by Kerri Turner
‘Valya, I don’t even have a shirt on under this. Surely you don’t want your staff to—’
‘This isn’t the time to worry about that.’ She practically ran down the hall as she spoke, opera cloak flaring behind her.
Luka followed, concerned when she slipped her hand into his. It was icy, and he wanted to stop and chafe it between his own to bring some life back to it. But she kept him moving forward, leading him into the blue reception room. Once inside, she still didn’t stop; she opened the tall doors that led onto the loggia and tugged him outside.
‘Valya, it’s freezing!’ he gasped. His bare feet stung, and he shrank into the depths of his coat, wishing he’d put his shirt on underneath.
Valya raised a finger to her lips. She was staring over the loggia rail into the expanse of Petrograd beyond.
‘Listen,’ she whispered, putting both hands on the stone rail and leaning over it as far as she could. ‘You can hear it.’
Lifting his feet off the ground one after the other to keep them from freezing, Luka tried to listen for whatever it was she wanted him to hear. At first, there was nothing. Just the usual everyday noises, muffled by the thick layer of snow that covered the ground. But then he began to make something out. His feet slowed their dance, and he shut his eyes as if that would help him discern it better.
‘It … it sounds like chanting,’ he said slowly. He opened his eyes again and saw that Valya had turned her back on the view and was leaning against the grey stone railing. Her shoulders were slumped forward. ‘Valya, what is it? What’s going on?’
‘It’s the people. The factory workers,’ she whispered. Her lips had gone dry in the cold air and she licked them. ‘I received a phone call telling me. They’ve gone on strike. They think we’re hoarding bread from them.’
Luka didn’t need to ask who ‘we’ were. He remembered the day he’d tried to take bread to his father and Vladimir’s outraged response.
‘They’ve stormed the bakeries and are helping themselves to whatever they find inside. But even then they’re still demanding more.’
‘Oh.’ The word sounded pathetic in the face of all that had apparently changed overnight. ‘How … how many are there?’
‘It’s hard to say. Too many to count, I’m told. Tens of thousands at least, and continually growing. They’re making their way into the centre of Petrograd—’
The telephone was ringing again. Valya glanced at Luka, then ran inside.
Luka stayed where he was, listening. The sound he had only just been able to discern before was louder now. It was still hard to make out, but he thought he detected a fierceness to it.
A sharp pain reminded him he was barefoot and he shuffled back inside. He sat down on the nearest chair, his floor-length coat wrapped around him, leaving the door open so he could continue listening to the protesting workers. He curled his hands around his frozen feet, waiting for Valya to come back with more news.
When she did, her face was even paler than before. Luka stood up to meet her, but he didn’t need to ask; she was already talking.
‘That was Mathilde. She almost couldn’t get through—she had to ring several times. The telephone lines are overloaded. She said there’s probably a hundred thousand protesters, maybe more.’
Luka sat down again, heavily. One hundred thousand. One hundred thousand angry, hungry workers marching through the streets and looting the bakeries. Even if they were right and bread really was being hoarded, there would never be enough to satisfy that many. What would they do when it ran out?
Food supplies had worsened all over Russia, and many had given up queuing outside the bakeries, resigned to the knowledge it wouldn’t be worth it. This winter was a particularly brutal one too—if it hadn’t been for his dancing and the hours spent in Valya’s warm embrace, Luka thought he might have frozen solid. Beggars had become a common sight in the city; and Moscow was once again riddled with uprisings. And still men died. It seemed as though the Tsar was ignoring the cries of his country. And so the people had resorted to this to try to make him listen.
Luka wondered suddenly if his father was in the crowd, shouting out his own cries for food between each hacking cough, happier to steal it than to accept it from his son.
The hours that followed passed slowly and, for the most part, in silence. Occasionally the telephone would ring, and whoever had managed to get through would trade rumours with Valentina, who then shared them with Luka. Through these hurried conversations they learned that the marchers were holding signs that read ‘Freedom or Death’, and their shouts had changed from cries for bread to demands for the removal of the Tsar.
