Thirteen Years Later (9 page)

‘So will you, Mitka. So will you.’ His father’s tone did not suggest that this was an attempt to persuade him – just a statement of the obvious.

The coach drove over the river and over the canal and into Zamoskvorechye. Soon they pulled up outside a hotel. It was not the grandest the city had to offer. Aleksei jumped out on to the street. The coachman dismounted more slowly.

‘So this is where you usually stay?’ asked Dmitry. On their visits as a family, they had stayed in a somewhat grander residence, north of the river.

‘Yes, since the war.’ The coachman gave Aleksei his single leather bag. ‘Before that it used to be a place in Tverskaya, but that half burned down. They demolished the rest, eventually.’

The coachman had remounted, and shook the horses’ reins. ‘And we’ll meet here, tomorrow?’ said Dmitry, as the coach pulled away.

‘Yes. Eight o’clock,’ shouted Aleksei after him. ‘And then on to Desna.’

Dmitry watched his father’s image recede for a few moments before settling back into his seat. Before long he would be at his barracks, and a new life would begin for him. He smiled. His father’s enthusiasm had infected him. Perhaps an army life wouldn’t be so bad.

Aleksei had unpacked, changed his clothes and was out of the hotel again within eight minutes. He chose to walk. It wasn’t far; back across the Stone Bridge and then west towards the Arbat. One might have thought Aleksei had chosen his hotel, back in 1816 when he first stayed there, for its convenience, but that was not the case. Back then, the house for which he was now heading had not even been built. The proximity which he had sought had been in the opposite direction, to a street in Zamoskvorechye
occupied almost exclusively by milliner’s shops, and to one shop in particular.

But that was in the past. Today, as he had done within moments of his every arrival in Moscow in the last four years, he strode purposefully west. He recalled how, many years before, he had always teased himself as to where he might go the moment he arrived in the city. Later, after 1812, he had abandoned such pretence, not because his sense of guilt was any less, but merely because he had become better at suppressing it. Since 1821, he had felt no guilt.

He walked up the five stone steps to the door of the house in a wealthy street in the south of the region, and rapped on the heavy iron knocker with three short, close reports. Then he waited. From within he heard the sound of slow, steady steps making their way towards the door, quickly overridden by lighter, less careful footsteps racing down a flight of stairs.

The door was opened and the face of an elderly butler was revealed behind it. Within an instant, the door, along with the butler, had been pushed further aside by the energetic advance of a pile of unkempt black hair which topped an unsuitably tall, unsuitably lean body.

‘Aleksei Ivanovich!’

A year or two before, the boy would have leapt into Aleksei’s arms, but today, regardless of how socially inappropriate that might have seemed for a boy who was almost a man, the physical action itself would have sent them both tumbling down the steps and back on to the street. Instead, Aleksei walked into the house, his arms widening as he responded to the greeting.

‘Rodion Valentinovich! Haven’t you grown?’ There was a time in Aleksei’s life when he would have despised such an inane, rhetorical question, both as its source and its recipient, but he was old enough to know that that period began some time after the age of thirteen and ended before the age of forty-four. For Rodion, it was an issue that had not yet arisen. They embraced briefly, but Rodion was soon rushing away towards the back of
the house. Aleksei handed his overcoat to the servant who still stood at the door, and then turned in pursuit of the boy.

He remembered the way to the drawing room perfectly well, and entered to find the figures of four people whom he knew and loved, four figures that seemed to make, much as the thought displeased him, a perfect family. Rodion stood – unable to remain quite still – behind the sofa on which his parents were seated. His father, Valentin Valentinovich, rose to greet Aleksei as he entered. Yelena Vadimovna remained seated, but grinned broadly. Beside her stood the tiny figure of Tamara – four and a half years old now, but seeming less changed since Aleksei had last seen her than did Rodion. Her red hair, curling tightly down to her shoulders, had perhaps darkened a little, but beyond that, she was the same. She looked at Aleksei nervously and attempted to smile.

‘Aleksei Ivanovich,’ said Valentin. ‘It’s good to see you. We only got your letter yesterday.’

