Years passed--famous and glorious years for Russia. Peace within
her borders, and splendid victories gained over foreign enemies,
particularly over the Prussians. In songs of jubilee the people praised
and blessed their empress, whose wisdom had brought all to such a
glorious conclusion, and had made her country great, triumphant, and
happy.
The good Elizabeth! What had she to do with the victories of her
soldiers, with the happiness of her realm? She knew nothing of it, and
if peace prevailed throughout the Russian empire, it was absolutely
unknown in the imperial palace, where there was eternal war, a
never-ending feud! There the young Catharine contended with her husband,
whom she hated and abhorred; with Elizabeth, who saw in her a dangerous
rival. But it was an unequal struggle in which these two women were
engaged, for Elizabeth had on her side the power and dominion, while
Catharine had only her youth, her beauty, and her tears!
Elizabeth hated Catharine because she dared to remain young and
handsome, while she, the empress, saw that she was growing old, and her
charms were withering; and Catharine hated Elizabeth because the latter
denied her a right which the empress daily claimed for herself--the
right to choose a lover, and to love him as long as he pleased her.
She hated Elizabeth because the latter surrounded her with spies
and watchers, and required of her a strict virtue, a never-violated
matrimonial fidelity--fidelity to the husband who so far derided and
insulted his wife as to demand that she should receive into her circle
and treat with respect and kindness his own mistress, the Countess
Woronzow--fidelity to this husband, who had never shown her any thing
but contempt and neglect, and who had no other way of entertaining her
than teaching her to march in military fashion, and stand as a sentinel
at his door!
Wounded in her inmost being and her feminine honor, tired of the eternal
pin-prickings with which Elizabeth tormented her, Catharine retreated
into her most retired apartment, there in quiet to reflect upon her
dishonorable greatness, and yearningly to dream of a splendid future.
“For the future,” said she, with sparkling eyes to her confidante,
Princess Daschkow, “the future is mine, they cannot deprive me of it.
For that I labor and think and study. Ah, when _my_ future shall have
become the present, then will I encircle my brows with a splendid
imperial diadem, and astonish you with all my greatness and
magnificence.”
“But you forget your husband!” smilingly interposed Princess Daschkow.
“He will a little obscure the splendor of your imperial crown, as he
will always be the first in the realm. He is the all-powerful emperor,
and you will be powerless, although an empress!”
Catharine proudly tossed her head, and her eyes flashed.
“I shall one day remember all the mortifications he has inflicted upon
me,” said she, “and an hour will come when I shall have a reckoning with
him, and full retribution! Ah, talk not to me of my husband--Russian
emperors have never been immortal, and why should he be so?”
“Catharine!” exclaimed the Princess Daschkow, turning pale, “you cannot
think--”
“I think,” interposed Catharine, with an unnatural smile, “I think the
Russian emperors are not immortal, and that this good Empress Elizabeth
is very fortunate in having no emperor who presumes to stand over her
and have a will more potent than her own!”
“Ah, Elizabeth has no will at all!” laughingly responded the princess.
“But I shall have a will!” said Catharine, proudly.
The Princess Daschkow had spoken the truth. Elizabeth had no longer
any will; she let Bestuscheff govern, and was herself ruled by Alexis
Razumovsky, the field-marshal, her husband. She did whatever these two
required, willingly yielding to them in all cases demanding no personal
effort on her part. On this point only had she a will of her own, which
she carried through with an iron hand.
“I have not become empress that I might labor, but that I might amuse
myself,” said she. “I have not set the crown upon my head for the
purpose of governing, but for the purpose of enjoying life. Spare me,
therefore, the labor of signing your documents. I will sign nothing
more, for my hand is not accustomed to holding the pen, and the ink
soils my fingers, which is unworthy of an empress!”
