‘Is that true then?’ Artyom teased him. ‘Or is your mother puffing you up?’

  ‘I can barely speak Russian. Mama and I always speak French together.’

  Artyom flicked away an ant which was scurrying over his knee. ‘Have you heard anything from your older brother at all?’

  ‘Not for ages.’

  ‘Not a letter or anything?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘No more have I. It’s a pity how Alyosha has cut himself off from his family. After all, we’re all that he has… the people who care about him.’

  Georgik winced, and buried his personality deeper under layers of shyness.

  ‘I know your mother worries terribly about him. Though we all have the right to live our own lives, I suppose.’ He flicked another ant from his sleeve. ‘If he insists on ploughing his own furrow, who are we to tell him differently? He’s a grown man, after all.’

  Artyom smiled at a sudden memory. ‘I remember Christmas of 1916. I drove the whole way from Paris back home to Petrograd. You were just a baby back then.’

  A shy smile crossed the boy’s face.

  ‘How old would you have been, Gosha?’

  ‘Christmas 1916? I was barely a year old, Uncle Artyom.’

  ‘And your brother? What would he have been? Twelve? Thirteen?’

  ‘Thirteen.’

  ‘Ah yes, thirteen.’

  He shook his head in wonder. ‘Thirteen! Good grief! So Alyosha must be… what? Twenty-six?’

  ‘Almost.’

  ‘Who would have thought? Doesn’t time run away with us without us noticing? Still, it’s all ahead of you, of course. You’re a blank slate without a scratch yet, Gosha. Though this old world has a habit of leaving its scars on you quicker than you might imagine.’

  The boy didn’t find this line of talk very interesting, though he didn’t have the gumption to change the subject.

  ‘I must have a picture of Christmas 1916 somewhere. I photographed the entire family with a brand new camera. Your parents, grandparents, your brother. Everybody together. Have you seen it?’

  The boy blushed again, even deeper this time, and shook his head.

  ‘There was so much snow outside, it reflected the sun, and the light flooded into the house. Your grandparents… I don’t suppose you even remember them? After the Revolution, they chose to stay in Russia, though I’d gone to considerable trouble in Paris to arrange visas for them – I had to pay quite a premium for them, with so many people trying their best to get their nearest and dearest safely out of Russia. My father was the problem, Changed his mind at the last minute. Home was his place, he said. At the time, I was furious. I remember sending them a rather peevish telegram. I know Mama would have come away in a heartbeat if it had been up to her. Your grandfather could be a stupid old fool at times.’ He smiled. ‘Mind you, he was a fine hunter in his day, loved to shoot wild ducks, in particular. When I was a boy, about the same age as you are now, I used to go out with him sometimes to Ladoga Lake. Just the two of us, spending whole afternoons lying on our stomachs in the rushes.’

  Like most boys in their teens, Georgik didn’t have the slightest interest in hearing this kind of reminiscing. Time gone by was time gone by. Another age, full of people he barely knew and people who were already dead. He found it all so boring. Artyom realised this and changed the subject.

  ‘Look, as your mother isn’t here…’

  He held out a little grey parcel.

  ‘Something for you. A very special gift from your old uncle, all the way from a little place I know about in Montmartre.’

  He gave it to his nephew with a wink.

  ‘Don’t you mention a word to your mother mind. If she finds out, I’ll swear till I’m blue in the face that it was nothing to do with me.’

  He winked again.

  ‘Thank you,’ the boy answered insipidly.

  ‘Aren’t you going to open it?’

  The door opened, and Inessa walked in with her fiancé.

  ‘Gosha, my love, go and fetch me a glass of something cold before I expire. Tomya darling, you’re here.’

  They kissed each other’s cheeks.

  ‘Mmmm. You smell of the sun. Such a good smell. Did Georgik look after you? Gosha, I hope you made your uncle feel at home.’

  ‘Yes Mama,’ he answered meekly.

  ‘What’s that you’re holding behind your back?’

  ‘Nothing,’ he mumbled, and went to fetch the drink.

