Marianne shook her head. “He didn’t say anything about Saint Petersburg.”
“And the train came from the other direction,” added Sophie.
Steam billowed past the windows, there was the screech of iron wheels on track, and the train shunted forward. The chandelier tinkled and sprinkled light over them.
“He’s been sent to fetch us,” Delphine said firmly. “He knows our names. Where else would he be taking us?”
The train gathered pace and slipped into the snow-covered forest.
“I’ve lost my ticket,” Marianne said, slumping down onto a banquette. “I hope he doesn’t ask to see it.”
Before the girls could say anything more, the man reappeared. He seemed even taller and larger now that he was in the daintily appointed carriage. He rubbed his hands together and said, “It is very cold in the forest. I must make sure that you are kept warm.” He turned and took three pale fur traveling rugs from a wooden cupboard.
He gestured to Sophie to sit down. “You must be tired after your long journey,” he said, tucking the fur under her knees and then turning his attention to the other girls. Marianne bit her nails and glanced out of the window as if she might still try to get off. The man seemed unaware of her anxiety. “I must first attend to the furnace in the driver’s cabin,” he said. “A matter of moments, only.”
“You’re the driver, too?” Marianne looked dazed.
“The train almost takes care of itself.” The man smiled. “Which means I will have time to serve you a midnight picnic and your first glass of proper Russian tea. I will prepare thesamovar!”
He rubbed his hands together and beamed at the girls as if he had just given them a present.
“Miss Ellis definitely got confused,” Delphine whispered once the man had left the carriage. They could hear him singing cheerfully, and the sound of cutlery and plates being placed on a tray.
“Or Dr. Starova didn’t explain things properly,” Marianne added.
An image of the woman in the tapestry coat sipping coffee and checking the station clock dropped into Sophie’s mind. Dr. Starova struck her as the sort of woman who knew exactly what she was doing. She thought of her visit to the school — her certainty at wanting Sophie to do the tour, her deftness in taking Sophie’s photograph in the playground. And then looking around her room, asking about her father … In Sophie’s memory, there seemed to be a point to all that the woman had done that day, to her waiting in the station café until the last possible moment at the station, although Sophie still could not understand what that point was.
“Perhaps …” Sophie started to say, just as the man reappeared with a small dish of pancakes.
“Blinis!” he said proudly. Each pancake had a dollop of thick white cream and pearls of pale gray on top. “With caviar!”
There was a question to which they desperately needed the answer, but none of them had had the courage to ask it. Sophie wished that Marianne wouldn’t go quiet in these situations; her reticence, as she sat observing everything like a little owl, had its drawbacks. And Delphine was sometimes a bittooforthright.
“Would you mind telling us …” Sophie felt heat sliding over her cheeks.
The man smiled encouragement as he handed them each a plate with a blini.
Delphine, using her most sophisticated voice, finished Sophie’s sentence. “… who you are?”
The man took a second to answer, as if he might be translating what they had said into Russian. And then he burst out laughing. “The journey to fetch you has made me forgetful!” He took a deep breath, bowed deeply to each of the girls in turn, and then said, in solemn tones, “I am Ivan Ivanovich, majordomo at the Volkonsky Winter Palace!”
Delphine simply nodded, as if she had known this all along. Sophie thought she might have laughed if she didn’t feel so confused.
Marianne turned to Sophie with a questioning look and mouthed, “What?”
Delphine was still nodding. “This palace place …” she said. “Is it in Saint Petersburg?”
The man shook his head. “Why, no!”
“Oh!” Delphine frowned and stopped nodding.
Marianne made a funny little noise, like air escaping from a balloon. “But we thought” — her voice had a catch to it, as if she were about to cry — “that you had come to take us back to Saint Petersburg.”
“That’s why we got on the train,” Sophie added.
“But why would I take you back to Saint Petersburg when you are to be guests at the palace?” The man called Ivan Ivanovich looked baffled.
Marianne looked even more worried. Sophie wanted to go and sit next to her, put her arm around her thin shoulders. It usually made her feel braver if she could comfort someone else.