Maxim, who was closer to events, was able to give the most detail, but had been more concerned with ensuring Valentina remained safe inside and didn’t go anywhere that day. It was an order that echoed Luka’s own request, and one that Valya didn’t hesitate to obey. They sat together in the blue room, loosely holding hands, ignoring the food Madame Ivkina brought them on a tray.
Eventually, the rumbling noise that had been building became too loud to ignore. The housekeeper and maid both appeared in the room, fear showing on their faces. Valya didn’t pay them any attention; her gaze was directed towards the noise. Before Luka knew what she was doing, she’d darted back outside.
‘Valya!’ he cried, sprinting out to the loggia after her. He heard the maid gasp in fright. ‘Valya, come back! It isn’t—’
The words died in his mouth. At the far end of the road, a dark, pulsating mass slowly edged towards them. As the front of the crowd came closer, the back seemed to grow. The whole street would soon be filled up and still they didn’t stop coming.
They were close enough now that Luka could begin to make out their faces. Some were grinning, enjoying the unruly display as if it were a holiday; others set their mouths in grim lines. He tried to scan for his father, but there were far too many people. Children laughed and ran among the legs of the adults, repeating whichever cries they happened to hear, oblivious to the real reason for the march. Hastily assembled banners waved above them. And the noise … Luka had never heard anything like it. It reminded him a little of the sudden thunderous applause that came at the end of a ballet, when the music had died away and the dancers finally stilled. The audience’s clapping and shouts of delight always came as a shock to Luka and he felt as if he heard them twice as loud as they really were. But that noise was made by people expressing gratitude for an evening well spent. This noise was far more unsettling.
The rumbling became a roar. Face after face came into view, and Luka thought they would be burned in his mind forever. No one seemed to notice him, standing on the loggia of a fine house, food going cold on a tray inside. No one, that was, until a small boy looked up and caught his eye. The boy stopped, staring at him for a moment, then smiled. He turned to a woman and tugged at her skirt, one finger already pointing to where Luka stood.
Luka didn’t wait to see what came next; he grabbed Valya by the elbow and pulled her back. ‘We have to get inside, now.’
She didn’t argue. They scrambled into the reception room and shut the door behind them, backing away so they couldn’t be seen from the street. There was a pause, then a few dull thumps sounded on the door that had just been closed.
The maid screamed, sinking to the floor.
Valya waved a hand without turning to look at her. ‘Stop that. It’s just some snowballs.’
They listened as the snowballs pelted the outside of the house.
‘Why are they doing that?’ Valya asked softly.
‘They know who this house belongs to.’
She said no more.
The noise of the crowd became so loud they could no longer hear the barrage of snowballs, only see the little white explosions as they hit the glass. The housekeeper and maid huddled in a corner, Madame Ivkina holding the quietly crying younger woman.
When Valya spoke, her words made no sound that Luka could hear. He gripped her tighter, as if she
were drifting away from him on the sea of noise. She looked up at him, the concern in her eyes barely covering the fear that rippled underneath. She spoke again, only this time she shouted the words.
‘It will be over by tomorrow. Won’t it?’
Luka wished he had an answer.
It wasn’t until the sky had darkened into a starless night that the last of the marching crowd passed through Valya’s street. Valentina wanted Luka to stay with her to be sure of his safety, but Maxim telephoned and, once he’d confirmed her surrounds to be clear, insisted on coming over.
‘Let me pay for a taxi for you,’ Valya whispered, as though Maxim might already be able to hear them.
Luka was going to refuse, but stopped himself. It was foolish to turn down the offer when he didn’t know what awaited him in the surrounding streets. He twined her fingers through his own and kissed her knuckles.
The thousands of feet had cleared most of the snow from the road, so it didn’t take long for the taxi carriage to arrive. The housekeeper alerted them to its presence, and Luka clambered in quickly, pulling back the furs at the window to look at Valya outlined in her doorway.
