The Keeper of the Walls (16 page)

“But have you ever thought that if this kind of thing takes place frequently, Misha might stand to be in a real cash-flow problem?”

Lily was silent. He could see her pupils contracting to tiny black points. She said, finally: “But Misha didn't really press this man too much. He really didn't seem to
need
that money. But the principle was another thing: the man owed him and had to be made to pay up honorably.”

Claude was tempted to rebuke her angrily, the way he'd used to when she'd been a girl. Now he controlled himself. She'd been a silly young girl he could rebuke. Now she was the wife of a powerful man. He'd come for a reason, anyway. It wasn't his custom to pay her social visits with no purpose in mind. When he was with Lily, he never knew what to say or do: they'd been brought up virtually as strangers, because of the difference in their age and because by the time she'd grown, financial difficulties had all but been eclipsed. He'd been the one who'd had to struggle—never she. Again he glanced at the ringed fingers, and felt anger.

“It's very grand to be generous with one's debtors,” he stated. “But today, things are more difficult than they were some years back. I don't suppose you've ever given any thought to the current economic crisis?”

She sat quietly, her eyes intent on his. She said, slowly: “But people are spending a great deal of money. The
grands couturiers
are doing more business than ever. And the jewelers, and the restaurateurs, and the antiquarians . . .”

“Oh, my darling, the very rich are richer than ever. The Rothschild fortune will never go dry. That's why, at the Bank of France, there's strong disagreement between the bankers and the industrialists—people like your husband, who invest their money in capital and not dividends. Who rely on products being manufactured and then being sold in order to make their profits. What you're witnessing are the fireworks before the deluge. People are spending madly, while there's still money to spend. Taxes are still low enough not to have disturbed the big earners, and inflation's reduced the national debt we incurred when we had to borrow to finance the war. But that's
right now.
And that's just the very rich.”

She leaned forward. “And Papa's firm?”

“First of all,” Claude said, “I run the firm now. Papa hasn't been well. His heart is bothering him. Mama's tried to put him on a diet, hoping it will help . . . and they're planning to go to the waters during the summer. . . .”

They said nothing for at least a minute. Then she asked, in a curious voice: “But still, your visit doesn't make sense. I can't believe you'd leave the office just to give me a lesson in economics.”

“No, that isn't why I came. I wanted to ask you to sign a paper for me. We're a small firm, but we're trying to grow, and all this talk of taxing businesses could weaken us a great deal. That's why I want to set up Bruisson et Fils as a multiple-vote company. Then we are not going to seem so big, and we won't be taxed so high. I need you to sign as a shareholder.”

“Is that fair? I'm a member of the family.”

“It really doesn't matter. The truth is”—and he laughed dryly—”nobody checks too closely. It's the setup that counts, that's all.”

As he began to fumble in his briefcase, she cleared her throat. “Claude. I can't sign anything without Misha's approval. Leave the papers and I'll show them to him when he comes home tonight.”

Claude's eyes hardened. “You're a Bruisson, aren't you? This is a family matter. As you yourself just finished pointing out.”

For a moment her fingers interlaced, tightly, so that her knuckles gleamed with tension. Then she asked, softly: “Aren't you a bit too late, Claude? Don't forget, it was primarily you who sold me to the Brasilovs. But now that you need me, you find it convenient to forget that I was once considered matter for trade—like the poor franc. Only, unlike the franc, my value's gone up. And now I'm first and foremost a Brasilov. I don't act behind my husband's back.”

Claude stood up, pale and straight. “I always knew we were complete strangers,” he said. “But I did believe you were a helpful person. Yes, maybe I wanted you to marry a rich man—but you chose him, Lily. You loved him. Nobody pushed you into this.”

“You're right. I married him because I loved him. And I love him now. I told you: leave the papers, and I'll discuss everything with him when he comes home. If you expected me to turn into a free thinking Amazon, like Elisabeth de Clermont-Tonnerre or Gertrude Stein, then you are mistaken. I was reared to be traded in for a business advantage—not to be independent and clear-thinking, with sufficient education to be able to make my own decisions. I won't be your pawn, Claude. If Misha approves, I'll sign.”

Claude closed the briefcase, and said, tightly: “Good-bye, Lily.” He didn't wait for her to escort him to the door, and when Arkhippe, the courtly
maìtre d'hôtel,
held out his coat for him, he shrugged him off impatiently and slung it over his arm.

In the street, the Renault 40 sat waiting for him. It was a solid car, but nothing compared to the metallic Rolls that was his sister's exclusive property. At the moment when he stepped inside, he felt hatred. He'd wanted Lily to marry Brasilov, but he'd imagined an alliance, two brothers-in-law equal partners in a fast-moving venture into industrial progress. He'd never thought to be left behind, by everybody.

What was his life, anyway, except for business deals made from behind the mass-produced desk the Galeries Lafayette had manufactured identically for hundreds—thousands—of offices like his? He'd never taken the time for fun, for sports, for shows, for women. He didn't know what it was like to be loved. He felt jealous and bitter. But his time would come.

I
n the study
, Misha didn't quite seem so overwhelming, such a force of nature, for the room was very spacious and had been furnished for his measure. An immense library covered one whole wall, and his desk was six feet long. The sofa where Lily was sitting was large enough to seat six people. The room had been decorated with pieces of stark, polished simplicity, English furniture from the late eighteenth century, and on the wall behind the desk were some Russian hunting scenes that he had bought from an impoverished countryman.