  ‘I’m sorry I wasn’t here when you arrived, Artyom, but I’d already arranged to meet…’

  She turned and gestured at the tall man by her side.

  ‘Tomya, this is Philippe – Philippe, this is my brother, Artyom.’

  They shook hands.

  ‘It’s a pleasure to meet you,’ said Artyom.

  ‘The pleasure really is all mine,’ Philippe said. ‘I’ve heard rather a lot about you.’

  28.

  ‘What? Your sister and her fiancé? That’s your surprise?’

  Zepherine was holding up a pair of earrings to her ears appraisingly.

  ‘You’ve brought me all the way from Paris to Monte Carlo to spend the evening with them?’ she pouted.

  ‘Tomorrow is when I give you your surprise. Tonight, we’re celebrating Inessa and Philippe’s engagement.’

  ‘I just hope this one is better than the last one. Why does she go for such awful types?’

  ‘We don’t know what type Philippe is.’

  ‘What is she doing here, anyway?’

  ‘I told you, celebrating her engagement.’

  ‘Pah!’

  ‘Why the scorn?’ he raised his eyes from the Carte Bécherel he was reading naked on the bed.

  ‘Your sister gets engaged more often than I change my stockings.’

  Artyom caught a fleeting expression in her eyes: something between anger and a deep unhappiness.

  ‘How many men has she been with since that idiotic husband of hers left her?’

  ‘Remember that you’re talking about my sister,’ Artyom chided her. ‘However foolish she may have been, she’s my flesh and blood, and always will be.’

  ‘She’s not much of a sister to you,’ Zepherine persisted. ‘It’s always you who has to rescue her out from whatever hole she’s managed to dig herself into.’

  She turned to face Artyom with one earring dangling and the other still in her hand.

  ‘You haven’t paid for her to stay at this hotel, I hope?’

  He shut the book with a snap. He certainly wasn’t going to admit that he’d bought his sister an apartment.

  ‘Oh, Artyom, you’re such a fool…’

  ‘I haven’t paid for her to stay in the hotel, no.’

  ‘I’m not sure I believe you…’

  There was a light knock on the door. Artyom wouldn’t have bothered to throw a towel over his lap if Zepherine hadn’t glared at him.

  ‘Enter.’

  The two nursemaids had brought Bibi and Karina in to say goodnight to their parents.

  ‘Good night, my darlings.’ Zepherine kissed her daughters tenderly on their foreheads. Their hair was still damp from their bath, and they smelled heavenly.

  ‘Good night, chicks.’ Artyom patted Bibi on her head and ran his little finger along Karina’s cheek, before the nursemaids took them off to bed.

  ‘We should probably think about dressing,’ Artyom said, and promptly lit himself a cigar. ‘We shouldn’t keep Inessa and Philippe waiting.’

  Zepherine saw him examining his groin intently.

  ‘I have a grey hair just here.’

  ‘You’re growing old.’

  He showed her. ‘Look…’

  Zepherine took her scissors and cut the hair out. ‘Oh but you have another one… here… and here…’ she said, snipping them away.

  ‘Do you still like it? Why don’t you make it hard?’

  Zepherine opened the blades of her scissors and balanced his penis between them.

  ‘This is what you deserve really.’

  They looked at each other for a moment, then Artyom leant towards her and kissed her lightly on her forehead, before going to the bathroom to run himself a bath. Zepherine heard him close the taps, test the temperature, and then step in, whistling to himself. She heard him add more water every now and again.

  ‘Why don’t you come in with me?’

  She looked at herself in the mirror. Did it show on her face that she’d been crying? Her shoulders slumped forward; she felt like weeping all over again.

  ‘Zephie?’

  ‘No.’

