DANGER FROM A FRESH SOURCE.
I walked home with a feeling of rare exhilaration. Whatever happened,
this was my own quarrel, and I had so acted as to secure the sympathy
of all who knew the facts. The quarrel had been fixed on me in public
in a manner peculiarly disgraceful to both my opponents, and if they
killed me, it would be murder.
If on the other hand I could kill either or both, the world would be
the sweeter and purer for their riddance. Moreover I had so arranged
matters that I saw how I should have at least an equal chance of my
life. I should have the choice of weapons and I would fight Devinsky
with swords and the "butcher" with pistols.
I thought much about Durescq's skill. He had a huge reputation both as
a swordsman and a shot; but I was very confident in my own skill with
the sword, and inclined to doubt whether he could beat me even with
that. In the end, however, I decided not to run that risk. The issue
should be left to chance. The duel should be fought with pistols. One
should be loaded, and one unloaded; and a toss should settle which each
should have. We would then stand at arm's length, the barrel of one
man's weapon touching the other's forehead. The man to whom Fortune
gave the loaded weapon would thus be bound to blow the other's brains
out, whether he had any skill or not. Both would stand equal before
Fortune.
About an hour later, Essaieff came to me and told me that the whole
regiment was in a state of excitement about the fight and that feeling
against Devinsky had reached a positively dangerous pitch, especially
when it was known that he had practically refused to meet me. That
point was still unsettled, and Essaieff had come to get my final
decision.
"My advice is, stand firm," he said. "You're in the right. There
isn't an unprejudiced man in the whole army who wouldn't say you were
acting well within your rights; just as, I must say, my dear fellow,
you've acted splendidly throughout."
I told him what I had been thinking.
"It seems a ghastly thing to put a life in the spin of a coin," he
commented.
"Better than to have it ended without a chance, by the thrust of a
butcher's knife."
"That name will stick to Durescq for always," he said, with a slow
smile. "It was splendid. Do you know you made me hold my breath while
you were at him. Damn him, so he is a butcher!"
"Do you say Devinsky won't meet me?" I asked.
"No, not that he won't; but he raises the excuse that as Durescq's
challenge was given first--as it was indeed--the order of the fight
must follow the order of the challenges. But they arranged the
challenges purposely in that order."
"I shan't hold to the point," I said, after a moment's consideration.
"If they insist I shall give way and meet Durescq first. But this will
only make it the more easy for us to insist on our plan of fighting.
Don't give way on that. I am resolved that one of us shall fall: and
chance shall settle which."
Essaieff tried to persuade me to insist on meeting Devinsky first; but
I would not.
"No. He shan't carry back to St Petersburg the tale that we in Moscow
are ready to bluster in words, and then daren't make them good in our
acts."
"I hope he'll carry back no tale at all to St Petersburg," answered my
friend, grimly: and then he left me.
I completed what few preparations I had to make in view of the very
probably fatal issue of the fight: wrote a letter to Olga and enclosed
one to Balestier as I had done before; and was just getting off to bed,
when Essaieff came back to report.
My message had added to the already great excitement and there had been
at first the most strenuous opposition to our plan of fighting. But he
had forced his way, and the meetings--with the "butcher" first and, if
I did not fall, with Devinsky afterwards--were fixed for eight o'clock.
He promised to come for me half an hour before that time: and he urged
me to get to bed and to have as much sleep as possible to steady my
nerves.
They were steady enough already. I gloated over the affair; and I
meant so to use it as to set the seal to my reputation as "that devil
Alexis," whether I lived or died.
But after all I was baulked.
I slept soundly enough till Borlas called me early in the morning and
told me strange news. A file of soldiers were in my room, and the
sergeant had requested me to be called at once as he had an important
message.
I called the man into my bedroom and asked him what he wanted.
"You are to consider yourself under arrest, Lieutenant," he said
saluting, and drawing himself up stiffly. "And in my charge."
"What for?"
"I don't know, Lieutenant. I had my orders from the Colonel himself
first thing; and, if you please, I am to prevent you leaving the house.
You'll understand my position, sir. Will you give me your word not to
attempt to leave?"
"Where are your written orders?" I knew the man well and he liked me.
"My orders are verbal, Lieutenant; but very strict and imperative."
"Privately, do you know anything of the cause of this?"
"You'll have a letter from the Colonel, I think, Lieutenant, within an
hour, requiring you to go to him. Major Devinsky is also confined to
his quarters, sir; and also, I think, Captain Durescq. We've heard in
the regiment, sir, what happened at the officers' club last night." A
certain look on his lined bearded face and in his eyes as he saluted me
when he said this, told me much.
I chafed at the interference, and cursed the Colonel for having
apparently taken a hand in the matter. This butcher would now be able
to go back to St Petersburg with a lying garbled tale that we in Moscow
got out of quarrels by clinging to the coat tails of our commanding
officer; and it made me mad. I tried to persuade the sergeant to let
me out to go to the place of meeting; promising to be back within an
hour; but he was immovable.
"I would, if I dared, Lieutenant; but I dare not. I'm not the man to
stop a fair fight, and I hate this work. But duty's duty."
