The Four Winds of Heaven Page 44

  She felt someone gently seize her hand and say, “He could not, after what he had done. Not because you would not have forgiven him, but because he was doubly a coward, and could never have faced you, knowing that you knew. He... married someone, last year. I do not think he ever loved her as he loved you. But she was a widow, and needed a father for her little girl. Maybe he married her to help atone for his disgraceful behavior.”

  She fell forward, and he caught her, and eased her back upon the sofa. “No,” he murmured, “this will not do at all, Sofia Davidovna. You are ten times the person he is. But you had to know. Sooner or later, someone else—Tania—would have told you. Come on.”

  “I could have forgiven him everything, if he had not married,” she said, her eyes shut tight to stem the tears. “Oh, no, he couldn’t have done this! Not—marriage.”

  “You are being a sentimental child,” Mossia Zlatopolsky said harshly. “He may love you forever, but he is a man, a person. You could hardly expect him to spend his life as a monk, loving only the memory of you. Surely such is the nonsense of novels.”

  She stopped moaning and regarded him, aghast. He broke into a smile. “Good, good!” he cried. “You are reacting like a strong individual, winning back your pride. Come now, be my hostess and allow me the pleasure of another glass of tea.”

  Sonia nodded, mutely, and when she returned to his side, Ossip was there, and not long afterward the Zlatopolskys asked for a carriage to their hotel. Before leaving, however, Mossia fetched a small package from the foyer, and handed it to Sonia. “Tatiana Alexandrovna knew that we would see you,” he said, “and she asked me to give you this book. It is, it seems, a novel by the daughter of the British Ambassador, Miss Buchanan. Your cousin told me to tell you that the plot amused her, and will quite take your fancy. I hope that I have accomplished my mission adequately.”

  “It was kind of you to undertake it,” she said, and gave him her hand. “In return, you will give Tania my love?”

  “Most certainly. I shall endear myself to the Halperins by kissing the new Madame on both cheeks and the third, and shock them all. After all, is Tania not… expecting?”

  She closed the door upon his tall, broad form, and stood in the foyer, lost in thoughts that were too jumbled to make sense. But as she went to bed, after kissing her parents good night, she felt queerly drained of all emotion. Her last waking thought was: Since when has Tania started to read books?

  In the carriage that was taking them to the Hotel de l’Europe, Mossia and Hillel Zlatopolsky smoked in companionable silence. Finally, it was Mossia who drew his father’s attention from thoughts of the Judaica and the rich supper at the Gunzburg home. “You are quite taken with the young Baroness, Papa,” he chuckled.

  “She is a lovely, delicate child,” the older man mused.

  “Hardly a child. She must be my own age. But she is one of those women who will always be childlike, don’t you think?”

  “I’m not certain,” Hillel replied. “There is a hardness about her that isn’t childlike at all. And it is that which draws me to her; it saddens me to see it.”

  “Why?” Mossia asked. “A little toughness in a girl isn’t always bad. As long as she doesn’t become a woman of iron—such as that Dutch governess. I prefer them soft, but zestful.”

  “Like Lialia.”

  Father and son regarded each other seriously in the darkness of the coach. The hooves of the horses clopped on the cobbles of Petrograd, and still neither would lower his gaze. Lialia was a sore point between them, though never discussed beyond this. She was a singer in a Muscovite cafe-concert, and was kept by Mossia. As long as the young man paid for his gypsy from his own earnings, Hillel felt that it was not his business to interfere. He loved Mossia, respected his brilliant business sense, but did not easily understand his immense appetites, which included women such as Lialia.

  “Like Lialia,” Mossia assented lightly. But he recalled the instance when his father had quelled him, the single time, and how searing a humiliation that had been. Mossia was a passionate aficionado of billiards, but in Kiev and Moscow, billiard halls were found only in the most disreputable neighborhoods. Hillel had strongly disapproved of his son’s presence among blackguards and thieves, although he had never been an interfering parent in regard to Mossia’s private activities. Mossia had chosen to overlook Hillel’s objection, and one night, in the midst of a tense game in the back room of a shanty in the slums of Kiev, he had seen his father, elegantly clad in tuxedo and top hat, a black pearl pin resplendent in his cravat, push open the door. Hillel had merely looked at the young man from his small, piercing eyes, and Mossia had dropped his cue in the corner and followed him home. Not a word had been exchanged between them; but the humiliation still rankled.

