The Lost Souls of Angelkov (63 page)

G
risha looks down at the body of the brother he had abandoned on the road outside Chita.

He remembers his one day in Irkutsk, and how he wouldn’t stay any longer in case he actually did spot Kolya. How he got drunk and took his first woman. How all he wanted was to start his life with no responsibilities, no ties to a little boy who would only hold him back.

How easy it had been for him to betray that boy. He had betrayed him once, and now he is responsible for his death.

“Lilya,” Lyosha breathes, finally getting to his feet. “Lilya, what have you done?” He lifts the rifle.

Lilya is staring at the body.

“Lilya?” Lyosha says again. She’s still crossing herself and whispering prayers. She clasps her hands, raising them in front of her. Lyosha wants to shout at her, strike her, but it’s all too frightening, too confusing. It is so quiet in
Grisha’s house now, with Grisha holding the dead musician, looking at him in such a stricken way. “What happened? Why did you do this?” She doesn’t answer. Lyosha looks at Grisha again. “Why has Lilya done this terrible thing?”

“I must go to church. I must ask for forgiveness.” Lilya speaks aloud for the first time. “I … I didn’t mean … I don’t know what I was doing. I didn’t even think it was loaded. How would I know? Why would you leave it loaded, Lyosha? I didn’t mean to kill him. I wanted only to drive him away. To make him understand he could never come back to her. I must beg forgiveness. Will God forgive me, Lyosha?” She is crying now.

Grisha gently lays Valentin down. “Lyosha, take Lilya to the servants’ quarters. Then come back and help me.”

Lyosha is so pale. “Help you? But what about Lilya? Will she go to prison? I shouldn’t have left the cartridge in the rifle. I never do that. I … I was tired. I got back and …”

“I’m not going to prison.” Lilya’s voice is unexpectedly loud, firm. She turns her head from Valentin’s body, glaring at Grisha. “Bad things happen, but it’s not always because one is bad.”

Grisha stares at her.

“I only meant to frighten him away so that he’d never come back. But … but now …” Lilya’s voice loses its strength, and she weeps. Almost immediately she gathers herself again. “Don’t tell me you aren’t glad,” she says to Grisha. “I saved you the trouble, didn’t I?”

Grisha wishes Lilya would be quiet. He’s trying to stay calm, to think logically, but he can’t. He wants to be alone with his dead brother.

“We’ll bury him in the woods,” Lilya continues. “Because how will we explain a man with a bullet in his chest? No one will miss him. He’s been dismissed by the Bakanevs, his career ruined. It would make sense that he moved on to another province, where no one would know of his disgrace.” Her words are stumbling, spittle flying from her lips. “And you can’t tell what I’ve done, Grisha. If you do, I’ll tell Antonina
you
killed him. Do you think she would suspect me? Do you think she doesn’t know how you felt about him? That you hated him as much as I did?” She finally looks back at the body. “I’ll tell her you did it,” she says again.

“Lilya,” Lyosha says. “Lilya, stop.”

She ignores him. “Besides, if I’m arrested for his murder, you won’t find Soso.”

At that, Grisha steps up to her and puts his hands around her throat in one quick movement. He just wants her to stop her incessant chattering.

Lyosha grips the rifle. “Grisha, what are you doing?”

Grisha’s hands are loose, loose enough for Lilya to speak. “Kill me then,” she says. “Kill me and you won’t find the boy. Kill me and you kill Mikhail Konstantinovich.”

Grisha holds his hands up, away from her throat, and steps back.

“My God. My God,” Lyosha repeats. “Tell me what you’re talking about, sister. What in the name of God is going on?”

Grisha puts his hand to his temple. “Take her out of here.”

Something in Grisha’s voice frightens Lyosha more than if he’d shouted.

“Don’t let her go to the countess,” Grisha says, and Lyosha takes Lilya’s arm. “And come back later to help me.”

That night, Lyosha and Grisha dig a grave in the cemetery behind the Church of the Redeemer. Grisha has chosen a spot hidden by a thick stand of fir, where the newly turned earth won’t likely be noticed. The ground is hard, although not yet frozen.

“Why did she do it, Grisha?” Lyosha asks, heaving clumps of hard soil out of the way. The area is lit by two lamps sitting on the ground. He glances at the wrapped shroud in the back of the cart. “And why are we burying him? Shouldn’t we tell someone? At least Father Cyril.”

Grisha stops digging. The harsh light from the lamps makes the bones of his face stand out. His mouth is grim. “Do you want your sister imprisoned, Lyosha? Sent to one of the women’s camps in Siberia, to die after years of hard labour?”

“No. But it’s wrong. It’s wrong in the eyes of God. We have to tell the authorities in Pskov. It was an accident. You see that. Lilya didn’t mean to do it.” He glances at the body again. “I’ll say I did it. I was hunting, and shot him by mistake. I’ll say I did it, Grisha. It’s my fault for leaving the rifle loaded. I’ll take the blame.”

Grisha looks at the young man, seeing what he is willing to do out of love for his sister. He has never known this kind of devotion. He didn’t have it for his brother; he betrayed him for his own gain. As he betrayed Mikhail—and ultimately Antonina—for his own gain. Lyosha is a far better man than he will ever be.

