The Four Winds of Heaven Page 24

  In the luxurious hotel where Dalia Hadjani took her, Anna seemed oblivious to everything until she reached the woman’s suite. All at once Anna burst into tears. “Oh, my God, my God!” she cried, sobs shaking her. Dalia ordered tea, and sat down beside her, taking one of her hands. Suddenly Anna turned to her, her cries abating. “Why are you helping me?” she asked abruptly.

  “I have no friends here,” Dalia said simply. “When a woman is in this condition, she looks for a friend. Maybe I have found one who is also alone?”

  Anna smiled for the first time. “Yes,” she admitted, “I am here alone. My name is Anna de Gunzburg, and my home is in St. Petersburg. Was in St. Petersburg. I shall never return there.”

  The vehemence of her tone startled Dalia. “Because… of the father?” she questioned softly.

  “Oh, no!” Anna cried. Tears welling anew in her eyes. “He is… was… a wonderful man. He is the only person who ever truly loved me, or understood me. He wanted to marry me. But I wouldn’t tie him to me—you wouldn’t see why, but I cannot explain. Things are too difficult to explain. He must never learn of…of this. Then he would find me, and force me to marry him—and—”

  “If you love each other?”

  “I would never bind him to me with his child. Our love was an act of freedom… But why am I telling you all this? How could you understand? You are a married woman.”

  “Yes,” Dalia said, “I am married. I have a good life. And I love my husband. I do not have to understand, Anna. If you feel that you cannot return to him… then will you have the child?” She blushed and looked away. “You are evidently a person of means and distinction. There are... ways...”

  Anna did not speak. She was thinking of Vanya, of his blond hair falling into his eyes, those brilliant green eyes that laughed, that danced, that wept. “I shall have the baby,” she whispered. “I do not care what anyone says. I shall have the baby, and love it, and rear it the way I wish I had been reared, in simplicity and joy, and freedom.”

  “That is fine,” Dalia said. “But do not say you do not care about the world. For your child will have to bear the brunt of its whispers.”

  There was a knock at the door, and Dalia rose to open it. A waiter wheeled in a cart with tea and cakes. He set it before the women, and Dalia waved him away. “That will do,” she told him. “We shall serve ourselves.” When he had left, she poured the hot liquid into fine china cups. Offering one to Anna, she asked, “Will you remain in Zurich? Are you known here?”

  Anna was startled. “Yes, I know people here. I had planned to go to Darmstadt, to study painting. I was going to leave in a few days. Now... I don’t know anymore. Suddenly I am two people—everything is happening so quickly!”

  But Dalia’s face had brightened. “You are a painter?” she cried. “How extraordinary! I am a dabbler, but that is my fondest hobby. In Teheran I belonged to a small class. We painted still lives, or garden scenes. Tell me, Anna, do they know you in Darmstadt?”

  Anna shook her head. She felt too confused to comprehend what was happening around her. She felt dizzy again as though seeing things in slow motion. Dalia turned to her, a look of determination on her face. “We shall go together, my friend,” she stated. “You shall find a name—any name—that is not yours. Madame… Madame Kussova! A good Russian name, is it not? You shall be Madame Kussova, a widow, and we shall travel together to Darmstadt. I shall send my husband a telegram. He will be so happy that I have found a friend, and that I shall paint once more! And we will help each other. I am glad to have discovered you in that tea room, Anna de Gunzburg.”

  Anna regarded the beige face, the heavy mass of black hair, and nodded in silence.

  “Come now,” Dalia said, passing her a chocolate eclair, “we must celebrate our meeting by fortifying our constitutions! Eat, Anna de Gunzburg. Eat, Anna Kussova!”

  Dazed, Anna picked up her fork and speared a bit of the eclair with it. All at once she was very hungry. She said, “I like you,” and her brown eyes caught the other’s darker ones and held their gaze. The colors of the room had sharpened, and Anna thought: I am still alive! It was the first time the numbness had departed from her mind and body since her arrival in Switzerland. “Let me tell you about Herr Bader,” she began.

