The Summer Day is Done (16 page)

She came in then. Unlike the others she did not look heated from the excursion, she was cool and fresh, as if she had washed her face and brushed her hair. And changed her dress.

‘Highness—’

‘It isn’t necessary to call me that,’ she said, clicking open the locks of a case, ‘it’s only in public that I’m supposed to be grand.’

‘Olga Nicolaievna, you’re very grand in the very best way, but Karita will be back to attend to this.’

‘Mr Kirby, I’m not incapable, you know.’
She was still a little unsure of herself, her shyness obvious. And she knew it was obvious and that made it worse. To overcome her self-consciousness she took out a white shirt and held it up against her front, saying lightly, ‘See, this is what you wear when you’re playing tennis with Papa, isn’t it?’

‘And when I fall about,’ he smiled.

She shot him a quick glance. He was just the same, so relaxed. He was always able to say something that eased her out of her restraint. She suddenly found confidence in herself.

‘Mr Kirby, oh, I’m so happy you could come. We all are. It will be such fun again.’

Her smile was impulsive, full of the winning charm of her father’s. She was lovelier, more endearing than ever.

He hid an intensely emotional reaction by saying, ‘Karita won’t think so when she sees the state of these things.’ He indicated the contents of the newly opened case. The clothes were tumbled and creased.

‘Oh, that’s nothing,’ said Olga, ‘it’s only important that you’ve come all this way to see us again. Papa will be delighted.’

Karita returned. She was dismayed to see the Grand Duchess actually unpacking clothes. The Grand Duchess even appeared to be happy about it, but it was the improperest activity for her young Imperial Highness. It was even more improper for Mr Kirby to stand by and let her.

‘Your Highness—’

‘Karita, I’m not in the way, am I?’ said Olga. ‘I’m not at all busy and can help, really. Are you
seeing to refreshment? Mr Kirby has creaking bones, you know, and I expect all of them are aching shockingly after his journey. And look, just see how he’s packed some of his things. You should look after him always and go to England with him, and then you’ll be able to see he doesn’t stay away from us so long. Think, he’s been away nearly a whole year and didn’t write to us once. Isn’t that terrible?’

‘I did write to her Imperial Majesty,’ said Kirby.

‘Oh yes, to Mama,’ said Olga as if that was of no account at all.

‘But he has made up for it now,’ said Karita, taking things as Olga unpacked them. She put aside items that needed pressing and hung others in the capacious wardrobe or placed them on shelves.

‘Yes, but you should still go with him next time,’ said Olga, ‘no one could look after him better than you, Karita.’

‘Would you like to do that?’ asked Kirby.

Karita stood in open-mouthed astonishment.

‘Oh,’ she gasped.

‘There, you see, Olga Nicolaievna,’ he said, ‘you’ve stunned her with thoughts of the awful responsibility of it.’

‘Oh no,’ said Karita, ‘I’d like it immensely. But you’re teasing me, and I can’t speak English.’

‘I’ll teach you on the way,’ he said.

‘Oh, now I’m frightened to death,’ said Karita and sat heavily down. Olga laughed.

‘Karita, you must,’ she said delightedly, ‘it will be simply famous.’

Karita could not think of anything more famous, that would please her more. She looked up at Kirby. He did not seem a bit teasing, only very interested.

‘You’ll have to ask the Princess Karinshka,’ she said, ‘and then my parents and also Karita Katerinova—’

‘Who is Karita Katerinova?’

‘My grandmother,’ said Karita, ‘and then there’s old Amarov, he would be like an old bear with fleas if you didn’t ask his approval too, but it’s Her Highness the Princess Karinshka who is most important.’

‘Naturally, we’ll ask them all,’ said Kirby.

Olga stole a look at him. There was nothing to say how important the princess was in his eyes. He just seemed very pleased about the prospect of Karita becoming his own servant. It would be the happiest arrangement. Karita would not let him forget Russia. Karita would write to her and tell her all that he was doing.

Olga felt uncommonly pleased with herself.

The Empress Alexandra also seemed pleased. Stiff and in pain as she often was with sciatica, she was never irritable with it. And at Livadia she could almost forget it, for here she was always at her most contented, close to her family, close to peace and beauty. Although state affairs frequently took up much of the Tsar’s time, there were still many hours of leisure, of happiness and of remoteness from the narrow and critical environment of St Petersburg.

