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  “Boris Vassilievitch Kussov does not appear to drain your resources,” Katya replied stingingly. She resented Natalia’s dislike of her beau and did not understand it.

  “Boris Vassilievitch? I have hardly seen him since his return. Besides, he is only a friend, a sort of mentor, whereas Grisha loves you, doesn’t he?”

  “Yes,” Katya answered meekly, “he does. And I love him back. Is that such a crime?”

  One day in October Katya came to Natalia, her face red and glowing, her eyes the color of fresh cornflowers. “Grisha has asked me to marry him!” she cried. “I have said yes, of course. He is so wonderful and will go far. And do you know, Natalia, General Teliakovsky told me today that I could become a coryphée next fall, if I work hard.”

  “That’s marvelous!” Natalia cried.

  “But I told him I didn’t want to. The corps is fine for me. I shall dance for a few years while Grisha gets started as a soloist, and then I shall have babies. That is what I really want to do.”

  Katya’s eyes pleaded for approval, for understanding. Hadn’t Natalia always advocated the saying: “Live and let live?” Why was it so necessary for Katya Balina to emulate Natalia, to do exactly what she had done? Wasn’t Katya allowed to live her own life with her own priorities? Why was Natashenka crying, then? Why did she behave as though she had been slapped in the face? “Oh, sweetie, sweetie,” Katya crooned, putting her arms around the other girl. “Are you sorry? Was there somebody you turned down and didn’t tell me about?”

  “Tell him,” Natalia repeated to Lydia, “that I am absolutely unable to receive him. He’ll have to leave.” She was lying on her bed in her chemise, her hair in disarray on the pillow.

  “But surely it would do you good—”

  “No, it wouldn’t.” She sighed, and closed her eyes. Lydia walked out of the room. Why? Natalia thought. Why had he come? Briefly there was a sharp pain in her chest, and she said to herself: But Pierre will never come. He is bad for me, an egotist who does not think I am as important as he. He wants a wife, not a dancer. Now she was being unfair to Count Boris, but that was too bad, because she was angry with everyone, including Boris Vassilievitch, whose friendship was so puzzling, who catered to Pierre because he thought that Pierre, not she, was the up-and-coming talent of St. Petersburg. She had never felt so confused and upset.

  She was so angry that she did not hear him until he was in the room, standing over her bed. She screamed and drew up the sheet. “Lydia!” she cried. He was laughing, as though he had caught a child hiding stolen sweets, when actually she was a full-grown woman in her chemise with unlaced corset stays, and her hair unpinned. “It’s all right, don’t blame Lydia,” he said. “I pushed past her. I had to see you, you know.”

  He was dressed in a loose-fitting suit of dark blue serge, with a high, stiff collar and a four-in-hand. A sapphire gleamed at each wrist. He held a cane topped with a gold handle. He was certainly a man of the times, slender, graceful—and out of place in this room. “Boris Vassilievitch, I don’t feel well,” she said. “Please let me be.”

  Instead, he sat down nonchalantly on the edge of the bed and took her hand. “I am growing tired of calling for you here in this miserable apartment and finding that half the time you are gone, and the rest refusing to receive me. Are we not good friends?”

  She was taken aback. His blue eyes shone intently on her, double sapphire rays. She crouched back on the pillow. “Friends,” she repeated. “Yes. But—”

  “Something has been brewing in my mind. I like you, Natalia. I need artists around me. For some reason, they are necessary to my life. I myself have never been capable of creation. I can help you.”

  She listened to the quiet, grave words, spoken not in his customary ironic voice but in a gentler, older one with which she was unfamiliar. Something stirred within her. She replied, softly, a little hoarsely, “Yes, I know. I know that about you.” She had a momentary glimpse into his life. “You have already helped me,” she added.

  “But when I help you, it is I who benefit more. You are so young, so lovely, with so much glory in your future—”

  “And so,” she said, “you wish to play a part in my destiny. But you know that you have already done much to enlarge my mind. What have I done for you in return? What can I do for you?”

  He did not answer. He looked at her directly, scanning her face. She was oddly not embarrassed by her lack of appropriate attire. For some reason this man was familiar to her, someone who could read her thoughts. But was he a friend? “What is it?” she asked him.

