Zoya (33 page)

People were selling apples on the street as they walked past, and more than one woman admired the two beautiful children. Nicholas was going to be ten in August, but long before that, the city lay crushed by the oppressive heat. And the second of July was the hottest day ever recorded. Both children were still awake when she left for work, in a white cotton dress, embroidered with little blue flowers. Nicholas knew that she worked, but he still didn't understand where, and somehow it didn't seem important.

She left a pitcher of lemonade for them, and reminded Nicholas to watch Sasha. The windows were wide open in the hope of bringing some air into the furnace-like apartment.

“Don't let her sit too close to the windows,” Zoya warned, and watched Nicholas pull the golden-haired child back into their bedroom. She was wearing only a slip and bare feet and looked angelic as she waved good-bye to her mother. “You'll be all right?” she asked, as she always did, when she left them, her
heart aching at having to leave them at all, and her heart heavy as she walked uptown to the theater. She could hardly move in the torrid heat, even at night the street seemed to steam beneath her feet, and the holes in her shoes made it even more uncomfortable to walk. She wondered where it would all end sometimes, how they would survive, how long she could go prancing around on the stage in her plumes and ridiculous costumes.

The performance was poorly attended that night, it was too hot to go anywhere. The people who still could had retreated to Newport and Long Island, and the others were languishing at home in the heat, or sitting on stoops, hoping it would break soon. She was exhausted when she finally walked home again, and she thought nothing of it as she heard the sirens in the distance. It was only when she neared her street that she smelled the acrid smoke, and then her whole body shook as she saw the fire engines and what looked like the entire block in flames as she turned the corner. She gasped in horror as she began to run, and an icy hand seemed to clutch her throat as she saw the fire engines outside their building.

“No! … no! …” She was crying as she tried to force her way through the crowds who stood in the street staring up at the three buildings in flames. There was smoke everywhere and she choked as she pushed her way past, and was stopped by the firemen at the door of her building.

“You can't go in there, lady! …” They were calling to each other in the midst of the fierce crackling sounds, punctuated by terrifying crashing noises. There was glass exploding everywhere, and her arm was cut, and began to bleed on the white dress as one
of the men held her back forcefully. “I said you can't go in there!”

“My children!” she gasped … “My babies …” She was wrestling with him with strength she didn't know she had, and for a moment she escaped his grip and then he caught her again as she tried to run past him. “Let me go!” She swung at him, and he grasped her arms in his powerful hands, as the neighbors looked on in silent horror. “My children are in there … oh, God … please …” She was sobbing uncontrollably, almost overcome by the smoke that burned her eyes and her throat as he called to two of the men rushing back into the building. They had already brought out several old women, and a young man was unconscious on the street, while two firemen tried to revive him.

“Hey, Joe!” the fireman called to one of the others, and then turned quickly to Zoya. “Where are they, lady? Which apartment?”

“The top floor … a boy and a girl …” She choked in the smoke-filled air, she had already seen that their ladders didn't go past the third floor.“… Let me go … please … please …” She fell against him, as he relayed the information to the two men, and they hurried back into the building for what seemed like hours … as Zoya watched, knowing that if they died, her life would finally be over. They were all she had left in the world, all she cared about, all she had to live for. But the firemen did not emerge again, and three more went in, with axes and anxious faces. There was a terrifying crashing sound, and an explosion of sparks and flames as part of the roof caved in, and Zoya almost fainted as she watched it. Her eyes were filled with terror, and
suddenly she darted forward, determined to find them, or die with them. She slipped past the firemen too quickly as she ran into the hall, but then, in answer to her prayers, she saw the firemen rushing toward her through the thick smoke, two of them with bundles in their arms, and she heard a child crying through the roar of the flames. She saw that it was Nicholas waving his arms, and crying out to her, as the third fireman swept her into his own arms, like a child, and the three men rushed from the building with their precious burdens, just as the fire reached out to engulf them. They barely reached the street before the whole building sounded as though it were caving in. There was a wall of flames behind them as they ran, and Nicholas clung to her, coughing and crying her name, as she kissed his face over and over again and then she saw that Sasha was unconscious. She knelt on the sidewalk beside her child, moaning and calling her name, as the firemen worked desperately to save her, and then slowly, with a small cry, she stirred, and Zoya lay down beside her and cried as she stroked her curls and held her.

