‘When I was a little girl, a maid spilled a pan of boiling water and I was burnt. I have a scar on my side that… that no one’s seen before and… I call it my snakeskin. I wanted to tell you so you know what to expect.’
Frank turned to her. They were lying together in Frank’s narrow bed, his flank against hers.
‘That’s why you’ve been so anxious?’
She nodded.
‘Oh darling, I thought you’d gone off me.’ He kissed her gently on the lips. ‘
‘Shall I show you?’
‘No need, darling, I’ll see you in all your beauty soon enough…’
‘But I’d prefer to show you so you know. So I can get it over with.’
‘If that would make you happier, then show me.’ They sat up.
The candles did their dances, and even though she was anxious, she was still trembling with the excitement. She looked at him. His sweet brown eyes shone with sympathy and love for her; the moisture in them caught the candlelight. He unhooked her dress. Then she faced him again and pulled down the dress slowly, as far as her breasts. She hesitated there and considered running away – out of the door and into the streets. But he shook his head as one does when one admires something beautiful. She reached behind and unhooked her brassiere, faltering there too. She pulled her dress down a little further, covering her breasts with her hands. She closed her eyes in case there was disgust on his face and then gradually she raised her arms and said: ‘There!’
‘Can I touch you?’ he asked and she could tell from his voice that he was smiling and she was so relieved. She jumped a little as his hand traced her snakeskin. His fingertips ran over the smooth skin and then across the borderline on to the roughness that extended up from her hip to her breast. ‘I think you’re so incredibly lovely, and I can’t wait much longer.’ His fingers retraced the snakeskin lightly, and she shivered.
‘Are you sure?’
‘More sure than I’ve been about anything. It can be our shared secret. Let this be the covenant of our love. Always.’
‘Our talisman.’
‘Yes, our talisman. Do you know the poem?’ He recited:
Serafima interrupted him to finish the verse:
She could not believe that she had been so blessed by this kind man who had transformed her fear into a talisman of love. He kissed away the tears on her cheeks.
‘Now may I undress you myself. Please?’
The undressing, with all its tension and anxiety, followed by success and relief, had deeply moved her. Now there were red stars before her eyes – was it the wine? – and waves of heat surfed up her body. Now she longed for him to touch her in the places where her body was vibrating with an unknown pleasure that she could neither bear, nor satisfy, nor end. She didn’t want to stop even when he reached for a package that she saw was marked ‘Trojan’. He covered her eyes, smiling.
‘This is much more awkward than…’ he said, and they laughed out of nerves and she realized he meant her snakeskin, and that both were to be celebrated.
Afterwards, she felt beautiful for the first time in her life. She had sloughed off her ungainliness; yes, she smiled to herself, just as a snake sheds its skin.
DASHKA DOROVA AND Hercules Satinov did not see each other again until the first day of term at School 801. It was May, and at the Golden Gates, he could see Dashka and she could see him and sometimes, as they passed one another, she would whisper: ‘More than yesterday. Less than tomorrow.’ Or just one word: ‘Almaz!’ But they were constantly watched by spouses, comrades, their own bodyguards and assistants, and both were wary of hurting their families or drawing the attention of the Organs.
When Satinov looked into his heart, he knew he loved Tamriko. He loved Dashka too, but it was a different species of love, and she came second to Tamriko. He saw no contradiction. There were many shades of love, he told himself. Together they made him complete. As for the secrecy, that cost him nothing: he was a Bolshevik.
They had found a way to phone each other. Sometimes the phone rang in the conference room next to his office.
‘Hello, it’s me!’ She would use his words.
‘Hello, me.’
‘I love you,’ she’d say.
‘I love you and love being loved by you: it’s the most unexpected joy for me, this secret jewel in my life.’
‘But where can this go?’ she would ask, anxious suddenly.
‘For me, it doesn’t have to go anywhere. It just is.’
She laughed. ‘Is this really you, the Iron Commissar? How has this great romantic survived all these years in the age of ice?’
‘I imagine kissing you when we’re in our sixties.’
‘One day, if we were both on our own, somehow, God forbid, then I know we would be together.’
