David Dickinson - Death Comes to the Ballets Russes

‘And have they?’

‘We had a couple of enterprising ones yesterday, hanging so far over that Palladian bridge you’d have sworn they were going to fall in. One of them, a young fellow from the Illustrated London News , says his master at the magazine always believes the preparations are more interesting than the real thing.’

‘He might well be right.’

‘Indeed so, my lord. One thing they have done is to cut down the numbers inside the Great Hall. The steward, after a lengthy conference with Diaghilev himself, cane tapping regularly on the antique chairs, said that fifty to sixty would be the maximum number permitted to attend, and even that’s a squeeze. Mrs Duke looked sad for a bit until the Duke himself rallied to the cause and told her it would be even more exclusive and even more highly prized.’

‘And what of Diaghilev’s finances, Monsieur Fokine?’

‘Ah yes, the finances of Monsieur Diaghilev, my lord, I haven’t forgotten. Where should I begin?’

The young man was now at the King’s Road end of the Powerscourt drawing room, about to turn towards the fireplace end.

‘The first thing I should say is that Diaghilev himself is not in the ballet business for money. Far from it. So what is he after? Glory, I think, fame certainly, but fame accorded to one who has changed the nature of ballet for ever. He wants to go down in history as the greatest impresario the world has ever seen. There is no limit to his ambitions. He wanted to conquer Paris and he has. They say there is another ballet being written by Stravinsky now that will change the whole nature and appreciation of ballet. And what does this mean when it comes to his finances? Total chaos is the answer. He does not distinguish between his own personal expenditure and the monies needed for the dancers and the stage sets and the artists who decorate them and design those fabulous costumes.’

‘Are you saying that his personal account and the company’s accounts are the same? No difference at all?’

‘I am, my lord. Take the money he is getting from the Duke of Marlborough up there at Blenheim. That could go on paying the carpenters of the theatre in Paris, or the hire of theatrical costumes here in London, or on paying the bill for his last trip to Venice. And there’s another thing. He is very successful at persuading the rich to sponsor his work. I bet Lady Ripon has had to put her hand in her pocket more than once on this trip to London. They give him cheques or banker’s drafts. He then forgets he has them. Only recently he trotted into the accounts department with a huge cheque some rich backer had given him six weeks ago in Paris.’

‘Is it therefore impossible to say at any given time whether he is bankrupt or not?’

‘Quite impossible. One of the accounts people says they should turn him upside down every now and again and shake him vigorously to see what money falls out. People don’t last very long in the accounts department, those young men with mathematical training from St Petersburg. There are a few who have stuck the course. One of the young men who has lasted longest claims he stays because of the excitement. He says it’s like going over Niagara in a barrel all the time and hoping you’re still alive at the bottom. Not necessarily what you’d expect to hear from an accountant. The other one also uses a watery metaphor. He says it’s like keeping track of the flood before Noah decided to shove off in his Ark.’

‘So there is no answer to my original question?’

‘I’m afraid not. I know there’s enough money to pay everybody till the end of next week. The Blenheim money may already have been spent paying bills in Paris or even St Petersburg. In two weeks’ time, my lord, we all climb into the barrel and go back over Niagara again.’

George Walker the docker, Albert Smith from the railways, the brothers William and Thomas Baker and Arthur Cooper were packed into Arthur Cooper’s front room. His wife and children had been packed off to her sister’s round the corner.

‘Comrades, thank you all for coming. I have to report what our enemies would call a miracle. A miracle indeed. The long arm of Comrade Lenin has reached out across Europe to visit us here in Pentonville.’

He held up a very large envelope with pages sticking out of the top. ‘This was put through my front door, and not by the postman, the day before yesterday.

‘This is what the money is to be used for. Comrade Lenin wants us to print five hundred copies of his latest masterwork in English and five hundred in Russian.’

‘How do you know that the work is from Lenin? That it isn’t from our enemies, trying to trick us into printing literature that will not help our cause?’

William Baker was always suspicious. That, he often told his wife, was how he kept out of the authorities’ files all this time. ‘The courier who brought it gave very definite proof that it came from Cracow. He himself did not bring it all the way, he merely collected it from its temporary resting place elsewhere in London. I believe he is a courier acting for Lenin.’

‘This isn’t like the old days when you could print anything you liked and send it wherever you liked,’ Albert Smith put in. ‘They could have us all locked up for breaking that Official Secrets Act, so they could.’

‘I do not see how the laws of the decadent bourgeoisie should be allowed to stand in the way of the advancement of the revolution, comrades.’ Arthur Cooper felt that the revolutionary spirit seemed to be in short supply this evening.

‘If you are opposed to this plan, I will proceed on my own. Anybody who refuses to agree with my proposals will face reprisals from the party.’

‘I think it’s all very suspicious,’ put in George Walker. ‘A man arrives who says he is a colleague of Comrade Lenin. He gives you a sign. That’s good enough for me. But that pamphlet, won’t it have to be translated as well? That’s another risk we are all taking.’

Arthur Cooper was growing more and more irritated.

‘And can you not see that Comrade Lenin has thought of everything? He toils away in his lonely library and sends the next pamphlet to forward the cause of world revolution. All you can do is worry about some ridiculous law.’

‘It won’t be ridiculous if we end up in jail.’

‘Comrade Lenin expected better from his colleagues in London. I was not meant to tell you this but I will. He thought you would agree to his wishes and carry them out without complaint. It seems he was wrong. He had given me the name of a translator and the name of a printing firm in Clerkenwell that will carry out the work. Comrade Lenin expected obedience. Do I have it?’

Reluctantly the revolutionaries agreed. Even then they weren’t finished.

‘What happens when they’re all printed off? What do we do with them then?’ asked William Baker.

‘When the pamphlets are done, I will take full responsibility for their distribution. That matter is not for discussion either here or later.’

A rather different meeting was taking place upstairs in Markham Square. Lady Lucy, returned from nursing a sick aunt, was to be brought up to date by Natasha Shaporova, Inspector Dutfield and her husband.

‘I don’t think we have made much progress, really,’ Powerscourt began. ‘We are no nearer to solving the central problem of the case — who was the victim? Bolm or Alexander Taneyev? Personally, I have no idea. Inspector?’

‘Well, my lord, my lady, I have to say, speaking as a policeman with some experience in these cases: statistically, it has to be Bolm.’

‘How did you work that one out, Inspector?’ Lady Lucy felt that she had made insufficient contribution to the case so far, even though she had the excuse of having been away.