Empress of the Night (22 page)

“You’ve thought of everything, Katinka,” he says. His voice is hoarse. “Now I’ll get well.”

But then at night, hot and humid, Vishka wakes her up. “Please, Majesty,” she says, breathless. “Come fast.”

When Catherine rushes into his room, Sashenka doesn’t recognize her. “I have to go,” he insists in an angry voice. “Why are the horses not harnessed yet? Who told you to be so slow?”

“It’s me,” she says, repressing the flicker of terror he would have seen on her features. “Katinka.”

He doesn’t hear. His body tenses, his hands thrash blindly as if he were drowning.

She wipes his forehead with a towel dipped in ice water, soothes him with promises that all will be as he wishes. His horses are on their way. The grooms are bringing them to the courtyard. They are outside already. “Can’t you hear the bells?” she asks. “I can.”

For a moment he seems to have understood her, for he says, “Those are not my horses.”

He falls back on the pillows. His hair, cropped short, is slick with sweat.

When she holds a sliver of ice to his lips, he sucks on it greedily.

She wishes to stay with him through the night, but Rogerson forbids it. “The contagion resides in the air,” the doctor says. “It’s too dangerous, madame.”

A young, strong body
, Catherine repeats to herself.
Surely he will recover
.

She hardly sleeps that night. With Vishka at her heels, she walks through the corridors of the Tsarskoye Selo. She stops by paintings, holds a candle up, making sure she looks only at those where life triumphs. Lovers united, a pilgrim returned home, a vase with blooming flowers, a warrior returning from battle with a garland over his neck.

By Tuesday, Sashenka is dead.

“Never!” she screams when Vishka asks her to name the day for the funeral.

For seventeen days and nights she stays in her room. She doesn’t dress. She doesn’t wash. She receives no one but Vishka, who sighs but doesn’t complain of having to serve as a chambermaid and merely casts quick, worried looks at yet another plate of untouched food.

Her eyes are sore from tears and rubbing, the skin underneath puffy. In the mirror, she examines the furrowed flesh of her neck, the thinning hair, the odd-looking flaps of skin that have grown on her shoulders and under her breasts. If she pulls on them, they bleed.

She has ordered Sashenka’s belongings to be brought to her. His engraved gems, his books, his wig, his dress uniform, which she tries to put on but, finding it too tight, places on her pillow instead. It smells of nothing but pepper, a smell that makes her sneeze.

In Algarotti’s book, she notes, half of the pages have never been cut.

On the eighteenth night, she goes to the room where Sashenka’s embalmed body lies in its coffin. The body she refuses to have buried.

“Leave,” she tells the mourners. They don’t dare to disobey her.

The coffin, lined with white satin, is surrounded by candles. Her eyes slide, slowly, from Sashenka’s black jackboots to the red jacket, the silver oak leaves embroidered on the collar. Finally, she forces herself to look at his face. “So calm,” Vishka has said.

No, not calm
, Catherine thinks.
Defeated. Cheated out of life that should’ve been his. And mine
.

Hair coiffed in an elaborate pouf is curled over his ears. Powdered with the wrong powder. Lavender, not orris. Someone has placed two gold coins on Sashenka’s eyes. Between his fingers is a passport to the other world signed by the priest. She wants to remove the coins, and the passport, but the effort seems enormous. Besides, she doesn’t want to touch Sashenka now. She wants to remember his skin warm with life.

So she sits there, on a low chair, watching him. Asking: “Why did you leave me?”

There are no answers on her lover’s still face. He is oblivious of her desire, her sorrow, her pain. As if his lips never caressed her, never sought
to give her pleasure. Shy, she has heard him described.
Not with me
, she thinks.
With me he couldn’t be shy
.

Each breath that leaves her chest robs her of some small part of him.

“I’ve come as soon as the news reached me,” Potemkin says. Sunburn has left a reddened smudge across his forehead. There is a trace of soot on his chin. Catherine clasps the hand he has extended toward her. The strong, hard hand of a soldier.