  She should really have cut his cock off when she had the chance. Earlier that day, Zepherine had come back to the Hôtel Metropole for lunch after a morning of shopping. As she gave her bags to a bellboy to take up to her room, the young man at the reception, in his light-blue suit and pink tie, waved at her discreetly to catch her attention. She went over, and he gave her an envelope: a letter from Paris addressed to Artyom. Zepherine wouldn’t have thought twice about it, but on the way to her room, she caught an elusive trace of a perfume that was not her own. She waited impatiently for the boy to deposit her bags by the chaise longue, and the minute the door had shut behind him, she ripped open the envelope.

  It was a short note, but unambiguous.

  ‘I will love you forever. P.’

  She looked and looked again at that single initial.

  Who was she? This P, who was going to love Artyom forever?

  Zepherine felt her heart die inside her.

  29.

  As they descended the white stairs outside the Hôtel Metropole, a balmy Monte Carlo evening welcomed them. Zepherine was not in the mood to enjoy herself, let alone celebrate the engagement of a women she had never been able to take to. Somehow, though, the night turned out far better than she’d imagined. Even the letter, which she hadn’t shown Artyom, faded from her mind. New company always succeeded in taking Zepherine out of herself.

  On the terrace of the Hôtel de Paris, Inessa introduced Philippe to her. Artyom pretended that this was the first time he had set eyes on the man. On the horizon, the sun slipped lazily into the sea as the champagne arrived, and Artyom toasted the happy couple.

  ‘To Inessa and Philippe!’

  Inessa and Philippe didn’t let go of each other’s hands, even as they clinked glasses.

  It was a sultry evening out on the terrace, and the air was redolent with the scent of the flowers in front of the Casino. They smoked their cigarettes and cigars, they sipped their champagne, Zepherine admired the ring, Inessa asked after Bibi and Karina, and Zepherine asked after Georgik, who had been playing tennis all day.

  Philippe was two yards tall, and although he was middle-aged, he had a young, scrubbed face, with a good head of dark hair and a neat moustache. When he spoke, his voice was slightly nasal, but there was something charming about the way he was ready to laugh at the smallest excuse, and he seemed to have a natural joie de vivre. From the way he’d look across at Inessa every so often, it was clear that he adored her.

  Inessa was telling her brother and Zepherine how they’d met.

  ‘I had an audition for a show they were putting on at the Odéon in Paris…’

  They were going to stage a new translation of an American play, a musical with a chorus line. She’d sung her two prepared songs, and when she’d finished, a faceless voice from the darkness had thanked her and told her they’d let her know. Of course, they never did let you know unless you were successful, so after a fortnight, she’d known she hadn’t been picked.

  ‘So much for that…’

  Inessa squeezed Philippe’s hand as he smiled at her, and resumed her story. A few days later, she’d happened to be having her hair trimmed at Valentin’s salon on the Rue Royal, and told the young girl who was cutting her hair about her disappointment. She’d been very sympathetic, and had assured her that her luck was sure to turn, but Inessa hadn’t felt very hopeful. While she’d been waiting for her hair to dry, she’d flicked through a copy of Figaro, and read about a newly established drama company, whose first production was to be a comedy called L’Argent n’a pas d’Odeur. But what had attracted Inessa’s attention had been that two Russian exiles – Georges Piteor and his wife Ludmilla – were part of the venture. She’d known their names from the magazines she’d used to read back in Petrograd. At one time, the two of them had worked for the Moscow Art Theatre, under Stanislavskii.

  She’d contrived, through a mutual acquaintance, to have herself invited to supper. The only other faces Inessa had recognised around the table that evening had been the actors Marcel Herrand and Paulette Pax. It had become clear before the first course had been cleared away that they were far more concerned with trying to extract as much gossip as possible from her about her ex-husband, Alexei Alexeivich Dashkov, than in getting to know her. They’d been pruriently interested in the ins and outs of his sex life, and the circumstances surrounding his mysterious death a few months previously in Hollywood. They’d quizzed her relentlessly about the truth of various rumours that had been swirling around; had the press exaggerated the scandals in order to sell more copies? Inessa hadn’t had the slightest desire to discuss him, and had been rather offended, so she’d turned to speak to the person by her side. That had happened to be Philippe, and he’d begun to tell her about the idea he had of establishing a truly multilingual theatre company.

