“And how do you answer to this?”
“It would be a comfort.”
“Answer in a respectful manner. Are you mad or no?”
She looked up at him. “My reason tells me that my husband and child are dead. I long for less reason.”
The judge nodded slowly as she spoke, but it was impossible to read in his face the meaning of these nods.
“Do you understand that should this court find against you, you will not be permitted to marry again? Further, that you shall be remanded to the custody of your nearest relations, and to them shall also go whatever property you may own?”
“It’s no matter.” She turned and looked directly at her mother and Nadya. “They may have whatever they ask. I do not want it.”
“So it seems. Gospodin Sudakov here claims that you have already given the bulk of your property to beggars.”
She nodded.
“And are you aware that there is a law against almsgiving?”
She nodded again.
“How do you explain yourself, then?”
There was another long silence.
“You will answer the court.”
Xenia looked on him wearily. “I did it that I might give my husband’s soul rest. And mine also. But God will not bargain for so little.”
“The law is in place to protect Her Imperial Majesty’s subjects from charlatans who would prey on their sympathies.”
“That your son died was not her fault,” Xenia answered. “Her prayers for his soul were well worth thirty kopeks.”
The judge was surprised from his dignity. He looked her up and down with undisguised confusion, and an emotion burbling beneath his features threatened to unseat him. He waved the clerk to him. There was a whispered exchange between them that somehow also concerned the person of Kuzma Zakharovich.
At last having satisfied himself, the judge put on again his formal demeanor. He did not look again at Xenia.
“The court cannot condone the breaking of its laws. But if it were to declare mad all those who breached this law, the monasteries should overflow with half of Russia.
“Her speech shows reason, and I can find no cause to declare her
With that, we were dismissed from his presence and other petitioners ushered in behind us.
As we made our way through the anteroom, Kuzma Zakharovich was philosophical. “It is true what they say. Tell God the truth, but give the judge money.”
“You might have thought of this before,” Nadya said.
“I was given assurances.” Kuzma Zakharovich shook his head. “By Prince Tatishchev himself.”
“Perhaps the Prince cares less for your welfare than you believe.”
At this, Xenia suddenly clutched her sister by the arm and said, “Your husband still lives and wants only your tenderness. Thank God for His mercy!”
Nadya wrenched herself from Xenia’s grasp. “You! I will not be preached to by you!” Her harshness caught even the attention of the residents, who left off their other diversions. I was reminded of the festival crowds that stop before a puppet theatre in the street to see Petrushka and his foes knock each other about the head.
“Collect yourself,” Aunt Galya said. She then took Xenia’s arm and with her free hand turned her daughter’s face to meet hers. “You said you would part with whatever we asked. So I will ask it: give up your people and your house, and I shall care for you.”
Xenia met her mother’s gaze. “If my peasants wish to serve you, they may. But the house is Dasha’s. It is my wedding gift to her.”
Aunt Galya turned on me, her voice brittle with suspicion. “What is this?”
“I do not know.”
“Have you schemed behind my back? After the love I have shown you?”
Someone in the crowd jeered and said I needed whipping.
“I do not deserve to be used so poorly,” she said.
I protested my innocence, but she shook me off, fury blooming in her cheeks. “Do not compound your sin with more lies.”
The Musico’s Wife
Chapter Eleven
We returned from the courthouse even poorer than we had been. The judge had granted Xenia control over what little remained of her estate but at the cost of her family’s protection. She, in turn, had bequeathed me this same house as a wedding gift—and with it the enmity of the person charged with finding me a husband. Mine had been a lost cause well before this—I was then nearly twenty-five, well beyond the age of a bride—but I could no longer pretend otherwise.
In short, because it was untenable for us to remain as we were, two women alone and without means or prospects, I devised the only plan I could think of, that we should go to the country and live again under my father’s roof. I wrote to him asking that he take us in.
Xenia did not like my plan, though.
“Where shall they go if the door is locked against them?” she asked me.
I explained that Marfa would go to live with her brother; Ivan and his son, Grishka, to the village where he was born; Masha would be coming with us.
“And the rest?”
“Who?”
“All the others.” There was no one unaccounted for. She gestured at the window. “Them.”
I understood. She meant the beggars. I answered that they would be taken care of.
She looked at me as though this untruth was a visible blemish on my nose.
“You cannot provide for all the poor, Xenia. You cannot even look after yourself.”
“I do not matter,” she countered. “But if you stayed here, you might look after them.”
“And how shall I do that? I do not have even a kopek to my name.”
“God is bringing a husband for you. Then you shall want for nothing.”
I could bear it no more. I broke into sobs, and once I had started could not stop myself. Xenia patted and stroked my head, but this only loosened my grief further. I was alone and unloved. Only Xenia remained, murmuring in my ear that my husband was coming. But she, too, was gone. Bereft, I exhausted myself in tears.
Masha entered to say that Gaspari was downstairs. I had no desire to be seen in such a state, but neither would I send away our last friend in the city. “Say that I shall be down presently.” I splashed water on my face, then gathered myself together and went downstairs.
He met me with such a look of sorrow that I suspected Masha had already told him our news. But no, he was only mirroring what he found in my face.
“The court has sent away Xenia Grigoryevna?”
“It is not the court’s doing, but we must leave nonetheless.”
I told him all that had occurred at the courthouse, and what I had written to my father.
