White Ghosts

6. THE DIVORCEES

Tony Aulman had been right: the documents for the fake consulate weren’t difficult to arrange. All it took was a well-aimed bribe and an official-looking letter to the Foreign Affairs Office, and very soon one of the houses near the Tibet Road got a brand new polished plaque with the legend “The Consulate of the Czechoslovak Republic” engraved on it.

Nina was forbidden to mention the horrors she had experienced during the Bolshevik Revolution to anyone.

“In your situation,” Tamara said, “it’s not only senseless, but also harmful to seek sympathy. People are only able to feel sorry for you if they can imagine themselves in your shoes. You don’t clutch your head every time you hear about a hurricane in the West Indies, do you? Well, likewise, don’t expect any degree of compassion for your suffering during the revolution in Russia.”

“The real reason people don’t sympathize with us is because they know so little about us,” Nina said with vehemence. “And I can tell them a lot about what’s happened—”

“And your guests will decide you are one of the losers who lost their country to the Bolsheviks. The gentlemen from the Shanghai Club are convinced that if they had found themselves in the same position as your White Army officers, they would have seen off the Bolshevik riff-raff in a couple of months.”

“Anyone can win a war from the comfort of the smoking room in a gentleman’s club,” Nina said. “I’d like to see how these ‘armchair heroes’ would have fought without reinforcements, ammunition, or transportation.”

“And how do you think you are going to disabuse them of their puffed-up illusions?” said Tamara, smiling. “Believe me, you’d be much better off telling them tall stories about European aristocrats. That is a topic that is always in demand.”

Tamara had kept a lot of old Russian magazines from the pre-revolutionary era, and Nina spent hours studying the descriptions of diplomatic receptions and opening nights in Imperial theaters. Then she would rehearse them to herself in front of a mirror, using her newly-acquired English.

The High Society in One Hundred Years Time masquerade was a great success. Thanks to Tamara’s advice, Nina was judged by all to be a consummate and brilliant hostess. The Chinese government was missing customs duties for ten crates of champagne, and soon Don Fernando had given Nina her first share in the profit.

“Not bad for a party girl, heh? Keep dancing, and we’ll have ourselves a good little business.”

A couple of weeks later, Nina invited her new acquaintances to a Masquerade of Lookalikes, which was also a great success. Among the glittering array of guests were three black Florence Mills cabaret singers, two mustachioed Thomas Beecham orchestra conductors, four Mary Pickford Hollywood actresses, and one revolutionary Leon Trotsky who pestered the ladies by demanding that they give him their “bloody diamonds.”

Before each party, Tamara would set Nina an assignment to work on a special anecdote to drop into a conversation or to flirt with this or that gentleman. Tamara took infinite delight in making fools of her former friends.

Everything was going smoothly, but Nina felt no joy at her success. She was Tamara’s ‘kept woman.’ Nina’s white house, her furniture, and dresses all belonged to the Aulmans; her guests were Tamara’s friends, not hers. Worst of all Nina wasn’t even mistress of her own past anymore. On Tamara’s advice she told everyone that for the entire duration of the civil war in Russia, she had had been living in a grand hotel on Lake Geneva.

Thanks to an endless whirl of social events, her consulate was scarcely ever out of the limelight, and Nina shuddered at the thought that sooner or later, her cover will be blown.

“Do we really need to keep up the facade of the consulate for our parties anymore?” she asked Tamara. “Why don’t we keep the events going but just quietly close the consulate down?”

But her mistress rejected the idea outright. “Don Fernando sells your liquor to the Governor’s assistant. If there is no consulate and no cheap champagne, Tony will lose a very valuable friendship.”

Nina had got into the habit of wandering around antique shops. For her, beautiful trinkets were symbols of wealth and represented a confidence in the future. At Rue Montauban, she would buy smoke-colored watercolors, porcelain, and lacquer boxes, and the finest embroideries and perfume bottles made of green and white jade at the stores on the Broadway. Soon Nina’s house began to resemble a museum but it did not feel like home at all.

One day, Nina came to visit Tamara and noticed a new photograph on her bedside table. It was a picture of Tony Aulman and a blond gentleman wearing a yacht club sweater. The man was in profile, and Nina was immediately struck by his high forehead and chiseled jaw.

“Daniel Bernard is one of the most amazing people I’ve ever met,” said Tamara. “Did you know that China joined the Great War on the side of the Allies, and under that pretext, it confiscated the property of German and Austro-Hungarian citizens? The poor Germans were herded like cattle into barracks, and when the Spanish flu epidemic hit, our ‘patriotic’ doctors refused to lift a finger to help them. Only Mr. Bernard showed any decency and organized a temporary hospital for the sick. He is a Czech by nationality, and his nation had suffered from Austrian and German oppressors for centuries, but it didn’t stop him from being human and helping them in their misfortune.”

