David Golder, The Ball, Snow in Autumn & The Courilof Affair (2008)

by Irene Nemirovsky

  He pronounced the letter “r” deeply, as they do in French, raising his chubby white hands up high. He was a hunchback without the hump; his chest was extremely round and his long, pale face sat low on his neck.

  “It will be very expensive, of course,” he added casually. “Leave it to me.”

  Dusk was extraordinarily desolate in these sad islands. I remember the falling rain splashing against the calm surface of the bay. The setting sun hovered above the horizon until morning, a circle of dull, smoky red, engulfed in mist.

  Courilof listened gloomily and often called out to me: “What do you think, Monsieur Legrand? You don’t say much, but you have good taste. What colour do you think the paper lanterns should be? Green?”

  He didn’t listen to what I said, though; he just stood there watching the still water and then walked back, sighing.

  Finally, Courilof decided to go and ask for the Emperor’s reply himself and give him the guest list for approval, if he agreed to attend. I accompanied the minister to the Winter Palace that day. When he got into the carriage, he saw all the people who’d come to ask favours waiting in the courtyard. They’d been there since morning; the rain had pushed them back under an awning, like a herd of sheep. When the Killer Whale appeared, they hesitantly took three steps forward. The minister waved his hand wearily. Two servants appeared.

  “Out! Get going!”

  In a flash, they had pushed the masses ofwaiting people back and closed the gate. Courilof, gloomy and preoccupied, got into the carriage, gesturing for me to follow him. It was rather funny: he too got a bad reception that day… the Emperor was tired; the Empress was ill…

  I waited for a long time in front of the palace, in the stifling heat of the enclosed little carriage. Then we retraced our steps back to the Iles.

  He huddled in the corner, silently staring into space. Sometimes he would tell the driver to go faster by making a dry little clicking noise, but as soon as the horses began to gallop, he’d get annoyed and swear at the coachman. Then we’d slow down again. It was raining harder and harder. It’s strange how well I understood the Killer Whale’s “feelings.” And still, it was difficult to guess the emotions that ran through him beneath his armour, his stony look. I sensed his emotions in a strange way, one that gave me both a feeling of satisfaction and a kind of contentment that was almost physical. Later on, when I escaped from prison in Siberia, I used to hunt for food along the road; as I stalked my prey, I remember sensing it quiver in the same way.

  The heat, a steamy torrent, seemed to rise up from the earth. He was clearly dying to talk to me; but the poor fool was always afraid that a single look or gesture would be enough to give him away. “We’re just slaves in fancy clothing,” he finally said, bitterly.

  I didn’t reply, and he also fell silent, looked away to watch the waves of rain streaming down the windows. We’d gone past St. Petersburg’s city limits. We took a large avenue lined with trees; their leaves were soaking wet and the raindrops fell from them noisily, with a sharp, metallic sound.

  At one point, the horse shied. I glanced at Courilof. For a man who was usually absolutely in control of himself, every shout in the street, jolt, or the sound of glass shattering made him wince involuntarily. Almost immediately afterwards, his face would freeze into a look of icy calm. I felt something akin to pleasure in witnessing these nervous reactions, as they proved he was obsessed with the thought of being assassinated.

  That day, he noticed nothing. He didn’t stiffen; his body swayed with the carriage’s movements as it was thrown to one side, veered off course by a stone. When I asked, “Did that hurt?” he seemed to awaken from a dream. I could see his pale, sagging face, his half-closed eyes.

  “No,” he said.

  Then he shook his head.

  “It’s strange. I feel better. I feel less pain when my mind is on all these problems.”

  I said nothing.

  “The higher a man’s position,” he sighed, “the heavier it seems the cross he must bear.”

  “But you’re tired, aren’t you?” I said. “Why don’t you retire? Marguerite Eduardovna…”

  He cut in. “I can’t. This is my life.”

  He fell silent and we continued on our way home.

