The Kindness of Enemies

1. SCOTLAND, DECEMBER 2010

I told Malak that I had seen, from the upstairs window, little islands of snow floating on the river. They must have fallen from the Grampians. We were sitting in the kitchen without the lights on, just the pale dawn from the window. Melting snow meant clearer roads. I could leave today and get to work. There was no excuse to stay here longer.

‘Would Oz like a lift to the university? I can wait for him to wake up.’ She agreed that it would be helpful, especially with the semester exams starting next week, and wrapped her shawl closer around her, held her mug with both hands. I was stalling for time, unloading the dishwasher, cleaning the coffee maker. Outside one side of the sky was completely dark, like it was still in night. But it would not be left in peace for much longer; daylight was ready to enter. If I looked closely I could see new vulnerable depressions in the snow, areas of relative warmth. The edges, too, were melting away, the solid mass shrinking. Yesterday evening I had offered to pay for my board and lodging but Malak refused. ‘We are happy to have you as a guest. We are enjoying your company.’ This was generous of her because I hadn’t really contributed anything; I should have, but I hadn’t, even offered to cook dinner. All I gave them was my interest in their past.

It had been a special evening, like a celebration of sorts, perhaps an unspoken agreement that it would be my last. Oz lit the fire and we sat on the cushions on the floor. I looked up at Shamil’s sword and down at the flames and I felt confident about my work, that I was on the right track, that I was worthy of my chosen subject. If I could get four papers on Shamil published in prestigious journals, I would have a bigger chance of promotion. I was saving too for a trip to Dagestan, to climb the Caucasus. ‘Come with me,’ I urged them both. The invitation tripped out spontaneously, so unlike me. I could tell by their eyes, by the way they exchanged glances that the idea piqued their interest.

Oz stood up and fetched his laptop. ‘Yes, let’s go this month, over the Christmas holidays. I’ll bet we can find cheap last-minute flights.’

‘It would be better to go in the spring,’ said Malak. ‘Early when the swallows fly back. There would be snow on the highlands, but the lowlands would be clear.’

‘Easter then,’ I said, my voice different with happiness. This would be my ultimate journey, my pilgrimage and they would lead me to Shamil, to knowing him better, to seeing the world through his eyes.

Oz, laptop on his crossed knees, was doing the research. He read out, ‘Tindi is a small picturesque aoul with a historic minaret, in the south-western mountains close to the Georgian and Chechen borders.’

‘That’s our place then,’ I said.

He kept on reading, ‘According to Wikivoyage, travel to Dagestan is extremely dangerous and strongly discouraged. And here’s the latest headlines: Russian security forces clash with militants in Dagestan, nine killed.’

This dampened us for the time being. I was and had always been a coward. Malak said there were plenty more ways to spend a holiday than courting danger. Only Oz, all bravado, still seemed keen. ‘You can’t believe everything you read,’ he argued. ‘Besides, we’re not tourists.’

‘What are you, Ossie?’ his mother smiled.

‘I won’t look out of place.’

‘You only have to open your mouth,’ she said. ‘Besides, your fancy trainers will give you away.’

He scowled at her. ‘I’ll get new ones from Primark.’

She laughed. ‘What a comedown!’

He was, I had noticed, proud of his clothes. But then many students nowadays were. They surprised me with their Uggs and Hunter wellies; their leather jackets and mobile accessories. The markets had them by the throat; they might be in debt, they were surely struggling, but they needed what generations before them had easily done without.

Perhaps if I wasn’t there they would have argued about his allowance. Instead Malak started to speak about her parents and grandparents; all those descendants of Shamil that history didn’t record. Stories that Oz hadn’t heard. It was a pleasure to watch a mother hand over strands of the family narrative to her son. She was talking to him as much as to me. ‘Our side of the family,’ she said, ‘followed the fatwa that with the collapse of Muslim rule in the Caucasus they should emigrate to the Ottoman Empire. Others stayed on and were deported by Stalin, and those who stayed struggled throughout Soviet rule. The mosques were shut down, it was forbidden to read or write Arabic and practising Islam had to be done in secret. Only the very tough could resist; most ordinary people lapsed. When I hear Muslims in the West complaining, I have no sympathy for them …’

Oz interrupted her, ‘Come on …’

‘I mean it,’ she said. ‘We have the freedom to practise and teach and bring up our children in our own faith. Can you imagine, Oz, what it is like when generation after generation grows up with all their Islamic teachings muddled up and pushed to the far side of memory? Snatches of verses here and there, a vague idea of Ramadan, no solid scholarship to back them, none of the blessing that comes from reciting the Qur’an. It is the biggest loss to become religiously illiterate, to be left without a choice. This is why my side of the family packed up and left. To spare themselves all this.’

I was surprised by her deeply held convictions. Too often she came across as malleable. Oz seemed surprised too but in a different direction. ‘You always said that your parents weren’t religious.’

‘They weren’t in the sense that you would understand it. My mother didn’t wear hijab, for example. But their faith mattered to them. I was the one who was the rebel. I ran away from home because I wanted to become an actor. I broke their hearts because I had grand ambitions.’

I would have liked her to say more but Oz stalled her with his question, ‘But they forgave you, didn’t they?’

‘Of course.’ She smiled at him. A smile I would always remember because of all that it held. ‘Parents will always forgive their children, no matter what.’

