of a Russian winter sky. “It’s cold, I know,” he murmured, “you should keep your jacket on.” The bearded Professor bent to stoke the glowing coals in the old stove. “But I cannot stand to have a fire in the fireplace...”
“Rens Karpasian,” she said softly. “Or should I call you Ivan?”
“Here, I am Ivan. You only think you know me, Alexandra.”
“I know you are a Russian spy.”
He spiked an amused eyebrow. “I am the President’s next National Security Advisor. Nothing more, nothing less.” Karpasian bowed slightly.
“I’m glad it’s you! I thought, for a time, that my brother-in-law was the spy. I couldn’t have born it.”
“You thought that my friend Anthony was a traitor...” Ivan smiled grimly. “Whatever made you think so?”
“So many small things.” Her voice was almost inaudible. “The scar on his forehead - he said it was a riding accident.”
“Poor Anthony. It was an accident, you know. He was hurt years ago, when he was thrown by a thoroughbred.” He watched her, shaking his head slowly. “So someone has filled your head with tales of injured spies, it seems, and you believed it.”
Her disloyalty flooded through her and she rushed on. “Anthony is in line to be the next Secretary of State. And - he drinks Stoli.”
“A wise man, if prematurely condemned.” Ivan reached for a silver-knobbed cane and took another step toward her.
She raised the ski pole like a shield and backed away. “Don’t come any closer.”
“I only need a cane when the weather is bad,” he murmured. He moved past her to the small table. “So you have come all this way in a storm to find me? Surely you could have exposed me with one phone call. Unless - you knew no one would believe your ridiculous accusations. Why are you really doing this, Alexandra?”
Her eyes followed him warily. The table held a samovar, a bottle of ice-colored whiskey, and a huge pitcher of water. Turning his back, he poured hot tea from the steaming samovar into a crystal glass, the old Russian way, added sugar and handed it to her. “You’re freezing and frightened. Drink this. I won’t hurt you. But you must tell me why you’ve come.”
She leaned the ski pole against the table, cupped her gloved hands around the mug and, watching him over the rim, drank deeply.
Satisfied, he returned to the sideboard and poured a full glass of Stolichnaya Gold for himself, then held it up to her in a gesture of mock salute. “Na Zdorovie.” He downed the vodka in one long swallow and gestured to the sofa. “Please, be comfortable.”
“I’ll stand.”
He smiled. “So. Tell me what you want to know,” he said again, conversationally, as he poured a second drink.
“Where is she, Rens?”
He turned to stare at her with surprise. “She? Who?”
“Juliet. Eve’s daughter.”
Genuine shock registered in his eyes. “Daring girl, isn’t she? I take it she’s run away again?”
“Not this time. I received a text message. And a photograph. Someone has her. He told me to come here, to Stratton.” She took another swallow of tea as she gazed around the shadowed room. “I thought it was you. At first…”
She caught the flash of concern in his eyes before he lifted the vodka to his lips. “I did not take her,” he said softly.
She watched him carefully. And thought he was telling the truth. “A man has been following me,” she pressed. “A tall man with very fair hair and pale blue eyes. I think you know who he is. I need your help.”
He met her gaze. Something more, now, flickering in the wintry eyes. Confusion. Suspicion. And then – sudden understanding. The eyes grew hard.
He was very still, staring down into his glass. “Help you… The irony is staggering,” he murmured.
“I agree. But you must help me. Tell me how I can find her.”
“Everything has a price, Alexandra.”
“Don’t play with me, damn you. What do you want?”
“You are hopelessly naïve. You cannot give me what I want.”
Don’t be so sure. She set the tea glass on the table. “I’m leaving. I came here for answers. If you won’t help me find Juliet, I’ll find her another way.” And take you down any way I can, you bastard.
“I can’t let you leave,” he said softly. He stepped from the shadows to stand in front of her.
“I said I’m leaving. Go to hell.” She reached for the ski pole.
He held up a hand. “No doubt I will. But Eve was my friend. I don’t want her daughter hurt.”
“Eve was your friend? Spare me.”
An odd expression flared in his eyes. He knew something.
“This is about me, Alexandra. Not Juliet. As long as I do what I have to do, I will be able to keep her safe.”
She hesitated, took a step back. She had no reason to believe him, a liar! And yet - she did. Keep him talking.
“Why should I believe you, Ivan? You’ve done nothing but betray your friends, all these years.”
“I am simply a man loyal to his country. That is not a crime.”
“But which country?”
“So many questions, Dr. Marik.”
“Just the one, Ivan. Why?”
“Why?” He took a deep swallow of vodka, closed his eyes. “Maybe because I was born in a very poor village north of Leningrad. I was always cold and hungry. To this day, the smell of goat cheese and boiled potatoes make me sick...”
