Requiem in the Snow Page 4

  ‘Yes. You?’

  ‘I did.’

  ‘It’s needs cleaning out.’

  ‘I could smell that much.’

  ‘If it’s indicative of the standards here, given the expected population explosion, we’d better brace ourselves for an outbreak of disease unless we can organise better sanitation.’ He sat on the end of the bed and unlaced his shoes.

  ‘I thought you’d discussed sanitation and rubbish disposal with Mr Hughes.’

  ‘Discussed in the abstract. From what Glyn and Mr Hughes said, I assumed the intention was to build a town on an empty steppe, although common sense should have told me any people already here would have made arrangements to dispose of their rubbish, albeit unsuitable ones. It’s going to take time to build incinerators and organise collection points.’

  ‘There’s nothing we can do about it tonight.’

  ‘There isn’t, sweetheart.’ He placed his shoes under a chair, shrugged off his jacket, and hung it on the back.

  ‘Perhaps we should look at what the Russians have been doing before we implement improvements. There hasn’t been an outbreak of disease here recently. Has there?’

  ‘None that Glyn’s mentioned. It’s a good idea of yours to ask the locals if they’ve made arrangements other than pits. As usual, my wife is providing the voice of common sense.’

  ‘Flattery will get you everything you desire.’

  ‘That’s my intention.’ He hung his waistcoat over his jacket, pulled his tie loose, unbuttoned his collar and shirt, and unclipped his braces. ‘What do you think of this house?’

  ‘It’s a palace. I never thought I’d live in anything so grand. Can your brother afford it?’

  ‘Courtesy of the mortgages Mr Hughes has arranged for all senior managers, he can. Our Glyn’s gone up the world and we’re climbing alongside him.’ He leaned over the bed and kissed her.

  ‘Glyn’s lucky to have Praskovia. She might be young but she’s an excellent housekeeper.’

  ‘Alexei knew what he was doing when he recommended her for the job.’

  ‘Is Alexei’s father right? Is there something going on between Praskovia and Alexei?’

  ‘You know as much as me, sweetheart.’

  ‘Glyn hasn’t said anything?’

  ‘Unlike women, men don’t gossip.’

  ‘That, darling, is not true but if you want to delude yourself, go ahead.’ She rearranged her pillows and dropped two to the floor.

  He draped his shirt, tie, and braces on top of his waistcoat. ‘What do you think men gossip about?’

  ‘Women.’

  ‘If you’re fishing for information about Glyn and Betty, all I know is Glyn doesn’t seem bothered by Betty’s decision to stay in Merthyr. He did say he wished they’d formally separated shortly after their marriage.’ He pulled his long sleeved vest over his head and unclipped his sock suspenders.

  ‘I’m fond of your brother. He’s a kind man who cares about people. He probably told you he wished he and Betty had separated to save face. I’ll write to her …’

  ‘No!’ Peter broke in. ‘Absolutely, definitely no. Whatever’s between Betty and Glyn or not – is personal to them and should remain that way.’ He pulled off his long drawers and padded naked across the room. Folding back the bedclothes he slipped in beside her. ‘What are we lying under?’ He lifted the bedcover. ‘It doesn’t feel like blankets.’

  ‘It’s not. I asked Praskovia when she showed me to the room. It’s a featherbed – a sort of overlay eiderdown. All the beds have them here. They’re lighter and warmer than blankets – or so she said.’

  ‘You’d prefer blankets?’

  ‘I’m used to lying under the weight of wool.’

  ‘Are you cold?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Then you don’t need your nightgown?’

  She unbuttoned her bodice before sitting up and pulling her nightdress over her head.

  He moved towards her.

  ‘Ow! Your feet are cold,’ she complained.

  ‘Yours are warm. I call that the perfect combination.’ He lifted aside the plait she’d knotted her hair into and caressed her breasts.

  ‘I have something to tell you,’ she whispered.

  ‘You’re pregnant.’

  She failed to keep the disappointment from her voice. ‘You know?’

  ‘I’m a qualified doctor, sweetheart. At least, I’ve been given a certificate that says so. I love you and enjoy looking at you. You’re pale in the morning – so pale you’re bordering on green – your beautiful breasts,’ he stroked her nipples tenderly, ‘are larger, and there’s a faraway look in your eyes that has to be down to more than being married to an incredibly handsome, clever man.’

