Encore (60 page)

That afternoon Tamara came in on tiptoe, and Natalia felt rather than heard her by the side of her bed. “Are you sick or sleeping?” the girl asked.

“I'm all right.” Natalia sat up and took the girl's hand and smiled.

“No, you're never ‘all right' anymore. You're either sick or busy, and Papa doesn't come as often to visit anymore. I'm lonely with Mademoiselle.” The girl chewed sullenly on the inside of her mouth.

Natalia felt a rush of blood to her face, a sudden thudding in her chest. She said carefully: “I didn't know he'd ever come to visit you. Why didn't you tell me, darling?”

Tamara looked away, all at once embarrassed. “Because he asked me not to tell you. He told me it would cause all sorts of problems. But
why?
He's my father!”

Natalia's free hand lay clenched in her lap, the nails digging into her palm. “I never sent your father away,” she said. “He's the one who left and who broke up the family. I don't think he should be allowed to come and go here as he pleases. It's not his home anymore—and I'm not his wife.”

“But I'm still his daughter! And I want to see him! Sometimes he only comes to pick me up, and we go for a drive, or out to tea or to a matinée at the Comédie Française. You're not being fair! I don't want to lose him!”

Tamara's voice had grown sharp with suppressed sobs, and now Natalia raised her hands to her temples and, shutting her eyes against the pain, cried: “I didn't want to lose him either! Do you think
he
was being fair?”

But Tamara was running from the room, and Natalia thought: What have I done? What damage have I now compounded in this little girl?

A week before the première, Natalia came home early from a rehearsal. Perhaps, she thought, her hands trembling with this added despair, perhaps if I give her time, listen to her, try to talk with her…. But it had been so many years since she had been Tamara's age. She simply did not remember how it felt to be seven and to feel betrayed by one's parents. A deep, gnawing frustration permeated Natalia's whole being.

She was never mine to begin with but always Pierre's, Natalia admitted, allowing Chaillou to remove her coat and handing him her little felt cloche. What use is it, she wondered dryly, to keep up with fashions when on the inside everything has been stripped? But the old
maître d'hôtel
was rubbing his chin, and murmuring:
“She's
here, Madame. We…I couldn't…”

“The princess? You let her in?” Just as he had let Pierre in behind her back?

Chaillou simply turned his eyes to a speck of dirt on the floor. He had always held a soft place in his heart for Galina, ever since her arrival over three years before. Natalia took a deep breath, steadied herself, and said: “Very well, Chaillou. Where is she?”

“She…they...are in the parlor, Madame.”

I have to learn to control myself better, Natalia thought as she hastened away. In front of the servants…no pride…. And all for a chit of a girl who thinks she's a woman!

She wound her way to the parlor door, which stood open. Natalia's face whitened. Tamara was sitting on an ottoman, her head in Galina's lap, and the older girl was saying, softly: “Nobody's right and nobody's wrong, my darling. In the grown-up world people don't really lie. They see the same thing differently, sometimes. Nobody hurts another person on purpose. Nobody wanted to hurt you.”

“My mother doesn't love me,” Tamara said.

“Yes. She loves you. She loves you and she needs you. Tamara, don't take sides. It isn't fair to anyone.”

“I don't care! Mama doesn't have time for me. You always had time. Oh, Galya—why can't I live with you? I want to so much!”

Galina raised the child's face with her index finger. “I want it, too. But I'll come to see you. And someday you can come see us.”

“Don't play the saint, Galina,” Natalia cut in sharply, entering the room. Galina reached for her purse and clutched it to her knees defensively, and Tamara jumped up and ran out, brushing past her mother on the way. Natalia did not sit down but remained, examining Galina, whose rigid, white face seemed frozen. She was trapped by the other woman's brown eyes riveted on her.

“Why did you come here?” Natalia asked, her voice a low tremble.

Galina said nothing, but her eyes filled with tears, and her knuckles on the bag were white with tension. Finally she said: “I wanted to see you.”