In the atmosphere of the capital things never got better. It was invariably the fault of
incompetent politicians. Without the burden of politicians the people could happily have left everything entirely to the Tsar and his own picked ministers. The Tsar thought first of the people. Politicians thought first of self-advancement and self-glorification. The Tsar did not have to consider his own advancement and was not interested in glory.

Tenderness was the keynote of all Alexandra’s feelings towards her beloved husband. How blessed they were in their family, and if God had chosen to visit Alexis with weakness He had also sent them His elect to ease the boy’s sufferings.

Alexandra gave Kirby a welcome not only kind, it was almost affectionate. She knew how his company delighted the children and that was sufficient in itself to earn her regard. And Nicholas, who seemed to dislike no one except disagreeable members of the Duma and people who threw bombs that maimed the innocent, was extremely partial towards the Englishman. He could not wait to get him on the tennis court again.

The children quickly resumed possession of Kirby whenever they could. They had no lack of playmates, including grown-ups, but it was Kirby they loved. He drilled with Alexis, who still had an enthusiasm for this particular activity, and they took turns to be officer and soldier. He introduced English games to all of them, and during the heat of afternoons, when most of the sensible adults retired to cooler quarters, the green lawns of Livadia sighed under romping,
scampering feet and the bright air echoed to shrieks and laughter.

Olga seemed not quite to know how to conduct herself when games were afoot. She was balanced on the brink. She was a young lady who could not join unruly, exuberant children without looking like one herself. Yet the gaiety and the infectiousness of the games called to her. And Mr Kirby himself always played and no one could say he was not grown-up. So sometimes she watched and sometimes she joined in, and when she joined in she was exquisitely caught up in the merriment, flushed, laughing, flying, slim ankles glimpsed amid swirling petticoats.

When she was watching, Alexis, always adoringly teased by the girls, would call on her for help.

‘Olga, take them away!’

‘They’re nothing to do with me,’ Olga would say, ‘they’re really too dreadful to belong to anyone.’

One day she responded to his appeal by saying, ‘Alexis, I’m still catching my breath from the other game, ask Mr Kirby to help you.’

‘He can’t help,’ said Anastasia, ‘Marie and I are sitting on him.’

Olga, who had been leaning back, fanning herself, sat up. Mr Kirby lay flat on his back. He seemed quite comfortable and was softly whistling a tune she had heard from him before, but Anastasia and Marie were indeed sitting on him.

‘Oh, you ruffians,’ cried Olga, ‘if Mama were to see you – get up!’

Alexis was shouting with laughter, Tatiana in hysterics.

‘It’s all right,’ said Kirby, ‘it’s just a new game.’

‘It’s Ivan’s own fault,’ said Tatiana, ‘he’s always lying down in the middle of some game or other.’

This was usually when he was requested to take sides. He avoided showing partiality by lying down and closing his eyes. More often than not they’d dance around him, singing a song of Georgian peasants at harvest time. And then, ‘Arise, Ivan Ivanovich, the corn is all cut and the grapes all gathered. Arise!’

Kirby would open his eyes and say, ‘Good. With the work all done who needs me?’ And he’d close his eyes again, they’d drop to their knees around him and shout him awake. It was a made-up game they adored, and in the flowering vitality of the girls and merriment of the boy, Kirby renewed his enchanted relationship with the children of the Tsar. He came to love them all, Anastasia the gifted, Marie the romantic, Tatiana the sparkling and Alexis the brave.

And Olga?

He loved Olga in a way that alarmed him.

Dearest of them all, grave in her moments of reserve, endearingly shy when caught off guard, wide-mouthed and blue-eyed, with her tumbling hair always lustrous and alive, Grand Duchess Olga Nicolaievna took renewed possession of his heart.

The days were hot and glorious. Olga loved it when, except for her mother, they all went off together on countryside excursions. The Tsar
was an outdoor addict. On these occasions there was no need for her to consider whether to frolic or sit, there was only the pleasure of walking with her family, with Kirby and any others who cared to join them. They explored woods, looked for berries, wandered over flower-carpeted slopes and meadows, and grew brown and happy and hungry.

