Ruzsky stretched out his own legs toward Pavel. The train lurched. The steam engine behind them hissed violently as it began to turn the giant iron wheels.

Despite the circumstances, Ruzsky found it hard to contain his excitement. As the train departed, he recalled how Dmitri and Ilya would stand with their noses pressed against the glass, waving to the servants who were staying behind to look after the house on Millionnaya Street.

Just as quickly as it had come, the thrill of those memories melted into something more melancholic. In every sense, the journeys to Petrovo were a part of history now.

They were gone forever.

The train gathered speed, pulling out of the Nicholas Station and gliding through the moonlit spires of the city.

The moon was bright until they reached the suburbs, and then it was suddenly engulfed in a bank of clouds and the world around them was swallowed by the night.

There was a single dim light in the compartment, but Ruzsky was happy to evade the scrutiny of his companions. “When will we see it again?” Pavel asked.

“See what?”

“Home.”

“We’re going to Yalta, not the moon.”

“Thanks for your understanding.”

“You’re going to Yalta?” the man opposite asked, pausing in the process of lighting a cigarette.

Ruzsky didn’t answer.

“Running away?”

Ruzsky leaned forward and offered his hand. “Sandro.”

The soldier opposite stared at Ruzsky, smoking nonchalantly, until the offer was withdrawn. “Officer class,” he said. “But not your friend.” He grinned. He had almost no teeth.

Pavel shook his head and leaned against the window. Ruzsky glanced at his pocket watch and then closed his eyes. He had not checked the passenger lists before they’d embarked-partly because he couldn’t think of an excuse to give Pavel-but he had climbed up onto the train brimming with confidence that she would be on board.

Her presence was like a magnet; it took a conscious act of will to remain seated.

Ruzsky tried to put her out of his mind. He listened as the soldiers opened a bottle of vodka and began to drink. They didn’t offer any to their traveling companions, but didn’t talk much amongst themselves either. When Ruzsky opened his eyes briefly, the man opposite was staring at him. Pavel started to snore gently.

Ruzsky listened to Pavel for a few moments, then could contain his impatience no longer. There were still soldiers in the corridor outside, as surly as those in his compartment. They allowed him to pass reluctantly, and his passage was a slow one.

Most of the blinds in the compartments had already been drawn, so Ruzsky had to knock on a succession of doors and open them, nodding to passengers within when he saw that she wasn’t there.

He worked his way down the train. About fifty percent of the billets were occupied by soldiers, and they packed the corridors until Ruzsky reached the first-class carriages.

Here, a conductor stood on the inside of the door, barring entry, and was reluctant to open it even to speak to him. Ruzsky tried putting his weight against it, but it was locked.

He began to gesticulate at the man, but the glass was thick and the rattle of the train loud, and the conductor looked away from him.

Ruzsky pulled out his identification papers, placed them against the glass, and then hammered hard to force the man to turn around. “Police,” he shouted.

Reluctantly, the guard unlocked the door and let him through, looking warily behind him to be sure he was on his own. As soon as he was past, the conductor slammed the door shut and locked it again.

It was quieter in here, and warmer. The curtains had been pulled shut all the way along the corridor. The conductor’s face was visible in the dim glow of an overhead lamp.

“Maria Popova,” Ruzsky said, and the man pointed down the corridor, without needing to consult the passenger list in his hand.

“Next carriage. At the end,” he said. “Cabin number eight.”

Ruzsky strode down the richly carpeted corridor and through the door into the next carriage, his nerves sharp again.

He breathed in. It was a relief to have left the soldiers behind.

He knocked.

“Who is it?”

Ruzsky did not answer.

“Who is it?” she called again.

“It’s me, Sandro.”

He waited. A thin sheen of sweat gathered on his forehead.

The door was pulled back.

There was no light in her eyes; she was not pleased to see him. His heart pounded faster. “I thought I would find you here,” he said.

Her gaze remained steely.

“I have business in Yalta,” he went on, aware that he was trying too hard to fill the silence that hung between them. “I am on the train with my partner and I recalled you saying you would be traveling south tonight.”

“I suppose you had better come in,” she said. She stepped back and sat down.

Ruzsky shut the door and seated himself opposite her. She wore a long, navy blue dress, buttoned with pearl studs high around her throat. Her dark hair spilled over her shoulders and down to the swell of her breast.

There was a single reading lamp, with a red lantern, casting shadows across the walls and ceiling, and the drawn blinds behind it.

Maria reached up to the leather suitcase on the rack above him, stretching on tiptoes as she removed a bottle.

She poured a large measure of whiskey into one of the glasses on the table by the window and handed it to him. She filled another for herself, then replaced the cork stopper and slipped the bottle under her pillow.

“Thank you,” Ruzsky said. His voice felt as if it were coming from someone else.

They both drank.

Maria lifted the blind closest to her and stared out of the darkened window, but because of the light inside, he knew it was impossible for her to see anything.

“So many soldiers on board,” Ruzsky said. “All ill-mannered.”

“Wouldn’t you be, if you’d been fighting with the Tsar’s army?”

“Probably.”

They sat in silence, each avoiding the other’s eye. Ruzsky sipped his whiskey, then took out his cigarette case and offered her one. She declined, so he slipped it back into his pocket.

He thought she had never looked more beautiful.

Maria shut her eyes. Ruzsky watched a pained expression take hold of her face and then relax its grip again.

He listened to the steady rattle of the wheels on the iron rails beneath them.

“Have I done something wrong?” he asked.

Maria opened her eyes, but continued to stare out of the window. “No.”

“You seem… angry.”

“It was foolish,” she said, almost inaudibly, “to think that we could be friends.”

“Why?”

“You know damned well why.” She turned on him. Anger burned brightly in her eyes. “What are you doing here?”

“I thought that-”

“What kind of fool do you take me for?”

“I made a mistake.”

“I’ll say you did.” Maria faced the window again. “I’d have waited for you until the end of the world, Sandro, if you could have given me just the faintest breath of hope.”

“I could not…”

“Compromise?” She shook her head. “No. Of course not. I know. It’s not in your genes.”

“I had a wife and a one-and-a half-year-old son.”

“A wife who is a liar and a cheat.”

“And a son who looks up to her as a mother.”

“Well, where is she now, Sandro?”

“I know I made a mistake.”

“You wouldn’t lower yourself.”

“Don’t be absurd.”

“You didn’t touch me.” She was almost shouting now. “Your sense of honor would not allow you even to touch me. Your wife fucked like a whore that… disgusting man-and others-and yet you would not-could not-bring yourself to touch the woman you professed to love.”

“I was… I wanted you so much…”

“You were right!” Her face was strained to breaking point, her eyes wet with tears. “You were right not to touch me.”

“If I’d known-”