The Jewel of St. Petersburg

  The man set down the mug and took the money. His fingers gripped it hard, smearing blood on the notes, but it was an uneasy moment. Jens laid his hand again on the man’s shoulder. “You are a good worker, Sergeyev. I’ll need you back here when your arm is mended.”

  The digger studied the roubles in his hand. “You’ll keep my job open for me?”

  “Yes, I will.”

  “The foreman won’t like that.”

  “The foreman will do as I say.”

  The man gave a half-smile. “Da. Of course he will.”

  Jens again felt that uneasiness seep into the hut. “Go home,” he said. “Go home and get better.”

  “It will need a clean dressing,” Dr. Fedorin pointed out.

  Sergeyev still stared at the money. “I can’t pay you, Doktor.”

  Fedorin glanced at Jens. “Your Direktor is good enough to cover the costs.”

  At last the man looked up at Jens. “Direktor, tell me, do you intend to pay personally for every man who needs a doctor here in the tunnel? To hold the job open for every digger who is injured? Every factory worker in Petersburg? Even for men like me who will now have a crippled arm?”

  Jens took a grip on the man’s good arm and hoisted him up out of the chair. “Get out of here, Sergeyev. Go home to your wife.”

  Clutching his right arm with his left, Sergeyev headed for the door.

  “What I do in these tunnels,” Jens said sharply, “is my business.”

  Sergeyev turned abruptly and his eyes fixed first on Jens, then on Fedorin. “Not for much longer,” he said softly.

  HE COULD HAVE BEEN MORE GRATEFUL, THE BASTARD,” the doctor said.

  “He was humiliated. He wanted to throw the money back in my teeth. It’s work in decent conditions that he wants, not charity.”

  “Jens, my good friend, sometimes I think you do not even now understand the Russian soul. Your Danish mind is too rational. The Russian soul is not.”

  Jens smiled at him and raised his glass. “Za zdorovye! Good health! To the Russian soul and the Russian mind. May they triumph over the enemies of progress.”

  “Which are?”

  “Complacency and corruption. Stupidity and greed.”

  “Hah!” Fedorin slapped Jens on the back. “I like that.”

  “The trouble is that no one is warmer hearted than a Russian, yet no one is crueler. There is no middle path in Russia; it is all or nothing. Look at Tsar Nicholas. He believes he was put on this earth by God himself to rule Russia and is even convinced that God sends him omens to guide him. He has spoken of them to me.”

  “Don’t depress me, my friend.”

  “He chases after spiritual guides such as Monsieur Philippe of Lyons and St. Serafim of Sarov. And that foul monk, Grigori Rasputin. The tsarina is besotted by him.”

  “I’m told she believes the illness of her son, Tsarevitch Alexei, is a curse from God and they try to keep it secret.”

  “How bad is it, this illness?” Jens asked.

  Fedorin poured himself another shot of brandy. “The tsar’s son is a bleeder. That’s why they hide him away at Tsarskoe Selo.”

  Jens did not let the shock show on his face. “A hemophiliac?”

  “Da.”

  “They don’t live long, do they?”

  “Not usually, no.”

  “God help Russia.”

  Fedorin knocked back his brandy. “God help all of us, my friend.”

  He shook hands and left Jens’s office. Jens poured his own brandy over his desk and scrubbed the blood off the wood with it. Whatever Dr. Fedorin said, Jens felt a kinship with the Russian soul, with its black aching moods of despair. He’d come here when only eighteen years old to escape servitude in his father’s printing business and had studied engineering in St. Petersburg instead. During the nine years he’d been here, he’d learned to love Russia with a passion. He wasn’t ready to see it brought to its knees by greed.

  EXPLAIN IT TO ME, WILL YOU, FRIIS?” MINISTER DAVIDOV instructed.

  The map of the city was spread out before the group of six men. Jens lit a cigarette and narrowed his eyes through the smoke, taking in the tension in the faces around the table. Andrei Davidov was a man whose voice rarely rose above a murmur. At times people forgot to silence their own tongues and listen to his, but Jens knew such people were fools.

