The Star of Kazan

‘Well, of course it was tissue-paper snow, but it looked wonderful. We were touring Moscow and St Petersburg and I was the Spirit of Winter. The Russians stamped and shouted and cheered. They love it when it begins to snow – it makes the streets so quiet, the horses’ hoofs are muffled and there are sledges everywhere. A count who lived in a wooden palace in the middle of a forest gave a great banquet for us. He was mad but so generous – he gave me an emerald pendant, which had belonged to his grandmother. The Star of Kazan, it was called.’

‘Were there wolves?’

‘We didn’t see any, but we heard them – and when we arrived it was dusk and there was a whole line of the count’s servants with lighted flares to lead us up the drive and welcome us.’

Her eyes closed. She began to snore, and her mouth went slack, but it didn’t matter any more. Annika was looking at a friend.

Then she woke as suddenly as she had slept.

‘The world was so beautiful in those days, Annika. The music, the flowers, the scent of the pines . . .’

‘It still is,’ said Annika. ‘Honestly, it still is.’

C

HAPTER

S

IX

T

HE

S

TAR OF

K

AZAN

Summer was now well under way. The geraniums in Ellie’s window boxes had to be watered twice a day, the cats lay in the shade of the cafe awning, and were shooed away, and came back . . .

At the opera, the season was nearly over, and Annika was sent out to buy the roses that Uncle Emil always sent, at the last performence, to a lady in the chorus called Cornelia Otter, whom he had admired for many years.

Professor Julius was relabelling the collection of rocks in his study, helped by Sigrid, who stood beside him with a duster looking sour, because it is not at all easy to dust rocks. Professor Gertrude was having trouble with her harp sonata and kept to her room, dabbing lavender water on to her temples to help her think.

But when she went to visit the Eggharts’ great-aunt in her stuffy attic, Annika was in a different world.

‘I was La Rondine for several years. The Little Swallow. There were pictures of me everywhere and people gave me such presents . . . Once a posy of flowers was brought on to the stage for me, and when I took it it seemed to be covered with drops of dew. But they weren’t drops of dew, they were diamonds . . . A banker sent them, just to say thank you. And a marquis gave me a priceless brooch in the shape of a butterfly. People were like that in those days; so generous – and so rich. My jewels were famous. I could have bought horses and carriages and mansions if I’d sold them, but they were friends, I loved them.’ She turned her head. ‘It’s true what I’m telling you,’ she said anxiously.

‘Of course it’s true.’

‘Anyway I was too busy – with my work . . .’

‘With strewing,’ said Annika, who liked that word particularly.

‘Yes. Not only, of course. I danced and sang too, but every time at the end of the show there had to be a number where I was hoisted up high and scattered things. The stage hands used to get quite cross, sweeping up roses, sweeping up daffodils, but the audience insisted. We toured all the big cities . . . we even went to London.’ She paused and stretched out her hand for the glass of water and Annika helped her to drink.

‘And then something happened,’ she went on.

Annika put her hand over her mouth. ‘You fell?’

‘I fell all right, but not off the swing. I fell in love. Oh my goodness how I fell! He was a wonderful man . . . a painter . . . and when he smiled . . . Ah well, you’ll know one day.’

‘Did you get married?’

‘No. But I gave up the stage. I gave up everything and went to live with him in the most beautiful place in the world.’

‘Where’s that?

‘It’s called Merano. It’s a village in the South Tyrol, in the Dolomites; it’s where the mountains come down to shelter the valley. There are vineyards everywhere and flowers, and orchards full of fruit – and when you look up there are the great peaks, which turn to rose when the sun sets.’

‘Yes, I know about that. It’s called Alpengluhen.’

She nodded. ‘Yes. His house was a little yellow villa halfway up the mountain, smothered in wisteria and jasmine, with a blue balcony where we had our meals. You must go there one day. You’ll know it because it has a tiny clock tower with a weathervane shaped like a crowing cock.’

She groped for her handkerchief, then shook her head impatiently. ‘I’m not sad. It’s good to remember. We lived there for ten years and I was so happy. Not famous now . . . but my goodness, so happy! Then he was killed in a climbing accident. He was trying to help someone who was trapped on an ice ledge.’

She stopped and Annika got up from her chair.

‘You’ll want to rest now.’