The Grand Duchess of Nowhere (4 page)

The day wore on. Eight hundred dead, we heard. Ernie went out to the Alexander Gardens with Elli and little Marie Pavlovna and came back with a number of different opinions he’d heard expressed by other families’ governesses and nursery maids.

1. The tragedy at Khodynka was the fault of the authorities who had failed to keep order.
   
2. No. It was the fault of the peasants who’d trample their own mother underfoot for a free drink.
   
3. It was an omen. A reign that starts with a tragedy was sure to end badly.
   
4. The Emperor should go to the ball but look solemn and not dance.
   
5. The Emperor should go to a monastery.
   
6. The food for the ball supper should be distributed among the bereaved.
   
7. Bereaved persons have no appetite. They should be given money.
   

We never did know for sure how many had died. More than a thousand, anyway. They were to be buried quickly, because of the heat, but not in a mass grave. After a day of doing nothing, Emperor Nicky finally announced that he would pay for coffins, and give a pension to any child who’d been orphaned. Then we went to the French ball.

It was a grim evening. Dowager Empress Aunt Minnie made clear her disapproval and stayed away. So did Uncle Vladimir and Aunt Miechen and, because they didn’t come, neither did any of their family or friends.

Missy was very put out. A ball without the Vladimirovichi was like soup without salt. She also had Cyril’s brother Boris in her sights, for a little Coronation Week flirtation. His absence meant a wasted evening. I was relieved though. At least I didn’t have to face Cyril.

Missy said, ‘You are an oddity. Just when you might have had the opportunity to dance with him. Well, Aunt Miechen won’t miss every event. They’ll certainly be on parade later in the week so I hope you’re not going to be stand-offish with Cyril and make me look like a perfect fool.’

We were at the Yusupovs’ ball. It was unthinkable to miss it. Zinaida Yusupov’s family own half of Russia. Perhaps I should now say
owned
. And unlike many wealthy people, the Yusupovs were never slow to spend their money. Their ball was bound to be splendid. It was four days after the Coronation, three days after the Khodynka tragedy. By eleven o’clock the only dance I’d had was the opening polonaise, and Ernie had disappeared to the card tables. People were going in to supper. My brother, Affie, offered me his arm. We turned into the corridor where the second buffet was set out and suddenly there was Cyril.

‘Ducky! Affie!’ he called. ‘I just got here. Big brouhaha at home. Father thinks there should be no dancing at a time of national mourning. Mother thinks life must go on. Mother won. Have you two eaten?’

I’d been hungry but suddenly I wasn’t.

Cyril said, ‘A lemonade, then?’

Affie muttered, ‘Something stronger,’ loosed my arm and was gone. My brother was always looking for escape routes.

Cyril said, ‘I see a pair of seats. Shall we grab them?’

Once I’d forced myself to look at him I found my nervousness disappeared. Cyril made it easy. He did all the talking, until I found my tongue. He’d just passed his Navy examinations and was off
to the Baltic for the summer, on training exercises. Petty Officer Romanov. He wasn’t the handsomest of my cousins. His brother Boris was certainly better-favoured. But I loved his face. I could have studied it for ever. He asked if my baby was thriving. He asked about my horses. And when he’d skirted around all permissible topics we sat in silence for a while. It became unbearable. I was cursing Missy’s indiscretion. And then I thought it would be better just to have it out, to say it and be done, like poor Tatiana with Onegin. I’d look foolish for five minutes, Cyril would go off to his ship and I’d go back to Darmstadt and that would be that.

I said, ‘I know Missy has been making mischief.’

He cut me off.

He said, ‘I hardly know your husband. Ernie doesn’t seem the vicious type.’

I agreed.

He said, ‘Perhaps just not suited to marriage?’

I did pretty well. I kept my composure, until he asked me if I was dreadfully unhappy, and then I couldn’t stop the tears. He gave me his handkerchief. People were looking. Not many, but it only required a few. Gossip works on the principle of compound interest.

I said, ‘Now I’ve embarrassed you.’

‘Hardly,’ he said. ‘Anyone asks, I’ll say you twisted your ankle.’

He took my hand. We were in shadow.

He said, ‘The thing is, Ducky, there’s really nothing I can do. You have to go home to Darmstadt and I have to report for duty, and who can say when we shall ever see each other again? But I want you to know that I wish things might have worked out differently. Do you understand?’

How a mood can change in a few seconds. I remember thinking that if Cyril cared for me, even a little, it made everything else bearable.