  “Minister.” Jens leaned forward and picked up a tapered ivory pointer from the table. “Let me show you.” He traced the tip of it along one of the lines that zigzagged across the map. “See this blue line; this depicts the sewer tunnels completed. Notice how they cluster around the central area and the palaces.”

  Davidov nodded. His eyes were hooded but watched the pointer intently.

  “This one”—Jens indicated a series of green lines—“represents those under construction.”

  The minister drew his craggy eyebrows together and flicked the cover of his watch open and shut with a sharp little snip. “Do we need so many?”

  “Indeed we do, Minister. Petersburg is expanding every year; the population is increasing as more peasants pour in from the fields to work in our new factories. That is why this one”—he drew the pointer along a thick red line—“shows the planned tunnels that have not yet been started.”

  There was a heavy silence in the room while Davidov contemplated the map. It was broken only by a snort from Gosolev, who was in the habit of taking snuff. “I am thinking of the cost. Everything,” Davidov said, “comes down to cost.”

  “We need a new water and sewage system in this city, Minister. Sickness and diarrhea are rife in Petersburg’s workforce because of the lack of clean water for hygiene. How can we rid the city of its slums without sufficient sewers and water pipes?”

  “The cost,” the minister murmured once more. “Last year we had to strip funds from the Trans-Siberian Railway to find the million roubles for that damn statue of our emperor’s father.”

  “Minister,” Jens said in a voice no louder than Davidov’s, “this was once marshland. It floods. We have to pump out the tunnels day and night while we construct them. There have been roof collapses because of—he narrowed his eyes at Khrastsyn farther down the table—“because of lack of wooden supports and shortages of lamps.”

  “You shouldn’t pamper the poor,” Davidov cut in.

  “How right you are, Minister,” Khrastsyn agreed. “They work better when they are hungry.”

  Jens looked from one to the other and placed both hands down on the table, as if to crush their words. “The men work best,” he pointed out, “when they are not afraid of dying every moment.” He drew a deep breath. “The tsar has asked me to report personally to him on the progress this water scheme is making. It is something dear to his heart. Shall I tell him I am prevented from proceeding faster by you, Minister, and by you, Khrastsyn?”

  Davidov raised one heavy eyebrow. “Is that true? That His Majesty asked you to report to him?”

  “Yes,” Jens lied.

  “Khrastsyn,” the minister ordered, “let us rethink those funds.”

  Jens lit himself another cigarette, surprised to see his hands so steady. He had just made two powerful enemies.

  THE COUNTESS SMELLED OF ATTAR OF ROSES. SHE LAY stretched out on the bed.

  “You are irritable today,” Natalia Serova announced.

  She took a handful of Jens’s red hair between her fingers and twisted it gently, just enough to pull on his scalp. Sometimes he thought she would like to tear him into little pieces so that she could put each piece in her pocket and own him completely.

  “I’m not irritable, Natalia. I am impatient.”

  “Impatient for what?”

  “For the changes that must come.”

  “Oh, Jens, please don’t start that again.” She leaned down and kissed his brow. “For once in your life, silence that whirring Danish brain of yours.”

  “Davidov is trying to remove me,” he said.

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake, Jens, c
an’t you just do what the man asks?” She brought her hand down hard on his bare chest and pushed him away roughly. “You know that he has Stolypin on his side, don’t you? Don’t even think of going up against our prime minister.” She rolled her eyes dramatically. “Because you will lose.” She moved away across her huge bed and slumped among the pillows. “Please don’t tell me you’d be that stupid.”

  He reached out and stroked her foot. “No,” he said, “I’m not that stupid.”

  “Stolypin is a force of nature. He’s a giant and storms over everyone.”

  “Including Tsar Nicholas himself, who is afraid of him. Just like he was afraid of his own father.” Jens sat up. “I am sick of politics. Tell me, how is your son?”

  “Alexei is well, thank you.”

  He had been having his affair with the countess for a full three months before he learned she had a son. She had once confessed to him that her husband, Count Serov, was not the boy’s father but refused to tell him who was, except to admit she had a weakness for green-eyed suitors. It would explain why Count Serov paid the boy scant attention. Alexei was six now, and Jens enjoyed taking him riding.