‘I’ll be in touch soon,’ he called softly.
The carriage jostled to life and took him away.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Luka hurried along the street, hat pulled low, eyes averted from what was going on around him. Petrograd was a nightmare come to life. He had no idea how many people were now on strike; the newspapers had stopped printing so it was impossible to get reliable news. Public transport had come to a standstill, and even taxis were no longer running. Looters did not bother to wait for the cover of darkness to commit their crimes, and many of the shops Luka passed had broken doors and windows. He wouldn’t have dared to step outside if fear for Valya hadn’t motivated him. He needed to find out how she was, even if it was only by whispering with Madame Ivkina at her front door.
It was the third day of strikes, and Luka had regretted going home ever since that first day at Valya’s house. The disruption had escalated into violence and he’d been stranded inside his apartment, unable to make contact. He’d finally understood the appeal of telephones.
A policeman across the road from where Luka now walked was attempting to prevent a group of youths from breaking into a store. He was outnumbered by at least five. The youths picked up stones and blocks of ice and threw them at him until he turned and ran. Their laughter chased him down the snowy street. Luka kept moving. He had to remind himself not to run. Running would bring attention, and attention spelled trouble.
A gunshot cracked the chilly air. Luka had never heard a gun before, but the sound was unmistakable. It echoed through his bones, and sent a flock of birds soaring into the sky.
A second of pure silence followed. Luka watched the birds, desperate to cling to that moment, not wanting to know what had happened before it. But then the silence broke, disrupted by terrified screams and jubilant shouts. The sound of running feet seemed to come at him from every direction. He gasped for breath, too scared to keep walking. He couldn’t tell which way to go; couldn’t tell if he would be moving towards the gunshot or away from it.
And then he was surrounded.
‘Down with the German woman!’ a man shouted. He looked at Luka, grinned, and grabbed his hand to hold it up in the air with his own. Luka was suddenly glad he’d pulled out his oldest, most worn coat for the walk. ‘Down with Niemka! Down with the war!’
‘The gunshot,’ Luka said, trying to get the man’s attention, but he was too excited to notice. Luka pulled his hand free and grabbed the man’s elbow. ‘The gunshot! What was it? What happened?’
‘You don’t know?’ The man crowed an ugly laugh. ‘It was a Cossack.’
‘They shot a Cossack?’
‘No! The Cossack shot a policeman! They’ve turned; they’re on our side.’
The man slapped Luka on the back enthusiastically, then marched on, crying out once more against the Tsarina.
Luka turned away from him. He forced his feet to move, stumbling in the direction of Valya’s house. This couldn’t be happening. The Cossacks had been brought in to aid the police in getting this protest under control. If one of them had shot a policeman … things had taken a far worse turn than any of them could have foreseen.
‘You must be joking,’ Luka said.
‘No, I’m not.’ Valentina pressed her lips together to still the tremble on them. She looked at her hands as she buttoned her sable-lined gloves; not seeing Luka’s face made things easier.
‘Valya, I just told you what I saw. A policeman, shot by a Cossack!’
‘You didn’t see it, you just heard it. Who knows if it’s even true? That man might have just been trying to stir up trouble.’
‘He doesn’t need to stir up trouble. Do you know how scared I was coming here?’
Valentina closed her eyes. She could hear muffled cracks and knew it was too early for the ice in the Neva to be splitting. It could only be the sound of gunfire. The thought of Luka out there among that violence threatened to undo her. But she had to keep herself composed. She couldn’t let him know how little she wanted to do what she had to do.
‘I’m not a policeman, am I? Nor a Cossack or a protester. We can’t let our lives come to a complete standstill.’
‘Does Maxim care nothing for you?’
Valentina could still feel the purple bruises like fingerprints on her arm. She pulled the sleeve of her dress lower, glad Luka couldn’t see beneath the fabric. He was right: this outing was Maxim’s doing. He was determined to use long-ago purchased tickets for an anniversary performance by the actor Yuriev at the Alexandrinsky Theatre, despite her protests. She thought he was testing how far she would go to prove her loyalty to him, and tonight wasn’t the night to push against those boundaries. She’d already chosen Luka; she could give Maxim this one thing before leaving him.
