The Four Winds of Heaven (27 page)

W
hen Anna appeared
inside the threshold of her home, she saw the adult members of her family awaiting her. Her grandfather, somewhat stooped, surveyed her from beneath his severe brows, and swiftly, she felt a hatred for him swell within her. She dismissed her uncle as unimportant, with his derisive look that said: The children of my favored brother are not so pure. Her brown eyes, angry and shot with small red veins, moved to her mother, who stood carved in alabaster, her face bloodless, her eyes proud and hurt and haughty. Anna shivered, then turned to her father who stood slightly apart from the rest, his face gray, his cheeks sunken, his eyes filled with sadness and defeat.

“Oh, Papa!” she burst out, and suddenly she ran to him, and he enveloped her in his long, thin arms and rocked her back and forth. She cried hot tears of relief and pain and intense humiliation, while he held her.

“You have brought shame on our family,” her grandfather said roughly. “I shall not dwell upon it. But you have torn apart a good man, your father. About that I cannot keep silent. You are my flesh and blood, Anna. I was proud of you. Have you nothing to say?”

“No,” she answered. Her father released her, and she looked tentatively at her mother. But Mathilde turned her face away, and a hot red flash passed over Anna's face. “I am sorry, Papa. But only for you. I shall find work somewhere, and you can all forget me, for I do not wish to remain a member of this family. I shall go away—”

But all at once she saw her younger sister running toward her from the corridor, and as Mathilde's hand flew to her mouth and Sasha turned with shock to his father, Sonia threw her arms savagely about her sister's neck. “Anna! You're back!” Sonia cried, and she began to sob aloud. “Oh, Annushka, don't ever leave again! Stay with us, love us—” Anna felt hot kisses upon her cheeks, and she held the small girl in her embrace, something hard and painful dissolving inside her. She began to cry with Sonia.

A firm hand came between the two sisters, as Johanna de Mey, who had followed Sonia into the room, separated Anna from Sonia. “That is a sufficient display of hysteria,” she declared. “Sonia, you were to remain in your room. As for you—” and her mouth became a sneer as she regarded the crumpled, disheveled Anna— “you have caused enough trouble for a lifetime, let alone one night. I have ordered Marfa to set up a cot in one of the storage rooms. You will sleep there.” She took Sonia's elbow in her hard fingers and propelled her from the sitting room. Not even Baron Horace had breathed so much as a syllable.

Without a word, Anna stood up and walked in the direction of the kitchens. She opened the door to the area where her father's books were kept, then closed it noiselessly behind her. She saw the small iron cot in the middle of the first room, and suddenly threw herself upon it. “Oh Vanya, Vanya!” she cried softly.

But she was alone, all alone. She was home.

O
n New Year's morning
, 1906, Sonia awakened early. She had barely slept between her bouts of heavy tears. She had thought only of her sister, and of the people gathered to meet her in the sitting room. Now she sat up, shivering in her white satin nightdress this cold winter morning. She shook her thick black hair behind her, and covered herself in an incongruously childish flannel bathrobe. Then she tiptoed out of the room.

She went first to her father's study. The night light still burned through the crack in the door. She hesitated, then set her face in grim lines, her gray eyes hard. She had wanted to go to Anna, to sit with her, to bring her some of the New Year sweets that had been given to her in France. But the hushed sounds that came from the study told her that David was speaking to Anna at that very moment. She had never eavesdropped before. But now, her heart pounding, she could not help giving into this abominable sin.

“Switzerland will do you good,” Baron David was saying. “It contains marvelous landscapes to paint, and good teachers. The boarding house we have selected is fine, decent, and quite luxurious. When you return home, everyone shall have forgotten all this nonsense. Nobody knows about this business with the youth group, and as for the Berson boy—”

“Papa, do not speak of him. Please!”

“Then I shall not. Aron Berson does not know the whereabouts of his son. After your grandfather's agents took you home, he lost track of the boy. He plans to disinherit him. But that is Ivan's disgrace, not yours. Nobody we know is aware that you two were in the same group, not even Berson's wife and daughters. They cannot be trusted to be discreet. But he can: he needs our business as much as we need his.”

