by Paul Park
Prochenko could see nothing of her son in her. “Ma’am,” he said, “you might not remember me. My name is Sasha Prochenko and—”
“Lieutenant,” she interrupted. The way she said the word seemed as complicated as a poem to him, a poem or a song that was full of sadness and hope, patience and fear. “Sir, I am pleased to see you.”
He came close to her, stood in the light, and she tilted her head so she could look at him out of the corner of her left eye. “Will you not come in?” she said. “It is a warm day. I believe there is some lemonade.”
Prochenko had already removed his hat and gloves. Now he put his stick into the old-fashioned ceramic umbrella stand beside the door. Madame de Graz stood aside to let him enter the house. In the parlor next to the piano, he stood among pieces of furniture that had been meant for a larger space. The old lady asked him to sit, and he chose a leather armchair. Immediately she was gone through an inner doorway, probably searching for some refreshment.
The room was cool and dark. Above the fireplace there was a painting of Prince Frederick Schenck von Schenck, dressed in civilian clothes. It had the unmistakable look of a posed portrait, rather than something painted from a photograph, or else some idealized scene. The prince, never a handsome man with his protruding ears and weak chin, nevertheless in his eyes and his expression managed to project an impression of wisdom and strength. Watching him, Prochenko felt a terrible surge of sadness and regret—what had happened to his country after the death of this man? Even more poignant, against the mantel, furled yet still recognizable, stood one of the faded old banners of the prince’s party, the tricolored flag of the Republic, throttled in its infancy by Valeria Dragonesti, Antonescu, Ceausescu, and the others. Once it had flown over half the roofs in Bucharest.
Pieter de Graz’s Star of Hercules lay in a glass case on the sideboard, along with several other decorations. And there were photographic portraits of horses and even dogs, and the old count in riding clothes, and several other men and women—de Graz had had brothers and sisters, Prochenko remembered now.
All the photographs were edged in black crepe. Or all but one, a larger picture of the Chevalier de Graz in his captain’s uniform with the high, embroidered collar. Pieter de Graz, Peter Gross—now the old lady had returned, carrying a silver tray with a glass pitcher. Ice had made it sweat.
He rose to take it from her hands. “I suppose it is very hot today,” she said. “Ordinarily I open the windows off the back veranda, and there is a breeze through the house into this room. But we’ve had so little rain, except for that storm two nights ago. Even so there was lightning, but in the morning the ground was scarcely damp. I’m afraid the weather will affect the fruit season, with the prices so very dear. Please, there is a compote.”
He placed the tray on a low inlaid table that, like many of the objects here, seemed too precious for this humble house. He let her talk. She stood in front of him, cataloguing the weather, wringing her hands. Unlike any other part of her they were smooth, unwrinkled, untouched by age or, he supposed, arthritis—why had he come? She spoke of the rain, the prices, the crops with a politeness that veiled but did not mask the greediness with which she stood and waited for information, any information after all these years alone. And what could he tell her? He had no good news to bring. Now more than anything he felt he must prevent her from having to decorate, at long last, the central photograph on the sideboard with its band of crepe. Did she have it prepared already, perhaps a roll of it with scissors, too, somewhere in some drawer?
He cleared his throat and she fell silent, licked her lips. “Please sit down,” he said. Immediately she perched on the edge of the horsehair settee, her head bowed as if awaiting some punishment or blow.
“Ma‘am,” he said. Then: “Ma’am, I hope your health is good—”
And she interrupted. “Oh, sir,” she said, “for God’s sake, please.” Immediately she was in tears, sobs that shook her little body as they emerged, tears that drenched her cheeks. “Forgive me,” she said. “Please forgive me. I’m so sorry—please, just tell me, for God’s love.”
She had a handkerchief in the bosom of her black dress and now she used it to wipe her eyes. Lieutenant Prochenko studied his dusty boots. On his trouser leg there was a greasy stain, which he must have acquired in the alley behind the Hotel Moskva; “I’m in Roumania after years abroad. We crossed the border after Dragonesti moved against the prince’s sister. It was our duty to protect his daughter where she’d be safe from her enemies … .”
