Russka (106 page)

Quietly he puffed on his pipe. After all, why not?

Alexis would be back in a few days. If he hadn’t changed his mind, he would make his proposal then.

Young Karpenko looked at Sergei with a puzzled frown: something strange was happening to his friend.

There was something about him, some profound inner tension and excitement whose causes Karpenko could not fathom. He knew that behind the façade – behind the Sergei who played idiotic practical jokes, behind even the moralist who so furiously protested about the State of Russia – there was a still, poetic soul. This was the Sergei he loved. And, he could sense, it was this inner man who, for whatever mysterious reason, had been raised to a pitch of secret nervous exaltation. Why, he had no idea.

And now, this strange request. What could his friend be up to? Why was he so insistent?

‘I’ll do what I can,’ the Cossack said, ‘though I’m not sure it will work.’ He gave Sergei a puzzled look. ‘It’s just that I don’t understand …’

Sergei sighed. How could anyone understand? ‘Don’t worry,’ he reassured his friend. ‘It’s very easy. Just do as I say, that’s all.’ He hardly understood it himself. But he knew one thing, more certainly than anything in his life. ‘It must happen,’ he muttered. ‘It must.’ He had planned it all so carefully.

It was June 24, the Feast of St John. The last week, since his quarrel and the departure of Alexis, had not been easy. Everyone had been keeping to themselves and he had felt rather an outcast. Ilya stayed with his books; Pinegin frequently went out hunting alone; his mother would scarcely speak to him; even little Misha seemed to be shy of him. And Olga, after three days, had told him sadly: ‘I tried so hard to keep the peace, Seriozha. And you spoilt it. You have hurt me.’

But the coming feast had lightened the atmosphere. People had begun to look more cheerful. And when, two days before, Sergei had made his suggestion, it had been quite warmly greeted. ‘I always promised to take you there,’ Olga had said to Pinegin. And
Tatiana announced: ‘Ilya and I will come too. I haven’t been to that place in years.’

And so it was agreed that, after the celebrations that day, they would all make an expedition to visit the old sacred springs. We’ll take the two Arinas as well,’ Sergei suggested. ‘Then old Arina can tell us fairy tales.’ It was a charming thought, for a delightful setting, and appropriate to the day. For it was the custom, upon St John’s Night, for people to go into the forest.

The feast of St John the Bather, as the Russians liked to call the Baptist, was a strange and magical day. Everyone dressed up, and in late morning the two Arinas appeared before the company in all their finery. How lovely, Sergei thought, and how stately was the traditional dress of the Russian peasant woman. Today, both the old nanny and her niece, instead of the usual simple skirt and shirt, wore embroidered blouses with billowing sleeves. Over these, and reaching to the ground, was a long sleeveless gown – the famous
sarafan
– coloured red and embroidered, as was the style in that village, with geometric birds of oriental design. And crowning this splendid ensemble was the high, tiara-like head-dress – the
kokoshnik
– a diadem embroidered with gold and silver threads, and river pearls. The only difference in their dress was that young Arina, as a still unmarried girl, wore her hair in a single, long plait, tied with ribbons, down her back. In such a dress, it was impossible not to walk in a stately fashion. As well they should, since, like every Russian peasant woman, they were arrayed – though they did not know it – like the ladies of the great, half-oriental, Roman court of Constantinople, a thousand years before.

At midday, they all went down the hill, to watch the celebrations. It was a curious feast, this day of John the Bather – half-Christian, half-ancient pagan Slav – and it was hard to say where one began and the other ended. Upon this day, at the village of Bobrovo, the villagers made little dolls of Yarillo the old fertility god and his female counterpart, whom they called Kupala; and having paraded them round the village, they drowned them in the river, in a ceremony that was half-baptism and half-ritual killing, and which in either case signalled an ancient rebirth.

Then, under the warm sun, they walked back to the house where a charming meal was laid out: meat
pirozhki
, cold
shchi –
the summer version of cabbage soup; trout, turkey and
binis
.
There were cherry, apple and raspberry pies, accompanied by mountains of sour cream. To drink there was
kvas
, wine, and half a dozen different flavoured vodkas.