Listen. Find his weakness. Use it.
“I spent most of my time alone, reading, thinking. I wanted to be a soldier, like my father. He was a war hero. All I wanted was to have a gun and shoot any man who fought against Russia. My homeland. The home of my parents, and their parents, and theirs...”
He moved to the table as he spoke, poured more hot tea for her, added sugar, then looked toward the window. Outside, the white mountains were etched sharp as glass against the night sky.
He gestured with his cane toward the high peaks. “When I was a young boy, five or six, I discovered the glory of the mountains. My father was gone for many months at a time, but once, when he came home, he took me into the forests. Just the two of us.” He looked down at her an
d smiled gently. “You remember the legend of Peter and the wolf?”
He was drawing her deeper and deeper into the game of cat and mouse. So be it. “Prokovkief’s music,” she answered.
“Yes. Magical. A Russian forest covered in snow, the glory of the mountains, the vast silences broken only by the cry of the wolves. My father gave me my first bow and arrow, taught me to survive in the forests. I eventually became an excellent hunter - and marksman.” He glanced at the silver arrows glinting near the stairs, then away. “But then one day he left to rejoin his unit, and never came home again.”
“And the young soldier became a dancer.”
Real surprise – and admiration - sparked in the silver-grey eyes. “So you know about that, too?”
“I know you were a ballet dancer with the Kirov.”
He made a pained sound in his throat. “Please, Alexandra. A danseur-noble. Da, another of fate’s twisted ironies. A ten-year-old who longed to be a soldier participated in his village folk dancing festival and was chosen by visitors to attend the Kirov’s ballet school in St. Petersburg.”
He smiled without humor. “The city was Leningrad, of course, in those days. Yes, the child of the Cold War, who wanted nothing more than to fight for Communism and make his father proud, became a dancer. It was a huge honor, not only for me, but for my mother and little sister, for my village.” He turned toward the window, and spoke to the distant peaks. “The amazing thing was, in the months that followed, I discovered that dancing was my soul’s true passion.”
“A passion you chose to leave behind.”
“No. I chose to dance in the west. Like Nureyev. And Baryshnikov. They were so accomplished, so brave.” He shrugged. “That is no crime.”
“You became a spy,” she accused him.
“You’re speculating,” he murmured. “What is it about Russian dancers? Are we all guilty until proven innocent? The Americans thought Nureyev was a spy, too, did you know that? The FBI launched an espionage investigation into Nureyev in 1964. They’d discovered a cryptic note in his California hotel room, behind a wall plaque. Something about ‘contact with an agent.’ Absurd, of course. Ludicrous. Trumped up charges, as usual!”
“Why would you say that?”
“Because I knew him. He was obsessed with ballet! Just as I was.”
She drank again, deeply, grateful for the hot tea that was seeping warmth into her bones.
Ivan said, “Nureyev was born in motion, on a train on the eve of World War II. I, too, believed that I was born in motion. For me dancing meant possession. When I was accepted into the Kirov, it was everything. Surely you understand having such a passion?”
Yes. Ruby. Art. Avenging my sister’s death.
“But you never danced again. Your life became a lie.”
“You believe I chose to stop dancing?”
When she remained silent, he went on. “I was secretly baptized by my mother,” he told her, “but never religious.” He sighed. “No, I found my faith on stage. There was my exaltation.” He gestured with a dancer’s grace in the shadows. “Home was no longer the forests in the north. The ballet became my true home.”
It sounded as if he was finally unlocking thoughts that had stirred inside him for many years. “Then how could you bear to leave that life behind?”
Melancholy eyes locked on hers. “I left because I was reaching for a dream,” he said. “In Russia, we had no freedom to dance. Your life depended on someone saying yes or no - for no logical reason. I had to fight just to get on stage two or three times each month, to get the partners I wanted, to dance the danseur-noble roles. But I would have to wait years to dance the Corsaire.”
He shook his head as if the memories still burned deep. “I was so young. I wanted to dance new ballets, modern ballets. I wanted to choreograph! But the company’s artsoviet - the artistic committee - vetoed all the creative roles. There would be no doorway for me to the international dance world. The Kirov was a mini police state.
“In those days,” he said softly, “Pushkin’s dancers were so purely trained that we could not survive in Russia. If I had remained, I would be dead, because impotence and rigidity corroded everyone. Understand this, Alexandra. Like Nureyev before me... To be an artist, I had to leave Russia.”
She swallowed her tea, drank again. She’d been moving around the room, was standing next to the fireplace now, one hand resting lightly on the sharp iron poker. An unsettling wave of dizziness passed over her, and she shook her head. “It still makes no sense,” she insisted. “How could you agree to remain loyal to a country that gave you no freedom?”
