The Ice King (25 page)

Tanya showed no inclination to talk on the way home, and the Kirovs, apart from a few speculative glances among themselves, left her to enjoy her reverie, Prince Nikolai's obvious happiness having reassured them that all was well. She undressed, washed and said her prayers in a blissful haze, and was so tired that she had almost drifted into sleep before a sudden realisation struck her into wakefulness and she sat up in bed with a jerk.

“Oh, heavens!" she thought. "He was trying to ask me what I mean to do about his son! How stupid of me not to realise!”

She had not really had time to consider Ilya Nikolaevich as a factor in her own life, for she had not in the end received his father's letter until Monday afternoon, because Count Alexei's friend at Gatchina had not only obtained the tickets of admission to Paul's palace, but had also arranged a small concert for Saturday evening. It was not done to travel on a Sunday, so their return to Petersburg was delayed until Monday. In any case, there had been so much else to assimilate in the letter.

Tanya had never had any close association with a young child apart from Irina, and she found it difficult to make up her mind how best to approach the problem of Ilya. It did not enter her head that Prince Nikolai might really think that she would object to him seeing as much of his son as he wished, and she assumed, quite wrongly, that he had really been trying to find out if it would now be possible to bring the boy to Petersburg, to live as one of the family, or if she would prefer to continue the present arrangement whereby Ilya lived in Novgorod with his tutor, but visit him with Prince Nikolai and gradually get to know him.

It was natural that her warm heart should go out to the child and wish to give him the motherly affection he had never known, but it was clearly not going to be as simple as that. Prince Nikolai had kept the boy's existence a secret for six years, and might wish to continue doing so. However much a man might love his bastard, he was not necessarily going to wish to bring him up among his legitimate children, or even make his existence generally known, for even in the less civilised provincial areas, the possession of a bastard was not regarded as something to be flaunted in society! Besides, however willing she might be to accept Ilya, he was not necessarily going to accept her, for she had a vague idea that children sometimes proved difficult towards a stepmother.

Obviously the matter was going to require careful thought and discussion with Nikolai, and she would be very unwise to rush into any unconsidered decisions. Besides, she was so tired that it was becoming difficult to think coherently.

She snuggled down into the warm bed, and her last conscious thought was a faint memory of something she had once read about illegitimate children, which might prove well worth looking into .

*

The Kirovs slept late the next morning, and when they gathered in the dining-room for a combined breakfast and luncheon they found it full of flowers, which had overflowed on to the gallery and into the salon.

“What on earth?" demanded Count Alexei.

“Prince Volkhov sent them," Nikita explained, looking distinctly put out. "I've already used most of our vases for the Emperor's bouquet, and I'm afraid we've had to employ whatever came to hand for them.”

Tanya was too overwhelmed to do more than look at the flowers, but Irina, Marisha and Fedor spent some time giggling over the strange assortment of containers Nikita had pressed into service, including two or three old coffee-pots, some large bread-crocks, some mixing-bowls from the kitchen, and even a chamber-pot without a handle, which Fedor pushed behind a curtain before his mother could catch sight of it.

After luncheon, as it was snowing quite heavily, they all repaired to the salon, where Marisha practised her piece on the pianoforte while Count Alexei drowsed behind a newspaper, Fedor pored over a stud-book which someone had lent him, Irina played with her dolls, and Countess Maria and Tanya worked at their embroidery, but Tanya glanced frequently at the clock on the mantel, the hands of which appeared to be moving with inordinate slowness, and wondered when Nikolai would come.

At three o'clock, Nikita made a stately entry and informed Countess Maria that Prince Volkhov was below-stairs and requested a few minutes' private conversation with her. As Maria went out of the room she looked questioningly at Tanya, who coloured. Everyone else then looked at Tanya, who started to embroider a rose with bright blue silk, stitching away very quickly and unevenly.

Presently Countess Maria returned, her eyes sparkling with pleasure. She kissed Tanya and said, you go down, dear? He's in Alexei's study.”

