The Way Through Doors (12 page)

All up and down the land the third minister traveled in a dark coach, sampling the ugly wares of this burg and that hamlet. He traveled even into the depths of Siberia, along obscure trade routes to forgotten principalities. After two months he returned, and in his train was the ugliest woman that ever man had set eyes upon. He brought her in secret conference before the empress, and the smile that rose then upon her face would have lit a ballroom.

—We are pleased, she said. You do no disservice to your own twisted reputation.

—I thank you, he said, and did a manic little bow.

Meanwhile, the ugliest of women stood by, worrying at the sleeve of her shift.

—Where did you find her? asked the empress in the tone of voice a botanist might use in conversation with a colleague, a tone of clinical curiosity.

—In Szarthel, said the minister. She is the daughter of a wealthy merchant. For many years he kept her in his house, her only company the many books that lined the walls. One of my soldiers saw her through a window, and brought me word.

The empress nodded. Her lovely features tensed a moment in a paroxysm of cruel thought.

—Organize for me, my minister, said the empress, a parade of misshapen and frightening folk. Bring me dwarves and giants, beasts and patch-skinned dogs. Arrange for me a parade. For I mean to marry the Count M. to this our lady, and I mean to have a wedding party that the world shall remember.

Out then the minister went, and he gathered together the makings of this parade. As per the empress’s plan, he commissioned the building of an ice palace at one end of Moscow. The parade was to begin at the other.

The day in question dawned slowly and silently. The empress went down in the dissipating darkness to the room where the ugliest of women was being kept.

—You, she said.

The ugliest of women said nothing.

—Today you are to marry the man whom I once loved. Do you know this?

Still the ugliest of women said nothing.

—I am giving to you possibly the most remarkable man that was ever born and raised in this our land of Russia. He is a king among men. His tastes are the most refined tastes, his passions the most refined passions. I am giving him to you, forcing you upon him, because I know how horrible it will be for him who was once raised above all other men to taste the wares of a creature as despicable as you. What do you have to say to that?

To that, the ugliest of women said nothing, and the empress went away. But there in the dawn, the ugliest of women smiled, and she said to herself, Still I will make him happy. Ugly as I am, I will please him, if he is so great a man.

The guard who had admitted the empress came then again to the ugliest of women.

—There is someone to see you, Kolya, he said.

—Thank you, said Kolya quietly. I would like that.

Then a young woman entered the room, dressed strangely. She sat down beside Kolya and took her hands into her own.

—This is how things are going to proceed.

And she told Kolya the remainder of the story. This heartened Kolya tremendously, and she thanked the girl, even going so far as to kiss her hand. The girl gave Kolya a drawing that looked like this:

and then went away. The guard came soon after, with waiting women who bore Kolya’s wedding gown. Bells rang out across Moscow. The populace was roused. All the major nobles were forced to be in attendance upon the empress for the spectacle that was about to unfold.

Out then into the street came the ugliest of women, dressed in a gown so lovely that none who saw it could report ever having seen anything its equal. The empress was a brilliant general in this her war, and she had realized the glorious touch that a faultless gown would give to the proceedings. She had hired the best dressmakers in all of Russia, and even brought in an expert from France who was later strangled in a town near the border.

The ugliest of women stood defiant as the crowded street prodded her with jibes and the throwing of small stones. The empress had approved the throwing of stones no larger than a certain size. Such stones, she reasoned, would not harm the parade’s participants, but might help in breaking their will. She had many stones of the precisely correct proportion distributed along the parade route in buckets stamped with her insignia. Such preparations she had made.

The ugliest of women waited, but not long, for after a moment a gate behind her was thrown open, and out of it poured the parade, gamboling on its hind legs, crawling and lurching, laughing and shrilling madly back and forth. But she did not stir from her expression, or tense a muscle towards flight. Quietly she turned her back upon the parade, and began to walk.

The empress was ahead, awaiting the coming of the parade, her court about her. And, tethered, as he had once tethered many a bear, the Count M. in rags, he too awaiting the coming of the parade. He did not know what was to happen, for he had been kept until this time in an oubliette beneath the empress’s chamber. However, since emerging he had heard already six of the fifteen rumors that were circulating.

Up the boulevard, the ghastly parade! It rounded a slow curve and emerged into view. The Count M., seeing for the first time his fate, recoiled slightly. In his defense, perhaps he recoiled less at the horror of the features of the ugliest of women, and more at the lengths he suddenly saw that the empress had gone to in order to destroy him. By God, he thought. That woman must really have loved me. And for a moment he regretted having spurned her.

The empress’s lovely breast meanwhile was heaving with pleasure and grand anticipation. She had seen the count twitch, and she had desired no more than that, had, in fact expected far less. For as we have said, the count was a redoubtable man, and not to be shaken easily.

The sound of bells as lepers ran around the edges of the pack. The rushing back and forth of the giants, trampling even into the crowd. The dwarves upon dwarves’ shoulders, lighting fires and shouting the names of all the great wizards of the past. At their heels, the patchcoat dogs, and at the fore, the ugliest of women.