  “It was a generous deed, to give Lialia the money for her mother’s operation,” Hillel now stated gently. “Oh, don’t look so peeved! Your friend Pierre told me about it.”

  “It was not his affair,” Mossia replied offhandedly. Then, his eyes shining, he turned to his father with animation: “Papa, while we are here, shall we go to the Opera? I have become good friends with Fedya Chaliapin, and I should like to have you hear him in Boris Godunov.”

  “I have already had the pleasure of listening to Chaliapin. He’s a genius. When he comes next to Kiev, bring him to the house, Mossia.”

  “Thank you, I shall. Now, tell me, do you suppose the Baron will sell the Judaica?”

  Hillel Zlatopolsky shrewdly narrowed his eyes. “I am not sure,” he replied. “He will want to wait, and weigh his options.”

  “But you will win, Papa,” Mossia stated. “You never fail.” He smiled, thinking of the sugar plantations in Kiev, the banks in Moscow, the shipping companies on the Volga, the tramways in Odessa, the mills, the mines, the pastures. “Still, I wish that you and Baron Gunzburg were on the same side.”

  “But we are, Mossia, we are,” his father replied, his small eyes twinkling. Then he sighed, and huddled comfortably beneath the plaid blanket in the landau. His son scrutinized him, but this time Hillel had no desire to share his thoughts with his son.

  Sonia was brutally awakened by loud voices in the foyer, and she peered at the elegant glass dome which held her clock upon her mantelpiece. It was after midnight. She turned on the small lamp by her bedside, and rose, her throat constricted. Her black hair cascaded down her back and over her shoulders, and she shuddered, slipping into her bathrobe which was at the foot of her bed. Then she ran out of her room toward the noise.

  Two men were arguing with Stepan, tall and stern, his hair tinged with strands of regal white. “What is it?” she asked, joining them.

  “I beg your pardon, Baroness,” one of the men said, and bowed. His attire was nondescript, his face sallow but intelligent. “We are searching for Baron Ossip de Gunzburg. This man says that—”

  “Ossip Davidovitch has gone to a ball,” Stepan articulated with disdain.

  “Who are you?” Sonia demanded. Goosebumps had spread over her arms, and although she examined the men carefully, she could figure nothing out. “Our maître d’hôtel speaks the truth,” she added, moving toward Stepan.

  “We are with the Secret Police,” the second man stated. “It seems unlikely to us that your brother would pick this one of all nights to attend a dance. Where is he?”

  Sonia’s head jerked up, and she straightened her sloping shoulders. “My brother is at the Abelmans’ home. Mademoiselle Abelman has turned eighteen, and because of the war there are few escorts available. My brother was asked to attend—although we do not believe in socializing during the war,” she could not help adding with displeasure, having argued this point many times with Ossip. She thought: If only he had listened to reason he would be here, and no one would make him sound like some kind of criminal! Thank God, she thought with a surge of relief, that he has no interest in politics. Thank God, for now they cannot arrest him! She nearly swooned with suppressed emotion. “Why is it you want him?” she
asked.

  The first man shrugged. “We must search his room. Can you lead us to it?”

  Stepan cried out, “No, indeed, we shall not! The young master has done nothing wrong.”

  But Sonia turned to the maître d’hôtel. “Stepan,” she said quietly, “we must summon my father at once. He would not allow such an indignity to take place in his own house. Although,” she added, a small but proud figure in her bathrobe trimmed with Brussels lace, “my brother has nothing to hide. You may as well begin your search, and see for yourself. But waken Papa, please, Stepan.”

  The two men entered the room then, and opened all the drawers and cabinets, and removed Ossip’s clothing to check the pockets and hems. Sonia stood erect by their side. “There,” she said finally. “You see? Nothing!”

  At this point, Stepan returned with a disheveled Baron David. In the commotion Mathilde and Johanna had awakened too, and they entered Ossip’s room on David’s heel. Mathilde seized her husband’s arm, and cried, “Stop them! You must call the minister at once!”