  ‘Why didn’t you say something?’

  ‘Isn’t it a wife’s prerogative to tell a husband he’s about to become a father?’ he kissed her. ‘A father,’ he repeated, as the import of the words sank in. ‘A new life, a new baby, and when Huw and Glyn have the builders and bricks to spare, a new house for us and our son.’

  ‘Our son could be a daughter.’

  He pulled her even closer. ‘No, it’s a boy. Thomas Edward Edwards.’

  ‘After your eldest brother and father?’ From the way all three brothers spoke about Tom and their father Sarah knew how close they’d been.

  ‘I wish you’d met them. My parents would have loved you, they adored children. They wanted grandchildren so much. It was a disappointment when Edward’s wife and Betty didn’t have any.’

  ‘I think Thomas Edward Edwards should have at least two more names. John should be one as Mr Hughes is responsible for us being here.’

  ‘And the other?’

  ‘Something Russian. Ivan or Boris or Vladimir … stop tickling me,’ she shrieked.

  ‘I’m not. I’m reaching for the lamp.’ He turned down the wick, plunging the room into darkness. ‘We’ve a busy day tomorrow, Mrs Dr Edwards.’ He returned to his side of the bed, but not for long.

  ‘I love you,’ she whispered into the darkness when he entered her.

  ‘I love you too. Both of you.’

  Hotel Hughesovka

  September 1870

  Madam Koshka had transformed the rooms at the back of the newly built hotel into a replica of her elegant apartment in fashionable Tverskaya Ultitsa Street in Moscow. Within easy distance of the university, military headquarters, theatres, churches, and monasteries, the location had been perfect for her business. Glyn wondered at her motives for moving from the city to the steppe.

  Unlike most ‘madams’ he and Mr Hughes had encountered in the European capitals, Koshka plied her trade subtly. Operating a ‘salon’; treating the ladies who entertained her male clientele as much-loved ‘nieces’ she’d invited to amuse her ‘guests’.

  Her girls’ dresses were fashioned from expensive fabrics but designed to leave little to masculine imagination. They exhibited more of their charms, particularly their breasts and legs, than any respectable female, but their demeanour was as demure as Queen Victoria’s ladies-in-waiting.

  The first Koshka girl Glyn had become acquainted with, confided that ‘Madam’ demanded bawdiness be kept from the salon and confined to the privacy of the bedroom. It was a wise decision on Madam’s part. Her elegant rooms attracted men from the upper echelons of the Russian Empire as well as visiting dignitaries, and the quality of her services was reflected in her prices.

  The hotel vestibule had smelled of paint and wet plaster, Madam Koshka’s rooms of cologne and dried rose petals. They’d been decorated French Empire style, in cream, gilt, and red plush. Glyn recognised a few pieces from Koshka’s Moscow apartment. The linen tablecloths were as pristine as they’d been in the capital. The wine, served in Koshka’s Venetian glass goblets, light and delicately flavoured. The canapés, cakes, and miniature sandwiches arranged on Madam’s Meissen porcelain could have come from a Moscow confectioner. Koshka had succeeded in recreating her salon in Hughesovka, even down to the a
mbience.

  Huw was in his element, dancing attendance on a buxom, blonde Bohemian. Glyn watched them sidle out, Huw’s hand clamped on the girl’s buttocks.

  ‘Glyn, my dear, dear, Glyn. You look bored. You were never that fond of wine.’ Koshka took his glass from him and clicked her fingers. ‘Brandy for Mr Edwards, Lily.’

  A brunette appeared at Glyn’s elbow with a brandy balloon and decanter.

  ‘I’m exhausted, not bored, Koshka.’ Glyn allowed the girl to fill the brandy balloon. ‘I only arrived a few hours ago.’

  ‘I hear you travelled with your brother, the doctor.’

  ‘And Mr Hughes, all the workers we’ve recruited, a regiment of Cossacks, and three of their women.’

  ‘Soldiers’ women,’ Koshka dismissed. ‘I trust you’ll bring your brother to the opening of my new house on Saturday. I’d like to make his acquaintance.’