“It would be nice to meet such a person,” Nina said. “Let’s invite him to my party?”

“Daniel is currently out of Shanghai,” Tamara replied.

For no apparent reason, Nina’s acquaintances also began telling her about Mr. Bernard, and she learned that he was selling tea and Chinese art to Europe. His erudition and sophistication were combined with a number of manly passions, such as sports, politics, and hunting. He was an avid reader, a successful entrepreneur, and a keen philanthropist.

The more Nina learned about Daniel, the more often she would glance at the picture on Tamara’s bedside table. A strange chain of coincidences seemed to be bringing them together, she thought. She had come up with the Czechoslovak Consulate idea, and Daniel was a Czech. He had gone to Europe soon after she had arrived in Shanghai, as if deliberately to give her time to get herself back on her feet. He was a friend of the Aulmans, and she would have every opportunity to meet him through them. Nina had an inkling that her mistress wanted to bring her and Daniel together, and, for now, she was fine with the idea.

When Nina learned from the newspapers that Mr. Bernard was among the hostages on the Blue Express, she immediately called Tamara.

“What do you think will happen to him?” she asked, shocked at the thought that her fragile hope for personal happiness might be crushed.

“The Chinese will buy their relatives’ freedom, and the representatives of the Great Powers will negotiate the release of their subjects,” Tamara said unemotionally.

There was no one to stand up for Daniel Bernard, a Czechoslovak national.

Nina announced to Jiří that they were going to Lincheng. “We have to save your countryman.”

“Are you out of your mind?” he cried. “What can we do for him? And why?”

“Get ready, I said!”

Nina couldn’t wait for the Chinese authorities to eventually see through their scam or for Tamara to get bored of her little games. Daniel Bernard seemed to offer Nina’s her best chance to take her destiny into her own hands.

At Lincheng, all she found was chaos and filth, and they learned that hostage release negotiations could often run for months.

“I knew that our journey would be completely pointless,” Jiří kept saying.

I really have lost my mind, Nina had to admit. There is no Daniel Bernard. I must have imagined it all.

She spent a long time moping in her compartment, convinced that her life was essentially over. Her past no longer existed, she had no control over her present, and the only realistic future that awaited her was a Chinese prison and not some imagined romance with a rich handsome stranger.

Just when Nina thought things couldn’t get any worse, the electricity had failed. But as she descended the steps of her car, she was met by a man she had never imagined she would see again.

Klim woke up and discovered that Nina had moved to her bed; the couch had been too narrow for the two of them.

Outside, in the world beyond the window shade, bustle, voices, and the snorting of a steam engine could be heard. The sun was shining and the morning was in full swing. But here, in the cocoon of the compartment, a gentle restorative twilight still reigned.

Klim leaned on his elbow and drank in the sight of his sleeping wife. What incredible and improbable circumstances had thrown them together?

Strong, stunning, and impossible, Nina hadn’t changed an iota. The shadow of her eyelashes flickered imperceptibly, and the skin on her neck and rounded shoulder shone like a dusky and ethereal pearl.

Klim looked around him. Someone had paid for Nina’s luxury compartment, her perfume and outfits. Most likely, she had had a fight with her sugar daddy and decided to cheat on him to get her revenge. Meeting Klim had just provided her with the perfect opportunity. What role could he ever play in her current life? An occasional guest lover? The ring on her finger alone cost more than he could earn in six months.

Klim glanced at his watch and hurriedly started to dress. It was five to eight, and he was in danger of missing the meeting with Roy Andersen.

He took his suitcase from the luggage rack, slipped out of the compartment, and stopped for a second in the middle of the corridor. Should I wake Nina up? he thought. No, let her sleep. We can talk when I get back, and then what will be, will be.

He went out onto the platform and squinted in the bright May sun. People were rushing past in one direction as if hurrying to see a house on fire.

“Have you heard the news?” Ursula cried, rushing up to him. “Daniel Bernard has managed to escape from the bandits.”

“Edna’s husband?”

“Come quickly. He’s just about to recount his story to the press. He’s very fair, and his face became so severely sunburned that the bandits thought he had contracted a dangerous disease. So they left him for dead in the forest.”

There was a huge crush of people by the station building, but the guards were only letting journalists in. Klim entered the waiting room where a blond man was sitting in a dense circle of photographers and reporters. Daniel Bernard was dressed in dirty striped pajamas, someone else’s coat had been thrown over his shoulders. His face was a livid red, and the skin on his nose and forehead was peeling in small white scales.

Daniel Bernard was dead on his feet: he had been wandering the mountains for two days before he met a search party of soldiers who finally brought him to the station.

