City of Silence (City of Mystery)

by Kim Wright

  The women startled as the door opened. They were waiting for what Ella had sworn to be the last of her endless requests, one of the Fabrege eggs Serge had given her with a miniature portrait tucked inside. Although sunlight still streamed and the night was warm, there were silken robes in bright colors tucked around them and they were reclining against great pillows. His Tatiana was encased in a pod of light green and dark pink, her hair twisted up in a casual but most becoming fashion. As Filip leaned into the carriage, their eyes locked.

  The police may have taken him at his word, and possibly the Grand Duchess Ella as well. But his wife was not in the list bit fooled by his claim he had come for a second kiss.

  “Why are you here?” she asked.

  “Perhaps I shall come to the coast with you,” he said.

  The Grand Duchess seemed confused by this exchange. “But we are a party of ladies,” she said, as if were an impossible notion that a man and his wife might travel together in a carriage.

  Filip could see they were a party of ladies. The tangle of silken colors around them made it seem as if his wife and the Grand Duchess and even the maid had been consumed by some great flower. Tatiana was drinking champagne. Her fingers, tight with tension, gripped the stem of the glass and the bedclothes smelled of lilac.

  She belongs in this world, Filip thought. It was made for her.

  And then there was a clatter behind him, so that he turned, one foot on the step of the carriage and the other still on the cobblestones, and looked over his shoulder. Gregor, wild-eyed and waving his pistol in the manner of an actor in a very bad play, had also run into the courtyard.

  As the groomsmen moved toward him, Gregor gestured with his gun, shouting for them to get back, and they did. And then he looked at Filip and did the last thing Filip would have ever expected him to do.

  Gregor smiled.

  Plan B was to exit by the stable instead of the docks. To commandeer a carriage for escape and Gregor apparently thought that Filip was doing just that. He smiled and began to move toward the carriage but, from behind Gregor’s shoulder, Filip could see the lumbering form of the British detective also approaching the door. The thin one in glasses was with him. And they both knew precisely who and what Filip Orlov was.

  Filip had no more than three seconds to make his decision, but under these sorts of circumstances, time becomes elastic. It stretches to accommodate anywhere the mind wishes to go. Filip could almost see himself standing there in the door of the carriage, the ladies with their rose and green silks on one side of him, the wild-eyed comrade with his pistol on the other. It all hung on his next gesture, did it not?

  Since boyhood, Filip Orlov had only two fears: that his life would have no meaning and that his death would have no meaning. He could see what Gregor could not. That the infidels had been prepared for them, that they had walked into a trap. To be caught now would mean that their cause had come to nothing and, perhaps more to the point, it would destroy Tatiana’s life.

  Her life and the life of his child.

  Plan B was to commandeer a carriage by any force necessary, including the death of the driver. Gregor now raised his pistol in the direction of the man, who had been abruptly awakened by the commotion and had taken up the reins in one hand and his whip in the other. Despite the fact he had been snatched from slumber, his grasp of the danger at hand was clear, and he seemed prepared to protect his imperial passenger at any cost.

  Filip allowed himself one final look at his wife.

  And then he sprang. He leapt from the step toward the top of the carriage, straining to reach the driver’s seat. It was a gesture which could be interpreted in many ways. But when Gregor’s bullet went into his back, Filip knew how history would judge him.

  And in that same moment Trevor was through the door and on top of Gregor, knocking him to the ground and falling over him. The groomsmen, released from their paralysis, surrounded them and inside the carriage two of the women had begun to shriek while the third remained absolutely silent, her eyes staring out the open door into the courtyard. The courtyard where Filip Orlov’s blood was running over the cobblestones.

  He was not dead. He groaned. His eyes fluttered open. This time, he knew, he had not been shot in the fat.

  A face over his, blocking the light. The thin owlish British detective, the one who had come to the gentlemen’s enclave. What was his name? They had smoked hashish and talked of love. The man bent low, his head at such an angle that his eyeglasses edged down the bridge of his nose.