I said, ‘I’ve always liked you.’

‘And I you,’ he said. ‘How silly that we only just got round to admitting it.’

I said, ‘Perhaps we can write? I’d like to know where you are.’

He said I’d find him an erratic correspondent but he’d certainly try. And then the dancing started up again and he partnered me for the mazurka and a waltz. He was a superb dancer. It’s been too long since we danced.

He said, ‘I long to kiss you, Ducky, darling. I can’t, of course, but I just wanted you to know.’

That was when I really knew that Things weren’t right with Ernie. He’d never, ever said anything so delicious.

It was dawn when we drove the short way back to the Governor’s house. The streets were empty and the shops were still shuttered although you could smell that the bakers were already at work. Ernie was tipsy. I was on air. I imagined I could still feel the press of Cyril’s hand on my back.

Ernie said, ‘Bloody excellent people, the Yusupovs. Bloody fine party. We should give parties like that.’

There were lamps burning in the library. Ernie made a terrible racket stumbling and crashing up the stairs and Uncle Serge came out and told him off. Aunt Ella had been home for hours and was asleep. Uncle Serge had little prospect of going to bed himself. At Khodynka there were still unburied dead. Emperor Nicky’s gesture was all very well, but it wasn’t so easy for Uncle Serge to find so many pine coffins at short notice.

‘Sleep well,’ he said.

And I did, a very contented sleep till late in the morning, but when I woke I found things didn’t look as rosy as they had the night before. Cyril Vladimirovich was nineteen years old and just starting out on his naval career. He’d see the world, meet beautiful women,
and eventually he’d marry. More than likely I’d be expected to attend his wedding. And all the silliness of the night before, all the talk of ‘if only’ and of forbidden kisses, was absolutely meaningless because I was stuck with Ernie and Darmstadt. I was in a hateful mood all day.

Ernie said, ‘You’re always disagreeable when you’ve been drinking champagne.’

He went out with the nurses again, when they took the children to the Gardens. He was a child himself, really. That was the day he came home with the idea of building a waterslide, at Wolfsgarten.

I was called to the telephone. Missy.

‘Well?’ she said. ‘I’ve been waiting all morning to hear from you. Can you talk? Just answer yes or no. Did Cyril declare himself?’

‘Yes.’

‘I knew he would! Was it divine dancing with him?’

‘Yes.’

‘Are you happy?’

‘No.’

Missy felt I had the wrong attitude to men.

‘You take it all too seriously,’ she’d say. ‘It’s nothing to do with marriage and babies and all that. Marriage is the sago pudding we’re obliged to eat. Now you need a little jam.’

Missy enjoyed flirtations. She began them and the very moment they started to pall she looked around for the next one.

She said, ‘By the by, did Cyril happen to say anything about me? In relation to Boris? I believe I’ve taken his fancy.’

I said, ‘Missy, you’re here with your husband and your children.’

‘So?’ she said. ‘I’m only talking about a little holiday diversion. I do hope Boris will be coming out to Arkhangelskoe.’

When the Coronation celebrations were finished and the last of the Khodynka dead had been buried, we were all going to
the country estates. Ernie and I were to stay with Aunt Ella and Uncle Serge at Ilyinskoe. Missy and Nando would be put up by the Yusupovs at Arkhangelskoe. There was to be no summer in the country for Cyril though. He was leaving to join his ship at Kronstadt.

I said, ‘I hardly think Boris is the type for a country house party full of marrieds and their children. And anyway, doesn’t he keep a ballerina?’

Missy said, ‘Of course he keeps a ballerina. What’s that to do with the price of tea in China?’

*

We set off for Ilyinskoe the first week of June. Ernie and me and Elli, Mother and Pa, brother Affie, and Uncle Paul’s children. Uncle Paul liked Marie and Dmitri to enjoy the good air and freedom of Ilyinskoe but it was the place where Aunt Aline died and I imagine he couldn’t bear to take them there himself. Aunt Ella said he had business to attend to anyway, in St Petersburg.

Missy said, ‘Aunt Ella must think we were born yesterday. There’s only one kind of business men rush off to in the middle of summer. Good old Uncle Paul! Who would have thought it!’

To reach Ilyinskoe, you go by train as far as Odintsevo and then on by carriage. The drive takes about an hour, first through a pine forest, and then out onto meadowland. You can see the roof of the house long before you reach it. There’s a little wooden bridge that sways alarmingly under the weight of the troika, and then the great gates and an avenue of lime trees. Such a pleasant place. I wonder if we shall ever see it again. I wonder if any of us will ever go back to Russia, even when this war ends? They say it will certainly end this year. But everything has changed.

