Tamara had just begun to dress when her godmother came into her room
next day.
"There is going to be a terrible snow storm, dear," she said. "I think
we should get down fairly early and suggest to Gritzko that we start
back to Moscow before lunch. It is no joke to be caught in this wild
country. I will send you in Katia."
Tamara's maid had been left in Petersburg, and indeed her godmother's,
an elderly Russian accustomed to these excursions, had been the only
one brought.
"I won't be more than half an hour dressing," she said. "Don't go down
without me, Marraine."
And the Princess promised and returned to her room.
"It has been a real success, our little outing, has it not?" she said,
when later they were descending the stairs. "Gritzko has been so quiet
and nice. I am so happy, dear child, that you can go away now without
that uncomfortable feeling of quarreling. There was one moment when he
got up from behind your chair last night I feared you had angered him
about something, but afterward he was so gentle and charming when we
talked I felt quite reassured."
"Yes, indeed," feebly responded Tamara. "The party has been positively
tame!"
They found their host had gone with Jack and the rest of the men to the
stables to inspect his famous teams. But Princess Sonia and Countess
Olga were already down. They were smoking lazily, and had almost
suggested a double dummy of their favorite game.
They hailed the two with delight, and soon the four began a rubber, and
Tamara, who hated it, had to keep the whole of her attention to try and
avoid making some mistake.
Thus an hour past, and first Stephen Strong and then the other men came
in.
Jack Courtray was enthusiastic about the horses, and indeed the whole
thing. He and Gritzko had arranged to go on a bear-hunt the following
week, and everything looked _couleur de rose_--except the sky, that
continued covered with an inky pall.
The Princess beckoned to Gritzko and took him aside. She explained her
fears about the storm, and the necessity of an earlier start, to which
he agreed.
"I am going to ask you to let us take Katia with us, we have only the
one maid, and must have her in Moscow when we arrive," she said.
So thus it was arranged. The Princess and Stephen Strong and Katia were
to start first, and Sonia and her husband would take both Serge and
Valonne, leaving Gritzko to bring Tamara, Olga and Lord Courtray last.
All through the early lunch, which was now brought in, nothing could
have been more lamblike than their host. He exerted himself to be
sweetly agreeable to every one, and the Princess, generally so alert,
felt tranquil and content, while Tamara almost experienced a sense of
regret.
Only Count Valonne, if he had been asked, would have suggested--but he
was not officious and kept his ideas to himself.
The snow now began to fall, just a few thin flakes, but it made them
hurry their departure.
In the general chatter and chaff no one noticed that Gritzko had never
once spoken directly to Tamara, but she was conscious of it, and
instead of its relieving her, she felt a sudden depression.
"You will be quite safe with Olga and your friend, dearest," the
Princess whispered to her as she got into the first troika which came
round. "And we shall be only just in front of you."
So they waved adieu.
Then Princess Sonia's party started. The cold was intense, and as the
team of blacks had not yet appeared, the host suggested the two ladies
should go back and wait in the saloon.
"Don't you think our way of herding in parties here is quite
ridiculous," he said to Jack, when Olga and Tamara were gone. "After
the rest get some way on, I'll have round the brown team too. It is
going to be a frightful storm, and we shall go much better with only
two in each sleigh."
Jack was entirely of his opinion, from his English point of view, a
party of four made two of them superfluous. Countess Olga and himself
were quite enough. So he expressed his hearty approval of this
arrangement, and presently as they smoked on the steps, the three brown
horses trotted up.
"I'll go and fetch Olga," Gritzko said, and as luck would have it he
met her at the saloon door.
"I had forgotten my muff," she said, "and had just run up to fetch it."
Then he explained to her about the storm and the load, and since it was
a question of duty to the poor horses, Countess Olga was delighted to
let pleasure go with it hand in hand. And she allowed herself to be
settled under the furs, with Jack, without going back to speak to
Tamara. Indeed, Gritzko was so matter of fact she started without a
qualm.
"We shall overtake you in ten minutes," he said. "The blacks are much
the faster team." And they gaily waved as they disappeared beyond the
bend of the trees. Then he spoke to his faithful Ivan. "In a quarter of
an hour let the blacks come round." And there was again the gleam of a
panther in his eyes as he glanced at the snow.
All this while Tamara, seated by the saloon stove, was almost growing
uneasy at being left so long alone. What could Olga be doing to stay
such a time?
Then the door opened, and the Prince came in.
"We must start now," he said, in a coldly polite tone. "The storm is
coming, and four persons made too heavy a load; so Lord Courtray and
Olga have gone on."
Tamara's heart gave a great bound, but his face expressed nothing, and
her sudden fear calmed.