Tanya dropped her embroidery and started up, her hands going to her hair for fear it might be untidy. A quick, half-frightened glance in a mirror showed her a very calm-looking young lady in a dark red woollen dress trimmed with black braid, with shining brown curls and rather pink cheeks.

At the top of the stairs, she suddenly stopped dead as she was struck by a practical consideration which had not occurred to her before. Surely it was customary for the
bride's
family to pay the expenses of the wedding and provide the trousseau? She sat down abruptly on the top step and contemplated the stark thought with numb horror. There was no means whatever by which she could solve that problem. Even if Count Alexei offered to pay, it would be completely out of the question for her to accept the offer.

For quite two or three very slow minutes, she stared at the opposite wall without any gleam of a solution entering her head, and then she remembered poor Nikolai waiting downstairs, perhaps wondering if she had changed her mind, or broken her neck on the way down. A little smile touched her mouth as she recalled how impassive she had once thought him – an Ice King sealed against the world behind an impenetrable barrier – and how vulnerable she had found him to be in reality! Dear Nikolai! He would know what to do! With that thought, she sprang to her feet and ran lightly down the stairs.

The entrance hall was empty, except for the square figure of Pyotr, who was standing stolidly midway between the foot of the stairs and the door of Alexei's study. He looked firmly at Tanya as she reached the bottom step, and said "Good afternoon, Tanya Ivanovna," in Russian.

“Good afternoon, Pyotr Efremovich," Tanya replied in the same language, noticing that he was already addressing her as if she were a member of the family which he served.

He took a couple of steps towards her and said very rapidly, in a low voice, "You ought to know that he was in a very bad state when it happened, sick in mind as well as body. He didn't know what he was doing most of the time, and we feared his reason would give way.
She
brought him to it – you wouldn't believe anyone could have treated him so badly! We – all the people on the estate, that is – we didn't know she was going to die so soon, we thought he'd be tied to her all his life, and
she
didn't want him, except to hurt. He had to have something, someone to love, so we thought a child – It did the trick, you see. Having the boy to look after made him pull himself together. He's a good child, clever and biddable.”

Tanya nodded, for he was confirming much of what she had already guessed. "And the mother?" she asked softly.

“She was glad to do it for him," Pyotr assured her. "She was very fond of him. It was a pity she died, but perhaps all for the best – she's happy where she is now." He gave a slight upward jerk of his head, signifying that he meant Heaven.

“He doesn't know who she was. He was too ill and confused to recognise her, and we didn't tell him. Better he doesn't know."

“Yes," Tanya agreed, "I wouldn't tell him.”

Pyotr looked her hard and straight in the eyes for a moment. His own eyes were a very clear grey, and looked remarkably shrewd and intelligent. "She was my sister," he whispered.

“Oh, Pyotr Efremovich!" Tanya exclaimed, her hand going out to him in a spontaneous gesture of sympathy and gratitude, her face a picture of concern. Pyotr took her hand and kissed it, and then kissed her shoulder in the traditional Russian gesture of respect from servant to master.

Nikita bustled into the hall from the back regions, clicked his tongue in a sharp "Tut!" of disapproval at the sight of Pyotr, and stared meaningly at the damp patches that the man's felt boots had made on the parquet floor.

As Tanya went on towards the study door, she heard Pyotr say in a slow, rather stupid voice, "I'll tell you what, Nikita Stepanovich, you ought to get our steward to give you his recipe for lavender polish. It brings up the wooden floors a fair treat, and really makes them shine. You must be using some very poor stuff on yours. Look at all these patches down here!”

As she reached the door of Alexei's study, Tanya stifled a giggle at the thought of Nikita's fury and then suddenly sobered, realising fully for the first time why she had come down here. The next few minutes were going to be so vitally important, not only for her own life, but for Prince Nikolai's as well.

She had no doubts about her feelings for him, but what if she failed him in some way? After the disaster of his first marriage, he must surely have some fears about the possibility of finding any real happiness, however much he loved her. There would be so many ways in which she might inadvertently hurt him, and she feared that it would not take many blunders on her part to drive him back into his frozen isolation.