“Is anything wrong?” For an instant, the briefest instant, Natalia's face betrayed the old concern, and Galina's lips parted, suddenly hopeful. Then the older woman looked away and reached for an enamel box on the coffee table. She sat down on the sofa and extracted a cigarette, then carefully lit it. The habit was still new and shocked her niece. Silently, Natalia took a puff and regarded Galina with expectation.

“I came to tell you something,” Galina said. Her eyes went to the carpet and remained there, abstracted. “We—Pierre and I—are going to Brussels next week. The banns…. You only have to live there six weeks.”

“So. You're going to be married.”

“Yes.” Galina looked at Natalia then and stopped trembling. “I felt that you should know,” she added.

“Well. That was very brave of you, Galina.” Natalia could feel the pulse beating in her throat, heard a din in her ears, and she closed her eyes and brought the cigarette gratefully to her lips. Then a scarlet anguish rushed into her, and she sat up brusquely, her eyes widening. “Damn it, Galina,” she cried, “why couldn't you have been this brave before? Why couldn't you have told me in the beginning, when you first thought you were falling in love with him?”

“I thought that I would be able to handle it myself,” the girl said miserably.

“Yourself! Look what a mess you've made of things, handling them yourself!” Natalia felt tears coming and brushed them angrily aside. “Oh, God! If you felt you loved him that much, why didn't you just sleep with him and leave his life alone? Like that little English dancer? She had him, I suppose he liked her well enough—but she didn't break open his marriage. She had the courage to stay on the outside!”

“He didn't want me that way,” Galina responded dully, numbed by Natalia's vehemence.

“Don't be so sure. Pierre's a very sensual man, and I don't think he'd turn any woman away from his bed if she were attractive. No—admit it, Galina—
you
were the one who wanted marriage. And Pierre, like any middle-aged fool, felt absurdly flattered by how much you cared for him. He didn't consider his daughter, or—or me! Because Pierre
did
love me, Galina. And love like that doesn't evaporate in one day.”

“You had your chance to make him happy,” the young woman said, and now tears streamed over her cheeks. “Don't make me out the only bad one in this. You're the one who made Pierre sneak behind the scenes to be with Tamara. Is that fair to
her?”

They were both standing now, staring at each other, bathed in tears. Natalia shook her head, threw up her hands—and stepped toward Galina. The young woman began to sob, almost hysterically now, and Natalia pressed her arms around her, held Galina's head against her own neck, felt the other girl's tears. Then she pushed her lightly away. “God, God,” she whispered. “Get out of here, Galina. Get out and get married and live happily ever after. But get out
now
…please.”

When she heard the front door closing, Natalia fell across the sofa and smothered her face in the bright cushions so that Chaillou and the other servants would not hear the shattering expression of her grief.

Natalia was tired after the première
of The Blue Train.
Dolin had performed remarkably well: “Beau Gosse,” the libretto had called him, “the handsome kid.” Now all of Parisian society would nickname him this. And he had managed to tell her, somewhat shyly, that he had no desire to encroach on her new profession: “I shall always be a dancer,” he'd said. “I can't make ballets.”

Now Natalia sat alone in her dressing room, removing her makeup. She had danced the part of a tennis player in the production, and was still clothed in the short tunic outfit. There was a soft, discreet knock on the door, and rather irritably she said: “Yes, yes, come in!” She was seated at her makeup table removing the paint on her face and turned to look at her intruder. Her hand, holding a cotton wad, remained in midair. Pierre had slid into the small room, a strange figure whose black suit made the silver in his hair all the more startling. He was somewhat pale, holding a walking stick in both his hands and twirling it nervously.

“You came to the show?” she asked, amazement overcoming her other emotions. “But—why?”

“Out of habit, perhaps?” He seemed uncomfortable as he sat down, so she turned back to the vanity and applied cold cream to her cheeks. “You're the best ballerina alive today,” he added.

“Damn it, Pierre! Couldn't you have had the common decency not to show yourself? Everyone must have seen you come into this room!” Her brown eyes were blazing at him from the mirror. She was starting to tremble, and now she breathed once, twice to control herself. “Of course, our colleagues all think there's something romantic about your situation, don't they? I mean, here you've left one woman, whom they've all known for years, for that same woman's young and well-born niece, the niece also of their onetime co-director. It's made you quite the dashing figure of a modern Casanova, hasn't it?”