He was ceremoniously polite as he helped her in. Nor did he sit too
near her or change his manner one atom as they went along. He hardly
spoke; indeed they both had to crouch down in the furs to shelter from
the blinding snow. And if Tamara had not been so preoccupied with
keeping her woollen scarf tight over her head she would have noticed
that when they left the park gate they turned to the right, in the full
storm, not to the left, where it was clearer and which was the way they
had come.
At last the Prince said something to the coachman in Russian, and the
man shook his head--the going was terribly heavy. They seemed to be
making tracks for themselves through untrodden snow.
"Stépan says we cannot possibly go much further, and we must shelter in
the shooting hut," Gritzko announced, gravely; and again Tamara felt a
twinge of fear.
"But what has become of the others?" she asked. "Why do we not see
their tracks?"
"They are obliterated in five minutes. You do not understand the
Russian storm," he said.
Tamara's heart now began to beat again rather wildly, but she reasoned
with herself; she was no coward, and indeed why had she any cause for
alarm? No one could be more aloof than her companion seemed. She was
already numb with cold too, and her common sense told her shelter of
any sort would be acceptable.
They had turned into the forest by now, and the road--if road it could
be called--was rather more distinct.
It was a weird scene. The great giant pine trees, and the fine falling
flakes penetrating through, the quickly vanishing daylight, and the
mist rising from the steaming horses as they galloped along; while
Stépan stood there urging them on like some northern pirate at a ship's
prow.
At last the view showed the white frozen lake, and by it a rough log
hut. They came upon it suddenly, so that Tamara could only realize it
was not large and rather low, when they drew up at the porch.
At the time she was too frozen and miserable to notice that the Prince
unlocked the door, but afterward she remembered she should have been
struck by the strangeness of his having a key.
He helped her out, and she almost fell she was so stiff with cold, and
then she found herself, after passing through a little passage, in a
warm, large room. It had a stove at one end, and the walls, distempered
green, had antlers hung round. There was one plain oak table and a
bench behind it, a couple of wooden armchairs, a corner cupboard, and
an immense couch with leather cushions, which evidently did for a bed,
and on the floor were several wolf skins.
The Prince made no explanation as to why there was a fire, he just
helped her off with her furs without a word; he hung them up on a peg
and then divested himself of his own.
He wore the brown coat to-day, and was handsome as a god. Then, after
he had examined the stove and looked from the window, he quietly left
the room.
The contrast of the heat after the intense cold without made a tingling
and singing in Tamara's ears. She was not sure, but thought she heard
the key turn in the lock. She started to her feet from the chair where
she sat and rushed to try the door, and this time her heart again gave
a terrible bound, and she stood sick with apprehension.
The door was fastened from without.
For a few awful moments which seemed an eternity, she was conscious of
nothing but an agonized terror. She could not reason or decide how to
act. And then her fine courage came back, and she grew more calm.
She turned to the window, but that was double, and tightly shut and
fastened up. There was no other exit, only this one door. Finding
escape hopeless, she sat down and waited the turn of events. Perhaps he
only meant to frighten her, perhaps there was some reason why the door
must be barred; perhaps there were bears in this terribly lonely place.
She sat there reasoning with herself and controlling her nerves for
moments which appeared like hours, and then she heard footsteps in the
passage, breaking the awful silence, and the door opened, and Gritzko
strode into the room.
He locked it after him, and pocketed the key; then he faced her. What
she saw in his passionate eyes turned her lips gray with fear.
And now everything of that subtle thing in womankind which resists
capture, came uppermost in Tamara's spirit. She loved him--but even so
she would not be taken.
She stood holding on to the rough oak table like a deer at bay, her
face deadly white, and her eyes wide and staring.
Then stealthily the Prince drew nearer, and with a spring seized her
and clasped her in his arms.
"Now, now, you shall belong to me," he cried. "You are mine at last,
and you shall pay for the hours of pain you have made me suffer!" and
he rained mad kisses on her trembling lips.
A ghastly terror shook Tamara. This man whom she loved, to whom in
happier circumstances she might have ceded all that he asked, now only
filled her with frantic fear. But she would not give in, she would
rather die than be conquered.
"Gritzko--oh, Gritzko! please--please don't!" she cried, almost
suffocated.
But she knew as she looked at him that he was beyond all hearing.
His splendid eyes blazed with the passion of a wild beast. She knew if
she resisted him he would kill her. Well, better death than this
hideous disgrace.
He held her from him for a second, and then lifted her in his arms.
But with the strength of terrified madness she grasped his wounded arm,
and in the second in which he made a sudden wince, she gave an eel-like
twist and slipped from his grasp, and as she did so she seized the
pistol in his belt and stood erect while she placed the muzzle to her
own white forehead.