  “My niece, Maria, is coming to stay with me for Christmas,” she told him as she ran a fingernail down his spine. “You might like to meet her again. Remember the concert?”

  Jens recalled the concert with instant clarity. The unforgettable music. The mass of hair at the piano, the huge dark eyes. The anger in them directed straight at him.

  Eight

  NURSE SONYA, WHAT IS IT LIKE?” “What is what like?”

  “Being a nurse. Always helping someone.”

  The woman inspected her with a kindly gaze. “Why do you ask?”

  “Because I’ve decided to train to be a nurse.”

  “A nurse? You?” Nurse Sonya burst out laughing, and Valentina felt it like a slap on the face. The older woman noticed her expression and silenced her laugh at once. “Are you serious?”

  “Yes, I am.”

  “Have you told your father and mother?”

  “Yes, I have.”

  There was an abrupt silence. Outside in the garden, huge snowflakes were drifting down like white apple blossoms.

  “Well? What did he say?”

  Valentina tried to laugh. “Papa, would prefer that I marry an officer.”

  “Valentina, you can’t be a nurse.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because you’re too thin-blooded. You’re too fragile. You’d wither and die in the harsh reality of a hospital. They are not pleasant places, I assure you.”

  “You survived it.”

  “I was raised on a farm.”

  There was nothing Valentina could say to that. She inspected her own hands, viewing their palms and their straight fingers. They didn’t look fragile to her or thin-blooded. They looked strong.

  “Nurse,” she said as Sonya was leaving, “will you teach me things? About nursing, I mean.”

  The nurse shook her head, her eyes soft and sad. “Nyet, no, malishka. I cannot teach you about nursing. That way we’d both end up being horsewhipped in the snow.”

  The door shut quietly behind her. Valentina unlocked her drawer and took out her list.

  SPASIBO, BARYSHNYA. THANK YOU, YOUNG MISTRESS.” THE kitchen maid bobbed a curtsy.

  “Merry Christmas, Shastlivogo Rozhdestva, Alisa,” Valentina responded.

  It was the annual Christmas evening ritual of presenting every servant with a gift from the Ivanov family. There were festive swathes of greenery and a brightly decorated Christmas tree from the fir tree market next to Gostiny Dvor. Valentina stood first in the line, passing out sweets and soap, shaking each hand in turn. Next to her, her mother wore gloves and a fixed smile as she handed out a length of good woolen material to each of the women, and a new razor and a pouch of tobacco for the men. Elizaveta Ivanova insisted that her male employees be clean shaven, even the gardeners. Her father stood with his back to the fire, legs apart, as he toasted his coattails and presented each member of his staff with a small velvet bag of coins. Valentina heard the chink of them as they landed in the outstretched hands and was curious as to how much they contained.

  “Shastlivogo Rozhdestva. Merry Christmas, Miss Valentina.”

  “Merry Christmas to you, Arkin.”

  This was the first time she’d seen the chauffeur out of uniform. He was wearing a neat jacket and clean white shirt. He looked lean and athletic. A determined face. The forthright way his gaze met hers made her wonder what went on behind those cool gray eyes of his. She placed the absurd sweets and soap in his spotless hand.

  “Spasibo,” he said, but the smile he gave her wasn’t quite a chauffeur’s.

  “Arkin, you drove well the other day. When we were caught in the car on Morskaya. Thank you.”

  He seemed about to say something but changed his mind and gave her a respectful nod of his head instead.

  “Where is Liev Popkov this evening?” she asked. “I don’t see him here.”

  His polite smile hardened. “Popkov is otherwise engaged, I believe. In the stables.”

  She frowned. “Is a horse sick?”

  “You’ll have to ask him, Miss Valentina.”

  “I’m asking you.”

  His eyes remained on her far too long for politeness. “I don’t believe it’s a horse that is sick.”

  “Liev? Is he unwell?”

  “Valentina, you are slowing the line, my dear,” her mother said firmly. “Come along, Arkin.”

  Immediately he moved onward to accept his next gift. Something about this chauffeur, something carefully hidden under that polite exterior of his, sent a shiver down Valentina’s spine.

  LIEV? LIEV?”

  Where the hell was he?