  A year before, Ossip’s physician had announced that as long as the family took frequent small trips to such resort areas as Imatra, in Finland, he would not have to interrupt his studies to leave St. Petersburg during the spring. This had always meant that the young man’s work load upon his return was prodigious, and had he not been a brilliant student, he would never have succeeded in passing his exams. Now that he was completing his next to the last year at the gymnasium, Ossip was relieved to be allowed to proceed on schedule. But he had yet another reason not to wish to absent himself from the capital.

  In March 1906, he could think of nothing but Natasha Tagantseva. He wandered about the apartment, singing, waltzing by himself, holding her dream form in his arms, and whispering into her invisible ear. At night he would compose poems to her, and sometimes, in reckless folly, he showed his poems to Volodia. His friend read them, smiling, and then with irony he said, “You did not think that our friendship alone was sufficiently dangerous?”

  “Since my earliest childhood I have lived in fear of life itself, or rather, of losing it,” Ossip told him solemnly. “Would our fathers alone frighten me? For the first time in my existence I have someone for whom to risk my security. Is she not worth it? Tell me, does she ever think of me, Volodia?”

  His friend sighed. “She thinks of you. You two have placed me in a damned awkward position. You speak to me of her, she speaks to me of you. But what good will that do except to cause you both unhappiness? I have no one dearer to me than the two of you. That is why I blame myself. I shall not give this poem to her, Ossip. It will only serve to feed useless fantasies.”

  Angrily, Ossip cried, “And you are too self-assured to entertain fantasies?”

  Volodia looked away. A searing pain tore his chest. He said, coldly, “I am less of a fool than you, or than Natasha. But that does not make me impervious to your feelings. All right. I shall give her the poem. But for the last time, Ossip.”

  “Someday I shall repay you,” his friend said fervently. But Volodia turned his back to him.

  “You cannot,” he stated grimly. But he took the ode and pocketed it.

  Not long afterward, Mathilde received a small envelope, bearing an unusual crest, in the morning mail, and when she opened it, she could not speak. She merely passed the note, on the finest of vellums, to David. Johanna de Mey opened her mouth in bewilderment and exasperation that she had been passed over. David exclaimed: “That family baffles me more than ever! I am impressed by this gesture of the Countess. Surely her husband is unaware of it.”

  “The Countess? Who?” Johanna cried.

  “Countess Tagantseva. She writes to me that she wishes to come to tea on Thursday next, if it is convenient for me. It is a most gracious note,” Mathilde stated.

  Ossip’s face flushed quickly. “She is a gracious lady,” he commented.

  “I am certain that this will be the first time Countess Tagantseva will ever pay a visit to a Jew,” David said.

  “After all, my dear, the Prime Minister set the pace with Uncle Horace,” Mathilde commented softly. “Perhaps the Tagantsevs are learning to accept our humanity.” She looked with gentle irony on her older son, whose blue eyes matched hers. “Ossip is very human, and he has been to their palace.”

  But David was annoyed. “That’s beside the point, Mathilde! If the Countess learns to accept you, or even my son, in however small a measure, that has no bearing on the larger question. Her husband may accept one Jew, as a great exception—but is that progress?”

  “You are picking lint from a clean carpet,” his wife replied.

  It was Sonia who spoke up, her voice high and young, but firm: “Whatever passes between the Tagantsev children and us, or between Mama and
the Countess, must not weaken your own position, Papa. Perhaps the Count does know of this proposed visit—and perhaps also he encourages it, to mollify you. You are the one man, besides Grandfather who has grown old, who can speak on behalf of the Jews. If you can be stilled, the Count’s purpose will have been achieved that much faster.”

  The family sat in stunned silence. Then Johanna de Mey, cords standing out in her long neck, rose in her chair and, leaning across the breakfast table, said shrilly, “You impudent chit of a girl! Go to your room at once!”

  But her voice died in her throat. David also was standing, facing her, his jaw pushed forward, his eyes blazing, his fists clenched on the table. “Sonia will remain where she is,” he declared, and he saw his wife’s lips part and the color leave her face. Johanna de Mey staggered, then fell back into her seat. But the Baron remained standing, regarding his family one by one until his eyes fell upon Sonia’s, her fragile face childlike beneath the heavy pompadour, her chin quivering.