  “Lie very still,” he said. “We will find a doctor.”

  “No,” said Filip. The sky tilted and slid above him, as if God were shaking the world. The palace police were here now, jerking Gregor to his feet, throwing him against the side wall of the stable, and Filip could hear the clang of their handcuffs, their cursing. The hysteria of the Grand Duchess, the low silent reassurance of her maid. No word from Tatiana, but she surely knew what he had done for her. Where his loyalty had come to rest.

  The sky seemed less bright now. The voices not so loud and the pain not so sharp, and Rayley’s form, still bent over him, was less distinct. Filip noticed, with some distraction, that he could see the reflection of his own face in the detective’s spectacles. He looked tired.

  “Hold on, man,” Rayley whispered. “They’re bringing water.”

  Filip attempted to shake his head and failed. There was no use for water, except possibly to wash the cobblestones. He pulled in his last breath and saved it until he was sure he had the strength for nine words.

  “Tell them I died,” Filip said, “in service to the tsar.”

  9:31 PM

  Vlad had kept his ear pressed to the door for several minutes and had slowly convinced himself that there were no more sounds coming from the hall. He had found himself in one of the leisure rooms, a place which held a broad couch, a table with a decanter and ashtray, and what Vlad could only assume were various instruments of pleasure. He felt unclean even being there, but his hiding place had at least given him a few minutes to calm his nerves. The dock, he now remembered, would be at the end of this hall and to the right.

  He cracked the door open and listened. Still no noise. He leaned his head out and looked in one direction, then the other. Absolute emptiness. Then he slipped from the room and walked in the direction of the docks. It had occurred to him that if he were able to maintain his composure he might not be intercepted. He carried no hostage and no gun. During the pursuit, no one had seen his face. There was every possibility he could return to the docks and reclaim his little rowboat. That he could depart the palace as he entered it, a humble purveyor of lilies.

  And that is just what would have happened had Davy Mabrey not been waiting on the docks.

  For a moment the two young men simply looked at each other. Then Vlad walked towards Davy slowly, his palms outstretched to show he carried no weapon.

  “Ah, comrade,” he said. “So you are with them after all.”

  “Scotland Yard.”

  “I should have known. The English are always English, no matter what else they try to be. And now you must turn me in, I suppose?”

  Davy swallowed. “The girl isn’t hurt. One of my group, a doctor, is with her.”

  “You tell me this why? Because you think I care?”

  “Because it will go better for you that she wasn’t injured. Better in court, I mean.”

  “Court?” Vlad laughed harshly, and the ugly cry echoed off the water. “Where do you think you are, comrade?” He looked at Davy with a sudden intensity. “Let me go. As one nothing to another, let me go.”

  “You must understand that I cannot.”

  “The revolution is dead to me now, I swear it. My life has run through my hands like water in the last hour and I didn’t like the feeling. The feeling that I might die before I have lived. I wish to go home, to sleep in my bed. To eat chicken and potatoes, to hear my mother sing off-key.”

  At the mention of the word “mothe
r,” Davy’s face changed. Only for a fraction of a second, but Vlad noted it and seized the opportunity.

  “My woman has already lost one son, comrade” he said. “Could you live with yourself if you cost her yet another?”

  The Grand Ballroom

  10:02 PM

  Tom watched her from the top of the staircase, uncertain of how to approach. But with his first footfall on the first step, Emma heard him and turned. She was standing in the center of the empty ballroom floor. She had been crying for some time.

  “Did you find Xenia?” she asked.

  “Yes. She’s a bit shaken, of course, but she’ll be fine. Orlov was shot dead. By his own man, as it turns out.”

  She absorbed this in thoughtful silence. “Tatiana and Ella? They will be all right?”

  “I suppose that remains to be seen.”

