  We study a bosonic four--dimensional effective action corresponding to the
heterotic string compactified on a 6--torus (dilaton--axion gravity with one
vector field) on a curved space--time manifold possessing a time--like Killing
vector field. Previously an existence of the $SO(2,3)\sim Sp(4, R)$ global
symmetry ($U$--duality) as well as the symmetric space property of the
corresponding $\sigma$--model have been established following Neugebauer and
Kramer approach. Here we present an explicit form of the $Sp(4, R)$ generators
in terms of coset variables and construct a representation of the coset in
terms of the physical target space coordinates. Complex symmetric $2\times 2$
matrix $Z$ (``matrix dilaton --axion'') is introduced for which $U$--duality
takes the matrix valued $SL(2, R)$ form. In terms of this matrix the theory is
further presented as a K\"ahler $\sigma$--model. This leads to a more concise
$2\times 2$ formulation which opens new ways to construct exact classical
solutions. New solution (corresponding to constant ${\rm Im} Z$ ) is obtained
which describes the system of point massless magnetic monopoles endowed with
axion charges equal to minus monopole charges. In such a system mutual magnetic
repulsion is exactly balanced by axion attraction so that the resulting space
time is locally flat but possesses multiple Taub--NUT singularities.