  ‘So he can meet his new patients?’

  ‘Doctors need patients. My girls need medical attention, and he’s your brother. If he’s anything like you, he’ll be good-looking and – how do you say it in English – “a ladies’ man”.’

  ‘He has a wife.’

  ‘So does practically every man in this room.’

  ‘Here, in his bed.’

  ‘He’s in love with her?’

  ‘Very much.’

  ‘In that case I will propose only a business arrangement.’

  ‘Probably best.’

  ‘It’s crowded here. I have an office where we can talk in private.’

  ‘I have a busy day tomorrow.’

  ‘Brandy should never be rushed.’ She led him to a curtained alcove and opened a door hidden behind the drapes.

  Koshka’s ‘office’ was small, exquisitely furnished with a desk, captain’s chair, two comfortably upholstered chairs that flanked a tiled Dutch stove and a long, wide sofa that could accommodate three people lying side by side. As Glyn had discovered.

  Koshka sat on one of the upholstered chairs, Glyn took the other.

  ‘So when is Mr Hughes arriving – and how many people are travelling with him?’

  ‘For people I take it you mean men. Tomorrow and several hundred including Mujiks.’

  ‘Immigrants?’ she questioned.

  ‘About a hundred. What on earth possessed you to forsake Moscow for the outskirts of the empty beyond?’

  ‘You and Mr Hughes informing everyone in Moscow that the hive of industry you will build here will be the new centre of Europe. Russia’s capital of enterprise where the bold will make untold riches.’

  ‘Koshka, you were making a fortune in Moscow. Something catastrophic must have happened for you to give that up.’

  Koshka opened a gold and enamelled box and offered it to him. ‘Cigar?’

  He took one and reached for the cigar lamp. A silver-plated German model that resembled an Aladdin’s lamp perched on a column. He lit Koshka’s cigar then his own. She drew on the cigar, removed it from her mouth, and studied the stem.

  ‘Do you remember Lucia?’

  ‘Small, dark, pretty girl with one brown and one blue eye.’

  ‘That was her.’

  ‘Was?’

  ‘She was carved up by a customer. She died slowly and horribly.’

  ‘You notified the authorities.’

  ‘I had more sense. I ordered the man who killed her to stay away from my salon and tried to keep Lucia’s murder quiet. It proved impossible. All the girls knew who’d killed her and he was aware they knew. He persisted in visiting us. The girls were terrified. None of them would go with him, no matter how much money he offered. Frightened people turn to anyone they believe trustworthy. My girls begged their patrons to help them get away from Moscow. Once the rumours started they spread like dandelion seeds.’

  ‘Lucia’s murderer is influential?’

  ‘And rich, more than anyone as sick in the head as he is has the right to be. He wanted me and my girls dead or in Siberia. Fortunately, I possess a few friends. They managed to convince him that our mass murder, forced exile, or disappearance would give rise to gossip that might point in his direction. When I couldn’t stand the strain of his visits any longer, I called him into my office and suggested he allow us to leave the city. He agreed. The girls and I signed confidentiality agreements promising never to speak of the reason behind our flight, and for your own safety I shouldn’t have told you this much.’

  ‘I’m more sorry than I can say about Lucia. My condolences to you and your girls, not only on the loss of Lucia, but on having to leave Moscow.’

  ‘Thank you. I miss Lucia.’ She forced a smile. ‘But it’s good to have a change of air and see you again. You’ll come to my party?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And bring your brother?’

  ‘I’ll answer for myself but not him. I can do no more than invite him.’ Glyn kissed her cheek. ‘I’m glad you’re here, Koshka. You’ll brighten my evenings and a great many men’s nights.’

  ‘Have you brought your wife with you?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I have a new girl. She’s very sweet, just your type.’

  ‘Not tonight, but thank you.’

  ‘You’re waiting for the Cossacks’ women?’

  He smiled at her blatant fishing. ‘Are you afraid of competition?’

  ‘Not from girls who’ve been reduced to entertaining soldiers. See you soon, Glyn?’

  ‘At your party. Thank you for the brandy and cigar.’

