THE VELVET PAW.
On leaving Petersburg I had been compelled to part from Mariána Néstoff,
nevertheless she wrote me weekly letters full of tenderness. Six months
after my return to London an exciting and extraordinary adventure befel
me.
One foggy December evening I had entered an empty second-class carriage
at the Temple Station of the Metropolitan District Railway, when I was
followed by a tall girl, neatly attired in black, who seated herself
in a corner opposite me. I noticed she was fairly good-looking, about
twenty years of age, with auburn hair, clear blue eyes, and well-moulded
features; then, after a furtive glance, I took up my newspaper and
commenced reading.
Scarcely had the train moved off, however, when I felt a light touch upon
my arm, and heard a musical voice utter my name with true Russian accent.
“I confess you have the advantage of me,” I said, surprised.
“Yes, possibly,” she replied, in Russian. “When last we met it was in
Petersburg. But we never spoke.”
“In Petersburg! You are Russian, then?”
She nodded, adding a word by which I knew at once that she was a Nihilist.
“You are a friend,” she continued earnestly; “Jakovleff has told me so.
Moreover, I have read your articles in the English magazines, in which
you exposed the vile treachery of the Secret Police, described the prison
horrors, and told the English public the truth about our oppressed
people. You have rendered our cause great assistance, and,” she added,
looking frankly into my face, “I—I wonder whether I, personally, might
count upon your aid!”
“What is the nature of your difficulty?” I asked, rather interested.
“Well,” she said, after a moment’s hesitation, “I expect my brother
to join me at South Kensington. If you will accompany us home, I will
explain all to you. I am in great peril—how great you cannot imagine.
Indeed, if you refuse your assistance, I shall probably lose my life.”
“What do you mean?” I asked in consternation. “Is your life threatened?”
“Hush!” she cried. “Although we are strangers, nevertheless our common
Cause, the freedom of Russia, unites us.” Then, noticing how perplexed
I was over her strangely sensational announcement, she said quickly,
“Pray pardon my omission. I ought to have told you my name—Axinïa
Pankrátiévna.”
By her manner and conversation I saw she was a political enthusiast,
and suspected that she was in England for some reason connected with
the operations of the Circle. My curiosity having now been thoroughly
aroused, I told her I would do whatever lay in my power to help her.
On alighting at South Kensington, we failed to meet her brother as she
expected; but, notwithstanding the fog, we walked together a considerable
distance through several quiet thoroughfares, until we came to a large,
old-fashioned house, standing in a square.
An elderly man-servant opened the door, and after I had divested myself
of my overcoat I was ushered into a small drawing-room, while my fair
hostess ascended the stairs.
The moment I entered the house I experienced a vague feeling of regret
that I had accepted her invitation. There was something about the place
I did not like. The room was dimly lit by one pink-shaded lamp, the
furniture had a frowsy, faded appearance, and there was an odour of
pastilles that was sickening.
For fully ten minutes I had been patiently awaiting the mysterious
Axinïa’s reappearance, when suddenly I experienced a strange dizziness,
and at the same time a terrible pain shot across my forehead.
A fit of coughing seized me—my breath came and went in short, quick
gasps, and I felt myself choking.
Rising, I walked quickly across the room, and then discovered something
that increased my suspicions. Everything was thickly coated with dust.
The place had evidently not been used for years!
Halting before the fireplace, and glancing at the fire burning clear and
bright, I discovered, to my horror and dismay, that it was of charcoal!
Then it suddenly dawned upon me that I had been entrapped into a lethal
chamber!
Rushing to the door I tried to open it, but it was securely fastened;
every crevice had been stopped up from the outside! I went to the window,
but, on drawing aside the curtains, found that the heavy shutters were
held in position by a padlocked bar! The chimney, too, had been closed by
an iron plate, which I could not remove.
I was being asphyxiated!