“Yes, business. Always business,” Anna said ironically.

“I am afraid we cannot overlook our interests,” her father replied. “But you needn't worry as far as we are concerned. We all know that it was a coincidence that you and the Berson boy were thrown together in the same group. There is no scandal.”

“It is to Mama that you should speak those reassuring words,” Anna said. “She is concerned with scandal in her household, not I.”

“Your mother is a saint, to have borne all this. I shall not permit you to speak of her that way. We are all concerned with our good name, but as it is connected to
you.
This whole dismal affair could have ruined you.”

“And now I am being sent away to avoid damaging the reputation of my sister and brothers,” Anna said.

“I shall miss you, Anna. I love you very much. If I have taken this step, it is for all of us, you included. This revolution bred strange thoughts in you—the good fresh Swiss air of Zurich will restore you to healthy thinking. Do not look at me with such disdain. It was not easy for us to decide what to do.”

“You might have continued to hide me with your extra books, and no one would ever have guessed I had returned to my baronial home,” Anna said with unconcealed bitterness. “But do not worry, Papa, I also realize that you were not the one who wished me gone. That is sufficient comfort. I would not remain here, anyway. But—”

Sonia heard a sudden muffled sob, a scraping of chairs. She felt the hot blood rush to her cheeks, and quickly, before the door was flung open, she hid in the hallway. Anna came bursting forth, disheveled and weeping. Sonia, her face now very pale, could not move as a faintness overwhelmed her.

When she felt sufficiently strong, she went determinedly to her mother's boudoir. It was so early, Mathilde would surely still be sleeping. Sonia thought of her mother's wan, white face, of the small lines of worry at the corners of her beautiful eyes, and pity filled her. Still, there was Anna. Her mother needed sleep, but Anna needed… She needs to be saved, Sonia thought with sudden passion, and in this passion, her gray eyes glowing, she knocked on her mother's door. “Mama,” she called in her girlish voice; then, when there was no answer: “Mamatchka! Please, it is important!”

She heard soft steps, then her mother appeared at the door. Her face was drawn, but she was fully awake. She stood in her green silk nightdress and instinctively she brought her hand to her breast to hide her bared collarbone from her daughter. “What is it, at this hour, Sonia?” she asked with impatience.

“It is about Anna. Please, Mama, let me speak with you—” Tears welled up once more in the gray eyes, spilled onto the young cheeks.

Mathilde regarded her with the expression of a startled doe, uncertain as to where to flee. Her face was ghastly white. At length, another, stronger voice emerged from behind her in the boudoir. “Mathilde, I can continue this massage while Sonia speaks to you. Come inside, or you shall freeze!”

Mathilde, her hand on her breast, opened the door completely, and Sonia saw Johanna sitting on the bed, a rose satin bathrobe trimmed with fox fur flowing about her like a gentle wind. She came to Mathilde with infinite gentleness, brought her back to bed. Then she dazzled Sonia with a splendid smile. “Your poor Mama has had a difficult night,” she said. “I was giving her a soothing massage. What was it you wanted, child?”

“I wished to speak to Mama alone, please, Juanita,” Sonia said.

“Your mother is too weak to sustain much conversation,” the governess said, a line forming between her brows. “You must not be insensitive.”

Sonia, clenching her fists, turned from the Dutchwoman to her mother, and her small, dainty features were constricted with frustrated anger. She lifted her frail shoulders, dropped them, looked all around the room at the beautiful objets d'art and remembered how her sister had once told her that one day she, Anna, would design her own home, that it would be simple and uncluttered and functional. Sonia had not agreed: antiques appealed most strongly to her own sense of beauty. But now it did not matter, nothing mattered but Anna and her dreadful misery, her impending departure. She flung her hands into the air in an uncharacteristic gesture, and her mother sat up, alarmed.

“Don't you love Annushka anymore? Is that it?” she cried. Before anyone could respond, she ran out of the room, her sobs resounding in the corridor.

“Oh, my God!” Mathilde wailed, and she began to rock back and forth, her hands over her face. Standing beside her, Johanna de Mey, her golden locks cascading over her shoulders, resembled a statue chiseled in rose-colored marble. She did not say a word.