  But David shook his head. “Let us first find out what this is about,” he stated. “Calm yourself, my dear.” But the pain in his chest grew worse, and blue lines showed around his lips. Sonia rang for tea, but fetched her father a shot of Napoleon brandy.

  She returned to her own room bewildered. In the distance, she could hear Johanna’s strident tone as she attempted to lead Mathilde to her room and back to bed. She heard her father, politely offering tea to the policemen, who accepted gingerly. Finally, she pushed her hair from her temples and lay back upon her pillows. She could not even think of sleeping. She reached for the book that Mossia had brought her, Tania’s gift, hoping that it might relax her. It was entitled: The Emeralds. She flipped through the pages, then opened to the first chapter, adjusting her lamp so that she might read more clearly. All the while, she kept one ear cocked for the sound of Ossip’s key at the back door, off their hallway.

  Strange, she thought, as she began to read. Tania has never given me a book before. Pregnancy must do odd things to a woman. The story, a bit farfetched but still enjoyable, concerned a young woman, ambitious and selfish, who wished to wed a young man of ancient and noble lineage, who was deeply in love with her as well. As always in such novels, Sonia reflected with a wry smile, the heroine was named Clarissa. (Sometimes they were Vanessa or Alicia.) The lover had given Clarissa a lovely emerald engagement ring, and also a family jewel composed similarly of emeralds, a necklace which was passed from generation to generation. Therefore, the necklace did not rightly belong to the lady who wore it; it constituted a loan until her own son’s wedding. She received it upon her engagement, but was not permitted to wear it until after the wedding. The vain Clarissa, however, insisted upon wearing the emeralds to a ball several days before her marriage, in spite of the supplications of her fiancé and his mother. The clasp was old and fragile, and during a mazurka, it opened, and the necklace fell to the ground. But in the time it took for her dancing partner to wheel about to pick it up, the crowd of dancers had moved, and it was nowhere to be seen. Someone had cleverly seized it. The young man, in a rage, broke the engagement.

  Sonia could not continue. She flung the book aside, tears stinging her eyes and pressing through her long, curling lashes. Her breast rose and fell rapidly, her cheeks burned. How had Tania dared? Why had she been so cruel? She thought wildly: My ring, my betrothal necklace, were emeralds, too, and I wore them for three months before Kolya refused me. All of Petersburg knew these jewels. And now she lives in Kiev, and knows that he has married another woman! Why, Tania, why? She wept bitterly, as she had wanted to but had not done in front of Mossia Zlatopolsky. She would write Tania, she would accuse her angrily—she would have young Zlatopolsky return the book. And then she thought: No, of course not. I shall not give her the satisfaction. I shall even thank her for her present.

  As she nodded resolutely to herself, tears upon her cheeks, she heard a vague scraping noise and rose quickly. Ossip! She dashed from her room, barely noticing that it was after three in the morning, and in her delicate slippered feet arrived at the back door, which no one but Ossip used, and he only after balls now when the rest of the house had retired early. She swung open the door before his key had unlocked it. Bewildered, he faced her in his top hat and tails. “Sonitchka! What is it?”

  “Ossip! There are two policemen here searching your room, waiting to arrest you. You must go to a friend’s house, and tomorrow I shall pack a bag for you and deliver it,” she whispered urgently.

  For a flicker of an instant, he hesitated on the doorstep. Then, shaking his head, he pushed past her. “Sonitchka, my love,” he declared, “it can only be a mistake. I have done absolutely nothing. There is no cause for alarm—or cowardice. I shall go to them.”

  Hat in hand, he strode elegantly into his bedroom and stood in the doorway, appraising his disarranged clothing strewn about the floor. “Come now, gentlemen, state secrets or no, you must improve your housekeeping,” he chided them lightly. “But what’s all this about?”

  Respectfully, the men stood up, and one of them said, “Please, Baron. Change into your daytime attire. We beg your pardon. We did not believe that you were attending a dance, but evidently we were wrong, as we can see by your clothing. But you will have to accompany us to the station. Take along your toilet articles.”

  “Toilet articles? Where are they taking you, Ossip?” Sonia cried.