“The bandits lined us up in rows and drove us into the mountains,” he said. “But with three hundred of us, they had bitten off more than they could chew. We didn’t have any food or water supplies, and many of us didn’t even have shoes. The gentleman who was walking by my side knew the local dialect, and he overheard the bandits talking about letting the women and children go free. To their way of thinking, men are much more valuable hostages and can command much higher ransoms.”

Ursula was too small to be able to see Daniel from behind the scrum of other reporters. “The authorities have tried to provide the hostages food and water supplies through envoys,” she cried from behind the reporters’ backs. “Did anything get through?”

Daniel shook his head. “The bandits threw everything away except the canned stew. They thought that the food might contain sleeping drugs.”

“Do they have any political demands?” Klim asked.

“No. These villagers haven’t become robbers because of politics. It’s purely out of desperation. The local peasants have five to eight children and live in utter poverty because they have no land rights. The bandits are young men who can only provide for themselves by robbing others.”

At that moment a short plump man with a doctor’s bag under his arm rushed into the room, barging through the crowd. “Ladies and gentlemen, my name is Dr. Piper and I must insist that you leave Mr. Bernard alone immediately. He needs medical attention and rest.”

Klim and Ursula went off to the telegraph office to send their cables, but there was a huge queue, and they ended up waiting for hours.

“Edna is so lucky that her husband has managed to escape from the bandits,” Ursula kept saying.

Klim nodded, but he was thinking about something else. What if he was to offer Nina a fresh start in life? Would she agree? What if she had meant it when she had said that they couldn’t get a divorce?

After sending his telegram, Klim raced back to the station, but when he reached the platform, he didn’t recognize the place. There were only empty freight cars on the tracks.

“Where is the Shanghai train?” Klim asked a young Chinese dressed in a railway uniform.

He looked at him over his round glasses. “I’m sorry, sir. It left a long time ago.”

A woman always knows when intimacy with her becomes very special for a man and when he is overwhelmed with happiness just because he has had a chance to hold her in his arms. That was what had happened between Nina and Klim that night, and she was surprised that he had disappeared, without saying a word to her.

She was sitting by the window, waiting for him, but an hour passed, then another, and another—and still Klim hadn’t shown up. There could only be one possible explanation: he had wanted nothing but to teach Nina a lesson and show her what she had lost.

How could she have doubted Klim? In less than a half a year he had settled in Shanghai and, apparently, was making a much better job than his ne’er-do-well wife.

There was a knock on the door, and Nina sprang to her feet.

But it was only Jiří. “Daniel Bernard has just escaped from captivity,” he said, excitedly. “He’ll be traveling to Shanghai on our train.”

Utterly crushed, Nina sank back down on the couch. She no longer gave a damn about Daniel Bernard.

The attendant appeared at the end of the corridor. “Ladies and gentlemen, the train will be leaving in fifteen minutes. Please, have your return tickets ready.”

Nina looked at her watch. It was half past one. Klim was not about to return. He had, after all, said that he wanted a divorce.

“Are you all right?” Jiří asked, looking into her eyes.

“Let’s just go home,” Nina replied, barely audible.

Every now and then, Jiří would knock at Nina’s door and tell her about Daniel Bernard. First, he went to the dining car, and then the train master visited him, and after that—

Nina couldn’t stand it any longer and rushed to the open smoking area at the end of the last car, just to have a chance to be alone.

The wheels clattered rhythmically, and the wind eddied over the vast green fields of sorghum. Nina stood, clutching the handrail, and wept silently.

Eventually, her remorse gave way to anger. “We’ll see who wins,” she whispered. “And boy, are you going to regret it.”

The doors parted slightly. Nina turned her head and recoiled as a man with a red scaly face stepped into the smoking area. To top everything, this was the “prince” she had been dreaming of—Jiří had already told Nina about Daniel’s misadventures in the forest.

Daniel lighted his cigarette, and he and Nina stood in silence for a while. From time to time, she gave him a puzzled look. In real life, Mr. Bernard was an angular, disheveled man with a rather abrupt way of moving. He constantly shrugged his shoulders, and the hand that held his cigarette jerked upward every now and then.

He had been sneaking secret glances at Nina, too.

“You know, you have a remarkable complexion,” he said. “I’ve really never seen anything like it before.”

Nina looked at her reflection in the glass door and gasped: her face was as filthy as a chimney sweep’s. The handrail she had been clutching had been smeared in soot, and she had soiled her face while wiping away her tears.

“Why didn’t you tell me earlier?” she asked. “Do you have a handkerchief?”

Daniel smiled. “I do, but I daren’t give it to you. If you end up transforming yourself into a beautiful woman, I’d never be able to summon up the courage to talk to you. As things are, I think we rather complement each other. After all red and black do go rather well together.”

