Garden of Venus (40 page)

As the carriage rolls past the inn, she spots a convent. A small, unassuming wooden structure, hardly worthy of its name. This is where she will go, she tells the driver. This is where they can ask for help. Inside the convent gates, a small group of Ukrainian women in their colourful kerchiefs are drinking
kvas
and mead, which a bald monk is selling.

She gets out of the carriage, relief in every tired muscle. She sends her maid to the nuns to announce Countess Potocka’s unexpected arrival and notes, with satisfaction, how they rush to bring refreshments and get a room ready for her. In the morning, she is reassured, one of the novices will lead the coach back to the main tract and she can proceed on her way.

‘The Virgin Mary Herself has guided you here, Your Highness!’ the prioress says, raising her hands to the heavens. ‘For our needs are indeed great.’

She motions to her maid to drop a handful of ducats into the alms bin. They rattle against the bottom.

Beauty is cheap, my Dou-Dou. Being of use is not
.

In the cell where the nuns have prepared her bed there is a painting on the wall, an amateurish effort by some local monk. She holds the candle to it and sees that it depicts the Last Judgement. The angels with their trumpets are waking the dead. The flames of Hell cover at least half of the canvas. Among these flames – rather crudely rendered, like giant tongues – stands Lucifer, his
hoofed legs big and contorted. In his big, hairy hands the prince of darkness is holding the chains to Hell, where a multitude of sinners are being tortured, each in a different manner. The painter, anxious that the moral of his painting be not missed, has added white clouds which emerge from the sinners’ lips, each adorned with an inscription.

Feeling better after a meal of cheese, black bread, and a mug of mead, she amuses herself by staring at the sinners. A cruel lord is being flogged, the same way he used to flog his serfs. A miser is being forcefed gold coins. A Jew in his black gabardine has vodka poured down his throat. Beside him a pale-skinned woman is being tortured by a small wiry devil who applies tongs and liquid tar to her private parts with a passion that makes her laugh. Another devil is defecating on the woman, while yet another pours liquid gold on her naked breasts. The inscription from the woman’s mouth says,
This is what will happen to you for your sins
.

Kotula, Nicolai, and baby Helena are taken away from her one after another, in one week. Taken by scarlet fever, the same rash on their chests and necks, the skin of their fingers rough and peeling, their tongues red, the colour of strawberries. Their breaths drag from sore throats, their hands wrench away from hers, fighting off some terrifying shadows. ‘I’m right here,’ she whispers into their hot ears, but they never hear her. Death takes all their attention, all their strength.

Helena will not grow up, will not marry, will not give her grandchildren. Kotula and Nicolai will never call her Maman, again. Despair tastes of ashes. It numbs her. It denies all hope.

‘I want them buried there,’ she says to Felix. ‘In Sophievka. In my garden.’

She is still only his mistress.
Does Madame de Witt or
whatever she calls herself now perhaps think herself a female Napoleon, grabbing what is not hers
, Josephine writes to Felix.
If this is so, please remind her what I have already stated many times before. There is only one Countess Potocka at your side
.

‘A church in Uman,’ he says, ‘would be a better place.’

She thinks: Not the parish church where generations of Potockis have been buried, but the small St Anthony’s church where his bastards would not draw attention to themselves.

She thinks: Better than the grave in the field where Gertruda’s body was buried, the unborn child still inside it.

Every fibre in her body tells her to please him. To tell him his wishes are her orders, but her defiance will not be quenched.

‘They are children,’ she screams. ‘They don’t want to be among stones.’

Felix looks at her, pain in his bulging eyes. ‘Sophie,’ he whispers. ‘My dear.’ He never meant to hurt her, he says. Never. She can have whatever she wants.

A priest will consecrate the spot in Sophievka. There, at least, she can imagine her children’s souls rising from the graves to play tag in the Elysian Fields, sneaking into the Grotto of Thunder where the water lashes like rain in a storm. Or taking a ride through the underground tunnel to the upper lake and playing hide and seek in the pavilion on the Island of Love.

She crawls into bed and lies motionless for days, refusing to see anyone. She cannot even pray. After a while tears don’t come either, just dry heaving sobs mixed with fury. If God is punishing her, she is thinking, He knows what He is doing.