A
fter Anna left
, Sonia, though outwardly poised and cool, became very depressed. She was nearing her sixteenth birthday, and her figure had filled out, though not like her mother's and sister's, which were full of hip and bust and slim of waist. Sonia was a small girl, and her breasts were small, too, but round and firm; and though her hips were not broad, now they were softer and more apparent than before. She did not wear the outfits made famous in America by Charles Dana Gibson, for they were geared to more womanly shapes than hers. But a revival of the Empire look, with its simple high-waisted gowns that clung to the hips, were perfect for her delicate slenderness. She now wore her hair up, loosely pulled into a demure topknot, for her mother had tried to cheer her with this gift of adulthood. “You are spoiling her,” Johanna had warned Mathilde, but on this point Sonia's mother remained firm. The haunted expression in the girl's gray eyes reminded Mathilde too painfully of her failures in rearing Anna, and of the hatred and disdain her older daughter had displayed toward her during their last months together.

After her lessons, when Ossip was at school, Sonia would retire to practice her piano. Mathilde heard the doleful sounds as the young fingers attacked the keyboard, and again she was reminded of Anna. Mathilde tried not to allow her mind to dwell on Anna, on the situation with Ivan Berson, on the escapade with the youth group. She smiled upon Sonia, and found this daughter infinitely sweet; and so Sonia's mournful playing was upsetting to her. There was a small room off the main sitting room, actually an alcove, and Mathilde ordered the piano moved there, so that she would not have to pass her daughter when she went into the sitting room. And the sounds were farther removed from the rest of the apartment. “This way, you will not be disturbed, and Gino will not burst in upon you,” she had told Sonia.

Sometimes Ossip would join her after supper in what was now called the piano room, and then the sounds would be gayer. They spent all their free time together, and he would tell her stories of school and make her laugh. “My bedroom is so empty now,” she said at times. “For you and I are the quiet ones. Gino is boisterous, but Anna—”

“Anna is what some people call ‘spirited,'” her brother stated. “And you are right: we are a most decorous house, but not a spirited one anymore.”

One noon, Ossip came home with Volodia Tagantsev, his face aglow. He was nearly nineteen now, Volodia seventeen, and the two young men still lunched at the Gunzburg home every day. Sonia would finish her walk with Johanna and Gino just as the boys were eating their dessert. She had to pass through the dining room on her way to her room. Each time, Volodia, dapper in his padded jacket which emphasized his athletic physique, would rise from his chair and extend his hand, shaking hers, and saying, “Did you have a pleasant walk, Sofia Davidovna?” or: “I hope that you were not too chilled today, Sofia Davidovna.” Sonia would smile and blush, and reply in her quiet voice whatever suited the occasion.

This time Ossip called out to her: “Sonitchka! I have exciting news! Come, I want to tell you all about it.” Sonia raised her fine eyebrows, and smiled, and spots of color appeared on her cheekbones. She hurried to the table.

Volodia had already risen. “Let me tell her,” he said. She turned to him, her small face tilted upward, shining from the bracing walk and from anticipation. “My mother has sent a message, Sofia Davidovna, inviting Ossip to supper at our home next Thursday.”

Suddenly Sonia turned her face aside, paling. She breathed deeply. “Vladimir Nicolaievitch,” she whispered, “what you say is impossible!”

But the young man shook his head, joy sparkling over his tan face like ripples of refracted sunlight. “No, it is true! My parents want to meet this best friend of mine— and so does Natasha, my sister.”

“But our father will never allow Ossip to accept,” Sonia said simply.

Her brother stood up now, his slender form taller than hers, his dark blue eyes boring into her. She took a step back, startled. “Mama will allow it,” he said. For the first time in her entire life, Sonia felt as though her brother had abused her. Tears filled her eyes, but she swallowed, and raised her head proudly.

“You are so confident,” she said.

But now Ossip had changed into his habitual laughing expression, and he reached for her hand. “I am
fairly
confident,” he replied. “I know our mother. But of course I cannot be certain. I can only hope. But after all, I am nearly a man now.”

“Perhaps, but a real man would think of his family first, and only then of himself,” Sonia said coldly.

