I submissively follow her into the spacious white marble bathroom. Here two other helpers are bustling about, preparing the bath, opening champagne. Her Highness takes a thin glass, then sits down on the toilet. That’s what she always does—first a bit of cognac, then some champagne. Her Highness does her business, sipping from the champagne glass. Then she stands up:
“Well, why aren’t you talking? Tell me about it.”
She raises her white arms. In a twinkling the helpers take off her nightgown. I lower my eyes, but manage once more to notice how buxom and white-skinned is Her Highness. Oy, there’s not another like…She descends the marble steps into her filled bathtub. She sits down.
“Your Highness, I followed your instructions. Praskovia said it would be tonight. She did everything correctly.”
Her Highness is quiet. She drinks her champagne. Sighs. So hard that the bubbles in the bath flutter.
“Tonight?” she asks again. “That’s…your nighttime?”
“Our nighttime, Your Highness.”
“I think that means…lunchtime. All right.”
She sighs again. Finishes off the glass of champagne. They give her another.
“What did the clairvoyant ask for?”
“Baltic herring, fern seeds, and books.”
“Books?”
“Yes. For the fireplace.”
“Ah…yes…”
Her main assistant enters without knocking:
“Your Highness, the children have come.”
“Already? Bring them in.”
The assistant leaves and returns with the ten-year-old twins—Andriusha and Agafia. They dash in and run to their mother. Her Highness rises from the bath, baring herself to the waist, covering her enormously wide breasts. The children kiss her on the cheek:
“Good morning, Mamochka!”
She embraces them without letting go of her champagne glass.
“Good morning, my dears. I’m running a bit late today, I thought we would breakfast together.”
“Mama, we already had dinner!” Andriusha shouts and slaps the water.
“Well, that’s wonderful,” she says, wiping the spray of foam from her face.
“Mamulya, I won at Go Ze.6 I found the bao xian.7”
“Hao hai zi.8” Her Highness kisses her daughter. “Min min.9”
Her Highness’s Chinese is really rather old-fashioned…
“And I won at Go Ze a long time ago!” Andriusha says, splashing water on his sister.
“Sha gua!10” Agafia splashes back.
“Gashenka, Andriusha…” Her Highness frowns, furrowing her beautiful black eyebrows, and covering her breast as before. She immerses herself in her bath. “Where’s Papa?”
“Papa’s with the armies,” says Andriusha, pulling a toy pistol out of its holster and aiming at me. “Bang, baaang!”
The red target ray settles on my forehead. I smile.
“Pouff! Bang Bang!” Andriusha pulls the trigger and a tiny ball hits me in the forehead.
It bounces off.
I smile at the future heir to the Russian state.
“Where is His Majesty?” Her Highness asks the tutor standing just outside the door.
“At army headquarters, Your Highness. Today is the anniversary of the Andreev Corps.”
“So that means there’s no one to breakfast with me…” Her Highness sighs, taking another glass of champagne from the gold tray. “All right, go on all of you…”
The children, servant, and I head for the door.
“Komiaga!”
I turn around.
“Have breakfast with me.”
“At your service, Your Highness.”
I await Her Highness in the small dining room. An unprecedented honor has been bestowed on me—to share the morning meal with our lady. Her Highness usually breakfasts in the evening, if not with His Majesty, then with someone from the Inner Circle—Countess Borisova or Princess Volkova. With her many “guests” and hangers-on she only lunches. And that is already far after midnight. Her Highness always dines at sunrise.
I sit at the breakfast table, which is already set: adorned with white roses, and laid with gold dishes and crystal. Four servants in silvery emerald caftans stand by the walls.
Forty minutes have already passed, but Her Highness isn’t here yet. She spends a long time on her morning toilette. I sit and think about our lady. She has a hard time of it, for many reasons. Not only because of natural feminine weaknesses. But because of blood. Her Highness is a half-Jewess. There’s no way around it. That’s partly why so many pasquinades are written about her, why so much gossip and rumor is spread about her around Moscow and all of Russia, for that matter.
I’ve never had a problem with Jews. My departed father wasn’t a kike eater either. He told me that people used to say that anyone who played the violin more than ten years automatically became a Jew. Mama, may she rest in peace for eternity, didn’t have any problems with Jews; she said it wasn’t the Yids that were dangerous for Russia, but the pseudo-Jews, people whose blood was Russian but pretended to be kikes. When I didn’t want to study German as an adolescent, my mathematician grandfather would recite a little poem he wrote, a parody of the famous Soviet poet Mayakovsky.11
Were I
A Jew
Late in life,
Even then—
Nicht zweifelnd und bitter12
I’d learn
German
If only because,
’Twas German spoken
by Hitler.
But not all were such Jew lovers as my relatives. Outbursts did occur, yes, and Judaic blood was spilled on Russian land. All of this smoldered and dragged on right up until His Majesty’s “Decree On Russian Orthodox Names.” This decree required all Russian citizens who were not christened in the Orthodox faith to have non-Orthodox names: they had to have names corresponding to their ethnicity. After that many of our Borises became Borukhs; Viktors—Agvidors; and Levs—Leibs. That’s how Our Sage Majesty resolved the Jewish question in Russia once and for all. He took all the smart Jews under his wing. The dimwitted ones scattered. It quickly became obvious that Jews were really quite useful to the Russian government. They were irreplaceable in treasury, trade, and ambassadorial affairs.
The problem with Her Highness was different. This wasn’t a matter of the Jewish question. The question was the purity of blood. Had our lady Her Highness been half Tatar or Chechen it would have been the same problem. There’s no getting around it. And thank God…
The white doors open, the greyhound Katerina bounds into the little dining room, sniffs me, barks twice and sneezes like dogs do, and jumps up on her chair. I stand and watch the open door with the motionless servants on each side. Sedate, assured steps are coming closer, building up, and—in a rustle of dark blue silk Her Highness appears in the doorway. She’s large, wide, stately. Her fan is folded in her strong hand. Her luxuriant hair is pulled back, coiffed, held with gold combs, iridescent with precious stones. On Her Highness’s neck is a velvet ring with the “Padishah” diamond, bordered with sapphires. Her face is powdered, she wears lipstick on her sensual lips, and her deep eyes shine under her black eyelashes.
“Sit down,” she says with a wave of her fan, while she sits in the chair the servant has moved up for her.
I sit. The servant brings in a small shell with finely chopped dove meat and sets it in front of Katerina. The greyhound devours the meat, and Her Highness strokes her on the back.
“Eat up now, my little oyster.”
The servants bring in a gold carafe of red wine, and fill Her Highness’s glass. She picks it up in her large hand and says:
“What will you drink with me?”
“Whatever you say, Your Highness.”