‘Yes, it was all rather sudden,’ said Aleksei. ‘Some business came up and so I thought I’d accompany Dmitry here to join his regiment.’

‘You should have brought him with you,’ said Yelena after Aleksei had gone over to kiss her offered hand. Valentin shot her a look.

‘Which regiment is he in?’ asked Rodion.

‘The Izmailovsky,’ said Aleksei. ‘So he should be back in Petersburg once he’s finished his training.’ He paused and stared directly into Rodion’s face for a few seconds. Then he turned to Yelena. ‘He looks more like Vadim Fyodorovich every time I see him.’

She smiled warmly. ‘I know.’

Yelena herself, thankfully, looked nothing like her father; his broad features had skipped a generation.

‘Tell me another story about Granddad,’ said Rodion. ‘Please.’

Aleksei’s mind drifted back, as so often, to the events of the autumn of 1812. Vadim had died in Moscow, on 18 September, as well as could be guessed – killed by Iuda. Rodion had been
born less than two weeks earlier, in Petersburg. Vadim had never known that he had a grandson. Aleksei had never told them the exact manner of Vadim’s death, but in all his stories, Vadim Fyodorovich was a hero. That required no embellishment.

‘Give him a minute,’ said Yelena. ‘He’s only just arrived. He hasn’t said hello to Tamara yet.’

Aleksei squatted down, his eyes level with those of the little girl. His heart began to pound in his chest and he felt the urge to wrap her in his arms. Instead, he lifted her hand and kissed it.

‘Good afternoon, Toma,’ he said.

Tamara grinned, revealing her bright white teeth. Then she turned away, breaking his contact with her hand and pressing her face against the arm of the sofa, so that it could not be seen. Yelena stroked her head.

‘I think she’s tired,’ she said. ‘Nanny will put her to bed. Do you want to take her, Aleksei?’

Aleksei looked at Yelena. She had been somewhat older than Tamara was now, perhaps thirteen or fourteen, when she and Aleksei had first met, but in the twenty intervening years they had come to understand each other very well – not least through their mutual love of her father. Many, perhaps even her husband, would have missed the glint in her eye as she spoke, and Aleksei knew, much as he tried to suppress it, that she would have seen the same glint in his. It was a game with which they were familiar.

‘I’d love to,’ said Aleksei. He held out his hand, and Tamara took it, then he turned and led her to the door.

‘You know the way,’ he heard Rodion add from behind him. It was a game for all of them.

Almost as soon as they were out of the drawing room, Tamara seemed to gain a little more confidence, and it was she that began to lead more than he. He deliberately walked more slowly, giving her the chance to run on ahead, although he knew where they were going. They arrived at the door and Aleksei raised his hand to knock, but Tamara did not wait; she opened the door and rushed inside.

The little girl ran straight across the room and over to the slim, dark-haired woman who stood silhouetted in the light from the window. The woman opened her arms as she saw the girl’s approach, and as the child leapt into them, she lifted her up to the level of her face for a kiss. It was only then that she noticed Aleksei’s figure standing in the doorway.

‘Lyosha,’ she said in a whisper.

She put Tamara down and Aleksei strode over to her. He had not seen Domnikiia for over six months. It was not the longest time they had ever been apart, but even if it had been only a day, the passion of their reunion would have been little different. Her arms held him tightly and he squeezed her body in return. His grip was so strong that he feared he would hurt her, but even as he relaxed his hold the merest fraction, her arms only pulled harder, imploring him not to lessen the expression of his desire. After only a few moments, he had to release his hold, had even to push her away from him, simply to be able to look at her face and let his lips fall on hers. They kissed deeply, not even breathing, lip dragging across lip, tongues circling one another in a silent waltz.

Eventually, it was Domnikiia who separated their embrace. She squatted down and spoke to Tamara. ‘Are you ready for bed?’ Tamara nodded. ‘Well, run into your room and get changed. I’ll be in in a bit.’

Tamara scurried off, but before reaching the door to her room, turned. ‘Will
you
still be here?’ she asked Aleksei.