He is still wearing his heavy traveling clothes, splashed with mud. His boots leave dark, wet imprints on the carpet. He has ridden here all the way from Kremenchuk in seven days, more than a thousand miles, forced his way into her bedroom, taken one look at her, and said: “
Matushka
, I won’t let you follow him.”

She wants to cry, but her tears are gone.

“Come,” Grisha says.

She lets him lead her, because she cannot think of doing anything else. They descend the stairs, pass the main hall, walk into the gardens. She is dimly aware of eyes watching her. Through the keyholes, from behind the corners. Frightened, worried looks.

In the dusk, wet trees take on shadowy, spectral hues. By the time they reach the reed-rimmed pond, her skirt has soaked up so much water it clings to her like another layer of skin. She stumbles on gravel sleek with rain, but Potemkin holds her arm too tightly to let her fall. Water lilies are taking over the pond and should be trimmed. Why does she have to tell the gardeners what they should pay attention to?

Standing here in the garden, she sees that the palace windows flicker like fireflies. The servants are lighting candles. Somewhere from the pond comes the fetid smell of rot.

Has she been vain? Greedy for flattery? Been obstinate? Inattentive? Suspicious? Jealous?

“Keep walking,” Potemkin says. “Don’t stop.”

“Where are we going?” she asks him.

“Nowhere,” Grisha answers.

“Then why?”

“Because we have to move.”

“Why?”

“Because if we ever stop, we die.”

“Maybe I want to die.”

“No.”

She stops, in defiance, but he pushes her on. Forces her to keep walking until she is too tired to go farther. Only then does he relent. “I won’t let you follow him,” he repeats.

She rests her head on the crook of his neck. His lips touch hers. His tongue parts her teeth, dives inside her. It is acrid and bitter.

She begins to talk. Father is gone, and Mother. Both died far away, unseen. Panin, always stirring her son’s mind into disobedience, was struck down by apoplexy. Grigory Orlov lost to madness. Drooling in a wheelchair, not even a spark of recognition in his deadened eyes when he looked at her. As if there were no difference between his Katinka and a piece of flotsam.

“Children of Providence, Grishenka? Are we still blessed?”

Potemkin doesn’t answer, but his arms hold her tight. The thought flashes that as long as she can still lose herself in his embrace, she’ll find the strength to keep on walking.

Her galleys are moored near Kaniv. She is on her way to inspect the Crimea. Her next stop is Kaydaki, where the Austrian Emperor is already waiting for her.

The dream of the thousand and one nights, she calls this voyage. The year of 1787 is the year of her victory tour, her triumphant inspection of the newly conquered lands. Potemkin, her Prince of Tauride, is laying it all at her feet, fertile fields carved out of steppes, new towns and ports, new trade routes, new fleet of ships, new peoples of the Empire dressed in their colorful garbs.

“Didn’t I tell you, Katinka?” he says and grins. “Wasn’t I right?”

They are the best of partners. Their thoughts travel the same roads. No one but he understands why conquests matter. Others speak of riches to be had. Imagine themselves lording it over old rivals. Avenge ancient humiliations. Potemkin says: “Remember the Middle Kingdom? The
Chinese Emperor called back his big ships and locked them away. Who remembers him now? The moment you stop growing, you begin to wilt and die.”

Russians are not sailors ready to conquer distant lands or trade in fragrant spices. So Russia must grow outward, expand at her core. Elizabeth’s wars were glorious but brought Russia no land.

Hers have.

Peter the Great went north. Catherine moved west and south.

The imperial barges bustle with activity. Courtiers prepare for ceremonial duties. Servants rush about with platters of food, fresh linen, jugs of wine. Painters with easels scurry about in search for the vantage point to capture the most important scenes of the day. When the journey to the Crimea is over, the drawings will be transformed into paintings, sculptures, or porcelain figurines to adorn her dining tables or mantelpieces.