She approached the makeshift dais, and mounted one by one the stairs, prodded by soldiers with bills and halberds. Her dress was already filthy from the dwarves’ Greek fire and the dirt of the street. She went before the empress and looked for the first time upon the Count M. He returned Kolya’s gaze, held it gently in his own and did not look away.

For that I thank you, thought the ugliest of women.

Up then the priest onto the dais, elbowing his way through the throng. Shouts and cries abounded, and though it was winter, the heat of the press made sweat run down the hungry faces.

The count was untethered and forced to the side of his soon-bride. A stave brought them both to their knees, and as they fell, the count whispered in her ear,

—Pretend that you love me. I will do the same.

The ugliest woman nodded. To herself, she thought, You will love me yet, and not in jest.

The priest pronounced over them a joining, and to it they gave their agreement. The count and his new bride were raised then to their feet. The empress climbed onto horseback, with the members of her court. A great quantity of hounds was brought then into the streets.

—My count, called out the empress. And for the first time the count turned his eyes upon her.

—My count, she said, we will harry you through the streets as once you and I followed prey on the paths in the country of my youth. Do you see the palace in the distance?

Turning, the count beheld a palace of ice at the edge of the city.

—To that you must go. Raising a horn to her lips, the empress blew a loud clear note.

The count took the hand of the ugliest of women.

—Do not stumble, he said.

—I am ugly, she said, but I am quick.

And they were off.

It is lucky that they had the parade of dwarves and giants and patch-skinned dogs between them and the hunt, for otherwise they would not have reached the palace in safety. Yet as it was, the hounds took great pleasure in ravaging the lepers, who rang their bells for all they were worth, but did not fare so well in the hounds’ sharp teeth.

Soon they were come, breathless and half-mad, to the ice palace. Rarely in the history of the great Russian Empire had such an ice palace been seen. A replica of the empress’s own, this palace had in addition to many of the other rooms a bedroom set apart from the rest, with a bed constructed of ice, and a viewing chamber beyond.

As the Count M. stepped onto the threshold of the ice palace, the empress dismounted with her court. Soldiers once more took charge of the count and his bride. Together they were delivered to the bedchamber and made to stand fast by the bed of ice, facing the viewing chamber.

Into the viewing chamber, then, the court in general, and at its head the empress. All the nobles, the lords and ladies that the count had known, now looked upon him with a cruel and sneering eye. But what they saw in the count was nothing they had seen before. He looked back at them as though he were a man staring up into the night sky, with nothing more than idling and evening in his hand.

Out of a small door, then, the third minister. To the soldiers, he said,

—Off with their clothing. Force them onto the bed.

The count closed his eyes, then opened them. Without a word, he removed his own clothing and stood, naked, shivering only slightly from the deep cold.

For her part, the ugliest of women could not remove her dress on her own, for she had been sewn into it. With sharp knives the soldiers cut it off, and all of her was soon visible to the count’s eye. He looked at her still and did not look away.

For this too I thank you, thought the ugliest of women. To him then she spoke.

—I am Kolya, she said.

—Think no more of the cold, Kolya, than of the audience, for they are the same. Here we will do what we must. If there is life beyond this, so be it.

The Count M. took Kolya to him then, and began to kiss her. In the viewing chamber the empress looked away. Tears started from her eyes, and she rushed from the room.

—Kolya, murmured the count. They lay upon the cold bed of ice, side by side. An hour had passed, and they were wrapped now in their rags and torn clothing. All the court had left, and all the soldiers too. They were alone, and had become inured to the ice.

—My count, said Kolya. My life has been till now a life of books. My father never took me out upon the street, to the marketplace or the promenade along the river. I never had schooling, or lessons on how to sew or cook. He kept me instead in his study and he told me, Learn all of this. Read every book and understand the things there writ. This will be your path to joy.

There was a book there, she continued, my favorite of them all. It constructed architectures, impossible places, dreams of impossible places. Of these a needle, larger than the tallest house, stabbed down into the sand at the sea’s edge. It rises from the sand only enough for a single plank, a walkway, to run out from its center. This plank runs out across the sea, inches above the shuddering waves. It runs for miles, and a curious thing begins to happen as the walkway tends farther and farther from the shore.

—I have read this book, said the count. Beneath the plank, the sea begins to fall away, and the plank becomes steeper and steeper, and harder to climb. Miles pass in this way. Finally, there begin to be handholds, and footholds, ladder rungs in the plank. For one has come so far that one must climb. At the top, one finds that one has reached another needle, this sunk into an island so far offshore from the first needle that it was not visible, though from the top of the second needle the first needle is plain in the far distance, as the path’s terminus.

—It is so lovely, said Kolya, how then there is another ladder, down along the side of the needle. One proceeds to the island of the anchored needle, where a small cabin sits, and someone is waiting with a bit of lunch and a pot of tea. Someone kind whom you have known a very long while. She comes to the door and plain upon her face is her joy at your arrival.

—You have come along the needle? said the count, in the voice of the someone-who-waits-in-the cabin. How long and tiring the route of needles, for it passes through the core of things.

—To this you say nothing, said Kolya, but only smile, admitting to the general truth of her words. And she brings you into the house and sets before you a fine meal. And afterwards, there is dancing and laughter, and it is the dancing one does when one is not observed, which is the best dancing of all.