"Touch me again, and I will shoot!" she gasped, and sank down on the
bench almost exhausted behind the rough wooden table.
He made a step forward, but she lifted the pistol again to her head and
leant her arm on the board to steady herself. And thus they glared at
one another, the hunter and the hunted.
"This is very clever of you, Madame," he said; "but do you think it
will avail you anything? You can sit like that all night, if you wish,
but before dawn I will take you."
Tamara did not answer.
Then he flung himself on the couch and lit a cigarette, and all that
was savage and cruel in him flamed from his eyes.
"My God! what do you think it has been like since the beginning?" he
said. "Your silly prudish fears and airs. And still I loved you--madly
loved you. And since the night when I kissed your sweet lips you have
made me go through hell--cold and provoking and disdainful, and last
night when you defied me, then I determined you should belong to me by
force; and now it is only a question of time. No power in heaven or
earth can save you--Ah! if you had been different, how happy we might
have been! But it is too late; the devil has won, and soon I will do
what I please."
Tamara never stirred, and the strain of keeping the pistol to her head
made her wrist ache.
For a long time there was silence, and the great heat caused a mist to
swim before her eyes, and an overpowering drowsiness--Oh, heaven!--if
unconsciousness should come upon her!
Then the daylight faded quite, and the Prince got up and lit a small
oil lamp and set it on the shelf. He opened the stove and let the glow
from the door flood through the room.
Then he sat down again.
A benumbing agony crept over Tamara; her brain grew confused in the
hot, airless room. It seemed as if everything swam round her. All she
saw clearly were Gritzko's eyes.
There was a deathly silence, but for an occasional moan of the wind in
the pine trees. The drift of snow without showed white as it gradually
blocked the window.
Were they buried here--under the snow? Ah! she must fight against this
horrible lethargy.
It was a strange picture. The rough hut room with its skins and
antlers; the fair, civilized woman, delicate and dainty in her soft
silk blouse, sitting there with the grim Cossack pistol at her
head--and opposite her, still as marble, the conquering savage man,
handsome and splendid in his picturesque uniform; and just the dull
glow of the stove and the one oil lamp, and outside the moaning wind
and the snow.
Presently Tamara's elbow slipped and the pistol jerked forward. In a
second the Prince had sprung into an alert position, but she
straightened herself, and put it back in its place, and he relaxed the
tension, and once more reclined on the couch.
And now there floated through Tamara's confused brain the thought that
perhaps it would be better to shoot in any case--shoot and have done
with it. But the instinct of her youth stopped her--suicide was a sin,
and while she did not reason, the habit of this belief kept its hold
upon her.
So an hour passed in silence, then the agonizing certainty came upon
her that there must be an end. Her arm had grown numb.
Strange lights seemed to flash before her eyes--Yes,--surely--that was
Gritzko coming toward her--!
She gave a gasping cry and tried to pull the trigger, but it was stiff,
her fingers had gone to sleep and refused to obey her. The pistol
dropped from her nerveless grasp.
So this was the end! He would win.
She gave one moan--and fell forward unconscious upon the table.
With a bound Gritzko leaped up, and seizing her in his arms carried her
into the middle of the room. Then he paused a moment to exult in his
triumph.
Her little head, with its soft brown hair from which the fur cap had
fallen, lay helpless on his breast. The pathetic white face, with its
childish curves and long eyelashes, resting on her cheek, made no
movement. The faint, sweet scent of a great bunch of violets crushed in
her belt came up to him.
And as he fiercely bent to kiss her white, unconscious lips, suddenly
he drew back and all the savage exultation went out of him.
He gazed at her for a moment, and then carried her tenderly to the
couch and laid her down. She never stirred. Was she dead? Oh, God!
In frightful anguish he put his ear to her heart; it did not seem to
beat.
In wild fear he tore open her blouse and wrenched apart her fine
underclothing, the better to listen. Yes, now through only the bare
soft skin he heard a faint sound. Ah! saints in heaven! she was not
dead.
Then he took off her boots and rubbed her cold little silk-stockinged
feet, and her cold damp hands, and presently as he watched, it seemed
as if some color came back to her cheeks, and at last she gave a sigh
and moved her head without opening her eyes--and then he saw that she
was not unconscious now, but sleeping.
Then the bounds of all his mad passion burst, and as he knelt beside
the couch, great tears suffused his eyes and trickled down his cheeks.
"My Doushka! my love!" he whispered, brokenly. "Oh, God! and I would
have hurt you!"
He rose quickly, and going to the window opened the ventilator at the
top, picked up the pistol from the table and replaced it in his belt,
and then he knelt once more beside Tamara, and with deepest reverence
bent down and kissed her feet.
"Sleep, sleep, my sweet Princess," he said softly, and then crept
stealthily from the room.