“Good morning, my dear little familiar spirit. The general slept
splendidly the latter part of the night. He did not touch his narcotic.
I am sure it is that dreadful mixture that gives him such frightful
dreams. And you, my dear little friend, you have not slept an instant.
I know it. I felt you going everywhere about the house like a little
mouse. Ah, it seems good, so good. I slept so peacefully, hearing the
subdued movement of your little steps. Thanks for the sleep you have
given me, little friend.”
Matrena talked on to Rouletabille, whom she had found the morning after
the nightmare tranquilly smoking his pipe in the garden.
“Ah, ah, you smoke a pipe. Now you do certainly look exactly like a dear
little domovoi-doukh. See how much you are alike. He smokes just like
you. Nothing new, eh? You do not look very bright this morning. You are
worn out. I have just arranged the little guest-chamber for you, the
only one we have, just behind mine. Your bed is waiting for you. Is
there anything you need? Tell me. Everything here is at your service.”
“I’m not in need of anything, madame,” said the young man smilingly,
after this outpouring of words from the good, heroic dame.
“How can you say that, dear child? You will make yourself sick. I want
you to understand that I wish you to rest. I want to be a mother to you,
if you please, and you must obey me, my child. Have you had breakfast
yet this morning? If you do not have breakfast promptly mornings, I will
think you are annoyed. I am so annoyed that you have heard the secret of
the night. I have been afraid that you would want to leave at once and
for good, and that you would have mistaken ideas about the general.
There is not a better man in the world than Feodor, and he must have
a good, a very good conscience to dare, without fail, to perform such
terrible duties as those at Moscow, when he is so good at heart. These
things are easy enough for wicked people, but for good men, for good men
who can reason it out, who know what they do and that they are condemned
to death into the bargain, it is terrible, it is terrible! Why, I told
him the moment things began to go wrong in Moscow, ‘You know what to
expect, Feodor. Here is a dreadful time to get through--make out you are
sick.’ I believed he was going to strike me, to kill me on the spot.
‘I! Betray the Emperor in such a moment! His Majesty, to whom I owe
everything! What are you thinking of, Matrena Petrovna!’ And he did
not speak to me after that for two days. It was only when he saw I was
growing very ill that he pardoned me, but he had to be plagued with my
jeremiads and the appealing looks of Natacha without end in his own
home each time we heard any shooting in the street. Natacha attended the
lectures of the Faculty, you know. And she knew many of them, and even
some of those who were being killed on the barricades. Ah, life was not
easy for him in his own home, the poor general! Besides, there was also
Boris, whom I love as well, for that matter, as my own child, because I
shall be very happy to see him married to Natacha--there was poor Boris
who always came home from the attacks paler than a corpse and who could
not keep from moaning with us.”
“And Michael?” questioned Rouletabille.
“Oh, Michael only came towards the last. He is a new orderly to the
general. The government at St. Petersburg sent him, because of course
they couldn’t help learning that Boris rather lacked zeal in repressing
the students and did not encourage the general in being as severe as was
necessary for the safety of the Empire. But Michael, he has a heart of
stone; he knows nothing but the countersign and massacres fathers and
mothers, crying, ‘Vive le Tsar!’ Truly, it seems his heart can only be
touched by the sight of Natacha. And that again has caused a good deal
of anxiety to Feodor and me. It has caught us in a useless complication
that we would have liked to end by the prompt marriage of Natacha and
Boris. But Natacha, to our great surprise, has not wished it to be so.
No, she has not wished it, saying that there is always time to think
of her wedding and that she is in no hurry to leave us. Meantime she
entertains herself with this Michael as if she did not fear his passion,
and neither has Michael the desperate air of a man who knows the
definite engagement of Natacha and Boris. And my step-daughter is not a
coquette. No, no. No one can say she is a coquette. At least, no one had
been able to say it up to the time that Michael arrived. Can it be
that she is a coquette? They are mysterious, these young girls, very
mysterious, above all when they have that calm and tranquil look that
Natacha always has; a face, monsieur, as you have noticed perhaps, whose
beauty is rather passive whatever one says and does, excepting when the
volleys in the streets kill her young comrades of the schools. Then I
have seen her almost faint, which proves she has a great heart under
her tranquil beauty. Poor Natacha! I have seen her excited as I over the
life of her father. My little friend, I have seen her searching in the
middle of the night, with me, for infernal machines under the furniture,
and then she has expressed the opinion that it is nervous, childish,
unworthy of us to act like that, like timid beasts under the sofas, and
she has left me to search by myself. True, she never quits the general.