“If this is what goes on when I'm not here,” he was saying, pacing up and down in front of her, “then I shall have to tell Arkhippe not to let him in next time.”

Lily said nothing. She watched him. Then she said, gently: “It's all right, really. I'm not at all upset.”

“You're my wife. You are not to get involved in any outside affairs with anyone—not even your own brother! You are not here to make deals with anyone, to sign papers as a favor to anyone. You're going to have a child, and you're supposed to take care of yourself, to do only the things that give you pleasure and that don't require a strain.”

“But ... is Claude right? That the economy's in trouble?”

He hoisted himself onto the edge of his desk, and crossed his legs. Her eyes were anxiously lifted to his. He compressed his lips and said: “Yes and no. There
is
a problem. It's a wealth caused by inflation. And if inflation makes the state richer, it also pushes everything else up: prices of goods and services, primarily. Devaluation weakens the franc, while at the same time, inflation creates a false sensation of wealth that sooner or later catches up with everyone except those rich enough never to feel anything.”

Lily asked, hesitantly: “Misha . . . are we part of those who never feel anything?”

He looked at her, wondering. She was so serious—so young and earnest and caring. He was furious that Claude had dared to upset her quiet, serene life with his petty, materialistic reality. He felt a profound pang of vulnerability when he looked at her, at the trust in her eyes.

Yet it was also, in a touching way, amusing. Like a child's naïve and hopeful question: “Papa, are we millionaires?” He'd once asked his father if they had enough rubles to buy the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg. He remembered Prince Ivan's answer: “No, my boy, but we do have enough to build one just as nice.” Now he wanted to laugh: the arrogance of the Brasilovs, the ease with which they'd lived, generation after generation, always secure in the knowledge that they were the ne plus ultra, that no one sprang from a better lineage, that Russia was their land and that, from this land, they would always be able to extract millions of rubles to build palaces of marble and gold. . . . An irony that was so bitter that the past now seemed ludicrous, God's harsh joke on those who had been too sure of themselves.

“No, Lily,” he answered, softly. “We aren't that kind of rich. Ours is the wealth of newcomers, of foreigners trying to make a new beginning. Our wealth is a vulnerable wealth, for we must invest our benefits right back into our capital, to make it prosper, and there is little in reserve in case the capital itself disappoints us. We're not the Rothschilds, nor Monsieur de Wendel.”

“But you told me that money was not an object.”

“I was speaking to you about the sorts of things that women want: jewels, furs, lovely furnishings. You know we have money. But you also know that we don't live in a five-story palace, like some of the people we know whose families have been accumulating millions for centuries. I had that in Russia—but here, it is yet to come. And it will come, I can assure you of it. When Nicolas grows up, he will be able to build his palace.”

How sure he was! Lily thought, admiring him. He possessed the force and drive of a bull, and the intelligence, she was sure, of a genius. Yes, he would do what he had set out to accomplish.

“In any case,” Misha continued, “the Radical party instigated taxation of businesses.”

“That's why Claude was here. You are not upset by this?”

“I'm not upset because, as your brother saw, there are legal ways to go around this. A Radical tax levy means that it provides loopholes. I've done what hundreds of other large firms are starting to do: formed subsidiaries, with multiple shares so that we can't be accused of monopolizing business.”

“You didn't ask me to sign for some shares.”

“There's a simple answer for that: you're my wife. I automatically have power-of-attorney over you. There are many shares in your name in three different companies, and shares in Nicky's name. And your mother gave me her signature.”

“I didn't know.”

“It wasn't important between you and me. So you see, all that Claude did was to stir up unnecessary anxieties in you.”

“But if you went to Mama, wasn't that the same thing?”

Misha shook his head, almost sadly. “I'm afraid not. Your mother may soon be alone in the world, and I did this to make sure that she would always have a steady income. Claude never intended to pass any dividends on to you—he just wanted to control his affairs without having to pay an extra tax.”

Lily turned away, and he could see the pain of her conflicting emotions. Her old family, her new—old loyalties betrayed, new ones still untested. She'd never had the chance to find out who
she
was, Liliane Bruisson Brasilova, and he wanted to tell her to go ahead, that it was all right to set out in search of her own self, that everybody had to do it. But the words stopped in his throat. Another feeling had taken possession of him, twisting his insides: fear. Fear that if she found out who she was, she would no longer be satisfied to remain what he had made her.

“Don't worry about Claude,” he said almost brusquely. “I'm planning to absorb his firm into our own, and give him a general vice-presidency.”

He was as shocked as she was by his own words, because until that very moment, he'd never considered such a thing. He felt the most profound antipathy toward his brother-in-law, and to top it all, he distrusted Claude's business ethics. The Brasilovs had always prided themselves, father and son, on the cleanliness of their books and on the lack of corruption of their firm. Yes, one could take advantage of a loophole—if it was legal. And one could compete to the bitter end of a financial rivalry, if one's methods were fair and aboveboard. Claude Bruisson's ways were like those of the Radical party: he was an opportunist, whose alliances could swing wherever he could hope to gain a point. Misha didn't respect him and found him potentially dangerous. Then why had he promised Lily to make him a partner?

It would have been a convenient self-deception to say he'd thought of Claire, or even of Lily. But Misha was too honest to lie to himself. He'd done it to bind her more to him, to make sure that not one string lay untied between her and him. Not merely to make her feel a debt of gratitude, but also to see to it that Claude never withdrew his total approval of the marriage. And, Misha realized, he intended to exercise control over Claude in business as well.