  “I should like to set you up in my home among beautiful works of art. I should like Ivan to serve you on my Meissen porcelain. I should like Yuri to take you anywhere you want to go in the landau or the victoria. Come home with me, Natalia.”

  She was speechless. Her eyelids fluttered, her nostrils quivered. An absurd desire to laugh rose in her throat as when Pierre had offered her marriage. She coughed it down. “Boris Vassilievitch,” she asked, “are we back to the incident with the pearls? Or is this—is this—a proposal?”

  He smiled, but not his usual, ironic half-smile. This one was rather wan and brought out the fine wrinkles at the corners of his eyes. “Not quite,” he said. “I am not asking for your hand in marriage, if that is what you mean. However, aside from that, I am asking for the same thing: For you to ‘come live with me, and be my love’ as the English poet says.”

  “We are back to the pearls!” she cried. Now she could no longer contain her amazement. “Boris Vassilievitch, this is silly. You do not love me. You do not love me at all, I know it! All the time you have been kind to me, you never once behaved as a man who is courting a woman but rather as the good friend you are, older, more learned, better traveled. You have guided me, teased me, helped me—but certainly not loved me. A woman does feel a man’s love—or even his desire. No, you definitely do not desire me.”

  “Desire is the last thing you want from me,” Boris retorted. “You do not want a man’s love, either. You want space around you, and most men are not willing to give that to the woman for whom they care. I am different. To me, your beauty, your primary beauty, is your virtuosity. Also, your character. Oh, Natalia, I do not always like you. There are even times when I dislike you intensely. But I never stop admiring you. I admire you sufficiently to offer you the sort of life that I know you need: my care, my protection, my connections, my worldliness, without the restrictions another man might impose. You do not have to love me. I want you in my life, but I do not wish to be your life.”

  “What you ask is for us to be lovers,” she said, “but without your marrying me and without my loving you. Yet what man wants a mistress who does not love him? I shan’t grow to love you, Boris Vassilievitch. Yet you are quite right. I do not need a man in my life. I despise marriage. Why, then, should I allow myself to be openly kept, which means the same thing?”

  “Because,” he explained, “I shall show you the world, and you do want that. I shall never prevent you from dancing but shall help you in any way I can. I shall shield you from that other force that frightens you, call it what you will—men, love. You can be honest with me, Natalia. I have felt your fear. Yet, around me you are not afraid, because you do not feel threatened. I shall not ask to share your bed. I know you would not want this. Just come and let us make a life for each other.”

  For a moment she felt blinded and put a hand out to shield her eyes. Then she felt Boris placing his arms about her, holding her up. His arms were strong, calm. He smelled of spearmint and clean lime. To be free, free of her obsession with Pierre. To dance without fearing Kchessinskaya, or Pavlova’s evil tongue. Was she so strong that she could resist Boris’s proposal? And why should she? Who but Boris had ever gone out of his way for this child of the Crimea? To go from being despised, unwanted by her own parents, to becoming the acknowledged consort of a member of the Tzar’s own court…. To live in beauty, without struggle. ... To see Paris. “But you?” she asked. “Wha
t would you receive from this arrangement?”

  “A man can be born to great wealth and to an illustrious name,” he murmured into her hair. “But to be allied to loveliness and talent is the ultimate goal. Be my princess. To be sure, other men will envy me. Soon the name Oblonova will be famous.”

  She shivered, remembering something else that Pierre had told her. Boris staked out his claims before anyone else even took notice: “No one else could lay claim to you afterward,” he had said. She thought of Pierre and their love—a useless love. What had Boris said? “You and Pierre Riazhin would be ridiculous together, with nothing to add to each other.”She sighed.

  Laying her head wearily on his chest, she murmured, yielding: “So be it, Boris Vassilievitch. I shall go with you.”

  Above her soft brown curls he smiled, and his sheer blue eyes shone like an azure banner in the sky. Pierre would not want her now, his little Sugar Plum. There would be no further trysts between them, no more late-night encounters. But Boris would be acquiring the most promising protégée of the Mariinsky stage. He had killed two birds with one stone, and perhaps this time he might put his own pain to sleep for a while. Of all his intimates, of course, his father would be the least surprised. Boris thought of the brown-eyed Madonna and touched Natalia’s hair.