She is more reassured, and is reassuring to him, at his side. It has
an excellent moral effect on him, while I walk about and search like a
beast. And she has become as fatalistic as he, and now she sings verses
to the guzla, like Boris, or talks in corners with Michael, which makes
the two enraged each with the other. They are curious, the young women
of St. Petersburg and Moscow, very curious. We were not like that in our
time, at Orel. We did not try to enrage people. We would have received a
box on the ears if we had.”
Natacha came in upon this conversation, happy, in white voile, fresh and
smiling like a girl who had passed an excellent night. She asked after
the health of the young man very prettily and embraced Matrena, in truth
as one embraces a much-beloved mother. She complained again of Matrena’s
night-watch.
“You have not stopped it, mamma; you have not stopped it, eh? You are
not going to be a little reasonable at last? I beg of you! What has
given me such a mother! Why don’t you sleep? Night is made for sleep.
Koupriane has upset you. All the terrible things are over in Moscow.
There is no occasion to think of them any more. That Koupriane makes
himself important with his police-agents and obsesses us all. I am
convinced that the affair of the bouquet was the work of his police.”
“Mademoiselle,” said Rouletabille, “I have just had them all sent away,
all of them--because I think very much the same as you do.”
“Well, then, you will be my friend, Monsieur Rouletabille I promise you,
since you have done that. Now that the police are gone we have nothing
more to fear. Nothing. I tell you, mamma; you can believe me and not
weep any more, mamma dear.”
“Yes, yes; kiss me. Kiss me again!” repeated Matrena, drying her eyes.
“When you kiss me I forget everything. You love me like your own mother,
don’t you?”
“Like my mother. Like my own mother.”
“You have nothing to hide from me?--tell me, Natacha.”
“Nothing to hide.”
“Then why do you make Boris suffer so? Why don’t you marry him?”
“Because I don’t wish to leave you, mamma dear.”
She escaped further parley by jumping up on the garden edge away from
Khor, who had just been set free for the day.
“The dear child,” said Matrena; “the dear little one, she little knows
how much pain she has caused us without being aware of it, by her ideas,
her extravagant ideas. Her father said to me one day at Moscow, ‘Matrena
Petrovna, I’ll tell you what I think--Natacha is the victim of the
wicked books that have turned the brains of all these poor rebellious
students. Yes, yes; it would be better for her and for us if she did not
know how to read, for there are moments--my word!--when she talks very
wildly, and I have said to myself more than once that with such ideas
her place is not in our salon hut behind a barricade. All the same,’ he
added after reflection, ‘I prefer to find her in the salon where I can
embrace her than behind a barricade where I would kill her like a mad
dog.’ But my husband, dear little monsieur, did not say what he really
thinks, for he loves his daughter more than all the rest of the world
put together, and there are things that even a general, yes, even a
governor-general, would not be able to do without violating both divine
and human laws. He suspects Boris also of setting Natacha’s wits awry.
We really have to consider that when they are married they will read
everything they have a mind to. My husband has much more real respect
for Michael Korsakoff because of his impregnable character and his
granite conscience. More than once he has said, ‘Here is the aide I
should have had in the worst days of Moscow. He would have spared me
much of the individual pain.’ I can understand how that would please
the general, but how such a tigerish nature succeeds in appealing to
Natacha, how it succeeds in not actually revolting her, these young
girls of the capital, one never can tell about them--they get away from
all your notions of them.”
Rouletabille inquired:
“Why did Boris say to Michael, ‘We will return together’? Do they live
together?”
“Yes, in the small villa on the Krestowsky Ostrov, the isle across from
ours, that you can see from the window of the sitting-room. Boris chose
it because of that. The orderlies wished to have camp-beds prepared for
them right here in the general’s house, by a natural devotion to him;
but I opposed it, in order to keep them both from Natacha, in whom,
of course, I have the most complete confidence, but one cannot be sure
about the extravagance of men nowadays.”
Ermolai came to announce the petit-dejeuner. They found Natacha already
at table and she poured them coffee and milk, eating away all the time
at a sandwich of anchovies and caviare.
“Tell me, mamma, do you know what gives me such an appetite? It is the
thought of the way poor Koupriane must have taken this dismissal of his
men. I should like to go to see him.”