Now Volodia interrupted, his color rising: “But Sofia Davidovna, I come here every day. What difference would it make if it were Ossip who visited my home?”

But Sonia shook her head. “I cannot explain it,” she said. “Perhaps it is simply that our father has never attempted to hurt your father's way of life, whereas yours has come between ours and the goals dearest to his existence. You will surely not understand. Ossip, clearly, does not either. But Papa will be hurt.”

“I am sorry, Sofia Davidovna. I only meant to convey an invitation,” Volodia said defensively. Then he added: “Ossip is closer to my heart than my own brother. Whatever you may think of my parents, they do love me, and by knowing Ossip they will feel that they know me better, too. Do not think of them, if it is painful to you. Think, instead, of me.”

Surprised, Sonia regarded him with parted lips. She began to say: But who are you that I should think of you, Vladimir Nicolaievitch, when my father is also concerned? The words remained unformed in her throat. All at once, gazing into Volodia's rich brown eyes, Sonia was overcome with a strange emotion that choked her, and she brought her hand to her throat. In the silence that followed, Ossip saw her wide gray eyes blending into Volodia's brown ones, and it was not haughty familial loyalty which he read in those eyes. It was something beyond words, something primeval. Ossip had never seen such an expression on his sister's face, had never guessed at its potential—and he was as amazed as she was at her own reaction.

And then the objects in the room took focus again, and she blinked, and bit her lip. She looked away from Volodia Tagantsev. Suddenly she seemed younger, smaller, a child in a woman's hairstyle. She stammered, “I hope that no one will be disappointed,” and Ossip wondered whether she meant him and Volodia, or their father. She bowed her head politely to Volodia and walked away toward her room with tiny footsteps.

S
onia felt confused
about Ossip's dinner plans at the Tagantsev palace, for at first she had refused to speak about it, averting her eyes whenever he came near her; then, seeing his high color, she had warmed somewhat to his excitement. Ossip had been to suppers and balls before, for he was nineteen, and much in demand as an excellent dancer and gay addition to the social events of the younger generation. But the Tagantsevs… He was without doubt the first Jew ever to set his dancing pumps within their walls. And it was to be a formal dinner, too.

When she saw her brother, Sonia started, for never, to her eyes, had he seemed so magnificent. His slim form was encased in a black tuxedo, and he wore a white vest encrusted with buttons of lapis lazuli that matched the cuffs to his shirt, which was stiff with fine pleating. His pumps were black patent leather, and he sported new pearl-gray evening spats. On his right hand he wore the gold signet ring etched with the family emblem given to him by his grandfather for his eighteenth birthday. Ossip's waving black hair was brushed back into a pompadour, unparted. His dark-blue eyes were more dazzling than the lapis as he stood before his sister. Sonia cried: “You are absolutely splendid!” And he bowed and pirouetted before her. Mathilde came to him from the doorway, her eyes filled with tears, and pressed his hands, quickly. Little Gino ran around his older brother, shouting war cries. Only David was nowhere in sight.

Stepan held Ossip's caped black evening coat for him. Downstairs the landau was waiting. The Swiss doorman, a skilled liveried servant who stood guard by the house, helped him inside, and laid a quilt upon his knees. Vova, the coachman, took his seat, as did the uniformed footman, for this was a formal occasion. Then the carriage departed. From the window, Sonia saw the horses trot off in the direction of the bridge connecting Vassilievsky Island with the city itself. Suddenly she felt a pang in her chest: a vision of Volodia dressed like her brother passed before her eyes, and she imagined him bowing before her, inviting her onto the dance floor. She felt like Cinderella here at home. This was Ossip's evening.

The coachman took off for the Quays, crossing the Nicolai Bridge and turning onto the Quai Français, which bordered the Neva River. It was a long, elegant block which Ossip knew, for many Gunzburg friends resided there. They passed the Quai de l'Amirauté and Alexander Square with its equestrian statue of Peter the Great; then, the Quai du Palais upon which stood the Winter Palace and the Hermitage Museum. Ossip's eyes glowed, seeing these sights as if for the first time. There was a hiatus of greenery as they passed by the immense municipal Summer Garden, and at last the Quai Anglais, where the mansions of the high aristocracy loomed like palaces. The horses stopped before one of them, and the footman delivered Ossip to the massive door.

