@somptueusesignora | plotted starter!
This morning, Gleb delayed his return to Russia by a week, telling the Commissioner her only needed more time to find the girl. He’d found her two days ago. He’d let her go two days ago. Whether she was or was not Anastasia did not matter. She had no designs on destroying Russia; he had not been able to pull the trigger. Whoever she was and wherever he let her flee to, when Gleb returned to Russia, he would go to his death in her stead. He knew the order of things. It hadn’t much changed from Imperial rule. He who went against the government was never heard of again.
If he didn’t return to Russia, another eager upstart - one just like he had been - would take his place. The hunt would resume. Anya would die by the hands of a stranger. This, Gleb could not allow. Whatever he was, he was not his father’s son.
Who was he now?
Laughter spilled from a nearby bar as drunks tumbled out onto the street. Slurring to each other in English loudly, pointing at Gleb and his shoes, laughing, they carried on. Gleb scowled. He didn’t have to know the language to guess what they were saying. Pushing off the railing, Gleb stepped down the cobblestones. As he walked, looking for some place quieter, more private. He wandered through neighborhoods, further away from the hotel in which the government had put him up. At last he found a quiet bridge. Shimmering up at him, reflecting Paris’ lights, the Seine did not look so different from the Neva. Gleb stared into the water. How easy it would be to disappear here. He thought of his mother’s words. Your father died of shame, Glebka. He’d heard the gunshot; even then, not wanting to believe it he knew his father had not died of shame, but by his own hand. And he was not his father’s son. Was he?
Years of climbing through the Bolshevik government taught him never to relax, to always be aware of his surroundings. He heard footsteps - light, heeled clicks on the stone - approach. Tensing, he swiveled his head to see. Instead of an armed guard, stood a woman. She seemed as surprised to see him as he was to see her. A nervous smile flickered across Gleb’s face and he pushed back his hair in an effort to look less like a man in the midst of treason. Wetting his lips, he struggled for words. When he found him, he managed to say -
“Good evening, mademoiselle. Are you- Is this your bridge?”
He recognized her face somewhere. Usually, Gleb never forgot a face. Usually he could easily pair it with a name. Now, he was stuck. He studied her as the stupidity of his own words reached his ears.
“Forgive me. I’m not myself tonight. ,,. No that you’d know the difference.” A quiet laugh, a shake of his head. “It’s Gleb. I mean, I’m Gleb.”
No more Deputy Commissioner General Gleb Vaganov. Only a frightened man, in a land that was not his own, cracking under pressure from across the continent.. He stuck out his hand for a handshake. What else could he do?
Carlotta lived an interesting life. All women of her time did. She had heard once, as a young woman, a Chinese curse – “May you live in interesting times.” One could only imagine it had been coined specifically for those forced to pick up the pieces of the war. She had passed her thirtieth year and, like so many others, missed the milemarks of marriage, children, and everything that would have marked her as an adult.
Admittedly, she was a singer. Miss Marie Lloyd had married, but she was the exception – British too. She likely wouldn’t have been married to begin with. If she told herself that enough, she would forget about Ulbaldo.
They were both young and in love in Paris when the war began. He was drafted, Italian though he may be. She waited day and night on his letters. A perfect duplicate of every other young, forlorn lover until she received one last letter from the government. Lost at the Somme. That had been more than a decade ago, and yet…
Carlotta needed to clear her head, and she knew one place to do that without entirely leaving the city. Though It was a silly question in many ways – as if one could simply own a bridge as a comb – in other ways, it was her bridge. She never contemplated the out that others had. Not verbally. And not for more than a few minutes. But the water was inviting on nights like this. Soothing. Especially as the light danced on the ripples, a modern-day siren calling lost souls into the depths of the Seine. Another few each paper round, it seemed.
She glanced up in surprise, short curls bouncing lightly around her face. She’d noted the figure, but hadn’t expected a greeting. She nodded warily.
“Good evening, Monsieur.” Her accent had all been sanded from her voice during the war. Italy was not held in high regards. She smiled as he pushed forward. He seemed a bit punch drunk, but largely harmless. He was hiding something – but he was too clean for it to be murder. Immediate murder, at least. She took his hand with the grace the stage lent her. Always emulating the upper classes, even if she’d never be allowed to join them properly. “The moon plays tricks on us all. My name is Carlotta.”
Once he released her, she turned back to the river, watching over the waves. “You seem anxious, Monsieur Gleb.” She could imagine why. Russian boots, accent, even the hair they all seemed to have. Not to mention the anxious, darting eyes of a runaway. The war had ruined Europe, but the revolution had obliterated the Russian people. What little they saw of them in Paris. “Are you quite alright?”