“If you see him,” said Rouletabille, “it is unnecessary to tell him that
the general will go for a long promenade among the isles this afternoon,
because without fail he would send us an escort of gendarmes.”
“Papa! A promenade among the islands? Truly? Oh, that is going to be
lovely!”
Matrena Petrovna sprang to her feet.
“Are you mad, my dear little domovoi, actually mad?”
“Why? Why? It is fine. I must run and tell papa.”
“Your father’s room is locked,” said Matrena brusquely.
“Yes, yes; he is locked in. You have the key. Locked away until death!
You will kill him. It will be you who kills him.”
She left the table without waiting for a reply and went and shut herself
also in her chamber.
Matrena looked at Rouletabille, who continued his breakfast as though
nothing had happened.
“Is it possible that you speak seriously?” she demanded, coming over and
sitting down beside him. “A promenade! Without the police, when we have
received again this morning a letter saying now that before forty-eight
hours the general will be dead!”
“Forty-eight hours,” said Rouletabille, soaking his bread in his
chocolate, “forty-eight hours? It is possible. In any case, I know they
will try something very soon.”
“My God, how is it that you believe that? You speak with assurance.”
“Madame, it is necessary to do everything I tell you, to the letter.”
“But to have the general go out, unless he is guarded--how can you take
such a responsibility? When I think about it, when I really think about
it, I ask myself how you have dared send away the police. But here, at
least, I know what to do in order to feel a little safe, I know that
downstairs with Gniagnia and Ermolai we have nothing to fear. No
stranger can approach even the basement. The provisions are brought from
the lodge by our dvornicks whom we have had sent from my mother’s home
in the Orel country and who are as devoted to us as bull-dogs. Not
a bottle of preserves is taken into the kitchens without having been
previously opened outside. No package comes from any tradesman without
being opened in the lodge. Here, within, we are able to feel a little
safe, even without the police--but away from here--outside!”
“Madame, they are going to try to kill your husband within forty-eight
hours. Do you desire me to save him perhaps for a long time--for good,
perhaps?”
“Ah, listen to him! Listen to him, the dear little domovoi! But what
will Koupriane say? He will not permit any venturing beyond the villa;
none, at least for the moment. Ah, now, how he looks at me, the dear
little domovoi! Oh, well, yes. There, I will do as you wish.”
“Very well, come into the garden with me.”
She accompanied him, leaning on his arm.
“Here’s the idea,” said Rouletabille. “This afternoon you will go with
the general in his rolling-chair. Everybody will follow. Everyone,
you understand, Madame--understand me thoroughly, I mean to say that
everyone who wishes to come must be invited to. Only those who wish
to remain behind will do so. And do not insist. Ah, now, I see, you
understand me. Why do you tremble?”
“But who will guard the house?”
“No one. Simply tell the servant at the lodge to watch from the
lodge those who enter the villa, but simply from the lodge, without
interfering with them, and saying nothing to them, nothing.”
“I will do as you wish. Do you want me to announce our promenade
beforehand?”
“Why, certainly. Don’t be uneasy; let everybody have the good news.”
“Oh, I will tell only the general and his friends, you may be sure.”
“Now, dear Madame, just one more word. Do not wait for me at luncheon.”
“What! You are going to leave us?” she cried instantly, breathless. “No,
no. I do not wish it. I am willing to do without the police, but I am
not willing to do without you. Everything might happen in your absence.
Everything! Everything!” she repeated with singular energy. “Because,
for me, I cannot feel sure as I should, perhaps. Ah, you make me say
these things. Such things! But do not go.”
“Do not be afraid; I am not going to leave you, madame.”
“Ah, you are good! You are kind, kind! Caracho! (Very well.)”
“I will not leave you. But I must not be at luncheon. If anyone asks
where I am, say that I have my business to look after, and have gone to
interview political personages in the city.”
“There’s only one political personage in Russia,” replied Matrena
Petrovna bluntly; “that is the Tsar.”
“Very well; say I have gone to interview the Tsar.”
“But no one will believe that. And where will you be?”
“I do not know myself. But I will be about the house.”
“Very well, very well, dear little domovoi.”
She left him, not knowing what she thought about it all, nor what she
should think--her head was all in a muddle.
In the course of the morning Athanase Georgevitch and Thaddeus
Tchnitchnikof arrived. The general was already in the veranda. Michael
and Boris arrived shortly after, and inquired in their turn how he had
passed the night without the police. When they were told that Feodor
was going for a promenade that afternoon they applauded his decision.