She closed her eyes and prayed very hard for a few moments, and then, with a fatalistic acceptance that she could only do her best, but with God's
help it would be enough, she blinked once or twice, took a deep breath, straightened her back and lifted her head, and then opened the door and went in.

The study was a warm, homely room, with a dull brown carpet, snuff-coloured curtains, and bookcases against the walls full of leather-bound volumes. A large, shabby desk stood in the middle of it, with
a
worn leather chair, and a cheerful fire crackled in the open hearth, behind a cut-steel fender from Tula. Nikolai was standing in the window, watching the snowflakes falling. He turned as Tanya entered and closed the door behind her, and stood looking at her.

“I didn't dream it, did I?" he asked. "You really did come to the Palace?"

“Yes," she replied, smiling. "And you really did present me to the Emperor.”

He advanced halfway across the room, then stopped and said "And you did say I might call today?”

She nodded. He skirted the desk and came close to her, taking her hands in his, and then, after a careful, searching look into her face, dropped on one knee. She tried to prevent him, but he persisted, and as she looked down at his bent head, seeing those grey threads amid his brown hair, he said in a raw, nervous voice, "Will you marry me, Tanya Ivanovna?”

Her hands trembled in his clasp and she said breathlessly, "Oh, I want
to very much, Nikolai, but there's a dreadful problem, and I don't know what to do.”

He stiffened, and without looking up said quietly, "What is it?"

“I haven't any money," she replied. "Only eighty-six roubles in the whole world. I can't buy a trousseau, or pay for the wedding, and I can't possibly let Alexei Fedorovich pay for anything, because he's already spent more than he should on me. . .”

She broke off as a shudder seemed to pass through Prince Nikolai's body, and he said in a voice shaking with laughter, "Why, my dear little goose! I'm one of the richest men in Russia! I'll buy you a dozen trousseaux, and I expect I can scrape enough together to pay for the wedding!"

“Oh," said Tanya naively. "I hadn't realised that you were rich!”

Prince Nikolai controlled his laughter with an effort and said soberly, "Well, if that problem is removed, is there anything else?"

“N — no," Tanya said thoughtfully. "I don't believe there is."

“Then will you marry me?"

“Yes, please.”

Prince Nikolai stood up and looked down at her, shaking his head and smiling ruefully. "Oh, Tanya! That was monstrous! I really thought there was some dreadful obstacle . . ." and then he realised that her anxiety about her lack of money had been genuine. "My dearest girl! I'd marry you if you came to me in rags, without a possession in the world!"

“It's nearly as bad as that," she told him. "Most of my clothes are borrowed, and I've only my mother's little string of pearls."

“And eighty-six roubles," he reminded her. "Maria said you had a hundred. What have you done with the rest?"

“I spent three on the linen and silks for the embroidery I'm working for Maria, and five on . . ." she hesitated, not liking to say "silk stockings", "feminine fripperies, and fifty kopecks for a book for Irina, and the rest I put in the poor box at church — not all at once," she added hastily.

“I love you very much, Tanya," he said softly. "I'm not really marrying you for your money."

“That's just as well," she said cheerfully, "for I mean to spend
all
the rest of it on a ring for you!”

The Prince laughed, putting his hands on her shoulders and studying her face. Tanya looked up at him, her eyes reflecting her amusement, and then saw it gradually change to a serious expression of such deep affection that she felt that her heart was melting with a strange mixture of longing and happiness, spiced with a thrill of nervous excitement. Unconsciously she moved closer to him as his hands slid caressingly across her back and his arms tightened about her.

“
Moya dushka!"
he whispered. "My little soul!"

“Dear Nikolushka!" she replied, and raised her parted lips as he bent his head to kiss her.

Once more her whole body thrilled in response to him, and she embraced him, pressing more closely against him, but even now managing, in some little corner of her mind, to remember his damaged side and avoid hurting him. She was learning quickly how to receive and return his kisses, and when he paused from time to time to lift his head enough to look at her, she could see quite clearly how delighted he was, and a great tide of happiness bubbled up inside her.

After a time they became aware of a persistent tapping at the door, and Nikolai reluctantly released Tanya, with a last light kiss on the tip of her nose, and went to see who it was.