Stirring the fire, I endeavoured to subdue it, but it only burned more
brightly! Unable to breathe on account of the poisonous fumes, and
feeling my strength fast failing, I tied my handkerchief across my mouth
and nose. Then, taking up a heavy fender, I commenced a frantic but
unsuccessful endeavour to batter down the door.
In mad despair I rushed from side to side of the apartment, shouting
for help, but I could hear no sound, and my voice seemed so hollow and
hoarse that I doubted whether it could be heard even outside in the hall.
The objects around me were slowly fading from my gaze. Seconds seemed
hours. I remember hearing a sound as if something heavy had fallen in the
room above. Confused voices whispered about me, and I have a distinct
recollection of strange, ominous words.
A heavy weight seemed to press upon my brain; my palsied limbs failed to
support me, and I fell backward upon the dust-encrusted carpet.
Then all became an utter blank.
* * * * *
Gradually I regained consciousness. Awakening as if from some terrible
nightmare, I opened my eyes and gazed wonderingly around.
The gray light of the wintry dawn showed that the room, small and
unfamiliar, was evidently used for lumber. Half-reclining in an old and
rickety armchair, I felt some cold object in my right hand, and found
it was a revolver, some of the chambers being loaded. My hand, too, was
covered with blood that had dried.
Staggering to my feet, and noticing that a half-open door communicated
with the adjoining apartment, I walked across and entered a small,
shabbily furnished sitting-room. The sight that met my gaze filled me
with horror and amazement.
Stretched upon the floor lay the woman Axinïa Pankrátiévna.
I touched the face! Its contact thrilled me; it was icy cold. Around her
was a pool of blood, and on examination I discovered she had a bullet
wound in the region of the heart, and that the breast of her dress was
singed, showing that the weapon had been discharged close against her.
A horrible thought took possession of me. I still held the revolver in my
hand, and blood was upon my fingers! Was not this circumstantial evidence
that I had been guilty of murder?
For several moments I stood in hesitation, my eyes fixed upon the ghastly
face of the corpse. At length I turned, made my way downstairs, and,
after inspecting the various apartments and finding the place empty,
stole out at the front door.
So suspicious were the circumstances in which I had discovered myself
that I refrained from giving information to the police, and resolved to
keep my secret and watch the newspapers, in order to see what sensation
would be caused when the body of my mysterious hostess was discovered.
Having noted the number of the house, and ascertained that it was in
Onslow Square, I found my way into Brompton Road, and turned my footsteps
in the direction of Gray’s Inn, where I at that time had chambers.
On arrival home I found I had lost my latch-key, and had therefore to
seek the assistance of a locksmith before I could enter. An additional
surprise was in store for me, for when I walked into my sitting-room,
I discovered that burglars had effected an entrance during the night
and ransacked the place. Every drawer in my writing-table had been
turned out, and the contents investigated in a methodical manner, after
which the thieves had apparently inspected a chest of drawers, a nest
of pigeon-holes, several trunks, and one or two cupboards. The carpets
had been disturbed, and every nook or corner where anything might be
concealed had been turned out.
Evidently the thieves had sought for something of value they believed
I had in my possession, and were disappointed; for, as far as I could
discover, they had stolen nothing. My first impulse was to send for the
police, but on reflection I resolved to remain silent on this matter also.
The days passed, but no announcement of the discovery of the body
appeared in the papers.
There was a possibility of something belonging to me being found in the
house by the police. My pockets had been almost emptied on that night;
but whether the contents had fallen out or been abstracted I was unable
to determine. It was, however, certain that clues to my identity were
not wanting, and I confess that the fearful suspicion that I was the
actual murderer caused me constant and terrible anxiety. Inquiries
I made regarding the house revealed that it belonged to a well-known
baronet, who was abroad in the diplomatic service; that it had been to
let furnished, but that for nearly five years it had remained unoccupied.