Potemkin has thought of everything.
Dnieper
, the gold and scarlet imperial galley, contains the Imperial Bedroom, an audience chamber, and a study furnished with a beautiful mahogany writing desk. An orchestra plays soft music for her whenever she wishes. At every stop, Prince Potemkin, with a roguish sparkle in his good eye, conjures up a garden. Potted trees and shrubs, clumps of blooming flowers, and carpets of luscious moss are laid on the steppe. One day a path might lead to a fountain; another, to a bubbling spring. A bench can stand in plain view or be hidden behind junipers. “You can force a flower to bloom!” Catherine says and laughs.

“You and me,
matushka
. We are invincible.”

Not a moment is wasted in idleness. Triumphant arches and garlands of flowers at each stop are reminders of her imperial duties: to hear a liturgy, host a ball, receive a local representation. That is the purpose of this sumptuous journey. To listen to her people. In every town, she questions the bishops, the landowners, the merchants. What would make your lives easier? More prosperous? What could I, your Empress, do to be of use?

“Why come so far to see nothing?” Mister Redcoat, her latest Favorite, sulks. “It’s as if we never left the court.” His predecessor tried to bad-mouth Grishenka and was dismissed. Let’s not recall at what cost.

Mister Redcoat’s real name is Alexander Matveyevich Mamonov, but how can she call a lover of hers Alexander? Or its diminutive
Sashenka
?

“I travel not to see places but people,” she tells him. “Places I can learn about from maps and descriptions.”

Mister Redcoat lowers his head. She is still sure that his young mind could be improved, molded into a finer shape.

“My visits may be short, but I give my people means to approach me,” she continues. “Those who might be tempted to abuse my authority take note and fear that I might discover their negligence and their injustices.”

Mister Redcoat lets out his breath. His fingertips drum a fast beat on the tabletop. There is a yellow stain on his collar and black under his fingernails. Vishka will have to remind him of the virtue of cleanliness.

Kaniv is a Polish town, the property of Stanislav’s nephew. A few days before, in Russian Kiev, visiting Polish grandees ate her food, drank her wine, and spun their big and small intrigues. Of their king of twenty-two years they spoke with irritation. Complained of Stanislav’s constant whinings about ancient virtues now vanished, of his melancholy musings. Poland’s losses are always their fault, never his.

Who supports him? Poets? Painters he commissions? Sculptors he employs to build statues of once triumphant Polish Kings? The weakness of character is a sea in which virtues and talents drown.

Twenty-nine years ago Stanislav was her beloved, but the past is a distant and foreign land. Her Russia is expanding. His Poland is shrinking. She made him king. His choice was to be her staunch ally or an adversary. He isn’t much of either.

A king once made can be unmade; Catherine knows that better than anyone.

The moment Stanislav climbs on board the imperial galley, the courtiers flock about him, curious and excited, eager for every scrap they can weigh and measure. The meeting of onetime lovers, after twenty-eight
years. Everything shall be recorded, passed on, gossiped about. First words, first gestures. Her smile, his smile. Or their absence.

The court speaks of nothing else, Catherine’s valet assures her. Bets have been made. Predictions float. Will she shed a tear? Will he? Even Queenie and Vishka get caught in this ghastly foolishness, fretting over which adornments would suit their mistress best. A feather with a single diamond? A string of black pearls? A fichu to cover Her Majesty’s neck? “Why would I wish to cover my wrinkles?” Catherine asks them. “I’ve lived for fifty-eight years. Would you wish me to be ashamed of it?”

Why is everyone trying to push her back into sentiments long dead? Because she is a woman? In love with flattery? Ignorant of the interest of her empire?

The imperial gifts are all lined up: For Stanislav, St. Andrew’s order and a gold medal with her image on one side and Peter I’s statute on the other. For the women of his family, the order of St. Catherine and imperial portraits in diamond-studded frames. There are also more substantial tokens of her favor. Annuities, gifts of jewels.

The Russian Empress is no miser.

“Count Poniatowski,” the footman announces, using his family name, as Stanislav enters her audience chamber. His gait is somewhat stiff, but graceful. He wears ivory-colored silk.