“Bravo! A promenade a la strielka (to the head of the island) at the
hour when all St. Petersburg is driving there. That is fine. We will all
be there.” The general made them stay for luncheon. Natacha appeared for
the meal, in rather melancholy mood. A little before luncheon she had
held a double conversation in the garden with Michael and Boris. No one
ever could have known what these three young people had said if some
stenographic notes in Rouletabille’s memorandum-book did not give us
a notion; the reporter had overheard, by accident surely, since all
self-respecting reporters are quite incapable of eavesdropping.
The memorandum notes:
Natacha went into the garden with a book, which she gave to Boris, who
pressed her hand lingeringly to his lips. “Here is your book; I return
it to you. I don’t want any more of them, the ideas surge so in my
brain. It makes my head ache. It is true, you are right, I don’t love
novelties. I can satisfy myself with Pouchkine perfectly. The rest are
all one to me. Did you pass a good night?”
Boris (good-looking young man, about thirty years old, blonde, a little
effeminate, wistful. A curious appurtenance in the military household of
so vigorous a general). “Natacha, there is not an hour that I can call
truly good if I spend it away from you, dear, dear Natacha.”
“I ask you seriously if you have passed a good night?”
She touched his hand a moment and looked into his eyes, but he shook his
head.
“What did you do last night after you reached home?” she demanded
insistently. “Did you stay up?”
“I obeyed you; I only sat a half-hour by the window looking over here at
the villa, and then I went to bed.”
“Yes, it is necessary you should get your rest. I wish it for you as
for everyone else. This feverish life is impossible. Matrena Petrovna is
getting us all ill, and we shall be prostrated.”
“Yesterday,” said Boris, “I looked at the villa for a half-hour from
my window. Dear, dear villa, dear night when I can feel you breathing,
living near me. As if you had been against my heart. I could have wept
because I could hear Michael snoring in his chamber. He seemed happy.
At last, I heard nothing more, there was nothing more to hear but the
double chorus of frogs in the pools of the island. Our pools, Natacha,
are like the enchanted lakes of the Caucasus which are silent by day and
sing at evening; there are innumerable throngs of frogs which sing on
the same chord, some of them on a major and some on a minor. The chorus
speaks from pool to pool, lamenting and moaning across the fields and
gardens, and re-echoing like AEolian harps placed opposite one another.”
“Do AEolian harps make so much noise, Boris?”
“You laugh? I don’t find you yourself half the time. It is Michael who
has changed you, and I am out of it. (Here they spoke in Russian.)
I shall not be easy until I am your husband. I can’t understand your
manner with Michael at all.”
(Here more Russian words which I do not understand.)
“Speak French; here is the gardener,” said Natacha.
“I do not like the way you are managing our lives. Why do you delay our
marriage? Why?”
(Russian words from Natacha. Gesture of desperation from Boris.)
“How long? You say a long time? But that says nothing--a long time. How
long? A year? Two years? Ten years? Tell me, or I will kill myself at
your feet. No, no; speak or I will kill Michael. On my word! Like a
dog!”
“I swear to you, by the dear head of your mother, Boris, that the date
of our marriage does not depend on Michael.”
(Some words in Russian. Boris, a little consoled, holds her hand
lingeringly to his lips.)
Conversation between Michael and Natacha in the garden:
“Well? Have you told him?”
“I ended at last by making him understand that there is not any hope.
None. It is necessary to have patience. I have to have it myself.”
“He is stupid and provoking.”
“Stupid, no. Provoking, yes, if you wish. But you also, you are
provoking.”
“Natacha! Natacha!”
(Here more Russian.) As Natacha started to leave, Michael placed his
hand on her shoulder, stopped her and said, looking her direct in the
eyes:
“There will be a letter from Annouchka this evening, by a messenger
at five o’clock.” He made each syllable explicit. “Very important and
requiring an immediate reply.”
These notes of Rouletabille’s are not followed by any commentary.
After luncheon the gentlemen played poker until half-past four, which
is the “chic” hour for the promenade to the head of the island.
Rouletabille had directed Matrena to start exactly at a quarter to five.
He appeared in the meantime, announcing that he had just interviewed
the mayor of St. Petersburg, which made Athanase laugh, who could not
understand that anyone would come clear from Paris to talk with men like
that. Natacha came from her chamber to join them for the promenade. Her
father told her she looked too worried.