It mattered to him that she said that. I wondered what he had done wrong or what he considered to be wrong or what he believed would hurt her. I envied them the ease between them. I could not reconcile the idea of forgiveness with my own parents. With my mother who left my father for Tony. The sensibilities of 1980s Khartoum were mine against my will. That world where men owned the streets and women pretended to be shy even when they weren’t. That time and place where sparks flared up at the slightest provocation; where words like ‘betrayal’ and ‘disgrace’ undid lives. Over the years I had tried to rid myself of such baggage but never fully succeeded. I understood my father’s feelings of shame and, later, my own failed romantic attachments seemed like an apt punishment, because although I went through the motions, these casual relationships never felt right.

Nor could I reconcile the idea of forgiveness for my father whom I hadn’t seen in over a decade. He visited me once when I was in university. He came, he said, all the way from Khartoum especially to see me. I kept telling him I was busy with exams and I only met up with him twice. The first time he was waiting for me outside the library and I was ashamed to be seen with him around the campus. He was wearing flimsy clothes in one of the coldest springs, his English was rudimentary and I had, by then, almost forgotten my Arabic. So ironically my mother’s language became our only way to communicate. We must have looked weird. On the grounds of a Scottish university, an African father and a mixed-race daughter, dodging the rain and speaking Russian. I told him that my graduation was next week but I did not even ask about my grandmother or my old friends. There was only the resentment at his presence, the impatience to get rid of him. ‘I will attend your graduation ceremony,’ he said.

‘You can’t,’ I replied. ‘The seating is limited and I only have tickets for Mum and Tony.’

The second and last time we met he took me to lunch and I ate in silence, barely answering his questions. And yet on that occasion I was more relaxed; I even smiled at one of his jokes and noticed the new white in his hair. When he warmed up, he called my mother a whore and Tony a racist. ‘A thief,’ my father spat out, spittle flying from his mouth, who stole her away from him, as if she didn’t have a will of her own. As if she and I didn’t spend afternoons in Tony’s villa, me in the swimming pool hugging a Tweety inflatable ring, the chlorine jamming my nose and the two of them upstairs, behind a locked door with the air-conditioner humming. But I wouldn’t defend the indefensible; I tucked into my meatballs and left him to rant.

‘I should not have let you go with them,’ he repeated. ‘All my friends advised me to keep you but I didn’t listen.’

I sounded grown-up when I replied, ‘It’s been good for me to come here.’ I sounded confident, as if I had moved on and the past hardly mattered to me at all. I was doing well in my studies and this impressed him. He had little to offer me if I chose to return with him. Sudan was in a state of economic collapse, the civil war against the south was raging. He had, as expected, failed in every business venture he started — he had neither the necessary political connections nor the dogged perseverance — his was another brilliant mind burned out by a dysfunctional post-colonial state. The house he was building was still incomplete, his only car a wreck, his debts mounting. I was much better where I was. At the end of the lunch, which didn’t include dessert, my father gave me money. Five twenty-pound notes in a grubby envelope. Tony had stopped supporting me since I turned eighteen and I worked part-time in the student union shop, so I hesitated a little but then I took his gift.

Malak, sipping her green tea, said, ‘I should wake up Ossie so that you’re not delayed. It would be better for him to get a lift from you in case the buses are still disrupted. And it would be good for you to have company in case your tyres get stuck in the snow.’ Her face was still puffy with sleep, gentle without make-up.

I assured her that I was not in a great hurry. I stood up to make myself another mug of coffee and to wash my cereal bowl in the sink. In the first orange rays from the rising sun I saw the car approaching. So for sure the roads were clear enough. No more doubts, no more procrastinations. I could leave, I should leave. The car came closer, but later I realised there must have been another car, one that was already parked out of sight of the house. My telephone buzzed. It was a message from Tony. Need to talk to you. Bad news from Khartoum.

I looked up and through the window saw two policemen. Before I could tell Malak, they rang the bell. She went to answer it and then everything happened very fast.

One of them speaks and says the other name instead of Oz. His voice is loud, says they have a warrant for his arrest. Malak asks why and the answer starts with ‘t’, ends with a suffix and she draws in her breath. I am glued to the kitchen floor, mobile phone in my hand, open at Tony’s message. They are everywhere now, lots of them, not two, with their shoes clomping, but Malak doesn’t say take your shoes off. They leap up the stairs, I catch a blur of dark uniform. Footsteps above me. Malak is calling Oz. This makes them angry. They think she is warning him off and two of them run, banging the bedroom door open. I hear him say, ‘What the fuck!’ I hear a scuffle but then Malak’s voice, telling him to be calm, to best do as he’s told. I walk to the landing but one of them is holding the sword in his hand, the sitting room is in disarray, one of them comes up to me, his large face looms close. He carries two laptops — mine and Oz’s. The white one is mine, I say but he takes my mobile too. His voice is loud but he just wants my name and my address. I tell him why I am here, but still my laptop gets carried into their car. They clamber down the stairs, Oz in handcuffs, Malak following. Oz is wearing his coat over his pyjamas. His lips are dry and his eyes, his body, the tilt of his head, are rigid with anger; anger a crust pressing down fear. Before they prod him out of the house, he looks at me and I have nothing to say.

Because the front door had been open all the time the police were here, the house was freezing. Blasts of air swept through; there was sludge on the carpet. I closed the door, I locked it too. I started to tidy up. I was shivering and my fingers were numb. Malak sat on the bottom step hugging her knees. ‘It’s a mistake,’ she repeated. ‘They’ve mixed him up with someone else, I’m sure.’

I reassured her as best I could. I picked up her shawl, which had fallen on the ground, and tucked it round her shoulders. I could not bear the chaos surrounding us, the way the house had been violated. I started to tidy up, putting everything back in its place. I pulled the vacuum cleaner from the store cupboard. I mopped up the shoe stains on the kitchen floor. I wanted everything to look and smell and feel like it had before they came.