The mellow atmosphere was made softer yet when a little later the village women, all in their wonderful dresses, arrived in front of the house and, standing in a circle, sang those most lovely of all the Russian folk melodies, the ancient
Kupala
songs.

It was perfect, Sergei thought. Everything was just right. And as the afternoon’s lengthening shadows stole across the threshold of evening, he waited.

Misha and the two babies had been put to bed, and the reddening sun was glowing softly over the forest when they all set out to visit the springs.

Tatiana and Ilya went in a little cart, with one of the serfs driving. Everyone else walked. They took the lane that led through the woods past the old burial mounds, and came out by the monastery. Then they crossed the river under the town. And soon afterwards Tatiana and Ilya had to abandon the cart, to walk along the little path that wound along near the water’s edge towards the site of the springs.

How quiet it was. Only the faint sound of lapping water disturbed the darkness. High in the starlit summer sky, the three-quarter moon rode to the south.

They were walking now by twos: Olga and Pinegin in front; then Karpenko and young Arina; then Sergei and old Arina; and slowly bringing up the rear, Ilya and Tatiana.

The air was warm; there was almost no breeze. Once or twice Sergei smelled the delicate scent of wild strawberries, hidden in the darkness. Once, in a glade, they saw by the moonlight a bank of the blue and yellow flowers the Russians call John and Mary flowers.

The moon gave light enough to show the wanderers their path; and Sergei watched them all. He saw the way Pinegin, still in white, walked beside Olga: never too far, never too near. He watched Olga’s easy, swinging gait. He saw Karpenko surreptitiously slip his arm round young Arina. He saw Ilya stumble on a root that his mother had entirely avoided. Each of them had their thoughts that night, he supposed: each their secret hopes. But none, surely, like his.

Sergei had never felt this way before: unless, perhaps, it had always been so, and he had never known it.

In childhood, she had always been his friend, his confidante – his soul mate. How he had loved her pale and lively face, her long brown hair, her light and gentle laugh. She seemed a part of him, and he of her: they knew each other’s thoughts, always, without speaking. But then, as was to be expected, they had been parted.

Life had been hard on Sergei. His literary career was slow; money was short. He was often rather lonely. Yet she is there, he always told himself; and his jaunty letters only bore half the tale.

Night after night, he would sit down to write. His verse came slowly, often he gave up. His hopes for fame seemed dismally far away.

He invented a method, though, when he composed. Olga became his audience: in his mind’s eye, her image was always, hauntingly, before him. If what he wrote was moving, he had moved her; if gay, it meant that he had made her laugh. And once or twice he saw he made her cry. And so, unknown to Olga, through these years, she was Sergei’s companion in his thoughts. And often alone in his lodgings he would cry: ‘My Olga, you – at least you – will understand.’

Would it, he had wondered, be a disappointment, living in the family house with her again? Married, then widowed, with children – he imagined she would have changed. Nothing had prepared him, therefore, for what took place in June.

His discovery was made the first day. It was so overwhelming, so absolute, that at times it made him tremble; and at times he wanted to laugh. It cleaved the whole sky, like a silent flash of lightning. It was so natural, so inevitable: surely it was fated, predestined, fashioned by the gods from the beginning of time, enduring, who knew, even to the end. She filled his thoughts. His entire existence seemed to take place under her blue eyes’ gentle gaze. Everything was for her. The translations of Shakespeare she loved had been written, every word, for her alone. And everything else that he did – the practical jokes, the foolish quarrel with Alexis – was only an insane game, played to distract them both, by a man who must wear a mask because his true love was forbidden.

Never before, he now understood, had he known passion. And now he could go on no more. Tonight, he had vowed. It must be resolved tonight.

The springs had not changed in centuries. They still burst out of the high bank in these silvery cascades that drained away to the river. It was fully dark. The stars were out. The small, moonlit glade in front of them made a perfect resting place and, charmed by the spot, the company sat on the grass, while the little waterfalls made a low, splashing sound a few yards away. Then Sergei turned to the old woman: ‘Come now, Arina, my duck,’ he gently said. ‘Tell all your children a story.’

And so, in a quiet but musical tone, old Arina began to speak. She told them about the sacred springs and the spirits which inhabited them. She told them about the magic ferns and flowers in the forest. She told them about the souls of lovelorn girls – the
rusalki
– who lived in the river; she recounted the story of the firebird, Ilya of Murom, and several others. And all of them were entranced, grateful to be sharing this most magical night of the Russian year.