Every day she can hear Felix outside her bedroom, his steps coming closer, stopping, and turning back. Is he disappointed by the force of her pain?

When she finally gets out of bed, her face pale, she finds him in the music room, playing the piano. A waltz. The sleeves of his jacket are rolled up and she almost chokes at the sight of the black hairs on his flabby skin.

‘Too much grief,’ he says, seeing her in the doorway, leaning on the door frame for support, ‘is a refusal to trust in the Lord’s mercy.’

She does not go away. She does not close her ears to music.

This is not the end, she thinks.

Anger blinded her, making her pace her room, wrench the curtains to close them, and then open them again, a torn-off golden tassel left in her hands, making her throw herself on her bed, and hide her face in the pillow.

Sneaky Jewess
. Her mother’s daughter.
Their women. Their blood
. Was this what her father gave his life for?

You will have to suffer for my sins, Rosalia. For no fault of your own
.

She stood up, straightened her dress and looked into the mirror. Her hair had come undone. A crease from the pillow was imprinted on her right cheek. One deep breath. Another one. ‘Count to ten,’ her mother would have said. ‘Before you do something foolish, count to ten.’

In the mirror her eyes seemed dull and lifeless, her skin yellowed and sagging. This was a face she hardly recognised.
He doesn’t want you, either
.

No one saw her when she sneaked through the servants’ door. After the morning rain the air was cool, the pavement still wet. Sunshine peered through the spaces between the buildings, the wind touched her cheeks and cooled them down. Only for a few minutes, she thought. No one will notice I’m gone.

She walked along Unter den Linden. By the university, she crossed the street to avoid the crowd of students, shouting and screaming. One climbed on a wooden butterbox and gesticulated wildly to bouts of laughter and applause. His clothes reminded her of a jester: blue, red, green, yellow mixed together. His orange hat had a feather in it and he was waving it now, as if conducting an orchestra.

She walked quickly, her heels clicking on the stone trottoir. In front of her a tall, stocky man in a top hat and peg trousers bowed to a woman who acknowledged his greeting with a tiny movement of her head. An elegant woman, in a heavy cape, trimmed with ermine. Then he crossed to the other side of the street and disappeared from view.

Dr Bolecki spotted her before she saw him. He was standing by the print shop, his hands behind him, holding his cane.

‘Mademoiselle Rosalia,’ he exclaimed. ‘Where are you bound? Can I be of assistance? Are you all right?’

‘You mustn’t inconvenience yourself on my behalf,’ she said, admitting she was only intending to walk. She had felt a momentary weakness but that had passed.

‘But I need a walk as much as you do,’ he protested. There was a lightness about him, a certain agitation she had not seen before.

It occurred to her that he too might be going to America. The picture in the print shop he had been contemplating was of a ship. A clipper with white sails, billowing in the wind. Two men on board were looking back at the shore.

But this suggestion brought a deep peal of laughter.

‘I’m going back to Poland,’ he said. ‘Unlike my good friend, I don’t believe one can start a new life. I don’t believe in escapes.’

He extended his arm to her and she took it, noting that in this Berlin street, Dr Bolecki was a popular figure. She soon stopped counting how many men bowed to him and stopped to inquire about his health, and how many times he raised his hat in greeting. Her presence at his side, she noted, caused curiosity, but he made sure they were not disturbed for longer than a passing exchange of pleasantries.

He was tired, he said, of Berlin. Here he was turning into a doctor of fashion and that did not suit his character. A few grateful patients was a nice reward for his efforts, but he was still young enough to expect more from life.

A man in a black frockcoat leaned from the carriage window and bowed to them. Dr Bolecki bowed back.

‘That’s Herr Trommer,’ he whispered with a smile. ‘I cured his gout and he never paid his bills. Last time he saw me, he ducked so fast I thought he would smash his head on the floor. Only the other day, however, the fellow sent me oysters. A small barrelful. Do you care much for oysters, Mademoiselle?’

‘No,’ she laughed. ‘Not that much.’