  The idea of music along the riverbank had been abandoned. Courilof decided to have the entertainment in the Malachite Room, as Dahl had suggested. The Emperor and Empress had ended up vaguely agreeing to come, but it was possible they might cancel at any time. Nevertheless, the invitations were sent out.

  The Malachite Room took up half of the first floor; it was here that a stage was set up. A few days before the ball, I went in and found Courilof watching one of the rehearsals. A young woman was dressed as a shepherdess in the style of Louis XV; she was playing an antique instrument, a sort of bagpipe that made the sharp, shrill sound of a fife. All the furniture had been removed; all that remained was the enormous Venetian glass chandelier, its crystals chiming to echo the music.

  Courilof listened, his wide, pale eyes almost popping out of his head. He paid his compliments to the musician, and finally the woman left. We stood alone in the middle of the stage. I noticed with surprise that the bare boards used to make the stage had been badly assembled. They looked as if they might collapse under the slightest weight. I pointed this out to Courilof. He looked through me, as though coming out of a trance, and said nothing.

  “Look at how flimsy this is,” I said again.

  All of a sudden, he clenched his teeth; a look of blind fury came over his face. “Well, that’s fine! Just fine! Lord! If only they would all go to hell! Disappear into a hole in the ground!” He pulled himself together but still seemed worried. “Don’t take any notice of me, I’m not well, I’m nervous.”

  He walked away from me, went over to the window, looked outside for a long time without saying a word, then left the room.

  CHAPTER 21

  AS I RECALL, the ball was at the end of June.

  That night, I went out for a walk through the Iles. I liked those clear nights. I could see the royal carriages, one after the other, driving down the wide avenues. I caught a glimpse of the most extraordinary faces through the carriage windows: women with thin, pinched features, covered in jewels, like religious relics, tiaras shimmering on their foreheads; men whose uniforms gleamed strangely, speckled with diamonds and gold. The odd light cast by the summer night made them look like ghosts from a dream.

  Afterwards, when I was head of the Special Police, I remember I used to interrogate suspects on such nights; they were brought to me in groups and then executed at dawn. I can picture their pale faces, the evening light that fell on their features, their eyes staring into mine. Some of them were so exhausted that they seemed indifferent to everything; they answered my questions with a weary little sneer. Very few of them fought for their lives. They just allowed themselves to be taken away and massacred without saying a word. A revolution is such a slaughterhouse! Is it really worth it? Nothing’s really worth the trouble; it’s true, not even life.

  I walked towards the gardens, opened the gate and immediately ran into Courilof. He had come outside to check on the police surrounding the house. Everywhere you turned was a policeman in civilian clothing hiding behind a tree.

  “What are you doing out here, Monsieur Legrand? Come inside, you’ll see how wonderful everything looks.” He forced me to go back into the house. Through the open windows, I could see the dazzling lights in the Malachite Room shining down brightly on the women fluttering their fans; in the front row were the Emperor and the princes.

  Courilof looked up and listened for a moment, frowning. “Can you hear that?” he said quietly. “Bach.”

  The calm, heavy music seemed to float very high above us. I listened with him. The famous R. was playing. I do not really like music, since I am not really interested in the arts in general. I only enjoy Bach and Haydn.

  “Their Highnesses have arrived,” Courilof said. “This is undoubtedly th
e first time you’ve seen them, isn’t it? There’s the Empress and, beside her, the Emperor himself. What venerable nobility shines from the faces of these absolute masters of our great Russia,” he continued, adopting his usual solemn tone that simultaneously annoyed and touched me.

  Through the bright glass partition, he pointed out Nicolas II; he was facing us, listening attentively. Once, during a slight pause in the music, I could distinctly hear the Emperor give a weary little cough; then I saw him raise his gloved hand to his lips and lower his head.

  “Let me stay out here,” I said to Courilof. “I can’t breathe in these large reception rooms.”