‘Oh, yes. I’ll be here.’

She turned again and ran into her room. Aleksei sat on the couch. Domnikiia sat down beside him, but immediately turned and leaned backwards, her shoulders in his lap, her eyes staring up at him. He clasped her hand. She was thirty-two now, but even more desirable than when he had first met her. She had been nineteen then, and he had been struck by her similarity to Bonaparte’s second wife, the empress Marie-Louise. With Bonaparte’s downfall, Marie-Louise had, thanks to her father’s position as Emperor
of Austria, been fortunate enough to be appointed Duchess of Parma. Aleksei had not seen any recent portrait of her, and did not know whether her appearance had diverged from Domnikiia’s. He doubted she could be more beautiful.

‘Yelena Vadimovna said you were coming,’ she said.

‘I’m sorry it’s been so long.’

‘I know you are. You have “business” to attend to, I’m told. You still think of it as “business” with me?’

Aleksei smiled. For the first months of their relationship, money had changed hands each time they met. In all honesty, it still did, but now he had the pleasure, and pleasure it was, of paying out even when they were apart.

‘I have to go to Desna,’ he said.

‘Desna?’ she asked, the concern showing in her voice. ‘Isn’t that where . . . ?’

‘That’s right,’ interrupted Aleksei. Of those who knew of Maks’ fate, only a few would remember the name of the place where it occurred thirteen years on. Only Domnikiia would make the association immediately. She knew his mind. He corrected himself. There was one other person who made the connection – whoever had summoned him with that message.

‘I’m guessing that’s not a coincidence,’ she said.

Aleksei shook his head. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I was sent a message. It was signed by Maks, ostensibly.’

‘My God. You don’t think . . . ?’

‘Thankfully, no. I saw Maks’ corpse, two months after he died. Vampires don’t rot.’ That was speculation, but it fitted the facts he knew. The image of Maks’ putrefying face – the rim of his spectacles sinking into his yielding cheek – filled Aleksei’s mind. But there was more than that. Aleksei had been told that only a willing human can become a vampire. Maks would never willingly have done that. He looked into Domnikiia’s eyes and remembered another occasion when he looked down upon her. He chose not to mention the idea of a human volunteering to become a
voordalak
.

‘So who else?’ asked Domnikiia.

Aleksei shrugged.

‘You never saw his body, Lyosha.’ Domnikiia did not use the name, but he knew who she was talking about – Iuda.

‘He drowned, or froze.’ Aleksei pictured his left hand forcing Iuda’s head beneath the icy surface of the Berezina, his three fingers entwined in the long blond hair. He recalled feeling the body writhe and spasm as the freezing water hit Iuda’s lungs, but realized that he had never in truth experienced that feeling – his own hand had been too numb. He’d kept the few strands of hair that were all he found when he pulled his hand from the water.

‘Those were a long six months,’ she said. She was referring to the time between his departure from Moscow to pursue Iuda and his return in 1813, after the Russian defeat at Lützen.

‘There was a war,’ he said. ‘And I did write.’

‘I know.’ This was not the first time they had discussed it. All his explanations were reasonable, and yet between the Battles of Berezina and Lützen, Aleksei had found time to go home to Marfa.

‘The landlord was ready to throw me out,’ she said.

‘He knew my credit was good.’

‘And then you set me up in the hat shop.’

‘The family trade – you must have inherited your father’s skill.’

‘My father went bust. I would have – more than once – if it hadn’t been for you.’

‘You miss it?’ asked Aleksei.

She smiled. ‘How could I?’

A call came through from the doorway to the other room, small but piercing, demanding their attention.

Domnikiia stood up. ‘Come on,’ she said, taking Aleksei by the hand. They went through to Tamara’s room. Toys, on shelves and on chairs, surrounded the bed. Aleksei recognized some as being gifts from him. Tamara had tucked herself in. Only her red hair and her small, pale face peeked out of the sheets. Domnikiia sat
beside her on the bed and took her hand. Aleksei knelt down on the other side, resting his elbows on top of the blankets.