With the object of recovering anything which might serve as evidence
against me, I called upon the house-agent, and, representing myself as a
likely tenant, obtained the key. The afternoon was wet and gloomy when I
revisited the place. Being alone, I felt rather unnerved as I ascended
the wide, old-fashioned stairs to the chamber of death; but when I
entered the inner room I found, to my amazement, that the body was not
there! It had mysteriously disappeared!
All traces of the crime had been carefully obliterated. Even the portion
of threadbare carpet that had been stained with blood had been cut out,
revealing the dust-covered boards. The other apartments were just as I
had left them, and in the drawing-room—where, by unknown means, I had
so narrowly escaped death—the ashes of the charcoal still remained. A
streak of grey light that came in over the top of the shutters enabled me
to inspect the room, and, although I failed to find any of the missing
contents of my pockets, I saw that the dust that lay thickly upon a
little rosewood table had been disturbed. There was a small mark—the
perfect imprint of a woman’s hand.
All endeavours to solve the mystery were in vain. I had been the victim
of an extraordinary plot; but the fact of my friendliness towards the
Revolutionists made its object appear the more incomprehensible.
One gloomy day I was sitting before the fire in my bachelor den, lazily
enjoying my pipe and a novel, when there came a heavy knock at the outer
door, and a boy handed me a telegram.
Tearing it open, I read words that caused me to utter a cry of dismay.
They were—
“Mariána Néstoff arrested. She left Petersburg by _étape_ for Siberia
yesterday.—JAKOVLEFF.”
“Arrested!” I cried aloud. What, I wondered, could be her crime? She
had evidently fallen into the drag-net of the Russian police as a
“political,” otherwise Jakovleff would not have telegraphed.
The horrors of the journey on foot thousands of versts beyond the Ourals,
the privations, the brutality of Cossack escorts, and the terrible
existence in the mines to which political exiles are doomed, shut out
from the light of hope or mercy, all occurred to me. A dozen times I
re-read the telegram, pacing the room in anxiety and despair; then I
resolved to leave that night for Petersburg, obtain a permit to travel in
Siberia, and endeavour to save her. There was no time to be lost, for it
was already three o’clock and I should be compelled to draw money from
the bank.
My only thought was of Mariána. How bitterly I regretted having left
her in Russia, and reproached myself for not having warned her against
associating too closely with those suspected of holding pronounced
political views. For myself I cared nothing; being prepared to run any
risk in order to rescue her from the terrible fate.
I had taken out a large portmanteau, and was busy thrusting into it some
things I should require on my journey, when I was startled by another
loud rat-tat. On opening the door a tall, fair-haired woman entered.
She was well dressed; wearing a small, close-fitting bonnet, and a
fashionable cape trimmed with costly fur. At first I did not recognise
her; but when she had passed through into my sitting-room and lifted her
veil, I saw with astonishment that the young and handsome face was that
of Agraféna Teréshkevna, a wealthy woman whom I had known in Petersburg
as an active member and generous supporter of the Nihilists.
“It is with much pleasure that I meet you again, m’sieur,” she exclaimed
in Russian, smiling, and extending her hand. “Since you left us I have
often thought of you,” she added, seating herself as if quite at home.
Then, glancing round, she said, “Ugh! What an untidy room! You want a
wife to keep things straight.”
Although I assured her how greatly I appreciated the honour she had
done me by calling, I was no means pleased at her visit. Though but
twenty-four years of age, she had already been a widow two years. At
twenty, in order to secure a set of diamonds and a position, she had
bound herself to an aged merchant king, who, two years later, died
suddenly of heart disease. After a brief period of mourning she became
one of the leaders of fashion in the Russian capital, and the brilliant
entertainments she gave at her great house in the Nevski were attended
by the smartest set. At her _salon_ I was always a welcome guest, and it
was the remembrance of certain mild flirtations that now caused me some
little uneasiness.
“My rooms are certainly rather untidy,” I said mechanically. “But I am
preparing to start on a long journey.”