Olga, perhaps, was desperate to grow up at this stage, to be a young woman. The excursions helped, made conversation easy, for there were always so many things to talk about, the abundant variety of nature being all around them. She could talk to Kirby about the colour of wild blooms, the call of a bird and each different view. Sometimes if there was a ridge or slope to climb and he was near he took her hand. It was never anything but a natural gesture to which she responded naturally, his clasp friendly and sure. She could not help herself, each time it happened her fingers closed around his and clung.

‘Mr Kirby – see?’

It was the tiniest and most delicate of wild blue flowers, peeping from a bed of moss.

‘And all alone,’ he said as they stooped to inspect it together.

‘Why do you say that?’ she asked, seeing his face in profile, its expression absorbed. ‘You aren’t alone, are you? You have friends and a home in England?’

‘No, I’m not alone, Olga. I’ll never be alone.’

‘What does that mean?’ She straightened up, regarding him a little seriously. He was
bare-headed, wearing an open-necked white shirt and blue flannel trousers. The sun was in his eyes.

‘That I’m very fortunate,’ he said, ‘some people can be lonely in the most crowded places.’

‘Yes, if they have no one who belongs to them,’ said Olga.

‘Yes,’ he agreed. ‘Come on, the others are leaving us behind. Shall we walk or run?’

If there were the intriguing complexities of growing up to consider, there was also the joy of still being young. The others were well ahead, the woods were bright with sunshine, the leaves glossy on the trees, dry on the ground. There was silence. It was broken by a whoop in the distance.

‘Run,’ said Grand Duchess Olga, and they ran, the leaves dancing around their feet. She laughed, an unseen twig caught her hat and pulled it from her head. ‘Oh!’ she said. They stopped, he picked up her hat and she stood quite still as gravely he put it on the back of her head where it perched like a white halo. Her eyes held his, hers full of life’s simple wonders.

‘There, now you’re grand again, Highness,’ he said.

‘Mr Kirby, please don’t call me that.’

She was a summer fragrance in green and white, her snowy blouse buttoned high to the neck, her skirt the colour of Livadia’s velvet lawns, her look one of wistful entreaty.

‘Sometimes it can’t be helped,’ he smiled.

They went on, walking this time. They saw the
others in the distance. Tatiana had stopped to wait for them. She was waving.

Olga said, ‘You know, of course, that Tatiana is passionately in love with you.’

‘No, is she?’ He considered it whimsically. ‘What d’you think, shall I wait for her to declare herself or what shall I do?’

‘Well,’ said Olga demurely, ‘I think you should know she’s also madly in love with the first officer of our yacht and terribly enamoured of a captain in our own regiment in St Petersburg. So, really, it would be better to do nothing.’

‘I’ll just wait,’ he said, ‘it may all blow over.’

They came up with Tatiana, who took his hand. They began to talk of books. Olga was an avid reader. The conversation flowed. Tatiana had never known her sister so unrestrained outside the family. She talked and talked. Well, thought Tatiana, imagine that.

When they finally got back to the palace that day, Olga said to him, ‘Mr Kirby, I’ve never enjoyed myself so much, except perhaps—’ The pink came.

‘Except perhaps when Anastasia and Marie sat on me?’

‘Except at my birthday ball,’ she said.

‘Well, that was exceptional, wasn’t it? That was an unforgettable experience for everybody.’

Her eyes danced.

‘Oh, dear Mr Kirby,’ she said and flew.

Never, he thought, had there been innocence entirely without artifice or primness. Never until Olga Nicolaievna.

He took tea in the gardens with the Tsar and the children. Olga did not appear, she had her tea with her mother and Anna Vyrubova in Alexandra’s boudoir. Alexandra observed how well Olga looked, how healthy from her walk.

‘Child, lamb,’ she smiled, ‘you’ve brought the sun indoors with you.’

‘It was lovely,’ said Olga, helping herself to bread and butter, ‘and Papa went on and on as usual. He’d walk off the face of the earth if you didn’t hold him back.’

‘Where did you go?’

‘Where? Oh, everywhere. Oh, thank you, Anna, I’m in such need of that.’ She took the glass of tea from Anna. The boudoir was an entirely feminine room, restful and quiet. Olga relaxed, sipping her hot tea. Alexandra discerned the soft, glowing happiness. She remembered again her own dreamy years at Darmstadt.

‘What are you thinking about, darling?’ she asked.

‘Mama, wouldn’t it be wonderful if today could go on for ever?’ said Olga. ‘Then we would always be with you and Papa. Nothing could be more perfect.’