Ah, thought Anne, so that’s all it is: a wine-flush. ‘Did you meet the new actor? What’s his name?’
He turned his pale, full eyes on her. ‘Jean-Luc de Berthier. Yes, I most certainly did. What a drôle he is! A fine actor, and, I must tell you, so ravishingly beautiful that he will put our belles to shame! I could not believe when I first saw him that he was a man. I thought Vanya must be teasing me. When I met him afterwards I begged him to take off his wig, but he wasn’t wearing one – it was all his own hair! At the club 1 took him in on my arm, and no one guessed. Vanya bet a hundred roubles we could not carry it off, but Jean-Luc wouldn’t take the bet – he said it would be unfair, because he’d done it hundreds of times before. I never met a more honest man!’
Anne listened with only half her mind, surprised at his high good humour and glad that he had been well occupied for the day. She didn’t want to feel guilty about her day; didn’t want to say anything about it if she could help it. As long as Basil kept talking, there was a good chance he would not ask her any questions. She would prefer not to have to lie.
Pauline appeared through one door with her gloves just as the butler came in through another to say that the carriage was waiting.
‘And there’s a messenger here, my lady, from Madame Gagarin, with a letter.’
Anne paled inwardly. ‘Tell him to go away. I haven’t time to read it now,’ she said quickly.
Basil looked round. ‘Oh, by all means read it. There’s no hurry. The play won’t start on time. They never do the first night.’
‘It’s not important,’ Anne began dismissively, but the butler, damn him, interrupted.
‘The boy asked me to say, my lady, that it was most urgent, and he was instructed to wait for an answer.’
‘Go and get the letter,’ Basil said. ‘I don’t mind waiting.’
‘I have it here, my lord,’ said the butler.
‘Give it to me,’ Anne said angrily. He would be dismissed the very next morning, if she had her way. What did the old bitch Gagarin want? It was a conspiracy to betray her. Did Basil know? Was that why he was insisting she open the letter in front of him? She broke the seal, and could not make her eyes focus on the black scrawl within – no secretary’s hand, that. Madame Gagarin must be one of the few of her generation who could read and write.
‘Well, what does she say?’ Basil prompted.
Anne scanned the lines again, trying to make the sense go in and stay in. Chère madame, when I saw you today in the Kuznetsky Most – she was going to be betrayed! She would have to say something to Basil. What excuse could she give? Her mind worked feverishly – I remembered that I had meant to ask you for the recipe for those delicious brandied cherries / tasted at your card party last week–
Anne looked up, and Basil’s face seemed to swim, blurred and wavering, before her. She licked her dry lips. A recipe! She wanted a recipe!
‘By the way,’ he said before she could speak, ‘did you know your friend Kirov was back from Paris?’ Her heart dropped sickeningly, like a stone. ‘He’s gone straight down to Tula to see his daughter, apparently. God knows why he didn’t go to St Petersburg first. Vanya says there’s a whole bag of letters that have been following him about from place to place for weeks, trying to catch up with him. I suppose he’ll get them in Tula – the courier’s gone after him, anyway.’
Anne could not find any words in her dry mouth. Basil was still talking, his face devoid of guile. ‘It’s going to be a bit of a shock for him, poor fellow. He’ll blame himself for not going to Petersburg first, when he knows. He might have been in time to see her if he had.’
‘See – her?’
‘His wife. She’s dead.’
Chapter Twenty-Four
Anne came down the stairs one day in March 1812 with a cautious smile of welcome stitched on to her lips. The Tchaikovskys were giving a ball tomorrow – the final ball of the Season – and she had not been pleased to be disturbed by her butler, who informed her that ‘a lady’ wished to see her, but would not give her name. There were all sorts of uninvited callers who demanded the time of a great lady during the St Petersburg Season, including beggars and troublemakers and petitioners, but the butler had assured her with an odd smile that the caller was none of these, and she had sighed and put down her pen resignedly.
However, as she reached the turn of the stairs and looked down into the hall, she saw a slender figure standing there, dressed in a magnificent long sable coat decorated with gold-tagged tails, and a very cunning little black hat, which sported a pair of crow’s wings and a great many jet beads. A heavy black veil completely covered her face and was tied under her chin. She was accompanied by a very young and pretty maid in a plain brown shooba with a hood. Anne’s artificial smile became genuine, if a little exasperated.
‘Lolya,’ she said, ‘you absurd child! What is this? Another of your silly pranks?’
Yelena Nikolayevna turned at the sound of her voice, and unfastened the veil and threw it back. ‘You recognised me!’ she cried disappointedly. ‘I thought I could surprise you.’
Anne advanced and kissed the rosy cheek offered up to her. Lolya had grown into a lovely young woman – not classically beautiful, but with an impish, charming face so full of life and fun that it was impossible not to love her. The death of her stepmother last year had delayed her coming-out until two months ago, in January 1812; but since her presentation, she had been enjoying every instant of the Season, and was certainly one of the most popular debutantes of that year. A strong friendship had developed between Anne and her former charge, whose naturally open temper and generous heart had not forgotten the affection that had existed between them, nor the debt she owed Anne for her upbringing and education.
‘If you want to go about incognito,’ Anne advised her now solemnly, ‘you will have to wear a different coat! I should think everyone in Petersburg recognises your father’s coming-out present to you.’
Lolya began pulling off her gloves. ‘Oh, is that what gave me away? But I have to wear it – I love it so!’ She stroked the sleeves with loving hands, and then threw the coat open to reveal a gown of fine, thin wool of a blue so dark it appeared almost black. Though officially out of mourning, Lolya had decided that dark colours suited her, and was attempting to start a fashion amongst her peers for discarding the pastel shades more usual for debutantes in their first season.
‘I’d have known you anyway, darling; and you forgot to disguise your maid,’ Anne said affectionately. ‘What is all this about? Some mad freak of yours, I suppose?’
‘I’ve come here secretly,’ Lolya said importantly, ‘to beg your help. No one knows I’m here. Even your butler didn’t recognise me.’
Anne thought of Mikhailo’s secret smile, and suppressed one of her own. ‘Where is your grandmother?’ she asked, going to the heart of it.
‘She’s taken Sashka to the puppet theatre. I said I couldn’t go, because I had to go to the mantuamaker’s for a final adjustment, and I did call in there, though there wasn’t really anything to do. But it did make it all right, and only a little of a lie, didn’t it? Only I couldn’t tell her what I really wanted to do, of course. Why does Gran’mère hate you so, Anna Petrovna?’
‘It would take too long to explain. But do you think you ought to do things you know she will disapprove of?’
‘Oh yes! It doesn’t matter really what she thinks, though I don’t like to upset her because it makes things so uncomfortable. But if Papa doesn’t mind me visiting you, it can’t be wrong, can it? I’d have asked him, only he went out too early this morning, before I was up. Anyway, he’ll make it all right with Gran’mère. Since Mamochka died, he stands up to her a great deal more, and makes her mind him. He never did before.’