  “This is the house of Gunzburg,” he said, “but only Sonia seems to have remembered that. Henceforth, no one shall forget it. Countess Tagantseva is welcome here, and I applaud her excellent breeding and her sense of justice in choosing to visit those who have made her son feel comfortable. We have had Christian friends before, and hope to have many more. But there will never be a bridging of the gap with the Tagantsevs until the Senator changes his position on the Jews of Russia. That is all.”

  Ossip looked at his sister for a moment in silence. He had seen the quick flood of color upon her cheekbones when their father had spoken, saw her chin stop quivering. He met her cool gray eyes and murmured, so that no one could hear but her, “I thought you had come to like Volodia! Have you now turned against him for his father’s sins?”

  Sonia looked aside, fumbled with her napkin. “No,” she answered simply. Caught up in her sudden anguish, she did not notice Johanna’s glance of interest in her direction. The governess no longer appeared cowed, and a glint of brightness shone in her aquamarine eyes. She bit into a piece of toast, and dabbed at her lips. Behind her napkin she was smiling.

  On Thursday afternoon Sonia came to her mother in a soft blue-gray gown that was the exact hue of her eyes, and which was singular in its austere simplicity. The high ruffled collar and the trim on the long sleeves were of the finest lace, and they provided the only ornamentation on the outfit. In her pompadour Sonia had placed a comb encrusted with gray pearls. She wore no other gem.

  Mathilde awaited their guest in a day gown of deep sapphire, which outlined her full figure. Johanna de Mey, in peach-colored muslin, was by far the most exuberant of the three women. Mathilde had sensed that this meeting meant a great deal to Ossip, and although she did not understand that more was involved than his friendship with Volodia, he had wordlessly communicated his message to his mother. Now she sat regally upon the sofa, wondering. Sonia, by her side, stood erect, almost protective of her family, thinking at once of her father’s fierce expression during that breakfast several days before, and of Volodia’s nut-brown features, so honest and unabashed. Superimposed upon their faces was Ossip’s, flushed as though with fever, as it had been the night of the Tagantsev ball. He had cried with such rapture, “She is perfect!” and Sonia felt herself stiffen against this mysterious “she” of whom her brother had not spoken since, but whom she instinctively felt to be a threat. She waited, her throat constricted.

  When Stepan entered, he announced, “Countess Maria Efimovna Tagantseva, and her daughter, Countess Natalia Nicolaievna.” Mathilde exchanged glances with her daughter: that was Volodia’s twin. Mathilde’s brows rose on a note of inquiry. And Sonia thought: Is this the “she”? When the women entered, and her mother stood to welcome them, Sonia’s heart leaped with recognition: there could be no other “she” than this tall, willowy girl who had just appeared.

  The Countess, who was in her middle forties, was elegant in a matronly way, with a high-crowned hat trimmed with flowers. She wore a gown of red silk with a high-necked overblouse and a skirt ending in three rows of ruffles. But her daughter, Natasha, gleamed beside her, her tall, slender form sheathed in a simple tailored dress of green cotton and a shorter jacket trimmed with astrakhan. Her straw hat was wide-brimmed and tilted up over her forehead, and her magnificent color radiated health. Sonia was taken aback. Sparkling blue eyes sought hers, and a warm hand pressed hers, and Natasha was saying, “So you are Ossip Davidovitch’s sister!”

  “You remember my brother… ?” Sonia asked, her voice small. But the young woman was already sitting down beside her, and the face she turned to Sonia was almost mocking in its happiness.

  “How could I forget him?” she said. “I had so hoped he would be here…”

  Sonia passed the girl a platter of delicate tea cakes, and replied: “But Ossip is in school. With Vladimir Nicolaievitch.”

  Natasha’s lips parted, and she nodded. “Yes, naturally, you are right! So you are the one who sees my own twin brother more than I do! It is most intriguing to meet you at last. Ossip is the most charming man I know. Volodia speaks of him constantly! And he has described you to me in great detail. I could have recognized you anywhere! Would you have known me, too?”