He shifted uncomfortably on the chair, but without taking his eyes from her. Then he shrugged. “I didn't want that,” he declared, a roughness in his throat. “It never had to come to that.”

She closed her hands together and turned slightly, raising her brows. “Oh? You mystify me.”

Color rose in his cheeks, and he stood up, clenching his fists to his thighs. “You made it all so easy!” he cried. “You never—you never fought, never fought for me, never asked me not to leave! It all seemed a confirmation of what I'd been thinking: that actually, I hadn't meant all that much to you, that you could let me go with such …such a lack of passion. And if she loved me and you didn't—”

The words hung in the moist, hot air between them. Then she said in a clear, crisp voice, applying a sterile wad of cotton to the tip of her nose: “You'd better go, Pierre. Galina tells me you're leaving tomorrow for Brussels. I suppose she's home packing and could use your help.”

“You're not going to say anything to me about my wedding?” he asked, hovering near the door.

Her resolve broke then, and she whispered: “What more can possibly be said between us at this point, Pierre? I'm the woman who didn't love you enough.”

Diaghilev's London agent, Wollheim, wrote in his letter: “My dear Natalia, my discussions with Sir Oswald Stoll concerning the liquidation of the Ballet's debt and the instigation of a new season this coming winter are stalling badly. For some reason with which I am not familiar, he has indicated that he would consider dealing with you. Can you come?”

She smiled. Boris would be amused, she thought: I am wanted as a diplomat in the affairs of Serge Pavlovitch. But Paris was beginning to drain her, and this would be a good way to clear the air between her and Diaghilev. If need be, she could make herself as indispensable to the Ballets Russes as her first husband had been. She could match wits with Diaghilev—or with Oswald Stoll.

In London she had lunch with Sir Oswald at the Savoy Grill. It was the first time she had seen him since her divorce, and she had dressed with casual elegance to demonstrate that she did not care what he might have learned about her rather sordid situation. She would appear free of stain, above it all. She wore a simple pleated skirt with a cowl-necked blouse and long gold chains: fashionably understated, and perfect for a British mind.

“Our last venture was a disaster,” Stoll said, carefully dissecting a piece of châteaubriand. “Seizing the properties hardly helped me at all, my dear Madame Oblonova. Why should I consider another season? Diaghilev is a madman. He distrusts the carpenters and the costume makers, and he pays none of them for fear of being cheated. And so, in the end, it is my reputation that suffers—as well as my bank account.”

“I understand. But Serge Pavlovitch can deliver a good product. I believe he's grown wiser these past few months. Still—he must be made to reimburse you. You can make him do so from the receipts of the new ballets. Another season with you would help considerably to reestablish the financial balance of the Ballets Russes.” She dabbed at her lower lip, took a swallow of wine, and said, smiling: “But Sir Oswald, I am not going to do business with you in secret this time. I shall not offer you money, which Diaghilev would discount at once if he knew of it. No. I shall act quite openly, and he will have to take notice. I shall offer you my house in Lausanne as collateral. If he fails to repay you for his previous debt, and if he cannot recuperate a new advance for this coming season—then by legal contract between you and me, you will seize my Swiss property. How does that suit you?”

“You are either extremely confident in Monsieur Diaghilev, or your devotion is beyond reason,” Stoll commented. He regarded Natalia with a level gaze. “But I cannot believe that you, Madame, ever lose sight of reason. Therefore let me tell you that your faith has convinced me.”

“My faith …and my house,” she added, raising her glass.

Then she thought, narrowing her eyes: Our lives are separate now for good, Pierre Riazhin—both in the professional and private sectors.