  “Don’t worry, we shall clear it up,” David said, putting an arm around his son’s shoulders. He was glad Mathilde had gone to her room.

  Ossip shrugged lightly. “Try to sleep, Papa,” he said soothingly.

  Ossip excused himself, and returned dressed as for a day at the bank. He touched his sister’s cheek with lingering softness. “Cheer up,” he murmured. “I cannot be sent to a worse place than Gino.”

  Sonia’s terrified face was the last thing he saw before leaving the room, between the two men. But when he had left, Sonia went at once to her father, and pulled his head onto her narrow shoulder. “It’s going to be all right, beloved,” she whispered. “All right.”

  Baron David was up at dawn, and his secretary, Alexei Fliederbaum, made many telephone calls. Sonia went to her Uncle Sasha, and explained the situation, begging him to round up all those who might help them locate Ossip and help him. Because of the havoc created by the war, they had no idea where Ossip had been taken. David recalled with anxiety how his friend Lopukhin had been sent to Siberia on charges of high treason, only to be pardoned after years of suffering when the case had been reviewed by the Tzar. If only Lopukhin were still Chief of Police, he might have been able to help, but David’s friend had retired to Moscow after his release from exile. Now David’s ministers were absent on war business or could learn nothing. What confusing times! Sasha’s colleagues did little better. Even an aged general, on leave in the capital, was barely able to learn that Ossip had been taken to the most dreaded of prisons, the Pyotrpavlovsky Fortress. But he was not able to gain admittance to see him, nor to discover what the young man might have been charged with.

  It is my fault, my fault, Sonia repeated to herself endlessly that day, as well as the next. It is because of my illegal work for the prisoners of war …

  But six days later she was struck by an idea. Nervously turning an opal ring around on her slender finger, she went into her mother’s boudoir and there faced Mathilde, her face frozen with fear and bewilderment. She kneeled before her, took her mother’s cold fingers between her own, and gazed beseechingly into her eyes. “Mama,” she stated, “there is someone we had not thought to call upon.”

  “Well?” her mother cried.

  “It is... Senator Count Tagantsev. I know Papa would hate it, and hate me for even suggesting it. But you, Mama, you could write to the Countess, Maria Efimovna. It is worth a try, is it not?”

  Mathilde sat back and regarded her daughter with a brilliant stare. “I do not care whether your father approves or not
,” she declared at length. “Thank you, Sonia. I shall write to the Countess. If she ignores my plea, I shall have lost little but my pride. And Ossip’s safety is worth that risk, isn’t it?”

  She quickly composed a note, and gave it to her maid with the order that it be hand-delivered to the Countess Tagantseva at her mansion, and, she added, “Tell the footman to await a reply.” Then she lay back and closed her eyes, not daring to hope. Her Ossip, in the Fortress! It was as ludicrous as that unspeakably immoral peasant, Rasputin, in the Winter Palace. Yet there they were, both of them, incontestably. She began to wait.

  In the Tagantsev palace, the Count and Countess were finishing a late breakfast when a footman was announced from the Gunzburg house. “The Baron David de Gunzburg?” the Count exclaimed, and his hirsute eyebrows lifted. “Give me the note, Anton.”

  “It is actually for the Countess, from the Baroness,” his servant interposed with deference. The Count regarded his wife with shock, and Maria Efimovna blushed. She took the note and quickly looked away from her husband’s angry face.

  “Oh, Nicolai, this is dreadful!” she finally cried. “Poor Mathilde Yureyevna! It seems that—”

  “It seems only that my wife has gone behind my back to make the acquaintance of that Jewess!” the Count exploded, oblivious to the servant shrinking timidly against the paneling.

  “Oh, Nicolai, that was… years ago. I visited her once, out of courtesy. You must remember how kind the Gunzburgs were toward Volodia.” Her eyes filled with tears. “She is a lady, Nicolai. And her children… were perfect. Do you not remember them, that summer?”

  “I remember only… afterward.” The husband and wife locked eyes, the specter of Natasha between them, while he thought of the shame his daughter had escaped, and she thought only of the girl’s abject distress.

  “But, they were so young, it was such a meaningless flirtation,” Maria Efimovna finally said. “You rather liked Ossip. Didn’t you?”