“No,” admitted the Count, but then he continued with his fateful tale: “Seven months pass, Charles. It is the spring of 1914, and I return to the family estate for a visit. Having paid my respects to my grandmother in the library, I venture outside in search of my sister, Helena, who likes to read under the great elm at the bend in the river. From a hundred feet away, I can tell that she is not herself—that is, I can tell that she is more than herself. Upon seeing me she sits up with a sparkle in her eye and a smile on her lips, clearly eager to share some piece of news, which I am now equally eager to hear. But just as I cross the lawn toward her, she looks over my shoulder and smiles even more brightly to see a lone figure approaching on a steed—a lone figure in the uniform of the Hussars. . . .
“You see the dilemma the fox had put me in, Charles. While I had been carousing back in Moscow, he had sought my sister out. He had arranged an introduction and then courted her carefully, patiently, successfully. And when he swung down from the saddle and our eyes met, he could barely keep the twist of mirth from his lips. But how was I to explain the situation to Helena? This angel of a thousand virtues? How was I to tell her that the man she has fallen in love with has sought her affections not due to an appreciation of her qualities, but to settle a score?”
“What did you do?”
“Ah, Charles. What did I do? I did nothing. I thought surely his true nature would find occasion to express itself—much as it had at the Novobaczkys’. So in the weeks that followed, I hovered at the edge of their courtship. I suffered through lunches and teas. I ground my teeth as I watched them stroll through the gardens. But as I bided my time, his self-control surpassed my wildest expectations. He pulled out her chair; he picked blossoms; he read verses; he wrote verses! And always when he caught my eye there was that little twist in his smile.
“But then on the afternoon of my sister’s twentieth birthday, when he was off on maneuvers and we were paying a visit to a neighbor, we returned at dusk to find his troika in front of our house. From a glance at Helena, I could sense her elation. He has rushed back all the way from his battalion, she was thinking, to wish me well on my day. She nearly jumped from her horse and ran up the steps; and I followed her like a condemned man to the noose.”
The Count emptied his glass and slowly set it back onto the bar.
“But there inside the entry hall, I did not find my sister in his arms. I found her two steps from the door, trembling. Against the wall was Nadezhda, my sister’s handmaiden. Her bodice torn open, her arms across her chest, her face scarlet with humiliation, she looked briefly at my sister then ran up the stairs. In horror, my sister stumbled across the hall, collapsed in a chair, and covered her face with her hands. And our noble lieutenant? He grinned at me like a cat.
“When I began to express my outrage, he said: ‘Oh, come now, Alexander. It is Helena’s birthday. In her honor, let us call it even.’ Then roaring with laughter, he walked out the door without giving my sister a glance.”
Charles whistled softly.
The Count nodded.
“But at this juncture, Charles, I did not do nothing. I crossed the entryway to the wall where a pair of pistols hung beneath the family crest. When my sister grabbed at my sleeve and asked where I was going, I too walked out the door without giving her a glance.”
The Count shook his head in condemnation of his own behavior.
“He had a one-minute head start, but he hadn’t used it to put distance between us. He had casually climbed into his troika and set his horses moving at little more than a trot. And there you have him in a nutshell, my friend: a man who raced toward parties, and trotted from his own misdeeds.”
Charles refilled their glasses and waited.
“Our drive was a grand circle that connected the house to the main road by two opposing arcs lined with apple trees. My horse was still tied at its post. So, when I saw him riding away, I mounted and set off in the opposite direction at a gallop. In a matter of minutes, I had reached the point where the two arcs of the drive met the road. Dismounting, I stood and waited for his approach.
“You can picture the scene—me alone in the drive with the sky blue, the breeze blowing, and the apple trees in bloom. Though he had left the house at little more than a trot, when he saw me, he rose to his feet, raised his whip, and began driving his horses at full speed. There was no question as to what he intended to do. So without a second thought, I raised my arm, steadied my aim, and pulled the trigger. The impact of the bullet knocked him off his feet. The reins flew free and the horses careened off the drive, rolling the troika, and tossing him into the dust—where he lay unmoving.”
“You killed him?”
“Yes, Charles. I killed him.”
The presumptive heir to the Earl of Westmorland slowly nodded his head.
“Right there in the dust . . .”
The Count sighed and took a drink.
“No. It was eight months later.”
Charles looked confused.
“Eight months later . . . ?”
“Yes. In February 1915. You see, ever since my youth I had been known for my marksmanship, and I had every intention of shooting the brute in the heart. But the road was uneven . . . and he was whipping his reins . . . and the apple blossoms were blowing about in the wind . . . In a word, I missed my mark. I ended up shooting him here.”
The Count touched his right shoulder.
“So, then you didn’t kill him. . . .”
“Not at that moment. After binding his wound and righting his troika, I drove him home. Along the way he cursed me at every turn of the wheel, and deservedly so. For while he survived the gunshot wound, with his right arm now lame, he was forced to surrender his commission in the Hussars. And when his father filed an official complaint, my grandmother sent me to Paris, as was the custom at the time. But later that summer when the war broke out, despite his injury he insisted upon resuming his place at the head of his regiment. And in the Second Battle of the Masurian Lakes, he was knocked from his horse and run through with a bayonet by an Austrian dragoon.”
There was a moment of silence.
“Alexander, I am sorry that this fellow died in battle; but I think I can safely say that you have assumed more than your share of guilt for these events.”
“But there is one more event to relate: Ten years ago tomorrow, while I was biding my time in Paris, my sister died.”
“Of a broken heart . . . ?”
“Young women only die of broken hearts in novels, Charles. She died of scarlet fever.”
The presumptive earl shook his head in bewilderment.
“But don’t you see?” explained the Count. “It is a chain of events. That night at the Novobaczkys’ when I magnanimously tore his marker, I knew perfectly well that word of the act would reach the Princess; and I took the greatest satisfaction in turning the tables on the cad. But if I had not so smugly put him in his place, he would not have pursued Helena, he would not have humiliated her, I would not have shot him, he might not have died in Masuria, and ten years ago I would have been where I belonged—at my sister’s side—when she finally breathed her last.”
Having capped off his snifter of brandy with six glasses of vodka, when the Count emerged from the attic hatch shortly before midnight, he weaved across the hotel’s roof. With the wind a little wild and the building shifting back and forth, one could almost imagine one was crossing the deck of a ship on high seas. How fitting, thought the Count, as he paused to steady himself at a chimney stack. Then picking his way among the irregular shadows that jutted here and there, he approached the building’s northwest corner.
For one last time, the Count looked out upon that city that was and wasn’t his. Given the frequency of street lamps on major roads, he could easily identify the Boulevard and Garden Rings—those concentric circles at the center of which was the Kremlin and beyond which was all of Russia.