“To where?”
“To Siberia.”
“_Dieu!_ Are you going there voluntarily?” she inquired, shuddering.
“Yes.”
“For what reason?”
“To seek a dear friend.”
“A woman, I presume?” she asked, with an ill-disguised sneer.
“Yes, Madame, it is a woman.”
“And her name is Mariána Néstoff, eh?” she asked slowly, watching my face.
“You are right. But how did you know?”
“I heard of her arrest. It is the common talk of Petersburg. The police
made a raid at one of the meetings, and captured twenty of our comrades.
Some explosives were found in Mariána’s room, and she has been sent to
Sredne Kolymsk.”
“My God!” I cried. “Why, that is beyond the Arctic Circle—the worst
region in all Siberia!”
She nodded, sighing slightly. “It must indeed be a terrible blow to you,”
she said.
“I—I love her,” I said hoarsely.
“Yes, yes, I understand. But do not take it to heart so much, Anton,”
she urged. “Mariána has been unfortunate; but for what reason should you
sacrifice your own liberty? You are known by the police as a Nihilist;
therefore, if you go to Siberia, you are almost certain to be detained
there. Besides, even if you found her, you would be unable to secure her
liberty.”
“No; I must do my best,” I replied.
“Do not run such an unnecessary risk,” she exclaimed, rising suddenly,
and coming behind my chair in an endeavour to console me. “You remember
that once you told me you cared for me?”
“What—what do you mean?” I cried wildly.
“I mean—I mean that I love you, Anton!”
“Love me!” I stammered, in amazement.
“Yes,” she said earnestly. “You know how passionately I have loved you,
yet this is the first time I have admitted it. Surely you are not blind?
Since I first saw you I have thought of no other man. It is you—you
only—that I care for.”
“But I——”
“Say the word,” she implored. “Tell me that you will cast aside that
pink-and-white, ill-bred doll, whose prettiness is already fading, and
I, Agraféna Teréshkevna, am ready to become your wife as soon as the
marriage formalities can be arranged.”
I shook my head.
“Think!” she urged. “I have wealth, position, and—and men say I have
beauty. I am at your feet. See...!”
And, casting herself upon her knees, she lifted my hand to her lips,
covering it with passionate kisses.
“Madame,” I said, withdrawing my hand firmly, “this interview is painful.
The _tête-à-tête_ we had some months ago amused us; it had a savour
of romance, but I did not dream that you had taken my foolish words
seriously. Let us part, and forget all that has passed between us to-day.”
For a moment she was pale and mute, her hands clenched, her body rigid
as marble. Then, struggling to her feet, she gave vent to a sudden
passionate outburst, tearing the furs from her throat.
“You cast me aside!” she cried. “You!—who declared your affection for
me—prefer that red-faced, uncouth furrier’s wench! So! We shall see!”
“Pray calm yourself,” I exclaimed.
“Calm myself! _Davolno_, Anton Prèhznev! Have I not been befooled? This
latest idol of yours has gone to Siberia, and you will follow! Good! When
you are toiling in the gloom of the lead-mines beyond Irkutsk you will
perhaps remember that you forsook the woman who loves you better than her
life—that she whom you insulted was Agraféna Teréshkevna.”
With a momentary glance at the mirror over the mantel-shelf she
rearranged her bonnet. Then, mortified and affronted, she bowed stiffly,
swept past me, and disappeared, slamming the door after her.
Six weary, anxious weeks passed.
Under a grey, lowering sky, a boundless, snow-covered plain stretched far
away into the mist.
It was already sixteen days since my driver and myself had left
Ekaterinbourg—the last Russian town—and a fortnight since we had gained
the great Siberian post road. With three horses, which we changed at
the post-stations, we had travelled almost night and day; yet I did not
experience fatigue, for the expectation of finding Mariána sustained me.