“Forgive me, please—I know all that,” sobbed Madame de Graz. “I received letters weekly from Constanta from my son. Then nothing after that. Not a postal card. Now Mademoiselle Popescu is in Bucharest—you read it in the newspapers. And some story about Gypsies that no one believes. And here you are … .”
Lieutenant Prochenko sat down again. “Yes. Well, let me tell you that the Chevalier de Graz is in good health. I have seen him in the last few days.”
He’d thought this would calm her, but he was wrong. Instead she collapsed onto the carpet on her knees. The tears came out of her as if she were vomiting them up; she clutched at her white hair. For a moment, panic-struck, he studied the row of buttons down her spine, each one corresponding to a section of vertebrae that he could see all too plainly. He wondered how she managed such small buttons every evening and morning. Then he was with her on the floor, helping her up—“Oh, domnul, please!” And to his intense embarrassment she kissed his hands, held them against her cheeks. “But my God, your hands are burning,” she said. “Please, you have come a long way just to comfort an old woman. You say my son is well—what about you?”
ABSENT FROM PROCHENKO’S copy of the Evenimentul Zilei was any mention of the anti-German protests that now gathered every afternoon in the Piata Revolutiei and the surrounding streets. These had begun modestly and furtively after the first disturbances at Chiselet, but had intensified especially after the attack on the Mogosoaia Gypsies. Radu Luckacz had done nothing to discourage them, and in the Roumania Libera there was speculation that the new chief of police would be more rigid in his attitude.
Late in the afternoon, as Lieutenant Prochenko and Madame de Graz searched for a taxi stand in the streets of Floreasca, a company of mounted Bavarian dragoons entered the piata and attempted to disperse the crowd. In this they were partially successful. But the core of the demonstration refused to budge. Under pacifist and anti-German banners, the representatives of the trade unions and artists’ guilds maintained their position in the center of the piata, around the cannons brought back from the siege of Prague. At three o’clock their spirits were lifted by the appearance of the Baroness Ceausescu, who climbed onto the monument to address the crowd, exhorting them with the memory of Kevin Markasev. She was alone, without any kind of bodyguard or entourage, but by the pure force of her character she appeared to push the Germans back, especially the horses, which seemed frightened and difficult to control. Enthusiastic and relieved, the crowd shouted her name and waved small flags, each one cheaply printed with a white, furry face.
Miranda watched this from a third floor balcony. After the baroness left for the theater, she saw the soldiers return, a battalion of infantry this time. So she was in a position to witness the so-called martyr’s massacre, when with fixed bayonets the soldiers put the crowd to flight. These were the troops of Sergeant-Colonel Carlos Maschmann; superbly trained, pelted with vegetables and stones, they never fired a shot. Nevertheless, a half dozen men and women died in the stampede, and several children were injured.
Though she saw from a distance huddled knots of confusion, Miranda didn’t hear about the casualties until the next day. Several times she left the balcony. But always she returned. She felt more fury than sadness, and she made three decisions as she watched. The first was to reject all further contact with Ambassador Moltke and her representatives. The second was to screw up her courage to demand from Nicola Ceausescu the return of her father’s gun. The
third was to find Peter and escape this place. Already her time in the woods, and before that her journey from the coast through the Roumanian plains, and before that her adventures on the Hoosick riverbank, all of it seemed like a forgotten paradise. She couldn’t even think of anything before that, in Berkshire Country or else trips with her family to Florida, or Colorado, or Westchester, or Maine.
So when darkness came, the soldiers lit carbide lamps. The cobblestones were covered with discarded clothing and pieces of paper and the small flags. Miranda kicked at the ornate iron balusters as if they were the bars of an iron cage, and then she went in through the French windows into the third-floor portrait gallery, where the chandeliers were lit. There at the end was Miranda Brancoveanu dressed in armor with her mace in her hand, standing in triumph over the prostrate Turkish captains. She had been very beautiful, apparently.