I walked past Malak, who seemed to be glued to the stairs, and carried the vacuum cleaner up. Oz’s room was in complete disarray. Every drawer had been turned out, every poster pulled down from the wall, files and books scattered, clothes on the floor. I folded his clothes and put them back in the cupboard and drawers. Unable to stick the posters back on the wall, I rolled them up — one black and white image of the Kaaba during a freak deluge, pilgrims swimming around the cube instead of walking, two Spider-man posters, one of X-Men Die by the Sword 5. As I worked, the room lit up with the morning sun; it felt warmer than anywhere else. It had really happened, they had taken him away and the magnitude of the charge against him was pitch-dark and shameful. What have you done, you stupid, stupid boy? I could no longer move, I slumped on the bed, willing myself to calm down, to be rational. What have you done …

I stretched out on the bed, the sun coming straight at me through the window. I could smell him on the pillow, I could see him putting the kettle on in the kitchen and I could hear him call his mother by her name and I tried to push away the fear, to ignore his last look. I must forget their clomping shoes, their big faces and the invasion that had happened. Soon, I would wipe away all traces of them, vacuum the fluff that had fallen from their uniforms and the shedding of their skins, open the windows and flush out the smell of them. I closed my eyes from the bright sun, I saw blotches of colours, my fingers pressed down on the duvet. There was no sound from downstairs, the peace of shock. My body started to feel heavy, my stomach relaxed enough to start digesting my breakfast, my bladder to start filling up. I dozed and I was standing on one of the peaks of the Caucasus, balancing on the edge of a ledge. From the top of my head all the way down in one straight swoop, I split in two, half-human and half-reptile. In the logic of dreams it made sense that my left side was human because that was where my heart was. In the logic of dreams I was not embarrassed that I was naked, nor that a part of me was inhuman. With my left hand I ran my fingers over a pattern of scales on my right shoulder, ridges of shell, leathery grooves. In the logic of dreams what perplexed me the most was that I had split vertically rather than horizontally. It was natural to be like a centaur or a sphinx; it was usual to have a full human head. But I had failed; I had morphed into something completely different. A man was coming behind me and I was reluctant to turn around. Below me was a sheer drop into rocks and burning forests. I lost my balance and jerked awake.

I sat up and remembered Tony’s message. I fished in my pocket for my mobile and realised that it was going to be a real nuisance not to have it. I could not remember Tony’s number off the top of my head. This was the result of years just pressing a button, instead of dialling. Of course there were other ways of getting hold of it and most likely I had scribbled it down in an old Filofax. But I wanted to hear that news from Khartoum. And how exactly had it reached Tony? Maybe Grusha, my mother’s friend, had called him. The news would be about my father — who else? I put the vacuum cleaner on and tried to remember Tony’s home number, the number I used to call Mum on all these years. 01224 was the code but the number itself was muddled.

When I went downstairs, Malak was locked in the same spot, her knees bunched up, her face expressionless. When she finally spoke, her voice sounded strange. An accent had crept in. Shock did that to people, it hurtled them back to their mother tongue. ‘They took the sword,’ she said.

‘They took every CD you have. They took my mobile phone and my laptop.’

‘I am sorry, Natasha. I hope you will get your things back soon.’

Tears came to my eyes. I wanted to speak to her like I had never spoken to anyone before. Instead I said, ‘I have to go.’

‘Can’t you stay a little longer?’ she whispered. She looked pathetic huddled in her shawl. She stood up and for the smallest fraction of a second, lost her balance and then regained it again. That wobble added years to her age, a slip-up as if she had been acting all the time, playing the role of a London actor, a glamorous woman of the world and now this was her real self. One of those who don’t matter, who shuffle down the street, reeking of failure if not trouble, suspect and unwanted. One of those people I never wanted to be seen with. She said, ‘Let’s make a pot of tea, shall we?’

Weren’t these the words I had longed to hear? Where did I have to go that was better than here? But the warning said get away, don’t get dragged further into this — it’s bad enough that you’re already involved; save your skin. I recognised this pragmatism, these tropes of survival. It made me grab my coat and head towards the door. Malak stood up and followed me. Her movements were slow and tentative; she was not herself. In a high querulous voice she repeated, ‘It’s all a mistake. They’ve made a mistake. They’ve got the wrong person I’m sure.’

I didn’t allow myself to speak, I didn’t look at her. Guilty, I got into the car and drove straight to work.

2. GEORGIA, JULY 1854

She walked through grass that reached her waist. It tickled her arms and almost covered Alexander to the brim of his straw summer hat. He let go of her hand and ran in the direction of the soldier galloping towards them. Anna opened her mouth to call him back then closed it again; she shaded her eyes from the sun. These maternal flickers of anxiety flared with varying degrees of intensity through every stage of his life. Sometimes they were justified, often they weren’t, but cats had nine lives and children didn’t. What if the soldier didn’t see Alexander or Alexander didn’t stop running early enough? At the same time she did not want him to be timid, to be tied to her apron strings as no boy should be. So she must grit her teeth as he exposed himself to a thousand and one dangers.

During her pregnancy with Lydia she had been less alert, and after the birth too, she was immersed in that satisfaction that only comes to mothers with copious milk and a healthy feeding baby. In that period Alexander had flourished, benefiting from less of her attention, venturing further away from the radius of her vision. Here in the countryside, he had grown fitter and more hardy. Apart from Madame Drancy’s lessons and the requirement to speak to her in French at all times, he was allowed to do as he liked. It was as carefree as a summer should be, despite the rumours that Shamil’s men were set to descend from the mountains. Such an invasion had never taken place throughout history and was, Anna believed, just as unlikely to happen now.