M
adame is practicing
in the rehearsal room,” Chaillou announced in a tone of slight disdain. Stuart Markham smiled beneath his mustache. It was evident that to Chaillou the American writer, whose suits were always one year out of fashion, was not on a par with Count Boris Kussov (whom Chaillou had known only by reputation) and that flamboyant painter of the
tout Paris,
Natalia's ex-husband, Pierre. To Chaillou their divorce had been tantamount to the Dreyfus Affair or the scandal caused in English circles by Alfred Douglas and Oscar Wilde: It was unspeakable and would never be lived down.

The rehearsal room, so elegantly named by Chaillou, was simply the converted master bedroom, which Natalia, with a dual objective in mind, had equipped with two
barres
and a floor that tilted upward like a ballet stage. She had needed a room in which to practice and choreograph, and now that Tamara's dance lessons had increased in length and frequency, this need had seemed more urgent. She had also felt compelled to cleanse herself of Pierre, to rid the house of any last reminders of his previous presence there. And so the rehearsal room had come into being. Stuart now went there, oblivious to Chaillou's shocked stare: Madame was practicing with Mademoiselle Tamara!

Through the open door Stuart saw Mademoiselle Pichenet at the piano, giving a less than inspired rendition of a Chopin nocturne. He stopped and watched. Tamara, black curls falling down her neck in childish disarray, was standing at the lower
barre,
her small body gracefully erect, the round buttocks firm, the waist already defined, her right arm extending out, the fingers relaxed. She was wearing a red leotard and red woolen leg warmers.

“All right now,
tendu,”
Natalia said. She stood in front of Tamara, and Stuart could see her face, its large, deep eyes gently on her daughter, her hair youthfully bobbed, her skin pale, almost anemic. There was something nakedly vulnerable about watching her when she was unaware, her brown leotard molded to her small, slender form like a second skin, more real than the first. The absurd black leg warmers made her appear bottom-heavy, a common pitfall of all dancers.

Natalia cocked her head to one side as Tamara pointed her right foot out, and Mademoiselle's music started up again. Then the mother held up her hand, and the piano stopped. “Look now,” Natalia said. “Your turnout isn't quite strong enough. Here”—and she went behind the child and took hold of her calf, repositioned it, and laid the small foot back on the hardwood planks. “All right?”

Tamara nodded, and Natalia motioned for the governess to resume her playing. But at that moment Stuart decided to break the atmosphere and entered the room. He saw the startled, then suddenly joyful look on Natalia's face, a quick flush in her cheekbones, and then the quiet grace of her steps to him, the small kiss on the cheek. “We didn't hear you,” she said, smiling. She always conveyed an unspoken aura of intimacy, of having let him into a private circle, that had lately made his stomach contract at odd times.

Tamara's face turned toward him, too, and he was once more confronted with the child's vivid beauty, so dark, so alive. He read initial gladness followed by uncertainty, and then she too came to him, almost shyly. “Hello, Mr. Markham,” she said. “Did you see me dance?”

“Yes, I did,” he replied, mingling his fingers in the curls on her head, while Natalia watched, stabbed suddenly by the poignant memory of her own oft-repeated gesture with Pierre's hair. “You're very serious, aren't you, Tam, about becoming a ballerina?” he asked.

The child's features broke into a wide, toothy grin. “Oh, yes,” she said. “When I'm ten, I'm going to try out for the
petits rats
at the Opéra. But Mother says I must be very good. It's almost as hard as when she went for her entrance exams at the Mariinsky!”

“That, Stu, is our favorite bedtime story,” Natalia said and laughed. “Now come along, Tamara. It's tea time.”

“Do I have to take it alone in my room with Mademoiselle?” Tamara asked, flashing her mother a look of sullen rebelliousness. “Can't I have it in the parlor with Mr. Markham?”

Natalia hesitated. “I don't want any white mustaches,” she remarked. “And you were messy at lunch. But it's all right,” she said, her voice catching. “Wash your hands and come.”

When Tamara had eagerly scampered out with her governess, Stuart took Natalia's face in his hands and examined it, raising his brows. She laughed, shaking herself free. It was always this way: tentative, questing, unsure, sparring. Now he took her by the shoulders and did not let go. Slowly the laughter, the playfulness died away. Her white face seemed to recede, to close off. Her eyes gave off an unreadable glow. He pulled her toward him and she did not resist, but neither did she respond. Finally he dropped his hands to his sides and shook his head. Taking his hand, she whispered: “Don't go away.”