They left the villa. Rouletabille noted that the dvornicks were before
the gate and that the schwitzar was at his post, from which he could
detect everyone who might enter or leave the villa. Matrena pushed the
rolling-chair herself. The general was radiant. He had Natacha at his
right and at his left Athanase and Thaddeus. The two orderlies followed,
talking with Rouletabille, who had monopolized them. The conversation
turned on the devotion of Matrena Petrovna, which they placed above the
finest heroic traits in the women of antiquity, and also on Natacha’s
love for her father. Rouletabille made them talk.
Boris Mourazoff explained that this exceptional love was accounted for
by the fact that Natacha’s own mother, the general’s first wife, died in
giving birth to their daughter, and accordingly Feodor Feodorovitch had
been both father and mother to his daughter. He had raised her with the
most touching care, not permitting anyone else, when she was sick, to
have the care of passing the nights by her bedside.
Natacha was seven years old when Feodor Feodorovitch was appointed
governor of Orel. In the country near Orel, during the summer, the
general and his daughter lived on neighborly terms near the family of
old Petroff, one of the richest fur merchants in Russia. Old Petroff
had a daughter, Matrena, who was magnificent to see, like a beautiful
field-flower. She was always in excellent humor, never spoke ill of
anyone in the neighborhood, and not only had the fine manners of a
city dame but a great, simple heart, which she lavished on the little
Natacha.
The child returned the affection of the beautiful Matrena, and it was
on seeing them always happy to find themselves together that Trebassof
dreamed of reestablishing his fireside. The nuptials were quickly
arranged, and the child, when she learned that her good Matrena was to
wed her papa, danced with joy. Then misfortune came only a few weeks
before the ceremony. Old Petroff, who speculated on the Exchange for a
long time without anyone knowing anything about it, was ruined from top
to bottom. Matrena came one evening to apprise Feodor Feodorovitch of
this sad news and return his pledge to him. For all response Feodor
placed Natacha in Matrena’s arms. “Embrace your mother,” he said to
the child, and to Matrena, “From to-day I consider you my wife, Matrena
Petrovna. You should obey me in all things. Take that reply to your
father and tell him my purse is at his disposition.”
The general was already, at that time, even before he had inherited
the Cheremaieff, immensely rich. He had lands behind Nijni as vast as
a province, and it would have been difficult to count the number of
moujiks who worked for him on his property. Old Pretroff gave his
daughter and did not wish to accept anything in exchange. Feodor wished
to settle a large allowance on his wife; her father opposed that, and
Matrena sided with him in the matter against her husband, because of
Natacha. “It all belongs to the little one,” she insisted. “I accept the
position of her mother, but on the condition that she shall never lose a
kopeck of her inheritance.”
“So that,” concluded Boris, “if the general died tomorrow she would be
poorer than Job.”
“Then the general is Matrena’s sole resource,” reflected Rouletabille
aloud.
“I can understand her hanging onto him,” said Michael Korsakoff, blowing
the smoke of his yellow cigarette. “Look at her. She watches him like a
treasure.”
“What do you mean, Michael Nikolaievitch?” said Boris, curtly.
“You believe, do you, that the devotion of Matrena Petrovna is not
disinterested. You must know her very poorly to dare utter such a
thought.”
“I have never had that thought, Boris Alexandrovitch,” replied the other
in a tone curter still. “To be able to imagine that anyone who lives
in the Trebassofs’ home could have such a thought needs an ass’s head,
surely.”
“We will speak of it again, Michael Nikolaievitch.”
“At your pleasure, Boris Alexandrovitch.”
They had exchanged these latter words tranquilly continuing their walk
and negligently smoking their yellow tobacco. Rouletabille was between
them. He did not regard them; he paid no attention even to their
quarrel; he had eyes only for Natacha, who just now quit her place
beside her father’s wheel-chair and passed by them with a little nod of
the head, seeming in haste to retrace the way back to the villa.
“Are you leaving us?” Boris demanded of her.
“Oh, I will rejoin you immediately. I have forgotten my umbrella.”
“But I will go and get it for you,” proposed Michael.
“No, no. I have to go to the villa; I will return right away.”
She was already past them. Rouletabille, during this, looked at Matrena
Petrovna, who looked at him also, turning toward the young man a visage
pale as wax. But no one else noted the emotion of the good Matrena, who
resumed pushing the general’s wheel-chair.
Rouletabille asked the officers, “Was this arrangement because the first
wife of the general, Natacha’s mother, was rich?”