The horseman had seen Alexander. She could tell by the way he straightened up in his saddle. Anna could breathe more easily now, continue walking towards them for surely the soldier was bringing a message from David. She was conscious of the fullness of her body in last summer’s dress, aware of the absence of Lydia, neither inside her nor in her arms, and still it was a surprise. She felt less weighed down but at the same time incomplete; the distance from the garden to the nursery where the baby was sleeping seemed excessively large. If Lydia woke up and cried now, she would not hear her. Her ears, though, strained for that familiar high note and now it felt as if she was playing truant, exploring the furthest end of the leash that tied her to her daughter. The gardener, Gregov, reached the rider first and turned to bring her the message. Despite the white in his hair, he was strong and quick in his movements. She must ask him why he had delayed cutting the grass. It had not rained yesterday.

Gregov gripped his hat in one hand and handed her the message. ‘Should he wait for a reply?’

She hesitated before saying, ‘Yes.’ It meant cutting her walk and returning to the house. She preferred writing leisurely long letters in the evening. Now it would have to be a hurried note. Still, David would want her to reassure him.

Gregov hovered over her as she read the message. His avuncular right or just a natural eagerness for news from the local militia? There is no occasion for uneasiness. The sentence was underlined and she read it first. Then she went back to the beginning.

She said to Gregov, ‘The fortress at Shildi was attacked by a large number of Lezgins but they were repulsed and they took heavy losses.’

‘Shildi must have been Shamil’s target then.’ He twisted his hat in his hands.

‘Would that explain the campfires on the mountains?’ There were four of them last night and Madame Drancy even more edgy. ‘How far is Shildi from here?’

‘A good thirty miles. The Lezgins are the most lawless of the tribes that follow Shamil.’ Gregov shook his head. ‘My cousin was taken by them as prisoner. They threaded horse-hairs through his heels.’

‘Whatever for?’

Gregov narrowed his eyes and replied coolly, ‘So that he wouldn’t escape, ma’am. The wounds fester and make walking horribly painful.’

She looked towards Alexander. He seemed to be enjoying a new friendship with the soldier, who now dismounted and lifted him up to take his place.

‘The Lezgins keep their prisoners in pits,’ Gregov continued. ‘What would they know of Christian compassion?’

Anna turned away from him. Sometimes she felt like she was part of a great charade. An essential pretence that Russia was winning the Caucasus, that every encounter with Shamil was a resounding victory. And yet thousands of lives were being lost and the mountains still did not belong to the tsar. David too, talked this optimistic language. He had to, he had no choice. This awareness of the pressures he was under caused a rush of love for him. This and the relief that he had not fallen into the hands of the Lezgins swept her back to the house and into writing him an effusive message urging him to come as soon as he could, even though they were all safe and well.

In the evening as she was putting Lydia to bed, Madame Drancy came in to say that Gregov wanted to talk to her. Lydia was not fully asleep — her eyes fluttered open as soon as Anna put her down in the cot. She tiptoed out of the room, Drancy close behind her. It was on the tip of her tongue to say, ‘Stay with Lydia until she is deeply asleep,’ but Madame Drancy bristled whenever she was asked to do anything that remotely resembled a nursery maid’s duty. Besides, she was clearly eager to hear what Gregov had to say. He had never asked to see Anna at this time in the evening.

‘There is a man at the gate asking permission to spend the night,’ Gregov said. ‘He is an Armenian merchant.’

‘Where did he come from?’

‘He says he swam the Alazani.’ Gregov stressed the word ‘says’ as if he didn’t believe it.

Neither did Anna. Most travellers were heading in the opposite direction.

‘He says he was evading Shamil’s men and he’s soaked to the skin.’ Gregov’s tone softened.

Madame Drancy, hovering behind Anna, blurted out, ‘At a time like this? We certainly should not trust him!’

Her outburst made the two Georgians close rank. ‘We can’t turn him away, Madame Drancy. It is not our custom.’ She turned to Gregov. ‘Give him supper too, but watch him.’

‘I will disarm him,’ said Gregov. ‘And if he tries to escape, I will shoot him.’

She had been brave in front of Madame Drancy but she did not feel comfortable with the thought of the stranger spending the night on the estate. Sleep eluded her and at last when she drifted off, she heard a shot. It could well have been a dream but Madame Drancy banged into the room without knocking.

‘Princess Anna, wake up!’

She scrambled to her feet. ‘Did you hear that?’

Madame Drancy’s face was visible in the bright strips of moonlight that bordered the curtains, ‘Yes, I was walking in the garden. I just couldn’t sleep. It’s so hot. I saw a man — the traveller who was spending the night. He had a gun — he must have hidden it from Gregov. I saw him make for the woods.’

Anna put on her dressing gown. ‘He must have fired that shot.’

‘Why? What does it mean?’

‘He’s a spy.’ The word was heavy in her mouth, the consciousness that she was turning a corner. ‘He fired the gun as a signal.’ She let duty dictate her next words, not her preference, not her need. Left to her own devices she could cling to Tsinondali and grit her teeth, pray that the threat would go away. ‘We must leave for Tiflis at dawn. I’ll have to start packing. We must bring down the big trunk from the attic.’ She would pack with precision and care; she would not scramble off dishevelled, leaving behind what was precious and irreplaceable. Back to face the smug ‘told you so’s of Tiflis, her flight a smile on everyone’s lips.