‘Oysters, of course, don’t keep,’ Dr Bolecki said.

They walked for a while, until they came to the small square lined with trees. With a white handkerchief that he retrieved from his coat pocket, he wiped a wooden bench for her and invited her to sit down.

‘You mustn’t get exhausted,’ he said. ‘No one is without limits.’

She smiled.

‘I can see big changes coming,’ he said, sitting down
beside her. Immense changes that could release untold human energy. At such moments, opportunities seized with wisdom made everything possible. The trick was to know how to act, to contribute to the force that could transform the world and use it to one’s advantage. Thoughts like that were the chief reason why he felt so elated. He was a man of action. He needed real challenges.

You are growing old
. She would be nine and twenty soon. The borderline of embarrassment, not the time to dream. She saw the stubble that was beginning to darken Dr Bolecki’s cheeks.

From the same pocket that had held his handkerchief, he retrieved a folded piece of paper. It was a poem, he said, that an old friend sent him from Vilnus. He read the first lines:

‘This,’ he said looking straight at her, measuring the effect of his words, ‘may be the awaited promise of rebirth.’ The poem was written by a young poet, Adam Mickiewicz, singing the praises of simple feelings and longings, uncluttered by the shackles of cold reason. The news from Poland had given him new strength. The young, he was sure, would atone for the sins of the past generation. The young would change the course of history, wipe off the shame of the partitions, of the squandered fatherland. They were generous. They were noble. They remembered the sacrifices of the past, the heroic deaths of men like her father. Here, Dr Bolecki bowed to her, raising his top hat.

‘The Poles are not the only ones. The Greeks will rise, too and restore their ancient glory,’ he said. ‘The whole world will be renewed.’

He was a doctor, he would be needed, for the young would not stop at words alone. There would be another insurrection, he was sure of that. Not right away perhaps, for the groundwork would have to be laid, but soon. The sacrifice, as always with great common struggles, would be great, but the stakes were even greater.
Measure your strength with the force of your desires
, the young poet said. How right the young were. Heroes like her father had not died in vain. Sacrifice was a torch passed from hand to hand, into the future.

Rosalia listened as he leaned toward her, his grey eyes fixed upon her.

‘The past is only important when it makes the future possible,’ he said. It was the duty of the living to make sure their heroes did not die in vain. At his side, she could be of help to countless young men whose lives she might save. He knew he was right. She knew it too, he said.

‘Mademoiselle Rosalia. This may seem sudden, but I’ve given it a lot of thought. I’m asking you to become my wife.’

A long indrawn breath. Another one. There was concern on his face, hope and the shadow of uncertainty. His hand was trembling, she could see with the corner of her eye. With him, she thought, I would not waste my life.

‘You don’t have to answer me now. I just want you to know of my intentions. I’m asking for nothing but hope,’ he said.

She could see herself placing her hand on his, quieting the tremor. She could see him at her side, shielding her from pain. These were good thoughts, precious.

‘I can give you hope,’ she said.

She did not pull her hand away after he had kissed it and told her that she had made him the happiest of men.

With Josephine residing in St Petersburg, she is true mistress of the Tulchin palace where the inscription above the portal says:
May it always be the home of the happy and the free
. Her bed is draped in pearly sheen. Everything in her bedroom is new, untouched by the past. The furniture is white, the walls pale grey. The colour is called
cuisse de nymph effrayée
, like a thigh of a terrified nymph. Her step-children are forbidden to cross the threshold of this room. Nothing here will remind her of Felix’s wife who is plotting against her, hoping her husband will
regain his senses
, turn his mistress away.

Hope is not a course of action
.

In this world, Dou-Dou, you are either someone’s wife or a whore
.

Felix loves me, she mutters.

He does love her. His eyes burn when he catches her look across a crowded room. ‘Nothing is as good as this,’ he whispers in her ear, burying his face in her hair. ‘Nothing.’ The Uman summer palace is a hundred
versts
from Tulchin, two long days of a carriage ride; there she has also ordered new furniture and new drapes. She wants it to feel hers, for this is where they stay when they visit her Uman garden. Sophievka is growing more beautiful each day, a testament to Potocki’s love.