  Any other time she would have questioned his vague comment. Would have demanded he speak plainly and tell her everything that had happened. But for now, Emma merely shrugged and the movement, even through slight, caused the red gown to shimmer. She had never looked lovelier, Tom thought. Had never worn a gown as spectacular as this one, perhaps never would again. She tugged at his heart, standing there so alone in the center of the dance floor, like a fairy princess whose prince must have lost his way.

  Tom walked down the final steps and onto the floor. “He is not the only man on earth who can waltz, you know.”

  “I never said he was.”

  “Nor is he the only man who can waltz with you.”

  Now this perhaps she did believe. She visibly exhaled and shifted a little on her feet, sending her skirt into a crescendo of sparkles and shimmer.

  He held out his arms. “Dance with me, Emma. Here on this great floor on this night that will ever end.”

  “I didn’t know you waltzed.”

  “There are many things about me you do not know,” he said, as she raised her arms to him. “Just as I suppose there are corridors and passageways I have not yet found in you. We are each as large as a palace, are we not? An endless series of doors to be opened as the years proceed.”

  It was a grand speech. Quite unlike him, and she was not sure if this was just another of his jokes, a way to jolly her out of this strange sadness. But it didn’t really matter, and she let her left hand alight on his shoulder as he took her right in his. As he pulled her closer and began, without music, to waltz.

  What would Konstantin have said, if he were now standing before them, watching? Probably that Tom knew the steps, but not the dance. His movements were small, neat, and tentative, and she matched hers to his. He began to hum, which made it worse, for there was no correlation between his music and his pace and their knees clanked against each other as they stepped slowly through the shape of a box. If he’d had a sword it would have surely poked her. And then the edge of his foot came down on hers.

  “I’m sorry,” he said.

  “It’s all right.”

  He brought his cheek closer. It was soft and fair and not that much higher than her own and he was humming again. There is no magic in this, she thought, bending back to look up at the ceiling, at the empty balconies and abandoned theatrical sets. There is no mystery. It is just me and Tom in the center of an empty room, but he has cared enough to come in search of me and he is trying to make it better. Trying to make up for something I have lost, even if he doesn’t understand what it was and has no idea how to recreate it. They danced another box and then he stopped.

  “Are your eyes closed?” he asked.

  “Of course,” she said. But they were open.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  A Train Outside of Danzig

  June 24, 1889

  7:50 AM

  The train was an hour past the Russian border and moving steadily through Germany when he opened the envelope. It contained, as promised, a letter of introduction from the Grand Duchess Ella Feodorovna, written on her official stationery and describing his talents in such flowery language that he had no doubt it would secure him a berth teaching in the best dance academy of Paris. He refolded it carefully and placed it back in its envelope, reflecting that it was a strange thing that a man’s whole future could be written on a single piece of paper.

  His bundle at his feet held a blue velvet pouch, the contents of which he had not yet explored. Slowly and tentatively, taking care not to disturb his fellow passengers who were crammed all around him, he pulled the silken string on top. Inside was a golden egg. Konstantin took one quick look, enough to register the shocking value of the gift, and then thrust it back into the pouch. The others in the compartment all appeared to be sleeping, but it would not do to attract their attention with an object of such obvious value. Like anyone who had ever lived in the Winter Palace, Konstantin had heard of the Fabrege eggs, but had never seen one up close and he had no idea why the Grand Duchess would have chosen to bestow such a treasure on him.

  “Take this,” she had said. “Something to help you start your new life in Paris.” But he had expected a handful of coins or perhaps a small bank note, certainly nothing as grand as this. Something which shamed him just to look at it, an object that would probably mark him as a thief if anyone knew he had it in his possession. But still, when Tatiana joined him…the sale of a Fabrege egg could buy them an apartment, simple furnishings, food in the cupboard, shoes on their feet.

  At the thought of her, he reached down to the other bundle resting at his feet, the one tied with heavy paper and string.