Sitting back in the sleigh, wrapped in a heavy otter _shuba_, and half
buried under thick rugs, painful thoughts were produced within me by
the loneliness and gloom as the last rays of the short wintry day were
fading amidst the icy vapours. The snorting of the horses, the jingling
of the bells on the wooden arch over their heads, and the hissing of
the sleigh-runners, combined to produce a noise that was indescribably
irritating and monotonous.
I had already visited Tiumen, where there is a great exile-forwarding
prison, through which all persons condemned to banishment, colonisation,
or penal servitude have to pass. On inquiry at the _Prikaz o Silnikh_, or
Chief Bureau of Exile Administration, I had learnt that Mariána had left
a week before with a convoy of _katorzhniki_ (hard-labour convicts) on
foot for Tomsk. With the object of overtaking them, I was now travelling
incessantly. The thought that she, innocent of crime, was compelled to
mix with murderers, robbers, and common criminals, sharing the same
filth, enduring the terrible hardships of the march, and living in the
same _entourage_ in the vile, fever-infected _étapes_, goaded me almost
to madness.
It grew quite dark, and the icy wind blew in fierce, sharp gusts, while
the snow, which commenced to fall thickly, beat into my face.
“How far is the next station?” I asked, in Russian, of the driver.
“Two versts, your High Nobility,” he replied.
“Very well,” I said, “let us hasten. We must remain there to-night, I
suppose.”
As I paid him to drive me with all possible speed and without resting,
he had not grumbled at being compelled to travel during the night, but
my decision apparently proved gratifying to him, for he whipped up his
horses, and within half an hour I was thawing myself before the great
stove in the log-built post-house of Abatskaya, distant two thousand
miles from Petersburg. Early on the following morning we were again on
the road, continuing throughout the day. In the dull afternoon, soon
after we had changed horses at Kalmakova, and were speeding across the
great undulating plain towards Omsk, the driver turned suddenly, and,
pointing with his whip to a distant hill, exclaimed excitedly—
“See! there they are!”
Jumping to my feet, and straining my eyes eagerly in the direction
indicated, I descried what appeared to be a black, winding streak
disappearing over the brow of the hill.
“Perhaps, after all, it may be only a train of freight sleighs,” I said.
“No! I can see the Cossacks’ bayonets,” he replied; for his practised
eyes could detect objects on the snow-covered plains where I could see
nothing.
For an hour we travelled at increased speed, until we gradually overtook
the convoy. My thoughts went back to the ever-to-be-remembered days when
I was a “political.” Trudging wearily onward through the deep snow, they
were a sorry band. The men wore flat caps on their half-shaven heads,
long grey overcoats with diamond-shaped patches of black or yellow on
the back, and leg-fetters that filled the air with an ominous clinking.
The women, too, wore coarse and ragged clothes of grey homespun, with
woollen squares tied tightly over their heads, while in the rear of the
sad procession were several _telegas_ filled with the sick.
Driving on past the party, we came up to the captain of the Cossack
escort. Jumping eagerly from the sleigh, I saluted him, telling him whom
I sought, and at the same time handing him an official paper bearing the
seal of the Minister of the Interior.
Opening it, he shouted an order to halt, and at that moment a ragged,
unkempt-looking woman rushed towards me and flung her arms wildly about
my neck. So tightly was the kerchief bound over her head for protection
from the icy blast, that it was only on second glance that I recognised
Mariána. She shed tears of joy.
“What’s this?” exclaimed the officer, carefully examining the document.
“An order from the Ministry for the immediate release of the convict
Mariána Néstoff?”
“Yes,” I said. “Here are my identification papers.”
“An order for my release, Anton?” she cried. “How did you obtain it?”
“It was simple, darling,” I replied, caressing her tenderly. “General
Korolénko now occupies a high position in the Ministry of the Interior
in Petersburg. In exchange for his written confession of the mysterious
death of Marie Smirnitskaya I obtained the document by which you are
released, and I have brought it personally in order to take you back
again to civilisation and happiness.”
