Danielle Steel: Granny Dan

She promised to think about it, and she did, constantly. All she could think about now was the terror of moving to Vermont. Madame Mar-kova sensed easily that something was happening to her. Danina was still tired and pale, and she looked deeply unhappy at times after Nikolai's visits. He was asking her to cast her lot with him, follow him to the end of the world, and trust him completely. And in spite of her love for him, it was a great deal to ask.

“You are troubled, Danina,” Madame Mar-kova said cautiously one afternoon, when she came to visit her, and sat beside Danina's bed while she rested. Nikolai had just left her, and as always they had spoken of the same things. Their future. Vermont. His cousin. Leaving Russia. And the ballet. “He is asking you to leave us, isn't he?” she asked wisely, and Danina didn't answer her. She didn't want to lie, or tell her the truth either. “It always happens that way. They fall in love with who you are, and then want to take it away from you,” she persisted. “I promise you, Danina, if you leave us, it will kill you. You will be nothing. And when he casts you aside one day for someone more fascinating, or perhaps even younger, you will regret all your life the part of your heart you left here.” She made it sound like a death sentence, and it was, in a way. But it was also an exchange for something Danina wanted desperately. It would be the end of her life as a ballerina, but the beginning of her life with Nikolai, a real life with him, which she also wanted. But to have it, she had to sacrifice everything she had now, just as he did. “If he truly loved you, Danina, he would not ask you to leave us.”

“And when I am old, what will I have without him, if I stay here?”

‘ ? life you can be proud of in remembering. No one can ever take that from you. Instead of a life of shame, which is all that he can give you. He is a married man, and his wife will not leave him. You will always be his mistress, the little ballet dancer he sleeps with, nothing more.”

But there was so much more between them, even now, and Danina knew that. “You make it sound so tawdry, and it isn't,” Danina said sadly.

“It is precisely what these things always are. Extremely romantic in the beginning. A dream you think you will have. And when you wake up from it one day, you will find it is a nightmare. This is the only life you will ever have that means something to you, this is the life you have worked hard for and trained for. Can you throw it all away for a man who cannot even marry you? Look what has just happened to you. How beautiful was that? How romantic?” It was a cruel thing to say and it unnerved Danina just listening to her. What if she was right? If Nikolai threw her away one day, if she regretted giving up the ballet all her life, and hated Vermont, if they were not happy together? Who could know the answers to those questions? There was no certainty to his plans, only promises, and hopes and dreams, and wishes. Hers as much as his own. Yet he was willing to give up medicine for her, the security he had, the life he had known for over fifteen years with his family. He was willing to sacrifice all for her. Why couldn't she do the same for him?

“You must think about it very carefully,” Madame Markova reminded her, “and come to the right decision.” The right decision to her, of course, was staying at the ballet and forgetting Nikolai, but Danina also knew she couldn't do that. Leaving the ballet now might destroy her life, but losing him would kill her. Just thinking about it, she felt under the blouse she wore for her locket, and was comforted to feel it there. She was deeply in love with him. Perhaps even enough to risk everything and follow him. Now all she could do was think about it, and look into her heart.

Madame Markova left her alone after that, to her own thoughts. She had planted the seeds she wanted to, and hoped that they would grow and take hold. She wanted Danina to feel the loss and terror of leaving the ballet, of perhaps a lifetime of regret and sorrow. It was certainly something to ponder. It was the only life Madame Markova knew, the only one she ever wanted, it was the legacy she wanted to give Danina now, the sacred bond, the holy grail, the wand passed from hand to hand, from teacher to student to teacher and back again, endlessly, the almost holy vow they took when they came, the love too deep to escape in the end, the sacrifices endless. To stay here now meant giving up all hope of a future with him. In a sense, it meant giving up hope. But to leave Russia with him meant giving up who she was forever. It was an agonizing choice, and whichever road she chose would require sacrifices almost too agonizing to think of. And all Danina could do now was pray that the right answer would come.

Chapter 8

Danina did not dance for a month, and began taking class again on the first of April. There was still snow on the ground outside, and once again she had to work harder than before to regain what she had lost, but this time the return to full strength was swifter. She was stronger now, and in better health.

She was back in rehearsals within a week, and performing again in early May. It was over a year since she had left Nikolai after their long, idyllic stay in the Czar's guest cottage during her convalescence from influenza. And in a year, little had changed between them. They were still deeply in love with each other, he was still married and living with his wife and children, and she was still at the ballet. But they were no closer than they had been a year before to a solution to their problems. If anything, Marie Obrajensky was more firmly entrenched than she had ever been in not leaving him. And in the past year, the two lovers had been able to save very little money for their future together. All they knew for sure was that a life together was still what they wanted. How to achieve it was the obstacle they constantly struggled to overcome. And Danina could not bring herself to agree to join him in Vermont. It was too big a change, she felt, too far away, too unknown, too foreign to her. And Nikolai continued to try and convince her, as gently as he could.

One of the Grand Duchesses fell ill in June, and kept both Imperial physicians busy. Nikolai had little time to visit Danina. He wanted to, but he couldn't get away, and she understood. And in early July, she had another tragedy when her oldest brother was killed in Czernoivitz. She had lost two now, and she knew from his letter that her father was beside himself over the death of his son. He had been with him when they were shelled, and miraculously he had been spared, but his firstborn was killed instantly. Danina took the news hard, and for weeks afterward she felt drained and lifeless. The war was taking a toll on all of them, even at the ballet. Dancers had lost brothers, friends, fathers, and one of their teachers had lost both her sons in April. Even in their cloistered world, it was impossible to ignore the war anymore.

The only thing she had to look forward to that year was another vacation with Nikolai and the Imperial family in Livadia. And this time Madame Markova made no attempt to oppose it. She had come to an uneasy truce with Nikolai after Danina's last illness. She knew that he would have gladly stolen Danina from her, but the young prima showed no sign of going anywhere, or giving up the ballet for him. And Madame Markova felt secure now in her belief that Danina would never be able to bring herself to leave. Just as it was, and always had been to Madame Markova, the ballet was Danina's life.

The Czar was not in Livadia that year, he was with his troops in Mogilev, and felt obliged to stay with them. So it was only the women and children and both physicians who were there, and Danina. The Czarina and her daughters had allowed themselves to take a brief time off from nursing the soldiers, and were happy to be in Livadia again. They were all old friends now, and she and Nikolai were happier than they had ever been. It seemed a perfect time to both of them, a magical moment suspended in time, protected from a dangerous world seemingly far from them. In the safety of Livadia, they were shielded from the realities that had already engulfed everything else.