From that moment on, Ossip was unable to keep track of events. Once inside the Tagantsev palace, where the Countess herself greeted him with gentle courtesy, Volodia seized him by the arm and brought him into a group of young people. Ossip, who had not mixed with children in the early years of his life, had nevertheless observed them well, and now he was comfortable with others, a witty speaker. He knew what to expect of people, how to be with them. His school friends, Botkin, Sokolov, and Petri, were all present, as were many older fellows whom he did not know. But he hardly noticed them, for at a distance he had seen a vision of utter loveliness to which his eyes, magnetized, were riveted.

She was almost as tall as he, her waist slim, her soft young bust round below a ruffled bateau neckline which revealed pink shoulders and exquisite long arms and tapering fingers. Her hips flowed with her long skirt, and around her neck she wore a collar of rubies and diamonds. Her gown was red, ruby red, as were her full, laughing lips below a tiny, uptilted nose. Even at a distance he could tell that her eyes were deep blue, rimmed with curling black lashes, and her cheeks were a glowing pink. Her hair was clearly as mischievous as she, for already this early in the evening tendrils were escaping from her diamond-studded pompadour at her forehead and her neck. Ossip stood, his eyes widened, marveling. And then the girl came running, with long, graceful steps, toward the group. “Volodia,” she exclaimed, “I have met all your friends but this one!” And she regarded Ossip, who stood dumbfounded.

“This is—” the young host began. But the girl burst out laughing, and placed light fingers on Ossip's arm: “No, let me guess! You are Ossip Davidovitch de Gunzburg. Why is it that I have not met you till now? I made my debut this year, you know. Volodia might have invited you! Instead Papa chose the dullest boys in Petersburg. Papa does not understand
la jeunesse!”

“Then,” Ossip stated, bowing, “you are Natalia Nicolaievna. I am most honored.”

“I hope that you will not feel too honorable to twirl me in a spirited waltz!” she said gaily.

“It would be dishonorable to do otherwise,” Ossip countered.

Natalia brightened. “Volodia! Did Mama tell you who was to escort me to supper tonight? I should like to change him for Ossip Davidovitch. Could you speak to her about it? This is such a special night for us, my angel, and if there were a young girl who made your heart patter, I would do you the same favor. Is there one? You blush, Volodia.”

Vassili Petri bowed to her. “I was to be your escort, Natalia Nicolaievna. But before my friend's success, I shall step aside. Not for long, however,” he added.

Volodia laughed. “I shall see if Mama agrees. You have the worst manners in the city, Natasha.” To himself, he thought: If only
she
could have come with Ossip… But he steeled his mind against the intrusive notion. Yet, as he moved toward his mother, he could not help seeing the gray eyes in front of him, the firm little chin, the fine black hair. I cannot put her out of my mind, he thought with frustration.

It was to be a supper for thirty, of which only half were young people; afterward, more of Natalia and Volodia's friends were to appear for the ball. Count Nicolai Tagantsev had made the rounds, pausing to be introduced to Ossip, and he had shaken his hand. He was a tall, massive, elegant man, and his handshake was warm. “You have brought joy into my son's life,” he had told Ossip. Then he had gone to another group.

Now the Countess inclined her head, and the Count took the arm of Princess Trepanova, the most important female guest, and began the march into the dining room. Every man found the lady he was to escort, and followed suit. Closing the ranks came the Countess with the guest of honor, her own cousin, General Prince Andrei Kurdukov; he was a handsome man, tall and strong, with auburn hair and whiskers, who had been pointed out before by Volodia. Prince Kurdukov looked every bit the part of a guest of honor: he was already in his prime, self-assured and successful. One could easily imagine him at Court. Ossip, somewhere in the middle of this procession which reminded him of the formation of a quadrille, felt Natasha's fingers upon his sleeve, and his heart raced. She tilted her head at him, regarding him frankly, and he smiled. “No painter could capture your lively charms, Natalia Nicolaievna,” he murmured in spite of himself, and she laughed, a low, intimate ripple of music.