  “Liev Popkov!” she shouted again in the stables.

  And then she found him. Eyes shut, heavy limbs lifeless. Stretched out on his back on a pile of straw in a vacant stall. Her heart stopped. Not again. First his father, Simeon, and now him. The smell of blood in her nostrils all over again.

  She started to scream.

  “For fuck’s sake, stop that racket, will you? You’re scaring the bloody horses.”

  He had one eye half open, scowling at her while he scratched his armpit.

  “You stupid dumb Cossack,” she yelled at him, “you frightened the life out of me. I thought you were dead.”

  His scowl faded. He mumbled something unintelligible and lifted a vodka bottle to his lips, spilling trails of clear liquid down his throat and over the straw. The bottle was almost empty.

  “Liev, you’re drunk.”

  “Of course I’m bloody drunk.”

  “I thought I smelled blood.”

  “You always did imagine things.”

  “I’m not imagining the trouble you’ll be in.”

  He grinned at her then, his mouth a dark cave in the shadows, and upended the bottle to his lips.

  “Liev! Don’t!” she scolded, but more softly this time.

  He tossed the empty bottle toward her at the entrance to the stall, but it fell short. “What are you so frightened of?”

  “I don’t want you whipped.”

  “Hah!”

  She held out the packet of sweets and soap. It felt absurd. “My father has a proper present for you.”

  He laughed, a big guttural explosion that burst from his chest. “He’s already given it to me.”

  “The pouch of roubles?”

  His eyes narrowed into black slits. “Nyet, not the roubles.”

  “What then? The razor and tobacco?”

  In response the big man suddenly sat up, swaying violently, and yanked his black tunic up over his head, revealing a broad chest matted with thick black curls. Valentina couldn’t tear her eyes away. She’d never seen a man half naked before, not this close.

  “You’re drunk,” she said again, but the words had lost their sting. “Put your top back on at once before you freeze to death.”

  She migh
t as well not have spoken. He threw the tunic aside and rolled over on the straw so that he was lying face down.

  “Liev!” This time it came out as a faint gasp. She put a hand over her mouth and stared at his back.

  The massive muscles were striped. Red tracks ran diagonally across them, so regular they looked as though they’d been painted on. The paint was still wet and glistening. Slowly she walked into the stall, where she dropped to her knees in the straw beside him. The lash cuts were deep in places, raw edges of flayed flesh laid bare. “Why?” she whispered. There was no need to ask Who?

  Liev rolled away, seized his tunic, and pulled it over his head. She couldn’t understand how he could even move with a back like that.

  “Why did he do such a thing?” She felt shame for her father, sour in her stomach.

  Popkov ferreted out another bottle from under the straw. This one was full. “Yesterday,” he said, “I went to your sister’s room when the nurse wasn’t there.”

  “Oh, Liev. I’m so sorry.”

  He shrugged and poured more of the alcohol down his throat. “I wanted to give her a small gift for Christmas, that’s all.”

  “But it’s her bedroom.”

  “I’ve been in there many times to lift her in and out of her wheelchair.”

  “But never without Nurse Sonya present.”

  He snorted. “Nyet. Your father walked in when I was sitting on the end of the bed talking with her. So he whipped me.”

  Suddenly Valentina was hitting him in a fury. Her fists hammered down on his chest, pummeling its granite muscles.

  “You stupid dumb oaf,” she shouted, “you brainless Cossack, you’re crazy. You deserve to be whipped.”

  He just laughed, then seized one of her wrists and pressed the neck of the vodka bottle into her hand.

  “Here, have some.”

  She stared at the innocent-looking drink, gave a deep bone-shaking shudder, and raised the bottle to her lips.

  VALENTINA FELT VERY WARM. SHE COULD HEAR THE NIGHT wind scratching at the wooden stable walls. Something pleasant was floating around in her head, something with wings like a butterfly or a moth. Her lips no longer seemed to belong to her and kept curling up into vacant smiles. She was seated on the floor, leaning back against the side of the stall with a pile of straw tucked around her legs. How did all that heat get inside her stomach? Whenever she shut her eyes a whirring sound set off inside her skull and she found herself tipping sideways.