‘There is something else.’ Madame Drancy drew in her breath. ‘Something I didn’t tell you.’

‘Well, out with it.’ Anna’s hand reached out to the back of her favourite armchair. How could she leave it behind?

‘The moon is so full tonight, I could see across the river. The water has definitely subsided. Two men were leading their horses along the bank searching for a place to cross. I saw their weapons.’

Anna stood up, the sense of urgency finally taking root. ‘They must be scouts. Wake the servants up. We have to be ready by dawn.’

But they were not ready by dawn. The ikons needed wrapping, the bedding needed folding, the maids panicked and slipped away which made the process of packing even slower. Anna made sure that all the silver was put away in the trunk. Her dresses and the children’s clothes. She made Gregov carry the armchair and hoist it up on the oxen-cart. He grumbled and cursed but he was too loyal to leave them at a time like this. The younger gardeners had already disappeared without even saying goodbye, so had the grooms and the field-hands. Gregov was the only one left guarding the estate; he would be at the gate now. When all this was over, she would tell David and he would reward him.

Alexander pushed his father’s pistol against Madame Drancy’s back. ‘I am the dreaded warrior, Shamil,’ he shouted.

‘Mon Dieu!’ his governess squealed and dropped the ikon she was wrapping. It shattered on the ground.

‘How dare you, Alexander! Is this a time for games?’ Anna snatched the pistol from him. ‘Apologise to Madame Drancy.’

She accepted his apology. ‘Now that you’re up, you might as well be packing instead of creating mischief.’

He smiled, ‘I will pack my summer hat.’

‘Off you go then,’ said Anna. ‘We are leaving soon. Be sure the flowers on your hat don’t get crushed.’ Afterwards she would think, if I had not cared about the flowers, the silver, the packing, how much time would I have saved? Horsemen at full tilt on the plains and she was giving Lydia her morning feed. Her breasts not as full as they usually were, the milk sensitive to the sleepless night, the disjointed nerves.

Could the trunk take one more tablecloth? ‘Just push it in.’

Madame Drancy kneeling to lock the trunk, held herself still. ‘Can you hear it?’

‘What? No. If we both sit on it, it will close.’

Sitting on the trunk, she heard the unmistakable galloping. Madame Drancy ran to the window, her voice squeaky as a girl’s. ‘They are here! They are here! We must run to the woods.’

Anna was conscious of her own heaviness — baby, Alexander, belongings. ‘No, it’s too late. It’s best to hide in the attic. Fetch Alexander from the nursery.’

Under the low ceiling of the attic, they crouched among the dust and what looked like rat droppings. Anna loaded the pistol and looked out of the window. The shock of the actual sight of them storming the gate — their turbans, some green, some white and patterned; their guns and sabres, their mouths stretched open, war cries in another language, a sense of chaos and tense power. There was Gregov carrying his gun, his familiar cap, white speckled hair, his compact figure, running towards them and shouting, ‘God save us. The Lezgins!’ He stood and fired. Then she saw his body receive the pain of a bullet and slump to the ground. She turned her head. If they were going to trample him with their horses, she could not watch.

She rocked Lydia while Alexander and Drancy peered out of the small window. The clatter of hooves on the cobbles of the courtyard. ‘Get back, they will look up and spot you,’ hissed Anna.

But that crash was the downstairs door being broken down. They were in the house now and Anna started to buzz with fear and indignation too. This violation of her property; their paws on her furniture, their hooves treading her carpets. Alexander came close to her, pushed his head against her arm. ‘Don’t be afraid. They won’t find us.’

She didn’t need to whisper. It was pandemonium below, glass breaking, the sounds of furniture being demolished, crockery smashed to the floor. So destructive, so destructive.

‘They will loot and leave. What would they want us for? They will take as much as they can and leave.’ She was speaking out loud and she jumped at the sound of the piano. One of them must have slammed his hands on the keys.

That quickening was them mounting the stairs. The voices coming closer, up to the attic. ‘Shush, not a sound.’ But Lydia was whimpering. Anna held her close. Madame Drancy was moving her lips in prayer. The doorknob juddered. A substantial group was at the door. A shout as they started to break it down. Once, twice, the door held for some time. More shouts and the wood cracked. Madame Drancy screamed as the men spilled into the attic.

Anna grabbed the pistol and started to shoot. She was not aiming, just pushing them away, wanting them down and out the door and out the gate and off the estate. A grunt as she wounded one of them. Smoke and the acrid smell of it and their smell too as the pistol was yanked out of her hand.

A Lezgin glared down at her. He had to stoop so that his head would not hit the ceiling. His turban was tight across his forehead, black beard and a snarl. ‘Enough. Not a single man among you and you think you have a chance!’

His Lezgian accent was heavy but she understood what he was saying. She could not, though, grasp the babble of the other men, all speaking at the same time as if making opposing suggestions, the word ‘Chavchavadzes’ chilly and odd in the middle of their sentences.

‘Take them downstairs,’ their leader bellowed.

She was lifted, Lydia and all, and when she resisted was dragged out of the attic, her elbow banging on the door, her toe scraping the floor. A raider lifted Alexander, who kicked and screamed.

‘I’m a French citizen,’ Madame Drancy was shouting. ‘Put me down. How dare you do this to me!’

Lydia was crying too. It took all Anna’s effort and concentration to keep her safe in her arms. Alexander bit his captor on the shoulder. He was punched in return and groaned from the pain. Grunts of laughter from the men. ‘That little devil has sharp teeth!’

