Sergei followed the direction of Anne’s eyes, and then stepped sideways, placing himself in line of her eyes and blocking out any other view. ‘Anna Petrovna, I want to dance with you,’ he said seriously, ‘and no one else will do. Don’t you want to dance with me?’
She could not hurt his feelings. ‘Of course, my dear,’ she said.
His eyes seemed to glow. He took hold of her hand and raised it to his lips. ‘Am I your dear?’ She looked up at him, startled, but at that moment the music ended, and he whirled round, keeping hold of her hand, but only, it seemed, to draw her towards the dance floor. ‘Now it is time! Our dance – come, Anna. Don’t worry, I’ll teach you the steps if you don’t know them.’
The set formed beyond them. There was Irina, laughing, her face wearing the Chastnaya animation that made it so much more beautiful than it appeared in Petersburg, taking her place with Dmitri. His beard – so shocking at first to Anne, who was used to clean-shaven men – fanned out over his chest, and there was a long, dark wine stain on his white Cossack tunic which looked like a continuation of it. As the music began, his youngest child, little Olga, her cheeks rosy as Crimean apples, came running to him with arms upheld, and he lifted her up on to his shoulder and danced with her clinging madly to his hair.
Sergei called the steps as he danced, and Anne suddenly cast restraint, reflection, sadness to the winds, and danced with Russian exuberance, clapping her hands above her head, whirling in the turns so energetically that her hair began to loosen. Sergei laughed, calling encouragement to her. ‘That’s the way! Again! And turn – and leap!’
He caught her crossed hands to spin her, and she leaned back to give them more momentum, feeling herself laughing, as, long ago now, she had felt herself screaming coming down the toboggan run in Petersburg. I must be a little drunk, she thought happily. Sergei looked so like his father, that for a confusing moment she forgot where she was, and imagined it was with him she was dancing.
‘Set across – and turn – clap!’
Zinochka, her melancholy love forgotten for a moment, dancing with Dmitri’s twelve-year-old son Pavel, her hair now entirely loose and flying like an animated cloud about her head. Natasha amongst the musicians, being allowed to turn the hurdy-gurdy’s handle, while the greybeard gazed at her admiringly and wagged his fingers in encouragement. Zina amongst the onlookers, sleepy Sashka in her arms, watching Sergei with a thoughtful frown.
The dance came to an end, leaving Anne feeling breathless and happy and little more than fifteen years old. Sergei, smiling broadly, led her off the dance floor towards the trestles where the feast was spread.
‘Something to drink,’ he suggested. ‘Are you hot? Some lemonade, perhaps. That was well done, Anna Petrovna! You danced like a Russian!’
‘I felt like a Russian,’ she laughed, glancing back at the next set gathering. ‘It would not have been possible in England,’ she said. ‘I should have been shamed for ever, if I had danced like that.’
There was no one at the tables at that moment. Bablash had long since abandoned his place, and with a flask of vodka had sought the comfort of a secluded tree trunk; the remains of the feast were there for anyone to help himself, and Sergei searched and found a jug of lemonade, but could not find any clean drinking vessels.
‘If I hold it for you, could you drink from the jug?’
‘Tonight, anything is possible,’ Anne said solemnly.
The attempt caused a certain amount of hilarity, and one part of Anne, standing back, was amazed at her continued freedom from restraint. When she had succeeded in drinking enough, Sergei dried her face and hair with his handkerchief.
‘There! You’re just like an obedient kitten, being licked by your mother cat,’ he said. ‘I should–’ He broke off, looking at her abstracted expression. ‘What is it?’
‘Listen!’
‘What? The music?’
‘No, listen – from the stables! That’s Quassy.’ She looked distressed. ‘I wish she would settle down. I can’t bear her to be so upset.’
‘Would you like to go and see her? Maybe she’s just lonely.’
‘Oh, yes! Wait – I’ll take her an apple. It’s all right, you needn’t come. I don’t want to drag you away from the dancing.’
‘Nonsense. You can’t go alone – you never know who might be wandering about in the dark. Come, take my arm – you might stumble.’
They almost stumbled on one of the guards, who had fallen into a profound slumber, his cheek cradled peacefully on his musket stock. Sergei stepped instantly into his military persona, and was every inch the Guards officer as he berated the unfortunate serf, who claimed feebly that he had just crouched down for an instant to examine a suspicious footmark, and must have accidentally fallen into the recumbent posture in which they had found him.
Quassy whinnied again, and Anne tugged at Sergei’s sleeve anxiously. He delivered a final threat, and led the way to the tack room to collect a lantern, and then opened the door of Quassy’s box and ushered Anne in.
The black mare came forward instantly, her dark eyes glowing in the lamplight, and she knuckered welcomingly and nudged at Anne’s hands.
‘There, you see, she was lonely,’ Sergei said. ‘She’ll be all right now.’
‘Poor Quassy,’ Anne crooned, rubbing the mare’s crest and fondling her ears. ‘It must be so hard for you, to taste a little freedom, and then to have it snatched away.’ Quassy nudged her briefly in the chest, and then pushed past her to thrust her head out over the half-door and stare into the darkness, her nostrils stretched to catch the scent of her lost sisters. She gave a piercing whinny, and one of the corralled herd answered her. Anne looked despairingly at Sergei, and tried offering the mare the apple. Quassy took it and crunched it up, but her attention plainly was not on the treat. ‘You see, she’s still upset. I wish I could make her forget.’
Anne stood close to her and stroked her neck soothingly, and after a while Sergei said, ‘It’s hard for women, isn’t it – made to go here and there, as men decide for them.’ Anne glanced at him enquiringly. ‘I was thinking of cousin Nadya – when she marries Yurka, she’ll have to go and live with him at Slovolovsk, which is a horrible place compared with Chastnaya, and I don’t believe she really wants to leave home at all. And then it’s the other way round for Zinochka – she’s in love with Mishenka Uvarov, but she won’t be allowed to marry him, because he isn’t suitable. Like poor Quassy being dragged away from the stallion,’ he added with a small smile.
Anne thought, painfully, of Irina. ‘It isn’t always like that,’ she said.
He looked at her cannily. ‘You know, it would have made me very unpopular if I had asked Zinochka to dance. They’ve never forgiven my father for taking their sister away, and if I were to show any signs of wanting to steal Zinochka, they’d send me about my business so fast my head would spin. In fact, I think you are the only person they’d feel happy seeing me dance with – which happens to be the way I feel, too.’
Anne, following her own thoughts, didn’t notice the last remark. ‘She went of her own free will. It was her own choice,’ she said.
‘Was it?’ he said coolly. ‘She’s never been happy away from here. If she could have had the choice, she’d have made Papa live with her here.’
‘Oh, of course – but one never has everything one wants. There must always be compromise.’
‘Unless–’ he hesitated. ‘Unless you choose someone who has nothing to begin with.’
She looked at him, puzzled. ‘What do you mean?’