  He returned to the salon. It was more crowded than when he’d left. Huw was nowhere to be seen. Deciding his friend could make his own way home, Glyn collected his coat and umbrella, walked down the stairs, and out of the front door of the hotel.

  Glyn Edwards’ house, Hughesovka

  September 1870

  Richard examined every inch of his room before he undressed for bed. Someone had unpacked his bag while he’d been at dinner and laid his damp clothes on the stove. He picked up his nightshirt. Warm, dry, just holding it felt comforting after the rain-sodden, wind-chafing days on the steppe. He laid it on the bed and began to stow away the rest of his belongings.

  The wardrobe was massive. It would have filled half the basement house in Merthyr, if it could have been carried through the door. The new suit of clothes Edward Edwards had bought him as a going-away present looked forlorn when he hung it on a hook in in its cavernous depths. His spare set of underclothes, socks, and shirts filled less than a quarter of one of the twelve drawers in the matching chest.

  He put two books he’d borrowed from Glyn on his bedside table before sitting at the desk in front of the curtained window. It was a fine piece of furniture. A red-leather writing block was sunk in the centre of its brass inlaid surface. The eight drawers held stationery, bottles of ready-mixed ink, nibs, and pencils.

  He imagined sitting there making notes Mr Edwards would find useful. Or writing letters to Morgan and Owen about his and Anna’s new life, describing what was waiting for the boys when they joined them, but the more he looked around the more he felt like an interloper. A servant playing at being the master in a place he had no right to clean, much less visit. He wondered how he could begin to tell his brothers about the house. Then he realised Owen and Morgan may never set foot inside. He and Anna were “lodgers” in Mr Edwards’ palace.

  Mr Edwards had been born in a two-up-two-down terraced house in the Quarr. He knew because one of his fellow colliers had pointed it out to him. He remembered Mr Edwards’ advice.

  “Aim as high as you like, Richard, there’ll be nothing to hold you back in Russia except the limit of your ambition.”

  The only limit was his dreams and as his mother had said, he was good at building castles in the air. Would he – could he – ever buy himself a mansion like this?

  He undressed, and pulled on his nightshirt. Loath to blow out the candle he continued to absorb his surroundings, the grand furniture, embroidered bedcover and curtains and gold-framed pictures. So differe
nt from anything he’d seen before, let alone been close enough to touch.

  He moved the candle alongside the books, crawled between the thick linen sheets, arranged the eiderdown on top, and reached for Robert Hunt’s The Mineral Statistics of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.

  The house closed around him, its atmosphere and smell very different from the stagnant taint of foul water that had hung over the court. The overwhelming scent was of honey with hints of Christmas spices.

  Small noises reverberated outside his door, new, strange, yet comforting. Doors closing; footsteps on the stairs; whispers of conversation that brought the assurance he was among friends. He read until his eyelids grew heavy, made a note of the page number and closed the book. He was disturbed by a tap at the door.

  ‘It’s me, Anna. Can I come in, Richard?’

  ‘Is something wrong?’

  ‘No.’ Anna entered in her nightgown a woollen shawl Sarah had given her draped around her shoulders. ‘When I peeked out and saw the light under your door, I knew you’d still be awake.’

  ‘Everything here is so different from Merthyr it’s no wonder you can’t sleep.’

  She sat on the bed. ‘I’m glad you’re here.’

  ‘Homesick?’

  ‘Not for Merthyr, but Mam, and the boys.’

  ‘Those days, like our old home, have gone, Anna. We won’t forget Mam but there’s no going back. Just as there was no going back to Dad or our house in Treforest. As for the boys, we’ll send for them as soon as we’ve earned enough to rent a house of our own. We might even earn enough to go back and fetch them …’

  ‘No!’

  ‘If you’re thinking about the Paskeys, whether they’re in gaol or not, they’re a thousand miles away. We won’t see them again.’

  She shuddered. ‘We would if we went back. ’

  He held out his arm and she leaned against his chest.

  ‘Here, you’re freezing, get under this eiderdown.’ He lifted it over her, so she was lying on top of the sheet he was under but beneath the bedcover. ‘Do you want to talk?’

  She shook her head. ‘Can I stay? Just a little while? Please?’

  ‘Having a room to yourself takes some getting used to after sharing a sleeping shelf, doesn’t it?’