Only when she had done, and everyone was sitting, contented, yet half-hoping for something more, did the little Cossack say: ‘Recite us some of your poems, Sergei. He’s written some wonderful ones recently,’ he added. And when Sergei made a show of reluctance Olga softly chimed in, in a tone that showed she had forgiven him: ‘Yes, Seriozha. Let us hear.’

He had prepared himself so carefully. The mood of the company was just as he had hoped as quietly he began. The first poem was an old folk tale about Baba Yaga the witch, which made them laugh. The second was a poem to autumn. But the third was a love poem.

It was not very long – just five short stanzas. But he knew it was the best thing he had ever written. It spoke of the poet meeting a loved friend after a long absence and finding his love had turned to passion.

I shall remember till my ending
How I first saw my love, my light;
Just as the darkness was descending;
A fleeting angel in the night.

He told how, in the years of his own unhappy life, when they were parted, it was her memory that sustained him:

Your spirit calmed me, waking: sleeping
I saw your face across the night

And that now, meeting his angel once more, she had awakened a passion; he was born again; and in his heart:

Divinity and inspiration,
And life, and tears, and love.

No one was looking at Olga. They did not realize. When Tatiana, after a pause, asked him who this lady was, he answered: ‘A woman I knew in St Petersburg.’ Everyone was quiet. Then he heard Ilya murmur: ‘Beautiful, my dear Seriozha. Exquisite. What a heart you have.’

And still, dear God, no one thought to look at Olga.

She was sitting a little back from Tatiana. She had only to move her face two inches to place it in shadow, and now she had done so, and bowed her head. But he had seen – even in the moonlight – he had seen her blush, then seen the tears upon her cheeks. Dear God, she knew. At last she understood.

They sat for several moments then Sergei suggested: ‘The night is young. Why don’t we walk to the
skit
where the monks live!’ The little hermitage lay at the end of the path. Karpenko at once endorsed the idea; Pinegin seemed agreeable. But Ilya and the two older women were disinclined. ‘We’ll go back to the cart and go home,’ Tatiana declared. ‘Let the young people go on.’ And so the party divided.

Those who continued were led by Sergei along the path. He had young Arina and Pinegin close beside him. Olga, seemingly lost in thought, walked just behind with Karpenko. Sergei moved along briskly, telling Pinegin something of the history of the little hermitage as they went. And so intent on this was he that, it seemed, he was taken by surprise to find after a few turns of the path that the Cossack and Olga had fallen behind so far they were out of sight.

‘Walk on,’ he said to Pinegin. ‘I’ll go and hurry them up.’ And a few minutes later the little Cossack came up to Pinegin, looking back over his shoulder as if the others were just round the corner, and remarked: ‘Olga’s talking to her brother. They’ll catch us up. This way.’ And he led them forward.

It was a couple of hundred yards further that the track forked. ‘Sergei said it’s this one,’ the Cossack said firmly. And they had walked on more than half a mile before the track petered out and Karpenko said: ‘Devil take it! I must have made a mistake.’

They stood together, Sergei and his sister. They had moved just off the path to the river bank, where they could watch the reflection of the moon and stars on the water. How pale she looked, in her long white summer dress. For a time they were silent.

‘The poem was for me?’

‘Of course.’

She gazed at the water. ‘I … had no idea.’ She stopped, then seemed to smile. ‘Dear Seriozha. It was very beautiful.’ She paused. ‘But the words … were not for a sister.’

‘No.’

She sighed. She shook her head, gently. ‘Seriozha … your poem spoke of love of the kind …’

‘Of passion.’

She took his hand and looked up at him for a moment, then down again at the water.

‘I am your sister.’

For a moment he did not speak. Then he said simply, ‘I dare say we shall never in our lives speak of this again. But, so that I may know, when I die – could you love me as I love you?’

She paused so long he thought the moon had moved upon the water. Then she shrugged. ‘What if I could?’ And then: ‘I love you as a brother.’ She squeezed his hand gently and turned her face up to his. ‘What is it you want, Seriozha, my poet of a brother? What is it you want?’