‘Nothing,’ Daniil said. ‘Well, he says that he hopes his writing wouldn’t embarrass me.’
‘Why would his writing embarrass you?’ she asked.
‘He would think I wanted nothing to do with him.’
‘At least it’s something to work on,’ Libby said, but he disagreed.
‘There’s nothing—no contact address in the letter, no surname. There’s no more information than that. We didn’t do much schooling in letter writing.’
Daniil had scanned every part of his memory to try to recall the surnames of Sev and Nikolai. They had never used or needed them where they had lived.
‘Have you been to the orphanage?’
‘It’s a school now,’ he said, ‘but I’ve been asking around. Sergio, he was the maintenance man, has since died but I spoke to his wife this afternoon. Sev got a scholarship to a good school and Nikolai left when he was fourteen.’
‘For where?’
‘He ran away,’ Daniil said and was quiet for a moment. ‘He drowned.’
‘Oh, no,’ Libby wailed but Daniil carried on speaking in his low voice.
Last night he had cried.
‘Katya—she was the cook—apparently left to follow her daughter, Anya, to St Petersburg.’
‘Roman?’
‘Nothing. I’m trying to find out if he did his military service but apart from that there are no more leads.’
‘Well, November is just a couple of months away. Why don’t you try to meet Sev then?’
‘I’m five years late,’ Daniil pointed out.
‘Well, it’s still worth a try. I know if I’d written that letter that I’d be there every year, like some sad old thing, holding a rose...’
She made him smile.
‘Can we start again?’ Daniil said.
‘Can we?’ she asked, wishing it were that easy.
‘I thought we might go out on a date, a proper date. I’ve bought tickets for Firebird. I could pick you up and go out to dinner...’
Libby lay on her bed in silence. She hadn’t watched a ballet production since she had made the decision to end her career and she didn’t know if she was ready to go and see beauty unfold and not be in it. She knew she would be aching to take part and yet he really was making an effort to give them a new start.
‘I don’t know...’ she said, but Daniil spoke over her doubt, quoting A Winter’s Journey by Polonsky, on which the ballet was based.
‘“And in my dreams I see myself on a wolf’s back
Riding along a forest path
To do battle with a sorcerer-tsar
In that land where a princess sits under lock and key,
Pining behind massive walls.
There gardens surround a palace all of glass,
There Firebirds sing by night
And peck at golden fruit.”’
His voice made her shiver.
‘Sev used to read to us at night,’ Daniil said and thought back to that time. ‘Come and see a nice wolf for once.’
‘Is there such a thing?’
‘Maybe it’s time to find out.’
After the call ended Libby wondered if she’d done the right thing in agreeing to go.
It had to be the right thing, she decided, swinging her legs off the bed and standing up.
A date.
A proper one.
Their first.
‘Well?’ Rachel said, when she came out of the bedroom.
‘He’s taking me to see Firebird on Saturday.’
‘That was thoughtful of him.’ Rachel rolled her eyes. ‘What an insensitive jerk.’
‘He doesn’t know.’
‘Then tell him what you told me just a couple of weeks ago, that you’re dreading going to see a full production.’
‘That was a couple of weeks ago,’ Libby said.
‘You’re sure?’
Libby nodded and headed over to the calendar that they kept on the fridge so that they would loosely know each other’s comings and goings.
‘Firebird,’ Libby wrote boldly, even if she felt sick at the thought of it, but then again she felt sick all the time anyway...
She flicked the calendar back and remembered the last week she’d spent with the company, blaming her up-and-down mood and tears on the time of the month.
She was going on her first date with Daniil and there was no getting away from it now—she was five days late.
Libby stepped away from the calendar as if closing the stable door.
The horse might already have bolted.