“My baby … my baby …” She felt it was her punishment for leaving them alone every night. All she could think of now was what it would have been like if she had come home and … it was almost beyond thinking. She sat huddled on the street, clutching her children, watching the building burn, as they cried and watched everything they owned go with it.

“All that matters is that you're alive,” she said it again and again, remembering the night her mother had died in the burning of Fontanka Palace.

The firemen stayed until dawn, on another blistering
hot day in July, and they said it would be days before anyone could go in. They would have to find somewhere else to stay, and before even attempting to go back to look in the ashes for whatever remained of their belongings. She thought of the photographs of Clayton that would be lost … the small mementos she had kept … the photographs of her parents, her grandparents, the Tsar … she thought of the imperial egg she had kept in case she ever needed to sell it, but she couldn't worry about any of it now. All that mattered was that Nicholas and Sasha were safe. And then suddenly, with a sharp pang of grief, she remembered Sava. The dog she had brought from St. Petersburg so long ago had died in the fire.

“I couldn't get her to come out, Mama … she was hiding under the couch when the men came in,” Nicky sobbed. “I wanted to take her, Mama … but they wouldn't let me …”

“Shh … darling, don't cry …” Her long red hair had come loose from its knot as she fought the firemen to go in after her children, and it hung over her torn white dress with the blue flowers. There were streaks of ashes on her face, and Nicholas's nightshirt reeked of smoke. It was everywhere, but he had never smelled so sweet, or meant so much to her as he did then. “I love you so much … she was very old, Nicky … shh … baby, don't cry …” Sava had been almost fifteen, and she'd come so far with them, but the only thing Zoya could think of now was the children.

A neighbor took them in, and Zoya and both children slept on the floor of their living room, on blankets. No matter how often they bathed or she washed
their hair, they still smelled of smoke, but each time she looked outside and saw the charred relic across the street, she knew how lucky they had been. The sight of it made her shudder.

She called the theater the next day, and told them she wouldn't be coming to work, and that night, she walked to the theater to pick up her last paycheck. She didn't care if they starved, she would never leave them alone again … ever.

The paycheck would be just enough to buy them some clothes and a little food, but they had nowhere to stay, nowhere to go, and with a look of total exhaustion, she went looking for Jimmy to say good-bye to him.

“You leavin’ us?” He looked sad to see her go, but he understood when she told him what had happened.

“I can't do this anymore. If anything had happened …” And it could happen again. It was sinful to leave them alone. She'd have to find something else, but he only nodded. He wasn't surprised, and he thought it was just as well.

“You don't belong here anyway, Mama. You never did.” He smiled. All of her breeding showed just in the way she moved, although she had never said anything to him about her past, but it always made his heart ache to see her doing high kicks with the others. “Get yo'seff something else. A good job with your own kind of folks. This ain't for you.” But she had been there for a year and a half and it had paid the rent. “Don't you got no family or friends you can turn to?” She shook her head, thinking again how lucky she was to still have her children. “You got any place to go back to? Like Russia or something?” She
smiled at how little he knew of the devastation they had left behind them.

‘I'll work it out,” she said, not really knowing what she was going to do.

“Where you stayin’ now?”

“With a neighbor.” He would have invited her to stay in Harlem, with him, but he knew that it wasn't right for her. Her kind of folks went to the Cotton Club to dance and raise hell, they didn't move into Harlem with an old piano player from a dance hall.