When Essaieff came, he threw new light on the matter. The affair had
caused a huge commotion. In the early hours of the morning he had been
summoned to the Colonel, who had in some way got wind of the matter; a
very ugly version having been told him. My friend had had to tell the
plain truth and there had been the devil to pay. The wires to St
Petersburg had been kept going through the night; the whole thing had
been laid before Head-Quarters at the Ministry for War; and the arrest
of the three principals had been ordered from the capital.
Soon afterwards a peremptory summons came for me from the Colonel and
when I got to him I found both Devinsky and Durescq there, together
with two or three of the highest officers then stationed in Moscow. A
sort of informal examination took place, out of which I am bound to say
both the other men came very badly; and in the end we were all three
ordered off to stay in our quarters under arrest. I found that not
only were we not allowed to go out--sentries being posted in my rooms
all the time--but no one was permitted to enter: nor could I
communicate with a single individual for two days.
At the end of that time the order came for me to resume duty; and as
soon as the morning's drill was over, the Colonel sent for me and told
me what had happened. The military authorities at St Petersburg had
taken the harshest view of the conduct of my two antagonists. It was
regarded as a deliberate plot to kill. Devinsky had been cashiered;
and only Durescq's great influence had prevented him from sharing the
same fate. As it was, he had had all his seniority struck off, been
reduced to the rank of a subaltern, and sent off there and then under
quasi arrest with heavy military escort, to a regiment stationed right
away on the most southern Turkestan frontier.
"As for Devinsky, the regiment's well rid of him," said the Colonel,
with such emphasis and earnestness that I saw his own personal
animosity had had quite as much to do with the man's overthrow as the
latter's own conduct. But it pleased the old man to put it all down to
me, and when we were parting, he shook hands cordially and said:--"The
Regiment owes you a vote of thanks, my boy; and I'll see that it's paid
in full."
"One question I should like to ask," said I. "How did you get to hear
of it all?"
"The news was everybody's property, lad, and--don't ask questions," he
replied with dry inconsequence. And would say no more.
But I was soon to learn, and the news surprised me as much as any part
of the whole strange incident.
The first use I made of my liberty was to go and see Olga and explain
my absence and all that had happened. She had heard a somewhat garbled
account of it in which the part I played had been greatly exaggerated,
and she received me with the greatest tenderness and sympathy; and
tears of what seemed pleasure, but she explained as cold, glistened in
her eyes. We had a long and closely confidential chat; and she made me
feel more by her trustful manner and gentle attitude than by her actual
words, how much she had missed me during the days of our separation and
how thankful she was to be free of Devinsky for good, and how much she
felt she owed to me on that account.
For myself I was sorry when I had to leave her. She was the only
person in Moscow to whom I could speak without restraint; a fact that
made our interviews so welcome that I was loath to end this one.
It was getting dusk when I left and as I walked home I was thoughtful
and preoccupied. The question of Olga's safety was pressing very
hardly on me and made me extremely anxious. The more I saw of her the
more eager I was to get her out of harm's way; and the consciousness
that she must share the consequences of any disaster that might happen
to me, were I discovered, was pressing upon me with increasing
severity. I was beginning to anticipate more vividly, moreover, the
coming of some such disaster. The time was passing very quickly. It
was getting on for nearly three weeks since the Nihilist meeting, and I
knew that my Nihilist "allies" would be growing anxious for a sign of
my zeal. They were probably well aware that I was doing nothing to
redeem my pledge.
There was also the undeniable danger inseparably connected with the
distasteful intrigue with Paula Tueski. I had so neglected her in my
character of lover that I was hourly expecting some proof of her
indignation. I had only seen her twice in the three weeks; and each
time in public; and though Olga and she had interchanged visits, I knew
perfectly well that she was not the woman to take neglect passively.
I blamed myself warmly, too, for my own inactivity. My whole policy
had been so to try and gain time, and yet I had made no use of it,
except to get into broils which had increased the already bewildering
complications.
That this would be the effect of my quarrel with Devinsky and Durescq,
I could not doubt when I came to think the matter over in cool blood.
I had been the means of both of them being ruined; and naturally every
friend they had in Russia would take part against me. I knew that
Durescq had friends among the most powerful circles in Russia, and I
had nothing to oppose to their anger save the poor position of a
lieutenant in a marching regiment and a past that was full of
blackguardism and evil repute. Personally this was all nothing to me;
but when I thought of the indirect results it might have for Olga it
troubled and worried me deeply.
Everything pointed to one conclusion--that Olga should leave Russia
while she could do so in safety. I was meditating on these things when
a girl stopped me suddenly, asking if I were Lieutenant Petrovitch.
She then gave me a scrap of paper; and I glanced at and read it.
"_The old rendezvous, at once. Urgent. P.T._"
I questioned the girl as to who gave it to her, and where the person
was; but getting no satisfactory account, dismissed her with a few
kopecks.
It beat me. Obviously it was from Paula Tueski. Equally obviously it
was an appointment at which she had apparently something to say of
importance. But where the deuce the "old rendezvous" was I knew no
more than the wind.