Luka wouldn’t understand, though; and there was no use arguing, for Maxim would be there soon to collect her.
‘I’m sorry. I have to go.’
Valentina clutched Maxim’s arm, trying not to panic at the chaos around them. The closed carriage struggled to move, hands grasping at its exterior to slow it down, and angry shouts seemed to come from every direction. She could hear the driver swearing, and the snap of reins being flicked over and over in panic. Her ermine muff had fallen to her feet, forgotten in the terror of being rocked from side to side.
Across from them, Mathilde’s white face was clenched with tension. ‘No!’ she screeched, leaning towards the window. The slip of fur that hung there to keep out the cold was being pulled away, dirty white fingers snaking their way inside.
One of the horses let out a loud neigh almost like a scream. It was followed by a human scream, and the carriage lurched forward. Valentina almost fell off the seat, while Maxim grabbed the edge of the window and pushed his face into the cold night air.
‘What’s happening?’ Valentina gasped, clinging on to any surface she could.
Maxim sat back and grabbed her hand, squeezing it unbearably tightly. ‘We knocked someone over.’
‘What? Then tell the driver to stop.’
‘No. They’ll tear us apart. We’ve only been able to get away because the crowd went to help the person. Otherwise they might have tipped the carriage right over.’
Feeling like she might vomit, Valentina pulled her hand free. She leaned down to pick up her muff and pushed her gloved fingers inside it. The soft fur did nothing to warm her. She was shivering deep inside, a rattling unlike any chill or nerves she’d felt before.
It was the 1905 revolution all over again. She wasn’t a child any more, and her life wasn’t run by Mamma, yet here she was, stuck in a carriage as it careened wildly through violent streets, not knowing what to expect at the other end. Then, she’d been taken to safety at the ballet school, sheltered from the barbaric outside world until all returned to normal. It couldn’t end the same today. She wished that Lu
ka had been able to convince her to stay, that she was tucked up in her bed with his arms around her. She had the horrible feeling they might never lie together like that again.
When they pulled up at the Alexandrinsky Theatre, it was as if the carriage had passed through a veil into a different world. All was eerily quiet, the gas streetlamps flickering in a way that felt distinctly ominous as she followed Mathilde out of the carriage. She could smell the horses, their earthy scent intensified by their fear, and she wanted to press a perfume-covered handkerchief to her face. The smell echoed her own fear all too closely.
She pulled her fur turban lower around her face, still striving for warmth that wouldn’t come. As they entered the theatre, she caught a glimpse of the silver cloth of Mathilde’s dress beneath her shuba, and her diamond shoe buckles, and knew the prima ballerina assoluta had dressed her best for the occasion. Defiant in her extravagance, even now.
Inside was a small, quiet crowd. Valentina had the impression that all was a little faded, as if she were peering at the scene through misted glass. She wondered if those with true courage were the ones who had stayed away.
‘Maxim Sergeivich, would you be so good as to fetch us some champagne? I’m sure our nerves would be the better for it after that ride.’ Mathilde, as always, spoke with an authority that said she knew her request would be met.
Maxim bristled for a second, and Valentina was reminded of that long-ago evening when Rasputin had ordered him to bring her a glass of champagne. So much had changed since then. Thankfully, tonight Maxim only gave a curt nod before disappearing into the small crowd.
Valentina felt Mathilde’s gloved hand slip into her own and tug her away a little. ‘Valya, I need to speak with you.’ The urgency in the older woman’s voice made Valentina’s heart beat a little more forcefully. ‘In a few days I will no longer be on Russian soil.’
The madness outside had made Valentina feel she could never be easily shocked again, yet now it was as though the wind had been knocked out of her. She put a hand on the nearest wall to steady herself.