“Wouldn’t you do the same?” Lyosha asks, and Grisha turns away. He goes to the cart and lifts Valentin’s body, carefully. With only a slight effort, he places him, gently,
onto the cold ground beside the grave. He unwraps the shroud and kneels over Valentin, kissing his forehead and then making the sign of the cross on it.

As he gazes down at the man’s face, he has a flash of understanding. His father wanted to give his younger son a chance at life that he never would have had if he remained in Chita. If he could have seen Kolya—Valentin—as a handsome and self-possessed young man, a powerful musician who brought joy to so many, he would have been proud. “I forgive you, Papa,” Grisha says, crossing himself. “You were right,” he adds in a whisper.

If he could only forgive himself; if only he had done something to make his father proud.

Grisha rearranges the shroud and, with Lyosha’s help, lowers the body into the hole. He picks up a handful of dark soil and slowly crumbles it over Valentin’s body, praying for him. Lyosha joins him, and then the two men begin shovelling.

There is snow through the night, and by morning the new grave is no more than another piece of lumpy ground in the neglected cemetery.

Just before dawn, while Grisha and Lyosha, alone and sleepless, wait for the night to pass, and Angelkov is still quiet, Lilya goes to Antonina’s bedroom. She builds a fire and then awakens Antonina. She sits on her bed, holding Antonina’s hand, and calmly talks to her.

“Yesterday, Tosya,” she tells her, “Kropotkin died. He was killed by bandits on the road close to here. He must have been coming to see you. He was shot and robbed and left dead by the side of the road. The village is talking about it. He was
taken back to Pskov and his body will be buried somewhere there. I found out in the evening, yesterday, but didn’t want to tell you just then. I thought it best if you slept first.”

Antonina pulls her hand from Lilya’s. “What are you saying, Lilya? Surely you’re wrong. Surely—”

“No. He’s dead. It happened yesterday, at dusk. He was trying to come to you again, as he did the other night. The musician is dead because he loved you, Tosya.”

Antonina’s face is the colour of putty. She remembers the distant shot she heard, thinking it was Lyosha still hunting. She is trembling. “A drink, Lilya. I need a drink.”

Lilya goes to the wardrobe and pulls out the bottle of vodka. She pours Antonina half a tumbler. “Here you go,
moya dorogaya
, my darling. Yes, you need something to help you. I understand what a shocking, unbelievable thing this is. But you know how violent some of the peasants are now. You, of all people, know what they’re capable of. I wouldn’t be surprised if Grisha had something to do with it.”

Antonina stares at her, the vodka in her mouth. She has trouble swallowing. “What are you talking about?”

“You’ve never seen Grisha’s temper, but I have,” Lilya says.

“Why would Grisha harm Valentin?”

Lilya sits on the bed again, smoothing Antonina’s hair. “Out of jealousy, simple jealousy, Tosya.” Her voice is low, soothing. “We all understand what it can do to a person.”

“Jealousy,” Antonina murmurs. She thinks of how she had spoken to Grisha about Valentin in his house the day before. How odd—almost ill—he’d looked. She puts the glass on the bedside table. She’d rambled on and on. Does Grisha really feel so much for her? Did she do this, then? Make Grisha angry enough to …

She covers her face with her hands. Lilya is right. It’s her fault this happened to Valentin.
I don’t know why he was coming back to me … we’d said goodbye. But it doesn’t matter. He was coming to me
.

“Oh, merciful God,” she says.
I’m responsible for Valentin’s death
. “Go away, Lilya,” she says, but Lilya stays beside her, then puts her arms around her.

“No. You need me with you, Tosya. You need me.” She covers Antonina’s cheek with kisses. “I will stay with you and comfort you.”

Antonina surrenders momentarily to Lilya’s embraces. But there’s something ghoulish on Lilya’s face, something that Antonina finds appalling. It’s as if the other woman is excited by this. Abruptly, Antonina pulls away. “I told you I want to be alone. Go away.” Her voice is firm.

Lilya stands. “I’ll bring you up some breakfast. We can eat together.”

Antonina rises, her hands clenched. “Lilya, do you not understand me?” she shouts. “Leave me alone.”

“I understand. You don’t want your breakfast—it’s the shock,” Lilya says. “You’ll be ready to eat later.”

When Lilya leaves, Antonina falls to her knees in her prayer corner. She knows. It’s her. She’s the poison at Angelkov. Everything has happened because of her.

I am immoral and evil. I loved my son more than life itself, and he was taken from me because my husband didn’t wish our child to be around me as I was. I am responsible for the death of my husband, because the night he fell ill, I was in bed with Grisha. Valentin died because I befriended him. And Grisha …
If what Lilya suggests really happened, then he will die at the hands of the authorities for his act of murder, and I will also be to blame for his death
.

Antonina presses her forehead onto her clasped hands. “My God, You have seen my wickedness. I bring destruction to all those who come near me. This is the reason You keep my son from me. This is my punishment.”

Her mouth is dry. She stumbles across the room, grabbing the bottle of vodka and drinking from it. Then she hurls it into the fire. It smashes, the flames roaring up in bright, consuming colour.

She is breathing heavily. She needs to keep praying for penance, and she needs to stop the evilness that is in her. The longer she stays at Angelkov, the more destruction she will bring.