I am not one to waste time over the impossible; and as I certainly
could not go to a place I did not know of, I tore the letter into
shreds and went on home.
I let myself in and found that my servant was out--a most unusual thing
at that time of the day; but I had begun to fear that the man was below
rather than above the average of Russian servants and was already
contemplating his dismissal. I did not attach much importance to his
present absence, however; and throwing myself into a chair sat and
thought or tried to think of some scheme by which I could induce Olga
to leave the country, and some means by which her departure could be
safely arranged. She must go at once. She had promised me to go when
I could tell her it was necessary for my safety; and I could truthfully
say that now. If she would go, I would have a dash for liberty myself.
While I was thinking in this strain someone knocked at my outer door,
and when I opened it, to my surprise, Paula Tueski rushed in quickly.
A glance at her face shewed me she was in an exceedingly ill temper; as
indeed it appeared to me she generally was.
"Where is your servant?" was her first question hurriedly asked.
"I really don't know. Out somewhere; but----"
"His absence means danger, Alexis. Why didn't you come to me when I
sent a message to you just now. You read it, questioned the girl, and
then tore it up and threw it in the gutter; and all this as
unconcernedly as if you did not know full well that from our window you
must be in full view of me. Are you always going to scorn me?"
I took care to shew no surprise; but it was clear I had blundered
badly, and that the "rendezvous" was close to the spot where the paper
had been given to me.
"I could not come. I had to hurry home. I----"
"Bah! Don't trifle with me like that. Haven't you had enough of your
prison during the last two days?"
"You know the news, then?" said I, following her gladly off the track.
"It is you who do not know the news. Ah, Alexis, you are giving me
more trouble in this new character of yours than ever you did in the
old one--much as you harassed me then. But I do not mind if only...."
She stopped and looked at me with beaming eyes. "You have not kissed
me; and here I am risking all again and even venturing right here into
your rooms."
"What do you mean about new character?" I asked. Her phrase had
startled me.
"I like it better than the old. Fifty thousand times better 'That
devil Alexis,' than 'That roue Petrovitch.' But whenever I think of
the change, I can't understand it--I don't understand you. I could
almost swear, sometimes, you are not the same man"--she came close up
to me and putting her hands on my shoulders, stared long and earnestly
right into my eyes--"and then I wonder how I can have been so blind as
not to have seen all that lay hidden in you: all that was noble and
brave and daring. But I love you, Alexis, twenty thousand times more
than ever; and to have saved your life now is a thought of infinite
sweetness to me. Kiss me, sweetheart."
I started back as if she had stung me.
"Do you mean you had anything to do with..." I stopped, but she knew
what I meant. She smiled and in a voice exquisitely sweet and tender,
though hateful to me, she answered:
"Your life is mine, Alexis? Do you think I would let that butcher from
St Petersburg take it? Let him keep to his own shambles. Yes, I set
the wires in motion, and I did not stop until the one man was utterly
ruined and the other degraded in the eyes of all Russia. Your life is
mine, Alexis"--she seemed to revel in this hateful phrase--"and those
who would strike at you, must reckon with me as well. We are destined
for each other, you and I; and we live or die together."
"You have done me a foul wrong, then," I cried hotly. "You have
disgraced me; made me out for a braggart that provokes a fight and then
shirks it by screening myself behind the law. Do you suppose I thank
you for that?" I spoke as sternly as I felt. But she only smiled as
she answered,
"I did not think of your feelings. This man would have killed you.
His hands are bloody to the armpits. Do you think I would let him find
another victim in you when I could stop him and save you? Did you not
reproach me, too when I did not interfere before, and tell me my love
was cold? Would I suffer such a reproach again, think you? No, no.
Your life is mine, I repeat, and for the future I will protect it
whether you will or no. That is how I love; and so it shall be always.
I have come now to warn you. Hush! What is that?"
I listened and heard someone moving in the lobby of my rooms.
"It is Borlas returned," I said, and opening the door called him.
Getting no answer I called again loudly; and then my visitor whispered
to me to come back into the room. But I paid no heed to her, and went
forward a few steps to go into my servant's room. As I did so, a
desperate rush was made and three men disguised, dashed at me
violently. They had gained an entrance somehow and were no doubt
making their way to attack me in my room or were going to lay in wait
for me, when my quick ears heard them and thus spoiled their plans.
I was unarmed, and saw instantly the foolishness of attempting to fight
three men, probably armed, while I had not so much as a stick. Making
a feint of an attack upon the nearest, therefore, I jumped aside and
darted back into the room I had just left, closing the door instantly
behind me, while my companion and I held it shut until I had secured it.
Then I turned to her for an explanation.
"They are my husband's agents," she whispered. "He suspects us, as you
know; and he arranged this attack, thinking that if you were killed,
the act just at this juncture would be set down to Devinsky's revenge.
I came on purpose to warn you. If they catch me here now, we are both
ruined beyond hope."
"Then they shan't catch us," I replied. "Or if they do, shan't live to
carry the tale outside the door:" and I proceeded to put in execution a
plan which had already occurred to me.