“No. The general, who always had his heart in his hand,” said Boris,
“married her for her great beauty. She was a beautiful girl of the
Caucasus, of excellent family besides, that Feodor Feodorovitch had
known when he was in garrison at Tiflis.”
“In short,” said Rouletabille, “the day that General Trebassof dies
Madame Trebassof, who now possesses everything, will have nothing, and
the daughter, who now has nothing, will have everything.”
“Exactly that,” said Michael.
“That doesn’t keep Matrena Petrovna and Natacha Feodorovna from deeply
loving each other,” observed Boris.
The little party drew near the “Point.” So far the promenade had been
along pleasant open country, among the low meadows traversed by fresh
streams, across which tiny bridges had been built, among bright gardens
guarded by porcelain dwarfs, or in the shade of small weeds from the
feet of whose trees the newly-cut grass gave a seasonal fragrance. All
was reflected in the pools--which lay like glass whereon a scene-painter
had cut the green hearts of the pond-lily leaves. An adorable country
glimpse which seemed to have been created centuries back for the
amusement of a queen and preserved, immaculately trimmed and cleaned,
from generation to generation, for the eternal charm of such an hour as
this on the banks of the Gulf of Finland.
Now they had reached the bank of the Gulf, and the waves rippled to the
prows of the light ships, which dipped gracefully like huge and rapid
sea-gulls, under the pressure of their great white sails.
Along the roadway, broader now, glided, silently and at walking pace,
the double file of luxurious equipages with impatient horses, the open
carriages in which the great personages of the court saw the view and
let themselves be seen. Enormous coachmen held the reins high. Lively
young women, negligently reclining against the cushions, displayed their
new Paris toilettes, and kept young officers on horseback busy with
salutes. There were all kinds of uniforms. No talking was heard.
Everyone was kept busy looking. There rang in the pure, thin air only
the noise of the champing bits and the tintinnabulation of the bells
attached to the hairy Finnish ponies’ collars. And all that, so
beautiful, fresh, charming and clear, and silent, it all seemed more
a dream than even that which hung in the pools, suspended between the
crystal of the air and the crystal of the water. The transparence of the
sky and the transparence of the gulf blended their two unrealities so
that one could not note where the horizons met.
Rouletabille looked at the view and looked at the general, and in all
his young vibrating soul there was a sense of infinite sadness, for he
recalled those terrible words in the night: “They have gone into all the
corners of the Russian land, and they have not found a single corner of
that land where there are not moanings.” “Well,” thought he, “they have
not come into this corner, apparently. I don’t know anything lovelier or
happier in the world.” No, no, Rouletabille, they have not come here.
In every country there is a corner of happy life, which the poor are
ashamed to approach, which they know nothing of, and of which merely the
sight would turn famished mothers enraged, with their thin bosoms, and,
if it is not more beautiful than that, certainly no part of the earth
is made so atrocious to live in for some, nor so happy for others as in
this Scythian country, the boreal country of the world.
Meanwhile the little group about the general’s rolling-chair had
attracted attention. Some passers-by saluted, and the news spread
quickly that General Trebassof had come for a promenade to “the Point.”
Heads turned as carriages passed; the general, noticing how much
excitement his presence produced, begged Matrena Petrovna to push his
chair into an adjacent by-path, behind a shield of trees where he would
be able to enjoy the spectacle in peace.
He was found, nevertheless, by Koupriane, the Chief of Police, who was
looking for him. He had gone to the datcha and been told there that the
general, accompanied by his friends and the young Frenchman, had gone
for a turn along the gulf. Koupriane had left his carriage at the
datcha, and taken the shortest route after them.
He was a fine man, large, solid, clear-eyed. His uniform showed his fine
build to advantage. He was generally liked in St. Petersburg, where
his martial bearing and his well-known bravery had given him a sort of
popularity in society, which, on the other hand, had great disdain for
Gounsovski, the head of the Secret Police, who was known to be capable
of anything underhanded and had been accused of sometimes playing into
the hands of the Nihilists, whom he disguised as agents-provocateurs,
without anybody really doubting it, and he had to fight against these
widespread political suspicions.