“It is only one signature that I implore of you to-day,” said
Bestuscheff, handing her a letter. “Have the great kindness to make an
exception of this one single case, by signing this letter to King Louis
XV. of France.”
“What have I to write to this King of France?” fretfully asked
Elizabeth. “Why should I do it? It is a long time since he has sent
me any new dresses, although he might well know that nothing is more
important for an empress than a splendid and varied wardrobe! Why, then,
should I write to this King of France?”
“You majesty, it is here question of a simple act of courtesy,” said
Bestuscheff, pressingly; “an act the omission of which may be attended
with the most disagreeable consequences, perhaps indeed involve us in a
war. Think of the peace of your realm, the welfare of your people, and
sign this letter!”
“But what does it contain that is so important?” asked the empress,
with astonishment. “I now remember that for a year past you have been
importuning me about this!”
“Yes, your majesty, I have been for the last three years daily imploring
of you this signature, and you have refused it to me; and yet the letter
is so necessary! It is against all propriety not to send it! For it is
a letter of congratulation to the King of France, who in an autograph
letter announced to you the birth of his grandson. Reflect, your
majesty, that he wrote you with his own hand, and for three years you
have refused to give yourself the small trouble to sign the answer I
have prepared. This prince, for whose birth you are to congratulate the
king, is now old enough to express his own thanks for the sympathy you
manifest for him.”
Elizabeth laughed. “Well,” said she, “I shall finally be obliged to
comply with your wishes, that you may leave me in peace. For three
years I have patiently borne your importunities for this signature. My
patience is now at an end, and I will sign the letter, that I may be
freed from your solicitations. Give me, therefore, that intolerable pen,
but first pour out a glass of Malvoisie, and hold it ready, that I may
strengthen myself with it after the labor is accomplished.”
Elizabeth, sighing, took the pen and slowly and anxiously subscribed her
name to this three-years-delayed letter of congratulation to the King of
France.
“So,” said she, throwing down her pen after the completion of her
task--“so, but you must not for a long time again trouble me with any
such work, and to-day I have well earned the right to a very pleasant
evening. Nothing more of business--no, no, not a word more of it! I will
not have these delightful hours embittered by your absurdities! Away
with you, Bestuscheff, and let my field-marshal, Count Razumovsky, be
called!”
And when Alexis came, Elizabeth smilingly said to him: “Alexis, the air
is to-day so fine and fresh that we will take a ride. Quick, quick! And
know you where?”
Razumovsky nodded. “To the villa!” said he, with a smile.
“Yes, to the villa!” cried Elizabeth, “to see my daughter at the villa!”
She therefore now had a daughter, and this daughter had not died like
her two sons. She lived, she throve in the freshness of childhood, and
Elizabeth loved her with idolatrous tenderness!
But precisely on account of this tenderness did she carefully conceal
the existence of this daughter, keeping her far from the world, ignorant
of her high birth, unsuspicious of her mother’s greatness!
The fatal words of the Countess Lapuschkin still resounded in the ears
of the empress: “Give this Elizabeth a daughter, and let that daughter
experience what I now suffer!”
Such had been the prayer of the bleeding countess, flayed by the
executioners of the empress, and the words were continually echoing in
Elizabeth’s heart.
Ah, she was indeed a lofty empress; she had the power to banish
thousands to Siberia, and was yet so powerless that she could not banish
those words from her mind which Eleonore Lapuschkin had planted there.
Eleonore was therefore avenged! And while the countess bore the torments
of her banishment with smiling fortitude, Elizabeth trembled on her
throne at the words of her banished rival--words that seemed to hang,
like the sword of Damocles, over the head of her daughter!
Perhaps it was precisely for the reason that she so much feared for her
daughter, that she loved her so very warmly. It was a passionate, an
adoring tenderness that she felt for the child, and nevertheless she
had the courage to keep her at a distance from herself, to see her but
seldom, that no one might suspect the secret of her birth.
