Heart of Iron (8 page)

“Not at all,” I protested.

He shuffled a few papers on his desk, and pulled out a single sheet. I recognized the page from my notebook; I think I blanched, because the gendarme gave me a humorless smile. “We have a report,” he said, “that one Wong Jun was arrested, while in company of two compatriots and a lady, reportedly of European appearance. With your letter, I am forced to conclude you were that lady — a lady who resisted arrest, interfered with the performance of police duties, and escaped lawful custody.”

“Wong Jun is a classmate of mine,” I protested. “And I am not blind — I know how many Chinese students have disappeared.”

“And yet, you’ve inquired only after the one in our custody.” The man seemed to enjoy the effect of his words. “Not anyone else. You know why you are dealing with this special branch of the police and not others, correct?”

“Military crimes,” I said, sullen. “Which I did not commit.”

“And yet, you’ve consorted with spies.”

“They are not spies,” I said, starting to lose patience. “You have no proof that any of them is involved in anything untoward, just as you have no proof that I was in any way connected with illegal activities.”

“Do you have proof that you weren’t?” he asked. “Where were you on Saturday September twenty-fourth?”

I sought feverishly for an answer — Olga? Anastasia? Both would swear they were with me the entire day; unfortunately, there were likely others who saw the two of them return to the dormitories without me.

Jack spoke. “The lady was with me,” he said. “After she separated from her maid and a friend, she went for a walk with me. Not entirely proper, perhaps, but quite legal.”

The officer’s eyes lit with understanding and a sly smile curled the corners of his mouth under his mouth under his mustache. “I see,” he said.

I nodded, speechless. I wasn’t sure whether to feel grateful Jack would lie for me, suspicious because he was probably more eager to conceal his role in the event than mine, or furious because he never told me that he represented the interests of the British crown in addition to being a student. It did explain his taciturn demeanor when he was asked about his homeland though. I finally settled on seething resentment, softened a little by regret.

I declined Jack Bartram’s offer of walking me home, and asked for someone to be sent to fetch Anastasia. She arrived soon after the paperwork was finished and I was let go with no greater punishment than admonition to be careful about writing letters to the emperor’s brother, and about who I chose as friends. I had decided to take the latter to heart, and frowned all the way home. Anastasia prattled about how worried she had been ever since Larisa and Olga told her about my sudden detainment, and how she was “this close” to sending a messenger to Trubetskoye.

I brooded all the way home and long after Anastasia made tea and supper and retired to bed. I thought it silly to be angry with Jack — if he was indeed in St. Petersburg to somehow work with Prince Nicholas and help him spy on the Chinese, then his help with Lee Bo’s and Chiang Tse’s escape made no sense. Nor did it make sense for him to help me, to lie for me in direct violation of what the policeman claimed was his mission. On the other hand, if the gendarme was deceived, then Jack was carrying forged papers, and his interests diverged quite greatly from those of both empires.
That
sounded even more dangerous than having Chinese friends and resisting arrest.

I finally slept, only because my philosophy exam was the next day and I had already lost an entire afternoon of studying; I did not need to add a sleepless night to the list of my disadvantages.

The next morning, Olga burst into my room to inform me of the events following my extraction from the examination room. It was a pandemonium, she said. There had been laughter and speculation, and Professor Ipatiev said rather loudly to the professor who had been examining me — his name turned out to be Parshin — that since I had not finished my exam, I should be required to retake it.

I gasped at this point in the story, since I could think of nothing worse than being re-examined by Ipatiev who would surely not let me pass. It was just unfair, I thought — of course the professors knew more than the students, of course Ipatiev could fail me quite easily.

Olga, however, wagged her finger in my direction, and continued. “Only as soon as he said it, Professor Parshin jumped up and said that yours was one of the best examinations he had ever had an honor of witnessing — I swear, he did say ‘honor.’ And then he took your examination booklet and wrote ‘Excellent’ in it, so Ipatiev and everyone else could see. I offered to take it to you.” Olga extracted my booklet from her muff and handed it to me, smiling. “I didn’t think Ipatiev could be taken aback, but there he was. Here, don’t leave that behind again.”