Nina was confused. Was he laughing at himself or her?

“We’ll just have to pass ourselves off as ‘a pair of rough diamonds,’” Daniel suggested. “Have you ever heard the story of the Imperial Seal of China?”

“Do you really have no one else to talk to?” Nina said, frowning.

Daniel shrugged. “I think I’d rather converse with you than the train master. He’s so dull, he could bore a man into an early grave. So I fear you have little choice but to listen to my story: A long time ago, a man called Bian He found a piece of jade in the hills and brought it to the king. Alas, the poor man was soon chased out of the palace without a word of thanks for his pains, his lump of jade tossed after him in contempt. When the king died, his younger brother ascended the throne, and Bian He repeated his long journey but again to no avail. Only the third king recognized the value of the treasure laid before him. Out of this stone, he ordered that a special ritual disc be made, known as bi, the symbol of the sky. It was so beautiful that it became an object of envy throughout China. Other rulers coveted it, and to obtain it, armies and even cities were lost. Many wars were waged for it and much blood shed for its sake. Long centuries passed, and the disc happened to fall into the hands of Qin Shi Huang, who turned it into the Heirloom Seal of the Realm. From that time forth, whoever possessed it was granted a mandate of power from the Heavens to rule the Empire. So the moral of my story is: Do not rush to reject a thing that might at first appear unsightly.”

Daniel was clearly referring himself, but for Nina it was another hint of her inability to see true value in people and things.

“What happened to the Seal afterwards?” she asked.

“For more than a thousand years, it passed from generation to generation, and then it disappeared under mysterious circumstances. The only thing that is certain is that the last two dynasties ruled without the Seal, and it all ended up with the collapse of the Empire.”

Daniel could talk endlessly about porcelain manufacturing, ancient scrolls, and China’s great libraries reduced to ashes by successive waves of barbarian invaders. His stories were so fascinating that Nina had even forgotten about the soot on her cheeks.

Two hours seemed to pass like a minute in his company, and she was amazed how quickly Daniel managed to win her over with his charm, wit, and erudition. She had always had a soft spot for self-confident, well-educated men with a delicious sense of self-irony.

But there was more to their meeting that just that. They were both in sore need of the balm that good company could provide to smooth over their recent troubles. Nina was desperate not to be left alone with her thoughts about Klim, and Daniel, it appeared, was just grateful to be alive and not brooding on the murders, the suffering, and the long hours of marching through the mountains. Now he could just smoke his cigarette and chat with a random fellow traveler about history and culture.

They agreed to have dinner together. Nina went to wash her face and came to the dining car a transformed woman.

“If the bandits hadn’t taken all my luggage,” Daniel said, “I would have made more of an effort to make myself presentable too. I had a remarkable German gas mask in my suitcase that I found at a flea market. I think it would have been just the thing to wear to dinner in polite company, considering the state of my face at the moment.”

Tamara was right: Mr. Bernard was an extraordinary man.

All the way to Shanghai, Nina and Daniel were almost inseparable, and they enjoyed every minute of each other’s company.

What if we are really fated to be together? Nina thought in dismay. She couldn’t imagine him as her lover, but she kept telling herself that his burnt face would heal up and that she’d get used to his strange gestures.

Finally, the train arrived at the North Station, and the passengers poured out onto the platform. Steam escaping from under the platform billowed onto the passengers’ feet. The crowd buzzed, the engines whistled, and the porters jostled from all quarters trying to attract the attention of their customers.

Nina had forgotten all the words she had wanted to say to Daniel before parting. He was silent, too, fiddling with her visiting card.

“It was a great pleasure meeting you—” he began, but at that moment a young lady in a checkered suit ran up to him.

“You’re alive!” she cried, throwing her arms around him.

Nina stared at her in amazement. Who on earth was this woman?

Daniel’s face didn’t betray the slightest emotion, as if he was at a business meeting.

“Edna, let me introduce you to Miss Nina Kupina. Nina, this is my wife, Edna.”

Nina was appalled. In her wild imaginings it hadn’t even occurred to her that there might already be a Mrs. Bernard.

Edna greeted Nina and immediately forgot about her existence. “Come on, the car is waiting for us,” she called to Daniel.

He followed his wife without a backward look, while Nina watched them go.

“Did Mr. Bernard forget to tell you that he was married?” Jiří asked as he stepped off the footboard of the railroad car. “How very ungentlemanly of him! But then I suppose you weren’t in any great hurry to tell him that you have a husband either?”

“One day I’m going to get rid of you for good, you clown!” Nina hissed through her teeth.

But Jiří only laughed. “You’ll just have to accept it. I’m the only man who is truly worthy of your rank. And unlike these fickle princes of yours, I’ll never abandon you.”