City of Silence (City of Mystery) (9 page)

Through
the blanket of the trees, Vlad could hear the girl laughing and he knew he
would not rest until he had completed the task that his brother had begun.  He
would devote his life to the sanctity of the revolution.  Just like Sasha.    

Chapter
Five

St.
Petersburg – The Winter Palace

June
14, 1889

4:45
PM

There
were those who considered dance to be the greatest art of Russia, far outstripping
any national accomplishments in music or literature.  The supremacy of Russian ballet,
of course, went uncontested – so much so that it was rumored that in the
academies of Paris, French girls had begun adding an “-ova” to the end of their
last names in a misguided effort to imply they had been born in the east.  But
while ballet was the pinnacle of the form, all Russians considered it their
patriotic duty to know at least a few steps of a folk dance, and it would have
been unthinkable for any lady at the tsarina’s court to be unskilled in the
waltz.

This
was how Tatiana met Konstantin.  He served as one of a cadre of imperial dance
masters, and if Tatiana’s position within the palace required an odd balancing
act, Konstantin’s was even more demanding.  For to dance with someone is an
extraordinarily intimate act.  More intimate than lovemaking in many ways, and
it was Konstantin’s professional duty to take a variety of women one by one
into his arms, to push his thigh between their knees and slip his palm into the
small hollow beneath their shoulder blades.  He was required to transform them
into larks and gypsies and tigers in turn, as they moved throughout the nuances
of a dozen different tempos.  And, most challenging of all, he must perform these
transformations before the watchful eyes of their husbands, fathers, brothers,
and sons. 

It
was not a task for the faint of heart.

In
the stratified world of the Winter Palace, Konstantin was one of the anomalies,
a man who belonged neither here nor there.  On the dance floor he was the
undisputed master of his realm; even the tsarina must follow his lead.  He
moved among the numerous court parties as an honored guest, one invited
specifically to pay attention to the ladies at dinner.  Otherwise, they were
often ignored by the men, especially when the talk drifted to hunting or war,
and in this role Konstantin quickly became as adept at navigating a flirtatious
conversation as he was at navigating a crowded dance floor.  But at the end of
these long evenings, he would return down the hall which led to his quarters,
unfastening the cuffs of his tuxedo as he walked, loosening his tie and waist
sash, sometimes even slipping out of his shining black shoes and carrying them,
dangling lightly from his fingertips.  The hall was long, but, when he finally
got to the end, for the first time in his life he had a room of his own.   

Konstantin
was introduced to Tatiana the first week he came to the palace.  Filip had just
been granted his most recent promotion, and Tatiana had thus been invited to
join the tsarina’s court of ladies.  She had learned with a remarkable
swiftness, despite her utter lack of experience with dance.  There is not much
waltzing in a slaughterhouse. 

Theirs
was not a case of love at first sight or even at twentieth sight.  Nor did they
have that sort of instant antipathy that often masks sexual attraction. 
Instead they began with a matter-of-fact appraisal of their role in each
other’s new life:  She must learn to dance and he must teach her.  Tatiana
could not have named the precise day when she became aware that her excitement
about the next lesson might truly be an excitement at seeing her dance master. 
Konstantin understood only in hindsight that at some point he had begun to put
on his best shirt on the days he was to instruct her, that he took the time to
rub powder into his palms before he led her to the floor, that he remembered
her favorite waltz song and would request the pianist play it for their
practice sessions.  But a passion that develops over time has a unique sort of
magic - it comes not with bells and fireworks but rather with the slow
awareness that assumptions once taken for granted are now no longer true. 
Falling in love slowly is like awakening one morning to find that the sun has
risen in the west.

They
laughed about it later, their initial disregard.  Konstantin’s tutelage had
been polite but firm; her willingness to practice - even on five days a week
when he had suggested only three - had been nothing more than conscientious.  Tatiana’s
position in the tsarina’s court would require her to learn many skills, and she
had been relieved to find that at least one of them came easily to her. 

Her
talent was a relief to him as well.  He was one of many dance masters and eager
to make his mark.  Because he was the most recent addition to the royal
contingent, he had been saddled with the most hopeless of the Romanov ladies -
the tsar’s squirming young daughter Xenia, the ancient and arthritic Princess Louisa,
and Ella, who looked as if she should be able to dance like an angel, but whose
reserve made her awkward on the ballroom floor.  These were women for whom no
amount of instruction would improve their musicality or grace, women destined
to clatter their heels to the marble floors with each step, to clutch his
shoulder as if they were drowning, to grow dizzy in the spinning and thus
require their partner to constantly step in to smilingly rescue them from their
own ineptitude.   Konstantin feared that if people judged him by the progress
of these three pupils he would be sent back to Siberia on the next train. 

At
least when he danced with Tatiana people could see that it was not his fault.

4:40
PM

The
rude detective had been as good as his word, for despite the fact that the day
had dawned with the unpleasantness of the double suicide, the afternoon waltz
practice commenced at the usual time of 4 PM.  

As
part of the series of performances scheduled for the upcoming ball, the
imperial ladies and their attendants were presenting what was known as a
formation waltz, an elaborate patterned dance which began and ended with twelve
couples on the floor.  But during the long central movement, each couple would
move in turn to the heart of the circle for a brief moment in which they were
featured in a particular step or – if the female dancer in question was
especially unsteady - a held pose. 

They
had been practicing for weeks and it was still a disaster.  It had been
announced at the last rehearsal that half of the ladies should come to the next
session at the customary time of four and the other half at five, the
discrepancy being explained as some challenge of choreography or blocking.  The
ruse fooled no one; the real reason was that the four o’clock ladies were in
need of an extra hour of practice and the five o’clock ones were not. 