‘Don’t fight him, Alexander.’ She was already downstairs, calling up. She was being pulled out of the house. It was as if there were a hundred of them crowded on the stairs. It was not only Madame Drancy and Alexander that they were carrying, but whatever they could loot. Without discipline, without logic, grabbing this and that, armfuls and their clanking weapons. The ludicrous sound of the piano as it was leant upon, fallen over or even used as a foothold. Loud jarring notes among the whoops of triumph. One of them leapt down the side of the staircase as if he were still on the mountains, jumping from boulder to boulder. Anna turned to see the heavy trunk being rolled down from the upper landing. The combined weight of people, goods and weapons brought the whole staircase crashing to the ground.

Dust rose in the centre of the house. Anna gasped at the ugliness of the splintered wood and the rubble, the strangeness of an upper storey that could not be reached. She screamed but her voice meant nothing; her orders, ‘Get out of my house’, did not raise the slightest interest. Nonchalantly, the highlanders picked themselves off the ground amidst grunts and lazy recriminations. In a flash they were looting again and she was pulled out the front door and into the courtyard.

It too was alien, crowded with their sweaty horses. The cart that carried her favourite armchair had been overturned. The familiar upholstery, the roses and lilac design was smeared with mud and horse manure. In the middle of the courtyard, Anna and her children were thrown in a heap. She examined Alexander’s arm. ‘Move it for me. Good boy.’ It was bruised but unbroken.

‘You are brave,’ she told him. ‘Papa will be proud of you.’ Her own back ached but she scarcely noticed it. One of the sleeves of her dress was torn. She could put Lydia down on her lap but she still clutched her. Around them more highlanders jostled each other to enter the house; those who had already been inside squabbled over their spoils. It was as if this was not Tsinondali any more, this was not the same garden trampled and muddied, this pillaged house not the same house, these were not the same stables, doors wide open, the horses tied up, men and more men swarming all the way to the gate. The men brandished their sabres even though they faced no resistance. No villagers had rallied round, no field-hands, no one.

Madame Drancy was being pulled and dragged between two men who were exchanging curses. One of them held her right arm; the other hooked her left arm over his shoulder and was grabbing her by the waist. A cold understanding seeped through Anna; these two were fighting over Madame Drancy. The tall Lezgin, who had taken the pistol from Anna upstairs, strode towards the scuffle, shashka in hand. He was, Anna guessed, their leader. He bellowed at the two men and they reluctantly let go of Drancy. She was dragged, instead, by her hair and thrown down on the ground next to Anna.

Lydia was whimpering and twisting her head, rooting for her next feed. It came as a surprise to Anna that several hours had already passed since she had last fed her. But yes, it was time again. Lydia started to cry, the distressed wails of a justified hunger. Here, in the middle of this, Anna must undo her bodice. She crouched behind Madame Drancy and tried to be as discreet as she could. But the Lezgin leader came over and leered down at her. With the tip of his shashka, he pierced the knot her hair was tied in. When it fell on her shoulders, he lifted a strand, the blade now touching her neck, inches above Lydia’s head, perpendicular to Alexander’s neck.

Madame Drancy shouted, ‘Get away, you turbaned monster.’ She leapt up but he pushed her down with his free hand. The blade vibrated against Anna’s cheek.

‘Well, you’re the pretty one, aren’t you?’ He hooked the shashka under the shoulder strap of her dress. It tore with the slightest of tugs.

‘How dare you do this to me! You don’t know who I am.’

He smiled, ‘Oh, but I do know, your Highness. I know it and it is a shame that I am under strict orders. You see, you are precious. Too valuable for a Lezgin like me. Maybe this one will do. If she is worth it!’ He turned to Madame Drancy and with a downward swoop of the shashka tore her dress in half. She was now in her corset and petticoat. She leapt at him, clawing at his face. ‘You butcher, you animal, leave me alone.’

Another highlander, with a bare shaven head, dropped the candlesticks he was holding and cut Madame Drancy across the shoulders with his whip. She fell down crying and huddled against Anna.

The Lezgin squatted down and brought his face level with the two of them. ‘Listen, you are my captives now. Until I take you up the mountains and hand you over, you will obey me. Understand. You will obey every word I say. This is better for you and easier for all of us. So now you sit here, you don’t move and you keep quiet. We have not herded your cattle yet.’

‘You will not get away with this,’ Anna said. ‘There are posts up and down the river and you will be captured. Is it brave to hit women and children? You’re a lowly criminal.’

‘Yes, I’m a bandit. I will be paid when I hand you over. But I’m following orders too. Don’t touch the princess, don’t hurt her children. But if you provoke me, you’ll see the worst side of me.’

He walked away and Anna turned to see that Madame Drancy’s shoulder was badly cut. She comforted her as best she could, her words sounding feeble even to her own ears. Had he really said take you up to the mountains? Would there be more of this, more of them? She had thought they would loot and leave, leave them humiliated, leave them hurt but leave without them. She started to fix up her own dress and managed to tie it up with a pin from Lydia’s nappy. Her toe was bleeding. She could not remember when and where she had injured it. If she wanted to change Lydia’s nappy now, how was she meant to go about it?

‘That’s my hat,’ Alexander called out. He ran towards a raider who had just stepped out of the house wearing the straw summer hat. Its flowers, crushed and askew, were dangling over his turban. Anna shouted, ‘Alexander, come back.’ But he darted ahead and managed to reach the man without being stopped. Instead of giving him his hat back, the man pushed him away. It was as if they were two children squabbling. Soon, Alexander was carried back and dumped next to Anna. She rebuked him for endangering himself. ‘They will hurt you, Alexander, they are merciless.’ Tears welled in her eyes. If anything should happen to him … but just thinking about it was unbearable. She hugged him close to her, finding comfort in his shape and the familiar sensation of his hair against her cheek.