  ‘It’s the only way forward in the Europe of today,’ Philippe interjected. ‘Artists of different countries coming together to form a group and working together in a spirit of fraternalism – a sort of theatrical United Nations.’

  ‘I told him I thought that would be my ideal company,’ Inessa told her brother and her sister-in-law, ‘and he told me I was his ideal woman!’

  ‘But in which language do you perform?’ asked Artyom. ‘French?’

  ‘And Spanish, Italian, German, English and Russian…’ Philippe replied.

  ‘But it’s in Paris you’ll be performing mainly?’ asked Zepherine rather impatiently.

  ‘We intend touring as much as we can, all over Europe,’ answered Philippe.

  30.

  In the baccarat room at the casino, Zepherine found a stool to watch the gambling, while Artyom went to buy chips for everybody. The gamblers were mostly elderly people: dinner-jacketed men with their bushy side-whiskers, and women in their old-fashioned floor-length evening dresses and white gloves, exposing the tired flesh of their upper arms, which hung loosely from their bones. They seemed so still and lifeless to her, their attitude to losing so impassive compared with the speedy cheerfulness of the young croupiers, lean young men with their hair plastered down with grease, so that they all looked identical.

  Inessa wanted to try her luck at the roulette table, so the four of them made their way into the main salle de jeu and took their places along the mahogany gaming table. In no time, their drinks were placed discreetly at their sides: gin and it for the women, whiskey and soda for the men. Inessa announced that she only ever bet on single figures, so Zepherine put her chips on the doubles. The ladies had soon lost all their chips, Philippe took a little longer, but Artyom was on a winning streak.

  ‘Why don’t you stop while you’re ahead?’ suggested Zepherine as he put a sizeable bundle of chips down. ‘Isn’t that what the professionals do?’

  Inessa, ever the contrarian, urged him to try his luck one more time.

  Zepherine scowled at her suggestion, and squeezed his elbow. ‘Cash them in. Buy me a nice surprise. Something to remember Monte Carlo.’

  ‘You’ll be having your surprise tomorrow.’

  Artyom was staring at the wheel.

  ‘Go on, Tomya,’ Inessa was urging him. ‘You’re on a run.’

  The croupier called for the table to place their bets.

  ‘I just know you’re going to win, something is telling me you will…’

  He put all his chips on number three.

  ‘I’m feeling lucky tonight,’ Artyom said, kissing a fuming Zepherine.

  The croupier spun the wheel around. The ball whirled around, before starting to rattle and click, and finally bounced once, twice, thrice before coming to a stop.

  On number three.

  Zepherine leapt up from her chair, clenched her hands in triumph, and brought them up to her mouth. ‘You’ve won!’

  Inessa stood up and said, ‘What did I say?’

  Philippe shook Artyom’s hand. ‘Congratulations.’

  31.

  It was a muggy evening on the terrace of Les Frères Provençaux. Zepherine’s back was uncomfortably sticky, and her cheeks were too hot, even though she fanned herself with the menu, as she discussed her two little girls with Philippe. The brother and sister were talking together.

  ‘I’m so happy, Tomya,’ Inessa said. ‘Happier than I’ve been in a very long time.’

  Artyom told her he was delighted for her.

  ‘You’re obviously happy too. How could you not be, now that you’re doing so well on the stock exchange? Who would have thought you would be so good at it? To accumulate such a fortune in such a short space of time. You’ve learnt how to gamble…’

  Something Philippe had just said made Zepherine burst out laughing.

  ‘See how he charms everyone?’ Inessa smiled as she lit a cigarette. ‘He puts a smile on my face every day.’ She threw the match into the black water of the harbour below them. ‘He loves me… and I know that I love him.’

  ‘How can you be so certain after such a short time?’

  ‘What has time to do with love?’

  Artyom was curious to know whether Philippe had been married before, and whether he had any children, but he decided not to ask any more. On a night as magical and tender as tonight, such questions could wait.