“Not without my tea,” he retorted, squeezing the cold fingers. “And besides, Tam's expecting me. For some reason the little ruffian likes me.”

“Both of us do,” Natalia answered quietly. Her fingers twitched slightly in his hand, and then she extricated them and made a pretense of scratching her collarbone. She pushed open the door to the parlor and cried, suddenly very brightly: “My! This is wonderful. Look, Stu! Chaillou has made a new fire for us!”

“My, my, indeed. Miracles never cease in this household, do they?” he commented, his green-gold eyes twinkling, but though she colored somewhat, she did not acknowledge his remark. She concentrated with great seriousness on slicing a thick, marbled pound cake.

Tamara came in, dressed in a new, frilly outfit of lace and flounces, her black hair in ribbons. “Oh!” she exclaimed, throwing herself with a startling lack of grace stomach first on an ottoman. “My favorite! D'you like it too, Mr. Markham? Our cook makes it. It's chocolate and rum-flavored.”

“I'm starved, too,” Natalia said. “Be careful this time, won't you? Be a lady!”

She served her guest and her daughter, then sliced a thinner piece for herself. From beneath her eyelids she watched them, watched the warm colors of the room swirling around her. Tamara was saying to Stuart: “You know what's nice? When you promise to come, you always do. Some grown-ups promise lots of things that never happen. If I did that, Mother would punish me. But who punishes a grown-up?”

“Some people think there is a special being called God, and that He punishes us all. I don't really know, Tam. I suppose all unkind people are eventually punished by their own bad consciences. Something inside them doesn't let them forget.”

“My papa and my friend Galina are going to have a baby,” Tamara declared. She spooned some cake onto her fork with abrupt belligerence, and the crumbs flew off her plate. Natalia did not say a word, but her eyes remained on her daughter's face, watchful.

“Let's all go ice skating tomorrow,” Stuart suggested. “What do you say, ladies?”

“Mama and I aren't real ladies,” Tamara interposed. “We just pretend, don't we?” She had said “Mama,” not the more distant, adult “Mother,” which she most often used.

Natalia started to laugh. “Too bad for our gallant Harvard blue-blood,” she said. “He'll have to put up with us all the same.”

Natalia adjusted the netted veil over her small face and made certain that the little black velvet hat fit her perfectly. For this strange occasion she had carefully chosen a gray wool suit bordered with silver fox fur and ankle-strap high heels of black patent leather. She had told her driver to wait in a cafe and had walked up to the tall house on the narrow Rue de Lille, across the Seine on the Left Bank. It was a long, picturesque street filled with small arches, balconies with flowers, and old restaurants with antique signs jutting above them. These Left Bank streets made one think back to the lusty days of France, the days of Louis XIII and Richelieu, of wenching and duels, of pestilence and sweat and plots and counterplots, of peasants and illiteracy and the intrigues of the court. Natalia's heel caught on a cobble, and then she pressed a shining brass button and passed through a heavy black wooden carriage entrance into a small courtyard, somewhat dismal but well kept and also cobbled. In front of her was the house: the apartment was on the third and top floor. She now rang the doorbell.

A rather dour-faced maid, in bombazine and white lace, let her in. “Madame is expecting you, but she is resting. If Madame will follow me?” Natalia nodded, and looked around her. They were standing in a beamed, white hall, adorned with four large, antique mirrors. In the corner was a Chinese vase filled with dried wildflowers, arranged to greet the eye with a splash of color. Natalia walked behind the servant into a dark passageway, hung with blue and gold wallpaper, and into a large, airy salon, where she was left alone.