We stayed at Ilyinskoe for the rest of June and the whole month of July. All the neighbouring dachas were filled with parties too.
The Yusupovs, the Golitsyns, the Scherbatovs. Everyone had deserted Moscow. The sun shone, we ate our meals on the verandah and we swam in the river every day. Elli was in heaven with so many children to entertain her. Most days Missy drove over with her children, and sometimes the Yusupov boys came too. That was when I first remember Felix Yusupov. How old could he have been then? Eight, nine? He never did care very much for climbing trees or building rafts but he was endlessly patient with the little ones, making them fairy tea parties and forgiving them if they ruined his careful work.

I was so happy at Ilyinskoe. There was plenty of company if I wanted it and when I didn’t, when I wanted to sit alone and think of Cyril, there were plenty of diversions for Ernie. We didn’t quarrel at all. Then one morning a black cloud appeared. Aunt Ella announced that Emperor Nicky and Sunny and Baby Olga would soon be joining us. I suppose I wasn’t very gracious about it.

Ernie said, ‘You might try not thinking of yourself for a change. Consider poor Sunny, how her life has changed. I’m sure she’s quite desperate to take a holiday from Empressing.’

The Imperials arrived in time for the great patronal feast on St Elijah’s Day. Aunt Ella and I were near the roadside gathering white currants when we heard the sound of a carriage and a cry went up from some of the villagers, ‘
Batyushka idyot!
’ Little Father was coming. They all made deep bows. Well, not quite all. There were one or two younger men who made no obeisance, nor even took off their hats. They just watched Nicky and Sunny go rattling past.

‘
Nyemka!
’ one of them said. ‘The German Woman.’ And he spat on the ground to show what he thought of his new German Empress.

I’d dreaded their coming and was sure Sunny would ruin my holiday, but she was all cordiality. A little dull, but apparently
disposed to be my friend. She liked nothing better than to sit in the shade and discuss teething and colic and cradle cap. But Missy’s diagnosis of her pale face and her tired eyes was incorrect. Sunny wasn’t expecting again.

‘Not yet,’ she said. ‘But very soon, I’m sure. We are trying.’

And as she said it she cast a shockingly doting eye on Emperor Nicky who was limbering up like a jumping-jack, preparing to play tennis with Ernie.

Behind her, quite out of her line of sight, Missy made a horribly realistic mime of vomiting.

Then Sunny said, ‘But, Ducky, it’s high time you and Ernie had another one,’ and Missy leaped in at once and said, ‘Ha! Tell that to Ernie.’

Sunny looked quite puzzled.

Ernie beat Nicky, two sets to one.

‘Observation,’ he said to me, later. ‘If His Imperial Majesty rules All the Russias the way he plays tennis he’ll make a sorry mess of it. He runs around far too much, like a spaniel. An untrained spaniel. And then he dithers and dabs at the ball as though it might bite him. I only allowed him to win a few games so as not to discourage him.’

In the middle of those lazy, comfortable days we had one moment of high drama. Missy almost drowned. There had been heavy rain in the night so the river was a little swollen. She went down to bathe, perhaps too soon after luncheon, and was swept off her feet by the current. We did hear her call, but then, one was rarely out of range of Missy’s voice, and we were all well fed and dozing. I don’t know how long it was before her cries became insistent enough for us to wake up and realise she was in difficulties. Hours, Missy says.

By the time we were all on our feet she was already some distance downstream. Nando flapped about on the river bank shouting helpful things like, ‘Don’t swallow any water!’ and ‘For heaven’s
sake, Missy!’ Ernie began to take off his trousers and Aunt Ella ran for a long birch branch, but brother Affie overtook them all, plunged in, fully clothed, and dragged Missy to safety. None of us had ever seen him move so energetically.

He was the toast of the house, of course. Whether he enjoyed it, it was difficult to say. He smiled bashfully for the first hour or so of compliments and he saw off two good snorts of Uncle Serge’s best cognac, but then he slipped back into his usual distant, cud-chewing habit and it was as if nothing had happened.

Nando said, ‘Not quite the thing, is he, your brother?’

The ingrate!

I said, ‘If it weren’t for Affie, you’d have been widowed this afternoon.’

‘Nonsense,’ he said. ‘Missy was just making an unnecessary fuss, as usual.’