‘What a clever idea,’ she exclaimed, and received another round of smiles and nods from the old folk, who didn’t understand her words, but were watching her expression carefully. ‘I suppose they decide who gets the best place by seniority.’
‘I suppose so,’ said the Countess indifferently, and Anne thought how much more she would have enjoyed this visit with the Count, who would have told her all manner of fascinating things. It was hard not to think disloyal thoughts about her mistress when in so many small ways she proved herself unworthy of her master.
The samovar was steaming, and soon the tea was brought and handed round with more nods and smiles. Anne essayed a sentence of thanks in Russian, which seemed to go down well. The Countess said something in which Anne distinguished the words barishnya and Angliskaya, and understood herself to be being explained to the inmates, and there were cries of enlightenment and renewed welcome before everyone settled down again to watch the great ladies drink their tea.
The tea seemed to revive the Countess. After the first few sips, she stopped staring blankly at the wall and looked at Anne a little hesitantly.
‘I seem to have behaved rather badly,’ she said. ‘I’m very sorry you have had a soaking for my foolishness.’
Anne was astonished to receive an apology, and it took a moment for her to assemble the right thing to say. ‘Please – I don’t mind in the least. I’m always doing things and thinking better of them later.’ That didn’t sound quite right, and she added hastily, ‘I mean, you weren’t to know there would be a storm.’
The Countess actually smiled, the first frank and natural smile Anne had ever received from her. ‘Oh, but I knew perfectly well there would be a storm. I wanted to get wet. But I shouldn’t have made you suffer too.’
‘I’m not suffering,’ Anne said. ‘I’m seeing the inside of an izba – is that right? And I enjoyed the ride. But I wonder why you didn’t go out alone, if you felt like that?’
‘I thought… ’ The Countess hesitated, and then shrugged. ‘I have been very much alone this last year, while Nikolai has been away. At home I always had my sisters to talk with. And now I thought – I hoped – that perhaps I could talk to you.’
Anne felt a rush of renewed shame at the unkind private thoughts she had been harbouring. ‘Of course, if you wish,’ she said, and then, thinking it sounded churlish, she added, ‘I should be honoured by your confidence.’
There was a silence, as the Countess arranged her thoughts, and then she said hesitantly, ‘I was upset, this morning, you see. I suppose you guessed that. That’s why I wanted to ride out. I had to get away. It’s foolish, but… when I am troubled, the only thing I want to do is to saddle Iskra and gallop and gallop.’ Anne thought of the Count’s sharp words she had overheard, and felt embarrassed. It would not do for the Countess to confide anything of too intimate a nature to her.
‘I can understand that. And I guessed you were a little – unhappy,’ she said cautiously.
It seemed to breach the dam. ‘Unhappy? Yes, yes, that’s the word! Unhappy, and afraid. Unhappy because I’m afraid. Nikolasha says it’s stupid, and I can see that to him it must seem so, but he does not know – he cannot know. He thinks her the model of womanhood.’
Her? Anne thought. Oh God, am I to hear of some affaire she has discovered? No, no, it couldn’t be. He would never do such a thing. ‘Who, madame?’ she asked bravely.
‘His mother,’ the Countess said, and gave a groan as if speaking the word had been a relief. ‘Vera Borisovna, the Dowager Countess Kirova! How she hates me!’
Anne glanced anxiously at the peasants, for the Countess’s voice was vehement, but she intercepted the glance and said, ‘Oh it’s all right, they don’t understand French. Nikolai had a letter from her this morning to say she is coming to stay, and that was what began it all.’ She stared at her hands. ‘You can’t imagine’, she went on in a lower voice, ‘how she terrifies me. She criticises everything I do, and finds fault, and asks me questions only to catch me out. She did not want Nikolasha to marry me. She thought I was unworthy to take the place of the woman she chose for him, and she makes me know it all the time. That was why she took Sergei away, to show me I was not fit to bring up her grandson. But of course,’ she added despairingly, ‘Nikolai never realises any of that. To him she speaks politely about me, even praises me. He never hears that she is being ironic.’
‘I’m surprised,’ Anne said. ‘I thought him a sensitive man.’
The Countess looked up. ‘All men are blind when it comes to their mother. You will learn that one day.’ She sighed. ‘Besides, she brought him up alone from an early age, after his father died, so her influence with him is very great. He thinks her a saint. He can’t see–’ She stopped abruptly and relapsed into silence.
Anne looked at the averted profile, half wishing the Countess had not confided in her, for it gave her something else to complicate her feelings. One part of her sympathised, as woman to woman, able easily to imagine how difficult a predicament it must be, and how impossible it would be to persuade any man that his mother was not as he thought her; another part felt that she would have managed somehow to get on with Vera Borisovna, or at least have explained matters to the Count so as to win his support. It seemed to her poor-spirited to be so upset over the attitude of someone who at most would be inflicted on one for a few weeks of the year; and then she looked at the unhappy droop of the Countess’s mouth and remembered the Count’s harsh words, and was angry with him for being so unfeeling towards one whom it was his duty to protect and support.
‘Have you tried to explain to him how you feel?’ Anne said at last.
‘Oh yes. But it makes him angry. He wants me to welcome his mother when she visits, and I try to, but it isn’t enough because he knows it isn’t from the heart. He should never have married me,’ she added in a small, sad voice. ‘There was no need. He already had a son, and my dowry was nothing, nothing.’
Anne forced herself to speak. ‘You mustn’t say that. He married you because he wanted to. He loves you, madame, surely you know that?’
She glanced up. ‘Do you think so? I wonder sometimes. I am not clever like you, and he has always admired intellectual women.’
Oh this was bitter! It was so innocently spoken. ‘He loves you, I’m sure of it. I’ve – I’ve seen the way he looks at you. Truly, I could not be mistaken.’
The Countess drew a small sigh. ‘Thank you,’ she said, and then, ‘Thank you for letting me talk to you like this. You cannot know what a comfort it is to have a female companion again. Oh, Fräulein Hoffnung is a kind woman, but she is not a companion, and besides, she is Nikolasha’s, to the bottom of her heart, not impartial, like you.’ Anne said nothing. ‘I am so glad you have come to us, Anna Petrovna. Glad for Lolya, but more glad for me.’
Anne tried to crush the feelings down and speak evenly. Perhaps this was to be her punishment for the sins of thought she had committed, to be the friend and confidante of the woman she had wronged in her mind. ‘I have everything to thank you for, madame, You have been kind and generous to me,’ she said with an effort.
‘Please, call me Irina Pavlovna. But not when my mother- in-law is within hearing,’ she added with a faint smile. ‘Will you help me prepare for her visit? There will be a great deal to do. Vera Borisovna always expects everything to be up to Petersburg standards, even in the country. I suppose we will have to have a formal dinner and a ball.’