  He left me and went back inside. The night was oppressively still, and every now and then there were flashes of lightning. I saw the crowd stand up; I heard the sound of footsteps and the clash of sabres against the parquet floor. The princes were going into the next room, where supper was being served. I kept walking back and forth beneath the windows. I saw the Emperor with a glass of champagne in his hand and Ina in a white dress. Marguerite Eduardovna was wearing a corsage of roses with a fan of diamonds pinned into her hair; there were many other people as well, a mass of strange faces.

  I was having difficulty breathing; the air was absolutely still. As I turned the corner, I ran into one of the policemen; he had seen me talking to the minister and didn’t bother me. All he did was follow me for a while along the path, absent-mindedly, out of habit. I offered him a cigarette, calling out to him. “You’ve got your work cut out for you tonight, haven’t you?”

  He frowned. “The house is well guarded,” he said cautiously, hesitantly, in French; he had a heavy German accent.

  He touched his hat and disappeared into the shadows.

  It was strange to be walking through the garden like this, spied on by the police. At the time, I didn’t often think about my own life. I existed in a kind of waking dream that was both lucid and confusing. On that night, for the first time, I thought about myself, about the death that awaited me. But truthfully, it was hard for me to care … I remember thinking: “I have to get hold of some bombs, not a gun, so I can also be blown up.” It was truly strange to be telling myself that the minister and I would probably die together… I felt a burning sensation rise through my body. I find storms oppressive, and the heavy weather that comes just before them is even worse … It was choking me. Once again I thought: “If I couldjust close my eyes, go to sleep.” What a rotten life … Incomprehensible. It’s easy to kill people you don’t know, like the men who were marched past me those nights in 1919, and afterwards … And even they …

  I had interrogated them: “What’s your name? Where were you born?” I’d look at their papers and passports; whether they were real or forged, they evoked the image of a life that was meaningful, almost fraternal. “You, the thief, the speculator, the dealer who provided the Imperial Army with worn-out leather boots, rotten food, you’re not a bad person, you wanted the money, that’s all. You lean towards me again, passionately, hopefully: ‘Comrade, I have dollars… Comrade, take pity on me; I’ve never hurt anyone; I have young children; take pity on me!’ Tomorrow, when two men blow your brains out in some dark shed, will you even know what you died for?”

  I remember the thugs in the White Army who hanged peasants by the thousands; they burned the villages they passed through so completely that the only thing left in the houses was the empty space where the stoves had been. As they were dying, they looked at me with their stunned, bloodshot eyes: “Superintendent, comrade, why, why are you making me suffer like this? I’ve never done anything wrong.” It was … farcical… And it was the same with Courilof.

  “Eliminate the unjust for the good of the majority.” Why should we? And who is just? And how do people treat me? It is unbearable for a hunter to kill an animal he has looked after and fed. But all the same, as long as we are on this earth, we have to play the game. I killed Courilof. I sent men to their deaths, men who I realised, in a moment of lucidity, were like my brothers, like my very soul…

  I had a moment of madness that evening. It was another one of those stormy, oppressive nights. I abandoned the old, futile pile of papers and went down into the garden; for a long time, I paced up and down the small path, ten feet long, that leads to the wall and the road beyond. I was overwhelmed by thirst. Anger surged inside me, and I felt as if I were being strangled by a heavy, rough hand. In the morning, the rain finally came, and I was able to stretch out on my bed and fall asleep.

  I’m coughing now, can’t catch my breath. Not a single sound in the house. I like this irrevocable solitude.

  And so, there you have it: one summer evening thirty years ago, I walked back and forth beneath Courilof’s windows and watched that crowd of dazzling clowns, all of whom are now dead.

  Time passed. It was time for the Emperor to leave. His carriage arrived. In the shadow of the trees, all the policemen moved forward, forming an invisible circle. I tried to see if I could hear anything: you could vaguely make out the sound of their breathing and see their feet brushing against the grass. The minister, bare-headed, accompanied the Emperor, as was the tradition; he held a large golden candelabra with lit candles, even though the night was perfectly clear. A respectful crowd bustled behind them.

  As soon as the Emperor began to speak, there was absolute silence. I could clearly hear his hesitant little cough and his words: “Thank you. It was a wonderful ball.”