‘Look, Mama.’ He pointed at two men who were sitting cross-legged examining their new belongings. One dipped his fingers in white powder and tasted it. It was the chalk from the schoolroom. Another one was licking Anna’s face cream.

‘He thinks it’s food.’ There was wonder in Alexander’s voice. She should laugh too, but the reflex let her down. She stared at their questioning, ignorant faces. What would they deduce apart from the realisation that chalk and face cream were inedible?

‘Grotesque,’ Madame Drancy whispered. She muttered to herself in French.

There were more men now in the courtyard, fewer in the house. Some were already mounted, leading behind them a new horse or cow. The Lezgin approached them. ‘Come on, it’s time to get out of here. Each one of you will ride with a different horseman.’ He reached out to take Lydia away from Anna.

‘No. My baby stays with me. I will not hand her to anyone else.’

There was no expression on his face. ‘Very well. Then you both ride with me.’ He dragged her away before she could even say goodbye to Alexander. ‘Mama, wait for me. Where are you going?’ But already one of the men was hoisting him off.

Anna shouted back, ‘Don’t be afraid, Alexander. I will be with you soon. Don’t fight so that they don’t hurt you.’ She wanted to tell him that David would come and rescue them. Soon. This ordeal would be over and everything would go back to how it was before. Surely David would not allow this to happen to his wife and children. But she was afraid to mention his name in front of the Lezgins. Let them be lulled into thinking that they had succeeded.

She turned to look back at the estate. Her favourite armchair toppled over on the ground, dirty and abandoned. The stables were set on fire, the shimmer of burning grass, pigs out of their pens roaming. Anna closed her eyes when she recognised the lifeless heap that only this morning was the loyal, active gardener; Gregov’s cap and his greying hair.

They rode at a moderate pace towards the river, towards those mountains that hosted the campfires of the past days. The sun was high in the sky; it made her head start to hurt. The cattle of the estate, rounded close together, bellowed and stirred the dust of the road. The gush of the water became louder and there was the Alazani, rushing over the boulders, foaming and deep.

‘Can you swim, Princess?’

She did not answer him.

‘Then hold on tight and keep your baby close to you!’

Everyone had told her that the Alazani was too deep to cross this time of year. David had said so, Gregov had said so. She had believed it and now these riders were patting their horses with encouragement; they were tensing up as if for an adventure.

‘Too deep for your horses,’ the Lezgin said. ‘But ours are trained. You will see how they will swim.’

When they entered the water, the riders fell silent. There were no more shouts and boasts, no argumentative exchanges and indecipherable grunts. The horses were indeed swimming even though they were weighed down with their riders and the cattle they were pulling. Anna’s lower half was plunged into the cold water. It filled her shoes and pulled down her petticoats and dress. She turned and saw the amazement in Alexander’s face. He had forgotten his fear and the bruise on his arm. Anna lifted Lydia even higher.

A sound of a splash as Madame Drancy fell into the river. The men burst out laughing while she flailed in the water shouting for help.

‘Hey, drag her out … enough,’ the Lezgin ordered and they obeyed, good-natured and at ease. It filled Anna with loathing and the urge to escape. Then panic rose in her throat like vomit. She was away from home now, floating weirdly on water. This Lezgin and his devilish horse were keeping her alive. Where were the Russian defences? She wanted the nightmare to end. Enough. Lydia was fidgeting against her. She needed her nappy changed.

Madame Drancy was now up behind her captor; she was breathless and soaked. Anna shouted out, ‘Are you all right?’ The spluttered reply elicited another foreign joke.

At the other side of the river, they stopped while the men made their ablutions and lined up to pray. Alexander took an interest in what they were doing, watching them from a distance. Anna took the opportunity to clean Lydia’s nappy but she did not have a change of clothes. She did her best under the circumstances but was not satisfied. The baby’s skin was sensitive and it would chafe. She washed the dirty nappy in the river and wrung it out. She hung it on a bush but they did not stop long enough for it to dry. She had to carry it damp.

‘You should give your baby to one of the men,’ said the Lezgin. They had been coming up to Anna with pantomime gestures, offering to do so.

‘Never.’ She held Lydia closer.

‘Suit yourself.’ He adjusted his turban. ‘It will be a dangerous climb.’

Lydia slept but was jolted awake with every leap and jerk of the horse. She started to cry, working herself up to such a pitch that her face turned red and her body rigid. She was so loud that some of the other riders heard her. They turned around and made lewd gestures as if to instruct Anna to feed her. She did eventually because she had to, because there was no other way to make this piercing, frustrating sound stop. Lydia was so overwrought that she could not at first settle and suck. The unsteady movement of the horse over the rocks made matters even worse. Still whimpering as if feeling sorry for herself, as if berating and reproaching her mother, she finally was able to draw in and swallow. But true satisfaction didn’t come. Anna’s milk was watery and insufficient. So long ago, it seemed, she had skimped breakfast in order to start the packing. Since then she had not had anything except gulps of water from the river. Lydia squirmed, sucking intensely until it made Anna’s nipple sore. She strained her ears for the Russian picket; surely they were stationed near, surely they would come to rescue them.

When the sun started to set, they made camp on the mountainside. It startled Anna to see Madame Drancy in a burka. It belonged to her captor and he had flung it over her to keep her warm. ‘The water was freezing,’ she said sitting down next to Anna, and arranging the folds around her. ‘Hideous outfit.’