“Not unless they decide to drag me to jail or something,” I muttered as I stared on the first page of the booklet, my first grade. Professor Parshin had beautiful penmanship.

Olga’s voice intruded. “What was that about then?” she asked. “I don’t even know what happened to you at the club… and afterwards. And who is that Englishman who follows you around.”

I did not want to place blame, but saw no way around it. “I thought you did not want to know.”

Olga’s gaze met mine. “Surely you can understand my position. My father is a nobody, our family cannot shrug off political scandals.”

“Neither can mine,” I said. After I gave it some thought, I touched Olga’s hand. “But I see your point, and it would be more dangerous to you.”

Olga beamed. “Now that they let you go, everything is well again, right? Well, come on! We have to be on campus in an hour or so, and you can tell me of your exploits on the way.”

I let her drag me cheerfully along, but my thoughts remained troubled. For one, I did not share Olga’s happy certainty that everything was well again, or even if such a possibility existed. My idea of things going well was not compatible with disappearances of my friends, or with being arrested and questioned for inquiring about their whereabouts.

It was unseasonably warm that day, and we still had time, so we decided to sit down on a park bench — not far from the Palace Bridge, with the view of the river, yellow and red with floating leaves, and Nevsky Prospect and the Palace Square on the other side. St. Isaac’s dome blazed like fire, and Alexander’s Column shone in the sun. It was easy to imagine it as molten gold touched by sunbeams reaching down from heaven. I looked toward Gorokhovaya, and even though I could not see it, I imagined the five-storied building with police and seemingly innocuous clerks and functionaries inside. Really, a city this beautiful had no right to have such a loathsome, shriveled heart. I tasted the bitterness in the air, the metallic under taste of the approaching rain, and felt pensive.

“Well?” Olga said. “Who is he?”

It made no sense to make as if I did not know of whom she spoke. I told her about Jack. I told her about the night at the Crane Club and the horrible Nikolashki, of Wong Jun’s arrest. I downplayed the drama of Jack’s appearance and mentioned only that he helped me escape, never explaining his propensity to fall out of the sky and commit violence against the secret police, who then for some reason treated him as if he were royalty. Really, even without the exams my mind was filled to bursting, and I thought it would be best to not further contemplate these things for a while, not if I hoped to avoid crying in a public place.

“He seems nice,” Olga said. “He does follow you all the time — I think he fancies you. Dasha and Larisa, they both were saying there are a lot of Englishmen in St. Petersburg this year.”

“Indeed,” I whispered. My thoughts tumbled, directionless, unable to reconcile the contradictory elements. The British had just made truce with the Chinese, and the emperor thought the Chinese were spies. And His Imperial Highness was greatly infatuated with all things British, and Jack was greatly infatuated…

“Sasha!” Olga gave me a troubled look. “Are you all right, Sasha? You are… drifting. Are you all right?”

“No,” I said. “I’m not exactly all right. I just feel there is something happening all around us, as if there are heavy stones waiting for us… imagine what a grain of wheat feels like — it sits there, listens to some distant rumbling, and before it knows it, it is ground into flour by some millstones it never knew existed.”

Olga’s eyes had grown as large as those on Byzantine icons. “Such strange things you say,” she whispered, clearly concerned.

I managed a smile and got to my feet. “I’m not trying to frighten you, Olga. I’m warning you — to not be ground up.”

The sky above us changed color — from cornflower blue, it silvered like the side of a fish, and slowly darkened into leaden. We hurried toward the university buildings, looking apprehensively at the sky swelling with imminent rain. “Nothing will be well again,” I whispered to myself; I wasn’t sure if Olga heard.

The rest of the exam week was uneventful. All the girls, undoubtedly spurred by the same sense of necessity as myself, passed. I did better than I expected but not as well as Eugenia would’ve liked — human biology was the only class in which I rated “excellent”; most of the rest were “good,” with “satisfactory” in philosophy. Jack Bartram teased me about it, but gently.