  Natalia thought: I have changed, my life has changed. In many ways this was true. She had at first felt like an intruder in the vast apartment on the Boulevard of the Horse Guard. Ivan, the maître d’hôtel, was more polished than she, while the young chamber and scullery maids came from families like her own. All these servants had resided for years under Count Boris’s expert command. They ran the flat according to the orders of the immaculate, intuitive Ivan. In the beginning Natalia had to find a place in this strange family. She had to be careful not to do anything to embarrass Boris.

  She had her own bedroom and boudoir, and her own maidservant to comb her hair and set out her clothes—an entire new wardrobe, which had been made to order by the team of seamstresses employed by Princess Nina Stassova, Boris’s beloved sister. “We shall hire you a seamstress of your own, by the by,” Boris had casually declared. But this is absurd! she had thought. I need no more than the few gowns I already own.

  All her life she had earned whatever she possessed, and now, such luxury was placed at her disposal that she did not know how to react. Boris wanted her to wear the emerald tiara, and wanted to take her with him to select an Aubusson carpet of rose, violet, and cerulean blue for her boudoir. He insisted on inviting guests for lavish six-course suppers on Thursdays, to give her a day’s rest after her performance on Wednesdays. The guest of honor sat at her left, and she was expected to be a gracious, intelligent hostess. Across the table from her sat Boris, regal and golden. Whenever she made a salient point or expressed a strong, witty opinion, he would smile, narrowing his eyes. This meant: Good, good. You are not disappointing me. You are doing your job well.

  But, in effect, what was her job? She sometimes even wondered who she was. At the Ballet, she noticed a different attitude among the dancers. Tamara Karsavina and Olga Preobrajenskaya continued to be unswervingly kind, the former in a gentle, discreet manner, the latter, who was older, in a more protective way. Anna Pavlova observed Natalia covertly and often avoided her, but she was no longer rude. Natalia saw many of these women at social gatherings. She had even been invited to Kchessinskaya’s palace, as Boris always had been in the past. Kchessinskaya never referred to their disagreement and was animated and agreeable with Natalia, in the vein of an older sister. After all, were they not both concubines of influential noblemen?

  Even the upper echelons of the aristocracy did not reject her, as she had expected. The gentlemen passed her from arm to arm as one would an enchanting exotic pet, a rare jewel to be displayed. To be sure, some of the ladies scoffed about her position in Boris’s life, the same ones who criticized Kchessinskaya. But for the most part, she was well accepted.

  Furthermore, she was now one of the soloists at the Ballet, and she soon learned that artists were thought to have rules of their own, created by the unusual needs of their genius. Not everyone regarded her with such lack of moral prejudice, but Boris protected her from those who did not. Her main concern was: What am I doing in his life?

  She had overheard her young maid, Luba, talking one morning with the French cook. “No, it’s true!” the girl was saying. “Madame has never slept with His Excellency. I would have noticed if she had. There is never so much as a cufflink in her room, or a hairpin in his. Besides, they both have their scents. Madame’s is attar of roses, and it’s unmistakable. Her odor has never been mixed with his—in either room.”

  “Hush now, Luba, and mind your business,” the cook had interposed.

  But, of course, it was true. Boris treated her with consideration, even affection. Now there was a new expression in his eyes when he regarded her: Sometimes the old irony, so often tinged with cruelty, would mingle with a certain pleasure, or praise. He approved of her. He even liked her. He would casually leave a gilt-edged volume of Petrarch’s poetry, bound in crumbling antique Moroccan leather, by her armchair, remarking that he had enjoyed it and perhaps she might, too. That was his way of indicating a new area for discovery. She had learned French during her rigid courses of instruction at the ballet school, but only in basic, cursory fashion. Now he had found her a pleasant middle-aged French widow to come to the flat and speak with her, suggesting reading to improve her fluency and general culture. She learned quickly, so that by the middle of the winter season she could hold conversations in French with their guests, most of whom spoke it in the manner common to the Russian aristocracy since the days of the Empress Catherine.