She reached her suite of rooms and there was Jean-Baptiste waiting outside with two other people, and one of them was Andromeda, dressed as before in a man’s expensive suit, and looking every inch a handsome young lieutenant—Sasha Prochenko, she supposed. Miranda went toward her with her hands held out, then found herself looking into the face of an old woman. Shoulders hunched, she peered up at Miranda through milky and occluded eyes.
“This is Peter’s mother,” said Andromeda.
Jean-Baptiste, unshaven, stood with his hand against Miranda’s door. Despite his slovenly, ill-fitting clothes, there was something gracious and punctilious about the way he held himself. Glancing at him as if for clues, Miranda saw a submissive look that was in contrast to his usual rudeness and informality. “I’m very pleased to meet you,” she said, holding out her hand.
And she was surprised by the force in the old woman’s fingers. Madame de Graz tilted her head to one side and the other, as if searching for an angle that would make Miranda’s face come clear. “Mademoiselle, I am so pleased. My husband and I were great admirers of your father … .”
But if there was a formality in Jean-Baptiste that was at odds with his wild appearance, then there was the reverse in Magda de Graz, and soon the wildness came out of her, an explosion of tears. “Mademoiselle,” she gasped when she could speak. “Please, for your father’s sake—please, for the love of God, please save my son.”
And Miranda, who at quick intervals during the day had felt some of this same passion, now pulled the old woman into an embrace, so that her white hair was against her shoulder. She could feel a resistance. She could feel the old woman’s body against hers, and it was rigid and unyielding. But Peter’s mother gripped her hand so hard it hurt.
They stood there for an odd, long, awkward moment. Glancing up, Miranda saw the steward’s expression change. Then she heard a noise behind her, several people in the long corridor—murmurs, laughter, and heavy steps. When she turned, there was Nicola Ceausescu back from her performance, and with her an enormous man in military uniform. His bald head shone in the light. And on her other side there was a woman whom Miranda recognized with shocked surprise—sour, emaciated, dressed in a fur coat despite the heat: Olga Karpov from her dream.
The baroness wore a long red coat unbuttoned down the front. She came to a stop in the middle of the hall. And then a hiss came out of her, which was in its own way as unexpected and disconcerting as Mme. de Graz’s explosion of sobs. “Domnul—sir,” she said, and Miranda could see that she was looking at Andromeda. “I understand you have ignored my requests. I understand you prefer other company.”
And then to Jean-Baptiste: “Go to your room. I will send for you. I don’t know how it is you could deceive me like this.”
“Ma’am,” the steward said. “It is to protect you from others … .”
The baroness laughed. “I see we’re all friends here,” she interrupted. “You know General Antonescu, I am sure. But who is …?”
Miranda had released Magda de Graz. What was Antonescu doing here? Weren’t they enemies, he and the baroness?
She watched a contortion of disgust pass over the old woman’s face. But she was still in tears, and now she stepped forward unsteadily. “Ma’am,” she said, “I am the mother of the Chevalier de Graz. Please, I am here to beg you for his life.”
“Go,” said Nicola Ceausescu to Jean-Baptiste. “Escort Madame Karpov to the elevators and the Spanish Gate. General,” she continued, turning to Antonescu, “I will wait for your dispatches.” She held out her gloved hand for him to kiss.
And when Jean-Baptiste had led Olga Karpov down the corridor, and Antonescu had turned back the way they’d come—not before giving her, Miranda thought, an insolent, assessing smile—Nicola Ceausescu stood alone in the middle of the hall. Then she also came forward and took Peter’s mother by the hand. “Madame,” she said, “I beg you to be patient. All is not lost. These potato-eating Germans—we are doing all we can.”
Her voice was full of sadness and concern. Liar, Miranda thought, but she said nothing. It was Andromeda who said it. “Liar,” she whispered, but she smiled.
Then it seemed to Miranda that she saw a complicated mix of emotions pass over the baroness’s beautiful, exquisitely expressive face—fury, amusement, and then a sort of furtive pleasure. Momentarily she closed her eyes.