  Sonia passed Natasha a glass of hot tea with a slice of lemon. “I—I am sorry,” she answered, “but I seldom see Vladimir Nicolaievitch for more than a few minutes a day. Unless, of course, it was Ossip you were talking about—” She blushed, and lowered her eyes. “Whom do you mean, Natalia Nicolaievna?”

  The other girl tilted back her head and laughed. “I see why I have confused you!” she cried. “Although—to tell you the truth—I had been thinking of both. It is Volodia who described you for me, but I had wondered if perhaps Ossip Davidovitch had paid me a similar compliment. Or has he forgotten the dance?”

  Sonia’s hand went to her throat. She stammered, “I am certain he hasn’t.” Inside, she was thinking: He has told her of me! Of me! And I am not even pretty! Then she regarded Natasha, and saw that the color had left her cheeks and that her mouth had fallen open in an expression of dejection. She looked more closely at the beautiful girl, Ossip’s mysterious “she,” and suddenly she felt compassion. Impulsively she said, “He finds you ‘perfect!’” And then horror assailed her. What had she said? Her father’s face loomed before her, and she hid her confusion by sipping her tea.

  But Natasha Tagantsev had tears in her eyes. “ ‘Perfect’…” she repeated. Then she leaned over and touched her mother’s sleeve. ‘I beg your pardon, Mama, but did Volodia not say that he would meet us here after the gymnasium, with Ossip Davidovitch?”

  Natalia had interrupted an agreeable conversation about Worth, Poiret, and the changing fashions, a genteel and matronly conversation, and now both mothers and Johanna looked at her. Natasha’s frank blue gaze disarmed them.

  “Yes, he did,” her mother said, and then, apologetically, to Mathilde: “I hope that this was not yet another presumption on our part… ?”

  “Not at all, Maria Efimovna. Vladimir Nicolaievitch is always welcome.”

  But Sonia, dismayed, whispered: “Ossip told me nothing of this plan!” And her hand flew to the comb in her pompadour, which she readjusted. Natasha smiled. “You have lovely fine hair,” she stated gently.

  They began to talk, unconscious really of the subject matter, for each was most acutely aware of the time. The young men would be arriving at any moment. Sonia stood straight-backed, like a figurine of porcelain and lace, and kept her voice controlled, pleasant, and neutral. Natasha relaxed against the soft cushions, her form elastic, her eyes expectant. She was older than Sonia by a year, and had officially come out into society, whereas Sonia was less sophisticated but more apt at hiding her emotions. She did not know how she felt about Natasha, only that she was greatly perturbed by this lanky, elegant girl who was Volodia’s sister. She would think things through at a later, more private time.

  When the young men’s voices, joyful and deep, resounded from the ha
llway, instinctively both girls rose. Sonia felt frozen in position. She saw her brother’s beautiful, fine face flush as he exchanged one intense look with Natasha, and that look disturbed her, as though she had seen something private. Both young men were greeting the ladies, bowing, kissing hands. Sonia saw Volodia’s muscular form, his trim mustache, his waving brown hair parted in the center. She tried to avoid the magnetism of his chestnut eyes, but when he came to her, her heart began to pound in her temples. He said, “How good it is to see you when you are not rushing off to your room during our luncheons!” She smiled, and replied something inane. He had his sister’s smile, open, totally disarming.

  It was Johanna who called out to the young people, suggesting that they move to the piano room. Ossip, more lively than Sonia had ever seen him, led the way. “We shall play something for four hands,” Volodia announced. Before Sonia could protest, he had drawn up the piano bench and was looking over her music sheets. Finally he sat down, for she had daintily taken her place, and Ossip and Natasha had moved farther back, by the window. She felt him take his seat, felt his leg again as she had felt it that day before her departure for Paris during the revolution. Their fingers stood poised above the keys, and they began to play. It was almost as if they were dancing with their fingertips. Neither of them spoke.

  But Ossip was saying to Natasha, “I could not concentrate in class, thinking of you. It kills me not to see you. You look wonderful.”

  “And you,” she said, unabashed, “are Apollo wading by a stream. I would be a naiad, if you would but have me!”