They sat in front of the fire. A campfire like the ones they used to see from the windows of Tsinondali. ‘The water made my fingers numb,’ said Anna. ‘I had trouble holding Lydia.’

‘Luckily Alexander didn’t get wet,’ said Madame Drancy. He too was wrapped in a burka, sound asleep.

Anna’s stomach growled. She had pushed away the dinner of dried millet they had been offered. It was unappetising and touched by their dirty fingers. Lydia was asleep now but she would not stay asleep for long; fretting and hungry, she would want to be nursed all night.

‘They say the journey up the mountains will take five weeks.’ Madame Drancy spoke in a matter-of-fact way.

Anna could not even visualise one week. She turned to look at Madame Drancy’s face. It looked fresher and leaner, like she had been on a brisk walk.

Madame Drancy said, ‘I wonder if one of these highlanders would be sympathetic enough to help us escape. I can teach him a little bit of French. We can bribe him …’

‘With what? They’ve taken everything.’

‘We can promise to reward him once we are free.’

Anna sighed, ‘You are so fanciful. We will be rescued. Surely by now David will have heard of our predicament.’

‘It’s only been a few hours,’ was the governess’s terse reply.

Of course it felt more than that. The night was long too. Anna couldn’t sleep even though she was exhausted and bruised. It was uncomfortable to lie on the ground without a pillow. The moonlight was too bright and there were the menacing sounds of the forests, the torrential river, the snores of these violent men. It seemed that whenever she dozed, Lydia would wake up whimpering and whenever Lydia fell asleep, Anna lay anxious, alert to the dangers around her. Images of the day pounded the gap between wakefulness and dreams; the pistol snatched away, a cow being dragged from the stables, Gregov’s body sprawled on the ground. She closed her eyes and saw Madame Drancy fall in the river. The water had been icy, it had chilled Anna’s legs and when her hands got wet, her fingers became numb. They felt clumsy and fat and it was awkward to hold up Lydia. She had been afraid that she would let her slip, straining all the time to keep her from sliding, forcing herself closer to her captor’s back because that was the only way to keep the baby safe.

Anna finally fell asleep a little before dawn and woke up to a foreign chant. It was some of the men praying. A part of her had hoped that she would wake up in her bedroom in Tsinondali and all of this would have been the longest of nightmares. Her body was stiff as she followed Madame Drancy deeper behind a clump of trees. This was their toilet and surprisingly the men were decent enough to stay at a distance. Perhaps they judged them too weak to escape or else they knew she would never run off and leave Alexander.

He was faring better than her and did not complain. He ate the food they put before him and drank a mug of tea. ‘I have to eat for Lydia’s sake,’ thought Anna. No food and drink meant no milk. It was as simple as that. She forced herself to eat. Her stomach felt full even though it wasn’t; her mouth was dry. One of the highlanders shambled close and pointed at Lydia, making gestures as if he wanted to carry her when they next rode off. His plebeian face was in smiles and he spoke in a dialect Anna couldn’t understand. She held Lydia close and waved him away, shaking her head. He persisted, trying to ingratiate himself by bowing and begging. Exasperated and eager to get rid of him, she took off her pearl earrings and tossed them to him. The bribe worked. He put them in his pocket and turned away.

When it was time to mount again, Anna retched out her breakfast. It splattered on her dress. She used to be clean and sweet-smelling. And Lydia too, used to be clean and sweet-smelling. Now her wispy hair was matted against her scalp, there was congealed milk behind her ears and in the folds of her neck. As expected, her lower half had risen in a red rash that extended even to the folds around her knees. She needed a bath, talcum powder, a change of clothes. But where would these come from?

Although their progress was slow, the higher they climbed, the more Anna’s heart sank. They were venturing further and further towards Shamil’s territory. This was the border that David was meant to be protecting, this was the line where the river forts were stationed. Around them was nothing but the forests and the mountains, familiar to these men; their natural habitat.

She dozed against her will and woke with a shock to find that her arms had gone slack and Lydia was wedged loosely between her and the rider, the trail of her nappy dangling over the saddle. The baby was wide awake, gazing up with large wet eyes at the green swirl of the trees, the sun filtering through.

They reached a clearing, a stretch of flat ground and suddenly there was a whizzing sound that made Anna turn her head. Were they being followed? The loudest cry from the Lezgin as his horse wheeled and broke into a gallop. ‘It’s an ambush. Go, go, go.’

Anna felt her whole body sway backwards, her arms instinctively jutting out for balance. ‘Stop,’ she screamed, ‘I’m not holding her properly.’

Lydia was loose in her arms, a lopsided bundle, as bullets zinged past them, as the highlanders dispersed, yelping and working their horses up to a frenzy. One of the riders was shot. He groaned and fell to the ground.

‘Hold your hostage close!’ the Lezgin shouted to his men. The horses of their pursuers could be heard now. They were gaining on them. A bullet hit a horse and it skidded and crashed down, flinging its rider.

‘Stop,’ she screamed. ‘Please stop.’

‘Hold tight to my belt, Princess.’

‘My baby is slipping from me. Stop now, I beg you.’

‘Soon, soon we will stop.’

I am holding her, aren’t I? She is here and we are being rescued. The Lezgin suddenly reeled his horse to the right and dashed into the forest. The movement guaranteed their escape but Anna swayed and nearly tipped over. He reached behind to steady her but only succeeded in knocking her elbow. Lydia slipped from her arm. ‘My baby!’ she screamed. She screamed and the sound pressed close, her nerves vibrating. The bundle fragile on soil and leaves. Her wrong empty hands. It was as if her own insides squished and bled. Her own spine cracked and the thud was thunder in her inner ear.