“I assure you,” she continued, “we are doing all we can. And do not give up hope. Hope is our most important commodity in times like these … .”
“Liar,” murmured Andromeda, and again Miranda followed the baroness’s expression.
“Alas,” she said, “it is so difficult to keep hold of oneself, living in this public way. Always under public scrutiny. Domnul Andromedes, you must not judge me. You will see that it is difficult what I attempt to do.”
Then she detached her gloved fingers one by one from Madame de Graz’s grasping hands. “Your son will die in one week’s time,” she said. “I don’t care about it one way or the other. You must console yourself. It is his duty as a soldier. I myself do not expect to die of old age.”
Then she turned back to Andromeda. “Is that better?” she asked. “Do you admire me now?”
“You are such dog shit,” Andromeda murmured in English. It had been one of her favorite phrases, and Miranda was surprised to hear it. There was little else she recognized of her old friend.
It occurred to Miranda suddenly that maybe they could kill this woman, Andromeda and she. And what would happen then? It was a wisp of a thought rather than a plan. But some version of it animated Magda de Graz, who now reached out with both her hands to seize hold of the baroness’s shirt. And before she had time to react, Miranda heard her question answered. In this palace if you thought you were alone it was an illusion. Two men in livery came running down the hall.
“No, it’s all right,” gasped Nicola Ceausescu. “Take Madame de Graz and return her to her carriage—you must not use any of the doors to the piata where the potato-eaters are camped. All of them are closed; ah, you have no carriage? Domnul Andromedes—always the gentleman! Doubtless he will escort you home.”
She was enjoying this, Miranda saw. Her shirt was ripped open at the throat. “Madame de Graz,” she said, “your honesty has touched my heart. Tomorrow I will ask for an interview with the new chief of police—you understand I am a citizen like you. Especially after today—these are dark days for our country. If Domnul Andromedes will call for me at two o’clock? I could have an answer then.”
“Unbelievable and total dog shit,” murmured Andromeda as she led Mme. de Graz away toward the elevators, and the baroness smiled.
One of the footmen stayed and pressed himself into the wall a discreet distance down the corridor. As far as could be seen, Miranda and the baroness were alone. “What do you have?” she asked when all was still. “You are not beautiful, not intelligent, and you have no art or culture or style. You are not touched by the muses or the gods. But de Graz and this other—are you a whore for them? Is that the explanation after all? But they are not jealous. Why is that?”
Furious, Miranda put her hand
up to her neck. “They are my friends,” she said.
The baroness laughed. “I see you have a lot to teach me, mademoiselle. I myself have no friends. Jean-Baptiste, have you also stolen him away?”
She stood with her hands in the pockets of her long red coat. She wore boots and tight pants, and her yellow shirt was torn around the throat. Her chestnut-colored hair seemed to glow in the muted light. Miranda caught a little of her body’s bitter smell, mixed also with cigarettes.
In her mind’s theater, though, Miranda was not watching the baroness, who stood alone under the lights as if onstage. Or else she also saw something else: Colonel Maschmann’s soldiers, moving with fixed bayonets over the stones of the Piata Revolutiei. And then at other moments she saw Mme. de Graz tilting her head from side to side, the tears running from her milky eyes.
Miranda had imagined for much of the past week that she and the baroness were fighting to manipulate the only power in Roumania, which was the German army. And it was a struggle Miranda knew she could win if she wanted—already she’d been of two minds about that. This evening, though, watching the soldiers from the balcony, Miranda had begun to understand something. Later, seeing General Antonescu and Olga Karpov in the hallways of the People’s Palace, another puzzle piece had been added in. Now she knew instinctively that German power in Roumania was at an end, and in the larger struggle the baroness’s position was unbeatable. In the piata the crowds had chanted her name, waved their little flags.
So this entire conversation was a form of gloating, of amusement. By confessing weakness, the baroness was confessing strength. There was no reason, for example, to have Miranda arrested or confined to her room, though it was easy to predict that that might come.