Tatiana,
of course, was a five o’clock lady and when she arrived at 4:45 she went back
to the platform where she had stood earlier that morning and considered the
scene before her.  There was the customary swirl of activity in the theater -
various couples in their places all about the stage, the trio of musicians who
came to such rehearsals noisily warming up, some of the ladies standing to the
side having costume fittings.  Konstantin was dancing with Ella, which was not
surprising, but as Tatiana squinted down at them, she could see that they were
talking, which was.

It
is not easy to converse while you waltz.  The woman holds her head back and to
the left in an exaggerated curve and the man is likewise also looking to the
left, although his arch is not so extreme.  But their faces are turned in
opposite directions and the music is often very loud and besides, dancers are
expected to have expressions of paralyzed rapture. Their mouths should not move. 
Elegant silence is the goal, with communication between the couple flowing
exclusively through their bodies, a gesture as slight as the pressure of a palm
directing the lady’s shoulders or the most subtle shift of his hip easing her
own into a turn.  

But
the reality was that the dance masters talked to their students constantly. 
Granted, it was mostly a matter of counting out the beat or saying “Slow”
“Hold” or “Left,” “Right,” or “Now,” but most of the instructors had acquired
the skill of ventriloquists, carrying on these primitive conversations without
moving their lips. The students rarely spoke in return, and were thus the
dummies, Tatiana supposed, but as she watched she could see that Ella was
openly talking and that Konstantin had tilted his had gracelessly close to her
in an attempt to listen.  He noticed Tatiana above them at some point and their
eyes met briefly.  Impossible to read his expression or to guess what news the
grand duchess might be so determined to convey under the guise of a waltz.

Tatiana
sat down in one of the small chairs and began to lace up her dancing shoes. It
would not do to show any more interest in one of the swirling couples beneath
her than the others, but she could not help but notice that Ella, while by no definition
a skilled dancer, was one of the ones who loved it.  You could tell by the way
she finally stopped talking and tilted her chin back, closing her eyes as they
moved.  Konstantin often instructed his partners to close their eyes.  The
better to hear the music, he would say.  The better to lose your embarrassment
at performing under the watchful gaze of others.  

But
it was also romantic, Tatiana thought.  This voluntary self-blinding made it
easier for the woman to submit to the movements of the man, to be truly swept
away, to slip off the confines of her everyday self.  Not being able to see
where you were going or how close you were to other couples on the floor
certainly made it easier to follow, for really, under such circumstances what
other choice does one have?  Ella had settled back into Konstantin’s arm, and
it was abundantly clear to Tatiana, if to no one else in the room, that she
liked this feeling of a man’s arm around her waist, drawing her steadily in,
and the gentle pressure of her hand in his.  Even if the man was but a lowly
dance master, even if they were surrounded by dozens of other people in the
middle of the day. 

Something
is missing in her life, Tatiana thought.  Perhaps it is the same thing that is
missing in mine.

She
was not jealous.  When a woman is married to a powerful man and having an
affair with a less powerful man, and when she is playing her dangerous game in
a well-lighted room, then jealousy is an emotion she cannot afford to
indulge.   Besides, Ella was not a threat to her.  No woman, not even a woman
possessed with Ella’s pedigree, would risk dishonoring the Romanov family with
an indiscretion.   Not in word, not in deed, not even by implication.  If
Tatiana’s ankle was in a trap, Ella was buried alive, and had been since the
day she first touched Russian soil.

Tatiana
knew she had been staring too long.  That was always her challenge when
Konstantin was in the room - to remember to periodically break the spell, to
sometimes look up and away.  When she did, she saw that Cynthia Kirby was also
on the balcony level, also looking down at the dancers, and that she too had
fixed her gaze on Ella and Konstantin.  The lady in waiting had seen it all: 
their conversation, followed by this, followed by these tight powerful swirls
of the formation and Ella’s head, thrown back too far for balance, thrown back
in a type of ecstasy.   

I
don’t like this Mrs. Kirby, Tatiana thought.  She has never wanted something
that she knows she cannot possess, never sinned nor broken rules and she has no
compassion for those of us who have.  I bet her eyes have never closed, not
even when she danced or when she made love.  I doubt they close when she
sleeps.

The
theater was often chilly, kept deliberately cool for the benefit of the performers
and Tatiana always brought one of her large silk scarves with her when she came
to rehearsal.  She reached down to her bundle and pulled out the red one,
draping it loosely around her shoulders.  Konstantin looked up again, spied it,
and smiled, not at her but at something above her.

She
had two scarves, one red and one white.  They were not only a means of keeping
warm while she waited her turn to dance, but also a signal.  The white one said
no.  But the red one said yes, that she would meet him later.

 7:20
PM

“Do
you like the velvet britches, or the satin?   Which ones show my legs to their
best advantage?”

It
was two hours after the rehearsal had ended and Tatiana and Konstantin were
lying in a heap of bright colored clothes, costumes that needed cleaning.  The
pile of discarded finery was relegated to the darkest and most hidden corner of
the prop room and they had trysted here many times before.  It was a
luxuriously quiet and private place, for once the rehearsals were over, the
dancers and musicians always emptied the theater en masse, leaving it with that
strangely exaggerated emptiness that only comes after a flurry of activity has
departed. 

It
never failed to surprise Tatiana how quickly the bubble could burst.

Besides,
Konstantin liked the costumes.  They not only provided a serviceable bed –
albeit one that contained an occasional jab from a wayward sword or crown – but
they allowed him to come to her in many forms.  In the ten months of their
affair, Tatiana had been ruthlessly ravished by a gypsy, coldly claimed as a
spoil of war by a Prussian general, seduced by the exotic rituals of a prince
of India, and thrust heavenward in the arms of a Greek god.