The salon had one enormous window, all of stained glass. Below it was a bench upholstered in green velvet, and to the left an alcove where a wide couch of lighter green stood flanked by tiny English Queen Anne tables. On each one lay a special knickknack: an antique music box, a cut-glass paperweight, and a miniature globe. Over the mantlepiece was another mirror and two vases from Thailand, adorned with coiling dragons. A bookcase was enclosed on either side behind glass panels. Natalia sat down on the sofa and tilted her head to examine the painting above it. Yes, of course, that was natural: the mermaid on her rock, overlooking the emerald sea, was perfect, her blue eyes mirroring joy, and peace, but also a certain fear and shyness, evidenced by the waves of golden hair that covered one round breast ever so gently, leaving only its twin exposed to the rays of the setting sun. How could he have failed?

She heard a rustling noise and looked up. Galina stood holding on to the door jamb, and something caught in Natalia's throat. The girl's eyes were on her, large and full of that old serenity, the age-old wisdom of the elderly and those who have borne witness. Beneath a new coiffure of upswept hair that coiled into a full chignon on top of her head, her face appeared less round, more linear. The willowy shape, in its simple tailored dress of royal blue, only hinted at new plumpness just below the bustline. Where we all first show, Natalia thought. Three months . . .

She rose suddenly and took two steps toward Galina. For a moment they stared at each other, each hesitating. Then, without looking at Galina's face, Natalia pressed her arms around her, held her—and quickly released her. “You're not doing so well?” she asked.

Galina uttered one short nervous giggle, then stopped it with a hand to her throat. She shook her head lightly. “It's nothing. It's worth it, Natalia. Just dizziness, nausea. I'll be fine next month, you'll see.”

“Have you informed your doctor about your mother? Her pelvis was very small. That's why she was told not to have other children after you were born.”

“It'll be all right, really. I'm not worried. I want this child, Natalia,” The blue eyes were gently reassuring, bright with serene joy. Natalia bit her lip and said nothing. “I want this child.” How he must have exulted, hearing these words! Another one of my mistakes, she added bitterly.

“That's wonderful, Galina,” she said. “You're very good with children. And Pierre will take care of you.” Her eyes blinked rapidly, like fluttering butterflies. “Galina,” she continued, “it's about a child that I've come today. You must have wondered why this sudden visit.”

“I was happy that you had at last decided to come. It didn't matter why. When I came to you last time, I had hoped ...” She let the sentence hover in midair.

Natalia shrugged. “Well. You must understand, Galina, that there's been no person in my life about whom I've felt so good and so bad at the same time. I loved you the way a woman can only love another woman. I trusted you. And then, of course, I hated you. Now …well, things are different. You can't expect the good to return to the way it was. I wish you all the best, but our lives don't touch anymore, except in a single area. And that's Tamara. That's why I came.”

Galina's face had set, a glaze had come over her eyes. Now her mouth worked, and she leaned forward. “What's wrong with Tamara?” she asked.

“Everything. She feels betrayed, Galina. You know how she always felt about her father: He was perfect, brilliant and perfect; and I was human, and negative, and strict. You were her older sister. When Pierre …left me, she wanted above all to go live with you, her two favorite loves. I was the mean one, the barrier. I suppose I'm much to blame, because I was never a mother by choice, and because I had my own life to deal with. But I did try. It's difficult to keep trying when a child resists you and prefers the other parent, the one who's hurt you beyond all hurts, torn up your self-esteem. Still, I tried, because I loved her and she was my child. And very slowly she's come around. She's disoriented and afraid and confused, but at least she no longer detests me. We dance together. She wants to become a
petit rat.
When we don't quarrel about the mess in her room, we even get along fairly well together. So you see, here we've been attempting to rebuild our lives, the two of us, but rather in vain: She feels that you and Pierre have abandoned her, that there's no room in your lives for her anymore, now that you're expecting a baby of your own.”

Natalia had been speaking fast, the words pouring out, for she had been afraid to pause, afraid that if she did, her courage would vanish, her resolve seem silly, and her presence here, in this apartment where he now lived and which they had turned together into a home, would make her ill. “Tamara misses her father,” she added. “I know I resented his visits when I first learned of them. But I never told him not to come! It was his idea to go behind my back, to hide his comings and goings from me. Still—I didn't think he would drop her, just like that!”