“You ask the most complex question of all,” he said softly. “To be a Russian artist in the Soviet era was perhaps the greatest oxy-moron. You have to be Russian, to be born there, to understand. I loved my country. It is still my spiritual homeland. The Russian exile becomes a Byronic figure, haunted, melancholy, filled with grief and longing for his homeland. It goes far, far beyond politics, into the deepest regions of the Russian soul...”
“But you sold your damned Russian soul to men who would rule you for the rest of your life.”
“Thoughts cannot be forced,” he said gently. “I expressed my soul in dance. It was ballet that would keep me free. And if I had to perform a - favor - for the country I loved, it was an honor. Not a price to pay.”
“Was there honor in leaving your family behind?”
“I gave them a better life.” He smiled and drained his glass. “I went to see my mother before I left, told her everything. She said, ‘Ty schastliv?’ Are you happy? She understood.”
The room was growing warmer. Alexandra felt the dizziness touch her again and swayed toward him, then back.
“I’ve spent over forty years hiding every truth about myself,” he murmured. “I’ve become someone else. But still I cannot erase a young boy’s memories of his homeland. The light of springtime, when the old babushkas would venture out in their shawls and hats of cat fur, to sit and gossip on the benches. My little sister, eating ripe peaches under a white flowering tree. My mother, cutting lilacs in her tiny garden, filling baskets to sell in the marketplace. Ah, the smell of those lilacs...”
He stiffened, suddenly, as if he’d heard something. “What was that?” he whispered, moving toward the spiral stairs. He stopped, held out a warning hand for silence, and listened. Only the hollow sigh of the wind through iced pines broke the stillness.
Alexandra felt as if she were swimming through thick water. “It’s a long road from ballet dancer to the inner circle of Presidents. What happened to that young man’s dreams?”
Anguish flickered across his face. “Fate Happened. Death Happened.” He glanced down at his twisted leg. “But I still had duty. And honor.” He gestured toward the stereo speakers on the bookshelf. “Perhaps I am like Stravinsky’s music,” he told her. “He took music apart, and put it back together in a new way. That’s what happened to me.”
“The liar is lying to himself, now, Rens.”
“Let this go, Alexandra. If you do, I can protect you. Your accusations will only open a Pandora’s box.”
“You sound like Anthony.” She drank again, shook her head stubbornly. “My sister is dead because of you. I will prove that you are the Firebird.”
He froze at the words, then moved to stand beside her. He bent until his eyes were burning into hers. “What do you know about the Firebird?” he whispered.
His words were becoming blurred, his voice fading in and out. What was the matter with her? Fighting off the fog, she said, “You danced the role of Prince Ivan, in the Kirov’s Firebird Ballet in London.”
Shock glazed his eyes. She looked away, into the stove’s embers, suddenly mesmerized. “You called this lodge your Court,” she said softly. The words sounded slurred in her ears.
“Yes, the Court of Prince Ivan,” he admitted. “Ivan’s glass palace, the place where the prince was happiest. Act III in the Firebird Ballet.”
The room was g
rowing too warm. Where was the ski pole? She pulled off her gloves, shoved them into her pocket. Shrugged off her ski jacket, let it drop to the floor. “There was a fire in the theater,” she murmured. “But you rose from the ashes, didn’t you? Like the legendary Firebird.”
He looked at her as if he knew there was no reason, any longer, to keep his secret. “Yes, there was a fire,” he said finally. “The fire changed everything.”
His voice resonated with remembered pain. “My partner and I were to leave by the alley door, immediately after the performance. A car would be waiting...” He looked down at his legs. “I did not expect the fire, never knew I would be hurt so badly.”
His face crumpled with agony. “A prince who did not know that his doomed love for his Firebird would lead to unwitting betrayal. And her death.”
He doesn’t know Tatyana is alive. Use it!
“You’re no longer that prince, Rens.”
“I never lost my presence. I have it still. Do you understand what I am telling you, Alexandra?”
“Yes. You’re not going to let me stop you.”
He nodded. “I cannot let you stop me. But it will be better for you if we are honest with each other now. Come, the hour grows late. Do you have any concrete proof that I have committed a crime?”
“Eve knew... And Charles Fraser.” The strange dizziness washed over her again and she squeezed her eyes shut. When it passed, she turned to him. “Was Fraser’s car crash an accident?”
“He was going to initiate a mole hunt.” He turned away. “But I do not know what caused his death.”
The pain that shimmered in his voice unsettled her. “Why, Ivan? Why have you lied all these years, why hurt so many people who never hurt you?”
“You think I do not know hurt?” he asked her fiercely. “When a fire in London took away all my dreams for the future!”
Firebird Page 36