We conversed with the officer for a few minutes. Then he turned to
her and said, “Death is preferable to the life to which you had been
consigned. You are indeed fortunate to obtain release, and you both have
my best wishes for your future welfare.”
Wishing me _bon voyage_, he shouted the order to march, and a moment
later the envious, despairing band of exiles moved slowly onward towards
their doom.
As we drove back together in the direction of Kalmakova I asked her about
her arrest. What she related astounded me.
“The spy who denounced me to the police was Madame Teréshkevna. There are
claws beneath the velvet paw,” she said.
“Agraféna Teréshkevna!” I cried. “I thought she was a member of the
Circle?”
“Yes. But it has since been ascertained that she is also in the pay of
the Secret Police, and that she gives her brilliant entertainments in
order to seek victims against whom to give information.”
As she went on to describe the circumstances of her arrest, and the
horrors of her imprisonment in the Fortress, I sat silently listening,
and wondering whether I should ever solve the mysteries connected with my
adventure in Onslow Square.
The solution came in a curious manner about six months afterwards.
Mariána and I, whose marriage was now publicly announced, had taken
up our residence in London, and were frequently the guests of the
Revolutionary refugees. At the house of one of these I met an elderly man
who was introduced as Ivan Ivanovitch, which was, of course, an assumed
name. It was he who explained the conspiracy against me.
“The Third Section received orders to suppress you,” he said. “It was
hinted to an _agent provocateur_ that your death would be gratifying, and
Axinïa—who for some time had acted as maid to Agraféna Teréshkevna—aided
by an adventurer named Goltmann, who assumed the part of ‘flunkey,’
formed a plot to kill you. We, however, were determined to frustrate
their designs, and, assisted by Paul Maiefski, I kept a close watch upon
them. We saw the girl Axinïa induce you to go to the house in Onslow
Square, a key of which she had obtained, and where she had prepared a
very ingenious death-trap. Madame was in the house at the time, as well
as Goltmann, and the object was first to murder you, and secondly to
secure the contents of your pockets, which they suspected contained
letters from ‘politicals.’ Soon after you had been admitted Maiefski
and I entered through a window, afterwards unlocking the door of the
drawing-room and dragging you out of the suffocating fumes. There were
sounds of quarrelling upstairs, and we took you up with us. The high
words between Madame and her maid prevented us from being heard, and,
leaving you insensible on the landing, we entered the room unobserved.
The women were quarrelling about you, when Axinïa uttered some insulting
words to Madame, and the latter, without more ado, drew a revolver from
her pocket and shot the girl dead.
“It was then we appeared. Madame, startled at finding her crime had been
witnessed, gave vent to a loud shriek, whereupon Goltmann decamped,
taking with him your latch-key and a number of letters, including one
from Mariána Néstoff, for he had rifled your pockets the moment we had
left you.”
“Then that accounts for my rooms being ransacked on that night!” I
exclaimed.
“Yes,” he continued. “The letters and papers were forwarded by Madame to
Petersburg, with the result that Mariána and the others were arrested.
It was no doubt one of the chief objects of the plot to get Mariána
exiled, because Madame herself loved you; but when she participated in
the conspiracy she did not intend that you should die, and it was over
this that the fatal quarrel arose. In order to make you believe you had
committed the murder, she placed the revolver in your hand, and on the
following day, fearing detection, she and Goltmann removed the body
secretly. The whole motive of the plot, it seems, was the fact that she
loved you, and desired to get Mariána out of the way.”
“And where is Madame now?” I asked.
“In Brussels. The Executive have sentenced her to death as a spy.”
* * * * *
A fortnight later the newspapers contained a telegram from Brussels
headed, “Mysterious Death of a Russian Lady.” It stated that the body of
the wealthy and beautiful Madame Teréshkevna, of St. Petersburg, had been
found floating in the Meuse near Namur.