The Secret Wife. Gill Paul

       Chapter Two

      Next morning, Dmitri opened his eyes and gazed up at the ceiling, where cupids, griffins, and other mythological creatures danced in cornflower-blue semicircles. A vast chandelier of multiple tiers glinted in the sunlight. The walls were of white silk with delicately painted blue flowers. He was in the Blue Drawing Room of the Catherine Palace, a place he had sometimes glanced into when serving in the imperial guard. His neighbour in the next bed, a man named Stepanov, told him that the staterooms of the Winter Palace had also been converted into makeshift wards for wounded officers. Surfaces had been cleared of ornament and the priceless furniture replaced by hospital beds, but the andirons and fireguard were gilded bronze, and the elaborate clock on the mantel showed the Greek gods Bacchus and Momus in marble and bronze. The wealth of the Romanovs was unfathomable.

      The royal family no longer lived in the Catherine Palace, preferring the relative intimacy of the nearby Alexander Palace in winter, the Peterhof in summer, and the extravagant luxury of the royal yacht, Standart, or their Crimean palace at Livadia for holidays. Most of the stately palaces lining the Baltic shores in St Petersburg, where Dmitri had worked, were kept for ceremonial purposes: to entertain visiting dignitaries, and as the setting for state occasions.

      What must it be like to grow up with such limitless wealth, Dmitri wondered? To have an elephant house and Chinese theatre in your garden, to be driven around in shiny new automobiles by uniformed chauffeurs, to be able to buy whatever your heart desired? Tatiana seemed an unspoiled girl, but the sheer grandeur of her upbringing must set her apart. He knew her clothes were made by French couturiers and her hats shipped from a fashionable store in London; that her perfume came from Brocard & Co and her shoes from Henry Weiss. He had often noticed deliveries arriving by special messenger. Although he was the son of an army general, a member of a well-connected upper-class family, surely he couldn’t ever hope to become close to Tatiana? It was impossible, wasn’t it?

      He watched the clock, wondering what time she would arrive. The previous day it had been mid morning when she stopped by his bed. He managed to eat some breakfast and had his dressing changed by the moustached nurse. She brought him a bowl of water and a razor and he shaved then combed his hair, keen to look presentable for Tatiana’s visit.

      She bounced in at ten, her cheeks flushed from hurrying, three books tucked under her arm.

      ‘I hope I didn’t keep you waiting. I had lessons to attend, then I had to go to the Znamenie Church to pray for our soldiers. Here – would any of these interest you?’ She placed the books on the bedcover then pulled up a chair and sat by his bed.

      ‘How kind of you, Nurse Romanova Three.’ Dmitri smiled. He picked up the first book: Turgenev’s Fathers and Sons. ‘I will enjoy re-visiting this to see if it lives up to memory.’ She watched eagerly as he examined the others. ‘I’ve never read Tolstoy’s Kreutzer Sonata so I look forward to that. And Gorky’s short stories are perfect: I remember one about the cutting of a tunnel through a mountain – have you read it?’

      ‘Ah, that was so haunting. Do you think it can be true that mountains have a spirit that can harm those who damage them?’ Her eyes looked grey today, with flecks of violet round the edge of the irises. A tendril of auburn hair had slipped from the side of her white headdress.

      ‘I remember seeing such a tunnel being dug and thinking that it looked like an offence against nature. Gorky has captured that sense of a wound being inflicted. Thank you for the books. I will stop being such a disruptive, demanding patient now I am so well occupied.’ He stroked the expensive Morocco leather binding.

      She glanced around, unsure whether to believe him, then realised he was pulling her leg. ‘Perhaps we might discuss them when you finish. I love to talk about books. I often write critiques of them in my journal.’

      ‘I can’t imagine when you find time to write your journal. It sounds as though your days are fully occupied: nurse, grand duchess, colonel …’ He was fishing, eager to know more about her life.

      ‘I write every evening before bedtime. In fact, I wrote about you last night.’ She coloured. ‘Mama tells me you are a hero, that you rescued a wounded officer while under enemy fire. She is going to award you the Golden Arms sword.’

      Dmitri was surprised: ‘It’s an insurance policy all soldiers follow. If you see a chance, you slip out to bring back the wounded, hoping that one day someone will do the same for you.’ He didn’t tell her the officer was a friend, and that he still had no word about whether Malevich had survived his wounds. He knew he would choke up if he spoke of it.

      ‘Nevertheless, I’m sure they don’t give bravery awards to just anyone. I suspect you are being modest. You have a heroic air.’ Her eyes were sparkling.

      Now he laughed. ‘I’m not sure what a heroic air is! My father was a genuine hero. He was a cavalry general in Tsar Alexander’s army, who served in many campaigns, and in 1904 became Viceroy of Georgia. He has so many decorations pinned on his jacket it is heavy as a suit of armour. I’m just a simple cavalryman following orders.’

      ‘Does your father fight in the present war?’

      ‘No, he has retired to my home town of Lozovatka, in Evkaterinskaya Province.’

      ‘I have never been there. Is it beautiful?’

      Dmitri wrinkled his nose. ‘It’s a very small town, set on a pretty river not far from the Sea of Azov, but Your Imperial Highness would have no reason to go there. They have no society to speak of. In my childhood it was rural, but they have started mining for minerals and great slashes are being torn through the landscape, just like Gorky’s tunnel.’

      ‘Do you come from a large family?’ She was regarding him intently. ‘What kind of childhood did you have?’

      ‘Not as large as Your Imperial Highness’s. I have two elder sisters, Vera and Valerina, but no brothers. The girls were always trying to rope me in to their games, dressing me in costumes and making me perform in their plays. You have no idea how character-forming it is for a young boy to be forced to wear a wig and gown and have his cheeks rouged! I escaped around the age of nine after I befriended one of the groundsmen on our family’s estate. He taught me how to hunt and fish, since my father was often away from home. All in all, it was a fairly average childhood.’ He did not tell her about the fierce rows when his irascible father came back, and the vicious beatings he had endured, sometimes with a horsewhip.

      ‘Tell me, are your sisters married now?’

      ‘Vera is married to Prince Alexander Eristavi-Ksani of Georgia, but Valerina still lives at home with our parents. She is twenty-six years old and I hope she will yet find a husband, but she is the quieter of the two, a little shy perhaps. I’m very close to her.’

      ‘I would love to meet them!’ Tatiana exclaimed. ‘I know hardly any women outside our family. Mama had just begun to allow Olga and me to attend the occasional ball or soirée when war broke out. We used to hear music floating up to the windows, and see fine ladies ice-skating on the Baltic, but no matter how hard we pleaded we were scarcely ever allowed to join them. Aunt Olga – Papa’s sister – would occasionally invite us, but I think the ladies felt awkward about introducing themselves to us. I should probably never have met you, Cornet Malama, had it not been for this war, and your injury.’

      ‘I am very glad we met, Nurse Romanova Three. Our conversation is helping to relieve my frustration