Eleonore’s words had brought reflection to Elizabeth. She comprehended
that her legitimate daughter would certainly be threatened with great
dangers after her death; she had shudderingly thought of poor Ivan in
Schlusselburg, and she said to herself: “As I have held him imprisoned
as a pretender, so may it happen to my daughter, one day, when I am
no more! Ivan had but a doubtful right to my throne, but Natalie is
indisputably the grand-daughter of Peter the Great--the blood of the
great Russian czar flows in her veins, and therefore Peter will fear
Natalie as I feared Ivan; therefore will he imprison and torment her as
I have imprisoned and tormented Ivan!”
By this affectionate anxiety was Elizabeth induced to make a secret
of the existence of her daughter, which was imparted to but a few
confidential friends.
The little Natalie was raised in a solitary country-house not far from
the city, and her few servants and people were forbidden under pain
of death to admit any stranger into this constantly-closed and
always-watched house. No one was to enter it without a written order of
the empress, and but few such written orders were given.
Elizabeth, then, as it were to recompense herself for the trouble of
signing the letter to the King of France, resolved to visit her daughter
to-day with her husband.
“Rasczinsky may precede and announce us,” said she. “We will take our
dinner there, and he may say to our major-domo that we are going to
Peterhoff. Then no one will be surprised that we make a short halt at my
little villa in passing, or, rather, they will know nothing of it. Call
Rasczinsky!”
Count Rasczinsky was one of the few who were acquainted with the secret,
and might accompany the empress in these visits. Elizabeth had unlimited
confidence in him; she knew him to be a silent nobleman, and she
estimated him the more highly from the fact that he seemed much attached
to the charming, beautiful, and delicate child, her daughter. She
remarked that he appeared to love her as a brother, that he constantly
and fondly watched over her, and that he was never better pleased than
when, as a child, he could jest and play with her.
“Rasczinsky, we are about to ride out to the villa on a visit to
Natalie!” she said, when the count entered.
The count’s eyes beamed with pleasure. “And I may be permitted to
accompany your majesty?” he hastily asked.
The empress smiled. “How impetuous you are!” said she. “Would not one
think you were a dying lover, a sighing shepherd, and it was a question
of seeking your tender shepherdess, instead of announcing to a child of
eleven years the speedy arrival of her mother?”
“Your majesty,” said Count Rasczinsky, laughing, “I am not in love, but
I adore this child as my good angel. I can never do or think any thing
bad in Natalie’s presence. She is so pure and innocent that one casts
down his eyes with shame before her, and when she glances at me with
her large, deep, and yet so childish eyes, I could directly fall upon my
knees and confess to her all my sins!”
“You would not have many to confess,” said Elizabeth, “for your sins are
few. You are the pride of my court, and, as I am told, a true pattern
of all knightly virtues. Remain so, and who knows, my fair young count,
what the future may bring you? Love my Natalie now only as an angel of
innocence; let her grow up as such, and then--”
“And then?” asked the count, as the empress stopped.
“Then we shall see!” smilingly responded Elizabeth. “But now hasten
forward to announce us.”
“Your majesty forgets that, to enable one to penetrate into this
enchanted castle, your written command is required!”
“Ah, that is true!” said Elizabeth, stepping to her writing-table. This
time she was not too indolent to write; no representations nor prayers
were needed. It concerned the seeing of her daughter--how, then, could
she have thought writing painful or troublesome?
With the same pen with which, a short time before, she had so
unwillingly signed the congratulatory letter, she now wrote upon a sheet
of paper, provided with her seal these words:
“The Count Rasczinsky may be admitted.
“ELIZABETH.”
She handed the paper to the count, who pressed it to his lips.
“You can retain this paper for all time,” said the empress, as she
dismissed him. “I know that I can wholly confide in you. You will never
sell or betray my Natalie?”
“Never!” protested the count, taking his leave.
Hastily mounting his horse, he galloped through the streets, and when,
having left the city behind him, he found himself in the open country
where no one could observe him, he drew the paper Elizabeth had given
him from his bosom, and waving it high in the air, shouted:
“Good fortune, good fortune! This paper is my talisman and my future!
With this paper I will give Russia an empress, and make myself her
emperor!”