“Well, let me know how you're doin’ sometime. Y'hear?” She leaned over and kissed his cheek and he beamed as she went to pick up her check, and he shook her hand warmly when she left, relieved at what she had done. It wasn't until late that night that she discovered it in her bag. Five crisp twenty-dollar bills he had slipped into her handbag when she went to get her check. He had won it in a hot card game only that afternoon, and he was just glad to have it to give to her. She knew it could only have been from him. She thought of hurrying back to the theater to give it back, but only she knew how desperately she needed it. Instead, she wrote him a grateful note, and promised to pay it back as soon as she could. But she knew she had to think fast. She had to get a job, and to find them someplace to live.

By the end of the week, their building had cooled sufficiently to allow the residents to go back in. There was precious little that anyone could save, and two apartments had been entirely destroyed, but as Zoya crawled slowly up the rickety stairs, she held her breath and wondered what she would find there. She opened the door gingerly, and tested the floor with a shovel as she moved around. The smell of smoke was
still heavy in the air, and the entire living room had been destroyed. The children's toys were all gone, most of their clothes, and her own, but she knew that they would probably always smell of smoke. She packed their dishes in a box, charred black from the smoke, and she discovered with amazement that the suitcase of photographs was still there, untouched, it was something anyway. And holding her breath, she began digging in what had once been a chest, and suddenly there it was … the enamel was cracked, but it was otherwise intact. The imperial egg had survived, she looked at it in silent wonder, and began to cry … it was a relic of a lost life, several lifetimes ago. There was nothing else to save, she packed the remains of the children's things in a single box, her black Chanel dress, two suits, and a pink linen dress, and her only other pair of shoes. It took her only ten minutes to get it all downstairs, and then as she turned to look around for a last time, she saw Sava beneath the couch, lying there … quiet and still, as though she were asleep. Zoya stood silently, looking at her, and then softly, she closed the door, and hurried back down the stairs to take their boxes to the children waiting across the street for her.

CHAPTER
33

After thanking the neighbors profusely for their kindness, Zoya rented a small hotel room with some of the money Jimmy had given her. Less than half of it was left by the time she'd bought the children new clothes, and herself a decent dress that did not smell of smoke. And they had to eat in a restaurant every night. They talked about what they were going to do, as Nicholas looked expectantly at her, but as she read the newspaper one night, scanning it for jobs, she suddenly had an idea. It wasn't something she would have done if she had the choice, but she no longer had. She had to use the little available to her, even if it embarrassed her. The next day she put on her new dress, carefully combed her hair, and wished she had some of her jewelry left, but all she had was her wedding ring, and a certain regal air, as she stood quietly, looking at herself in the mirror.

“Where are you going, Mama?” Nicky asked as he watched her dress.

I'm going out to get a job.” She wasn't embarrassed this time, as both children stared at her.

“Can you do anything?”’ Sasha asked innocently, as Zoya laughed.

“Not much.” But she knew clothes, she had worn the best for the past ten years, and even as a child, she and Marie had studied everything their mothers and other relatives had worn. She knew how to put herself together with style, and perhaps she could teach others to also. There were plenty of women who could afford that sort of thing. She took the bus uptown, after committing Sasha to her brother's care, and with a nervous heart, leaving them alone, she got off close to the address in the ad. It was on Fifty-first Street, just off Fifth Avenue. And when she reached the door, she saw that it was as stylish as she had hoped it would be. A liveried doorman stood by to assist ladies from their cars, and once inside she saw fashionable women and a few men gazing at the shop's expensive wares. There were dresses and hats, handbags and coats, and an incredibly beautiful line of handmade shoes. The salesgirls were well dressed, and many had an aristocratic air. It was what she should have done from the first, she reproached herself, trying to block the fire from her mind, and praying that the children were all right. It was the first time she had left them alone since that night, and she would never again be sure that they were safe if they were out of her sight, but she knew that this was something she had to do. She had no choice now.

“May I help you, madame?” a gray-haired woman in a black dress asked quietly, as Zoya looked around. “Is there something you wished to see?” Her accent was clearly French, and Zoya turned to her with a dignified smile. She was trembling inside but she prayed it didn't show as she answered in her own
flawless French, which she had spoken since her childhood.