  The paper was still damp and the form of the package was bent in the center, where the water from the chapel rainspout had pounded against it as he had made love to Tatiana. He remembered the painting inside, their first meal together and their final one too, at least for a while. He tugged at the edge of the package and the paper tore easily. Sliding the string and wrapping to the side, he slowly revealed what was left of the picture.

  He could see the city around them. The café tables, the stray cat which rubbed against their legs, the streets, the shop windows, the dome of a church in the distance. The details remained quite clear around the periphery but in the center the picture was washed out. The paint had run away, the colors probably still visible among the cobblestones outside the Chapel of Mourning.

  “Leave it,” she had said. She had seen the water pouring down upon the package and she had known that their image must have fled. But yet he had not left it, and now he was glad, for looking at the painting, holding it carefully by the corners with his fingertips, a bit of fear ran across him. He allowed his mind to sink, just for a second, into the possibility that she would not follow him. That this goodbye had always meant something different for her than for him, that his escape had been bought at a high price. Yes, even higher than the value of a Fabrege egg.

  The light from the window flickered on the painting in his hands. He imagined what it would look like on his wall, how many times he would have to study it before the meaning of all that had happened in the last few days would at last fully emerge. The picture was, Konstantin thought, the perfect memento of their affair. St. Petersburg would always be there. It was dark-edged and clear and full of the small realities of a city, the sort which anchored and framed you, the details of everyday life. A chair, a church, a wine glass, a cat, the pink splash of a woman’s dress. But there was a great emptiness in the center. The lovers once found there were gone.

  The Docks of the Winter Palace

  11:20 AM

  “That poor composer,” the Queen said. “I suppose he is never to have his ball.”

  Trevor and Queen stood on the deck of The Albert and Victoria, watching the dockworkers roll the trunks up the gangplank and on board. It was a strangely unceremonious departure. No one from the Imperial family had come down to the riverbank to see them off.

  “This is a singularly difficult country in which to make plans,” Trevor said. “Perhaps in the future when invitations go out from the palace they should read something along the line of
‘There will be a grand ball on this evening as long as no one is assassinated or kidnapped.’”

  Victoria gave a little snort which Trevor hoped indicated amusement and gazed up the green lawn toward the Winter Palace. “My granddaughter informs me that there is to be a baby.”

  Hard to say what sort of reaction was expected to this, so Trevor decided to go with the most conventional one possible. “My congratulations, Your Majesty.”

  “And thus Ella is irretrievably gone,” the Queen continued, her eyes never leaving the Palace. “Nothing ties a woman to a man more definitively than giving birth to his child and once she has a Romanov baby, she will be here forever. From some decisions, there is no turning back.” She sighed. “But at least Alix has come to her senses.”

  “Something to be grateful for,” Trevor said, making note as one especially long and ungainly sack was rolled aboard, most likely containing the earthly remains of Cynthia Kirby. “A gun pointed toward a carriage which held her sister must have done what three previous murders could not. Provided evidence beyond question that Russia is not a safe place in which to marry and raise a family.”

  The Queen pulled her gaze away from the Palace. “One would think so, but that wasn’t what convinced her. Alix was far more deeply shocked by Ella’s decision to turn her back on Lutheranism and convert to Orthodoxy. Apparently Nicky wished to mark their understanding with the gift of a diamond brooch, but she tells me that she has returned it and informed him she could never marry a man of a different faith.”

  “My congratulations, Your Majesty.”

  The irony of the repeated response was not lost on the Queen. Her mouth twisted into a grim smile as she turned toward an approaching servant. The same fellow who had served them dinner on their voyage over, Trevor recalled. He wondered where the crew of the yacht had been during their time in St. Petersburg. Living onboard most likely, awaiting word that Her Majesty’s business was concluded and they would once again be required to spring into action. It was a strange life being in service to the Queen. Long stretches of inactivity, followed by bursts of extraordinary effort.