I decided not to go home for the break. It was only a week long, and my fervor to see my aunt and mother had abated due to a part of me — a brand new part that had not existed until recently — that felt the time would be best spent getting to know Jack Bartram and figuring out exactly what his position was, as well as why the British crown was interested in Chinese students in St. Petersburg. Luckily, Jack, deprived of our daily walks from the university to the dormitory, showed keen interest in standing outside my domicile in plain view from my windows. On the first day of break, I slept late, greatly aided by an interminable drizzle. When I eventually looked out the window, I saw all of Vasilyevsky Island was weeping — the buildings and the trees dripped water the same ashen color as the sky. There was a man standing outside, and even though his collar was raised, I recognized Jack Bartram by his gaunt physique and soft-brimmed hat. He huddled under his black umbrella and smoked a long thin cigar, thick clouds of smoke drifting and twining with the fog.

“Your suitor’s here, miss,” Anastasia informed me helpfully as she peered over my shoulder.

“He’s not my suitor,” I said. “At least I don’t think he is… ”

“He sure ain’t here to enjoy the weather,” Anastasia pointed out. “Maybe you should invite him in then — he seems to get wetter and sadder by the minute.”

Natalia Sergeevna was in a kind mood that morning, and allowed a visitor, so Anastasia ran outside to extend the invitation while I put the kettle on. When Anastasia returned, she was disappointingly alone.

“He’s too shy,” she explained. “He just asked me to give you this.”

I unfolded the piece of paper Anastasia handed me. It was an invitation to a concert of chamber music to be held in a club called Northern Star. I could not help but think of the Crane Club, and miss Chiang Tse acutely. Chamber music seemed a pleasant enough way to spend the evening, but no one could argue that at the same time it was quite unadventurous and dull.

I sighed and rolled my eyes at Anastasia. “Prepare an evening dress,” I said. “I’m going out tomorrow night.”

The Northern Star Club was surreptitiously tucked away among the tenement buildings not too far from Moyka and the Yusupovs’ palace — that reminded me painfully of my first season. It was hard to believe it had been less than a year since my debut. I certainly felt more adult and more sympathetic to my aunt after just a couple of months on my own. I could now understand the deep irritation those who ran this city caused her.

Jack had collected me by the dormitories — he still refused to come inside, and waited stubbornly by the main entrance as I made sure that my dress had not developed any rips or stains while I was not watching. Jack had the good sense to hire a coach, and as soon as my crinoline and I settled inside the carriage, I began asking him questions. And I had quite a few of them.

“Why did that gendarme listen to you?” I asked, not bothering to waste time on how-do-you-dos and other polite nonsense.

“He told you,” Jack said. “I have diplomatic papers.”

“Even though you claim to be a student.”

“I claim to be both.” He smiled. “Is that not allowed?”

“And since when do the English have jurisdiction over the police, which are, if I recall correctly, a part of Russian Internal Affairs?”

Jack swallowed and looked out of the carriage window, no doubt longing to be outside or at the very least away from me — even though just an hour before he wanted nothing better but my company. “Collaboration in the cases of Chinese espionage,” he finally said. “You understand.”

I shook my head vehemently enough to displace my bonnet. “I most certainly do not. If you indeed think they are spies, why did you let them go?”

“But you… ”

“It was not about me,” I interrupted, with Eugenia’s stern tone cutting into my voice. “You did not know who I was… ” A sudden thought struck me and I peered into his face, undeterred by darkness and flopping brim of his hat. “Or did you?”

“I did,” he said. “But that is not why I was there.”

“You were there to help with the arrests?”

He shook his head. “My… my own business, I swear to you. And I just happened by and could not bear to see your distress.”

He seemed sincerely anguished, and I decided to scale back my interrogation. There’s only so far you can push a horse before it collapses, Eugenia used to say. I suspected the maxim applied to bipeds as well as the equine species. We traveled the rest of the way in silence, me smiling as beatifically as I could manage, and Jack hiding under his hat, his nervous fingers worrying an unlit cigar.