Now, the speculation was that despite the apparent agreement, the rivalries still continued. The SRs in Ufa were vying with the right-wing elements in Omsk for control. The situation had worsened following the Red Army’s advance with the huge influx of refugees into the town, and had deteriorated now to the point where law and order had broken down. Murder and counter-murder was a nightly occurrence. Bodies were left lying in the streets. Each side blamed the other and the Legion, the only force capable of stopping the conflict, seemed to be caught in the middle.
Paul had hung around all afternoon. He walked around the Petropávlovsk railway station, taken refuge from the cold in the waiting room and killed, as best he could, the five hours it took until Kolchak finally emerged, only then to disappear into Ward’s carriage again to eat. When they had at last resumed their journey, Paul sensed an air of foreboding permeating the train. It was almost as tangible as the stale tobacco smoke and the odour of unwashed bodies.
Walking through Omsk, Paul saw no bodies — discounting those of the refugees who had been unable to find accommodation and slept where they could, that is. He passed aimless knots of soldiers who had declared their own personal armistice, many already drunk despite the hour and starting to turn ugly. A group of civilians — men, women and children — had set up camp in the park where the Officers’ Summer Casino stood, having pulled together some scraps of board and tin for shelter from the wind. Closer to Nikólskaya Square, he came upon seething masses of the homeless, gathering in the lee of the taller buildings in and around the railway carriages where the branch line terminated. Some, chased away by troops from the government building which had now become the headquarters of the Stavka, the Army Staff, had taken to hanging dejectedly on the steps of the Church of St Nicholas. Inside the church, supposedly, was the banner of Yermák. Ward, who had been reading from his Baedeker on the train the previous evening, had happened to mention that the relic of the Cossack leader who while in the service of the Stroganovs had conquered Siberia from the Tartars, was kept in the Church of St Nicholas. Paul had learned all about this Russian hero as child. After being ambushed by Tartars, Yermák had apparently drowned attempting to ford the Irtúish, pulled under, ironically, by armour presented to him by Ivan the Terrible. Seeing the state of the government capital, it occurred to Paul that Yermák was just the kind of leader Russia could do with now. All they had, though, was the dour admiral. Unless — as General Knox had seemed to suggest — anyone thought Gajda to be a good outside bet.
Paul left the square and walked north along the Dvortzóvaya, crossing an iron bridge over the Om past the steamboat wharf and onto Lyúbinski Prospékt. The Rossiya Hotel, he discovered when he found it, had a lot in common with much of what he had seen of Imperial Russia since returning: an air that suggested its best days were behind it. The once fine façade only vaguely recalled an earlier splendour. Its most notable feature now appeared to be the grey lumps of ice cleared from its entrance and left piled either side of the doors like boulders. Inside the foyer Paul stripped off his coat under the eyes of a doorman who, seeing he was in uniform, diplomatically averted his gaze. At the desk Paul gave Mikhail Rostov’s name to the bored clerk who told him the suite number and that the lift was out of order. Paul took the stairs, leaving mud on an already filthy carpet. Outside the suite, feeling a sudden sense of trepidation, he knocked on the door.
44
The man who answered the door bore some passing resemblance to his cousin Mikhail Ivanovich although, to Paul’s surprise, the once-remembered features seemed to have coarsened under the pressure of superfluous flesh. His neck bulged out of his dress collar like bread proving in a tin. It was his height, though, that shocked Paul the most. Mikhail now stood a head shorter than he did.
As children his cousin had towered over Paul. He had been stronger, too, a fact Mikhail had always been eager to demonstrate. The intervening years, though, seemed to have added little to his stature while Paul, like a sapling free of his cousin’s shade, had grown.
‘Yes?’ Mikhail said rather irritably, and Paul saw his Uncle Ivan in the son’s face.
‘Mikhail Ivanovich,’ Paul said in greeting, managing to sound a deal heartier than he felt, ‘don’t you recognise me?’
Mikhail stared, dabbing deliberately at his mouth with the napkin he was carrying as if wishing to demonstrate the intrusion had interrupted his breakfast. His gaze dropped to the uniform and Kirgis coat Paul was carrying before, somewhat calculatingly Paul thought, allowing his petulant expression to give way to one of dawning recognition.
‘Cousin Pavel?’ he declared, as if Paul were the last person in the world he might have expected to come calling. ‘Is it really you? So it is. I wouldn’t have known you.’
‘Nor I you, Mikhail.’
They stood looking at each other for a long moment before Paul put out his hand. Mikhail took it, his grip, Paul found, unenthusiastic.
‘What are you doing here?’
‘Surely Sofya told you? I came to Russia to see you.’
‘Sofya,’ Mikhail muttered, ‘of course, of course.’ He stepped aside, waving the napkin with the exaggerated flourish of a matador. ‘Come in, come in. I see you are still with the Czechs. Sophie will be pleased to see you.’
‘She is with you then?’
‘Of course. Where else would a sister be but with her brother?’
Paul thought that a bit rich since Mikhail had abandoned her in Petersburg. But he said nothing and followed Mikhail along a short corridor to a sitting room. He was well-dressed, Paul noted; street clothes but stylishly elegant. And decidedly newer than the worn suit Sofya had been holding for his return to Petersburg.
‘Sofya,’ Mikhail announced loudly as they entered the sitting room, ‘look who has come to see us. It is our cousin, Pavel Sergeyevich!’
She was sitting at a table by the window. What was left of their breakfast cluttered the white tablecloth. She half rose, dropped back into the chair, then stood more steadily.
She had regained some weight in the three months since he had last seen her. Not as much as her brother, certainly, but enough to soften the definition of her jaw line and to fill out those hollow cheeks he remembered. He saw a blush on them now, but was it health or his sudden appearance that gave them colour?
‘Sofya,’ he said.
She was better dressed than when he had last seen her, too. The old sarafan had been replaced by a high-collared morning dress that reached ankles and wrists, covering those taut limbs he remembered so well. The thought of the incident on the train brought a sudden colour to his own cheeks.
‘Pavel…’
Stupidly, he found himself holding out his hand. He had kissed her when they had parted but Mikhail’s presence, standing as he was between them, constrained Paul to formality.
‘But what are you doing in Omsk?’ Sofya asked, taking his hand.
‘I’m here with Admiral Kolchak. We’ve been in Ekaterinburg and just returned from Chelyabinsk. We were supposed to—’
‘The admiral in Omsk?’ Mikhail interrupted.
‘We got in late last night,’ Paul explained.
Mikhail tossed his napkin onto the table. ‘I must go,’ he said, frowning at Sofya. ‘If Krasilnikov calls tell him I’m on my way.’ He glanced at Paul, executed the slightest of bows and hurried from the room without another word.