  He got into the carriage next to the Empress; she sat upright and stiff, mechanically nodding her sad, haughty head. She wore long white feathers in her hair and a wide necklace of various precious gemstones. They left.

  Courilof was beaming. An eager crowd of people surrounded him, complimenting him, as if some part of His Royal Highness had remained glued to him. He pointed to the gardens.

  “Ladies, would you enjoy walking beneath these arches?” he said, with the pompous tone he used on his best days.

  He turned to Dahl and took his arm. They followed the crowd of people who were walking along the paths.

  “I must congratulate you,” Dahl said. “His Majesty was more than kind.”

  Courilof was walking on clouds. Soon the musicians, hidden by the shrubbery, began to play. Torches had been lit and set into the ground around the lawns; their flames cast a deep red glow. The reflected light on the deathly pale faces of Dahl and Courilof looked like shimmering blood; they had the same pale faces you find on the people of St. Petersburg who never see the sunshine, just the artificial light of their summer nights (they sleep during the day). It was rather appropriate, when you think about it.

  Dahl took the minister’s arm and squeezed it affectionately. It was then that I guessed the Killer Whale’s end was near.

  “I just knew that if Their Majesties got to know my wife a bit better,” Courilof said, “they would realise that what they had been led to believe was incorrect.” He smiled proudly. That’s what this man was like. His mind was certainly not as impressive as he thought, but it was greater than I myself had first believed. Yet the moment everything was going well for him, he became confused. Success went to his head like wine.

  I went back to my room. I opened the window, watching the carriages in the courtyard move off, one after the other. I listened to the sound of accordions playing in the stables until morning. I saw the light for a moment in Marguerite Eduardovna’s bedroom, then everything went dark.

  CHAPTER 22

  A WEEK AFTER the ball, the Emperor sent for Courilof. Very politely—for Emperor Nicolas was an enlightened sovereign who, unlike his father, never displayed any brutality in his words or deeds—he informed his minister that he must choose between disgrace or divorce; he urged him to opt for the latter. But Courilof refused to leave his wife; he even displayed a sense of indignation in the matter that the Emperor found “tactless,” as he would later say. Courilof was relieved of his official duties.

  I saw my Courilof return from St. Petersburg that day. His face seemed as impassive as ev
er, just the tiniest bit greyer, the corners of his mouth sagging slightly more. But he seemed perfectly calm and in control of himself; he smiled with an ironic, resigned expression that surprised me.

  “Now I’ll be able to rest as long as I like, Monsieur Legrand, my friend,” he said as he walked past me.

  His dishonour was meant to be kept secret for a while; but the “upper circles” in St. Petersburg, as the court and its members were referred to at the time, openly talked about it.

  At first Courilof’s composure surprised me. Later on, I realised he hadn’t actually understood the extent of his fall from grace. He undoubtedly believed it would be temporary… or perhaps his deep conviction that he had behaved like a gentleman, as he liked to put it, tensing his lips and hissing in that particular way I’d come to know so well, perhaps that was some consolation to him… Nor was he unhappy to have spoken to his beloved sovereign alone, for the first time in his life.

  The rebels at court warmly congratulated him on his attitude; he thus enjoyed a brief popularity that deceived him and made his head spin. But it was short-lived. Soon he was alone. Forgotten. From my window, I started to watch him pace back and forth across his room in the evening, for hours on end. Gradually he became more irritable and miserable, locking himself away in his bedroom, all alone.

  One day I went into his room. He was sitting at his desk; he was holding open a bronze box that contained a bundle of papers; he re-read them, then carefully folded them up, as if they were old love letters. They were all the telegrams he’d received when he’d been appointed Minister of Education; he always kept them with him, locked up in his desk.

  When he saw me, he became a little flustered. I expected him to send me on my way with the same severe gesture he used to dismiss anyone who annoyed him, the regal turn of his head, as if to say, “What is it? What do you want?” accompanied by an icy, heavy look in his pale blue eyes. But all he did was sadly tense his lips.