  She was never bored with Boris—but she was baffled. At first she had tensely listened for his footstep by her door at night. But evidently he intended to respect his promise not to intrude as a man into her life. She was relieved. She still thought of Pierre and could not lie still remembering the night that she had spent in his arms, the joy, the sweet pain. She did not feel the same way about Boris. Her skin did not tingle when he drew near her, and she did not feel lightheaded and dizzy when he entered a room. She thought of Boris as a cool wind, a peaceful landscape that brought repose and loftiness to her existence.

  Lydia often came to see her, and amusement glittered in her black eyes when Ivan bowed to Natalia and called her “Madame.” “Fancy that,” she would say. “Our Manya would look askance at us in this loveseat, with our tea glasses monogrammed with the Kussov K. Manya is shocked, Natalia. She wholeheartedly disapproves of this illicit arrangement of yours.” Natalia knew that such criticism was unavoidable. The enlightened members of St. Petersburg could afford to be more liberal, both in the matter of their own conduct and in accepting hers—but the middle classes and the peasants considered her no better than a whore. Katya practically never saw her now, except at the Ballet; her family had expressed such utter condemnation of Natalia’s life that the young woman’s own opinions had been shaken, to the point where she could not feel comfortable with Natalia. Natalia accepted this censure as inevitable. She had gained so much from Boris that the loss was minor in comparison.

  He had set up a bank account in her name, “So that you will not feel under obligation to ask for every small thing,” he had explained. She had been touched by his consideration. In return, it did not occur to her to tell anyone the truth about their relations, even if this might have rehabilitated her reputation in certain circles. She was, then, for all intents and purposes, firmly established as Boris’s companion—his mistress.

  At the Mikhailovsky one evening they encountered his father, Count Vassily. He bowed over her hand, and said: “I have watched you at the Mariinsky, my dear. I am not a balletomane, but in you I saw the loveliness of which my son has spoken.” What did she see in his expression: approval? complicity with Boris? The old man was rather paternal. For a member of the old guard, he behaved decently and kindly.

  So did B
oris’s sister. That is, for Liza, the youngest, lived in Moscow. Princess Nina Stassova invited her to tea and praised her great talent. When she thought that Natalia was out of earshot, she told Boris: “She is charming, absolutely charming. What a pity you can’t marry her. I like her a lot more than I did Marguerite, for all her superior breeding.” Sometimes Princess Nina brought her small daughter, Galina, for a quick visit to Natalia—and Natalia knew that this was an unspoken sign of acceptance. A Stassov did not expose her three-year-old child to women of bad influence. Galina was tiny and golden, a fairy—and Natalia often thought with amazement that women s lives could be so different, her own devoted to her art while Nina was dedicated to her family. In a sense Natalia had exchanged Katya for Nina Stassova. For a person who had always relied on her own resources, an exchange of one friend for another was not a trauma but a nonchalant affair. Nina was a friendly acquaintance who wanted to like her because she loved Boris; whereas Katya had been dependent on Natalia. In actuality, neither of these women made a vital connection with Natalia’s heart and soul.

  I have but one real friend, Natalia pondered: Boris Kussov, a strange, essentially lonely man, whom I am afraid to try to reach. She felt compassion for him, as she had never felt toward another human being. Whatever he sought, he was not finding it. She would go to him in the study, and sit with him by the fire, not speaking. She knew he was unhappy, but there was nothing she could do. She wanted to say “Thank you,” or to cry out to him that she was there, another person, someone who cared. But she could not. Instead, she took his hand, and when his startled eyes flew to her face, she quickly kissed it, turning away—knowing that for this gesture he would deride her.

  “What have we here,” he would say, “a romantic little bayadère? Come now, Liebchen, let us not become maudlin before the ripe old age of nineteen.”

  “Say what you will, Boris,” she replied. She picked up Voltaire’s Candide to resume her reading. Her face, small and austere, was as impenetrable to him, she realized, as his Grecian features remained closed to her. Theirs was a decidedly odd friendship—yet real, nevertheless.