Well-informed men declared that the death of the previous “prime
minister,” who had been blown up before Varsovie station when he was on
his way to the Tsar at Peterhof, was Gounsovski’s work and that in this
he was the instrument of the party at court which had sworn the death
of the minister which inconvenienced it.* On the other hand, everyone
regarded Koupriane as incapable of participating in any such horrors and
that he contented himself with honest performance of his obvious duties,
confining himself to ridding the streets of its troublesome elements,
and sending to Siberia as many as he could of the hot-heads, without
lowering himself to the compromises which, more than once, had given
grounds for the enemies of the empire to maintain that it was difficult
to say whether the chiefs of the Russian police played the part of the
law or that of the revolutionary party, even that the police had been at
the end of a certain time of such mixed procedure hardly able to
decide themselves which they did.
* Rumored cause of Plehve’s assassination.
This afternoon Koupriane appeared very nervous. He paid his compliments
to the general, grumbled at his imprudence, praised him for his bravery,
and then at once picked out Rouletabille, whom he took aside to talk to.
“You have sent my men back to me,” said he to the young reporter.
“You understand that I do not allow that. They are furious, and quite
rightly. You have given publicly as explanation of their departure--a
departure which has naturally astonished, stupefied the general’s
friends--the suspicion of their possible participation in the last
attack. That is abominable, and I will not permit it. My men have not
been trained in the methods of Gounsovski, and it does them a cruel
injury, which I resent, for that matter, personally, to treat them this
way. But let that go, as a matter of sentiment, and return to the simple
fact itself, which proves your excessive imprudence, not to say more,
and which involves you, you alone, in a responsibility of which you
certainly have not measured the importance. All in all, I consider that
you have strangely abused the complete authority that I gave you upon
the Emperor’s orders. When I learned what you had done I went to find
the Tsar, as was my duty, and told him the whole thing. He was more
astonished than can be expressed. He directed me to go myself to find
out just how things were and to furnish the general the guard you had
removed. I arrive at the isles and not only find the villa open like a
mill where anyone may enter, but I am informed, and then I see, that the
general is promenading in the midst of the crowd, at the mercy of the
first miserable venturer. Monsieur Rouletabille, I am not satisfied. The
Tsar is not satisfied. And, within an hour, my men will return to assume
their guard at the datcha.”
Rouletabille listened to the end. No one ever had spoken to him in that
tone. He was red, and as ready to burst as a child’s balloon blown too
hard. He said:
“And I will take the train this evening.”
“You will go?”
“Yes, and you can guard your general all alone. I have had enough of it.
Ah, you are not satisfied! Ah, the Tsar is not satisfied! It is too
bad. No more of it for me. Monsieur, I am not satisfied, and I say
Good-evening to you. Only do not forget to send me from here every three
or four days a letter which will keep me informed of the health of the
general, whom I love dearly. I will offer up a little prayer for him.”
Thereupon he was silent, for he caught the glance of Matrena Petrovna,
a glance so desolated, so imploring, so desperate, that the poor woman
inspired him anew with great pity. Natacha had not returned. What was
the young girl doing at that moment? If Matrena really loved Natacha
she must be suffering atrociously. Koupriane spoke; Rouletabille did
not hear him, and he had already forgotten his own anger. His spirit was
wrapped in the mystery.
“Monsieur,” Koupriane finished by saying, tugging his sleeve, “do you
hear me? I pray you at least reply to me. I offer all possible excuses
for speaking to you in that tone. I reiterate them. I ask your pardon.
I pray you to explain your conduct, which appeared imprudent to me but
which, after all, should have some reason. I have to explain to the
Emperor. Will you tell me? What ought I to say to the Emperor?”
“Nothing at all,” said Rouletabille. “I have no explanation to give you
or the Emperor, or to anyone. You can offer him my utmost homage and do
me the kindness to vise my passport for this evening.”
And he sighed:
“It is too bad, for we were just about to see something interesting.”
Koupriane looked at him. Rouletabille had not quitted Matrena Petrovna’s
eyes, and her pallor struck Koupriane.
“Just a minute,” continued the young man. “I’m sure there is someone
who will miss me--that brave woman there. Ask her which she prefers, all
your police, or her dear little domovoi. We are good friends already.
And--don’t forget to present my condolences to her when the terrible
moment has come.”
It was Koupriane’s turn to be troubled.
He coughed and said:
“You believe, then, that the general runs a great immediate danger?”
“I do not only believe it, monsieur, I am sure of it. His death is a
matter of hours for the poor dear man. Before I go I shall not fail
to tell him, so that he can prepare himself comfortably for the great
journey and ask pardon of the Lord for the rather heavy hand he has laid
on these poor men of Presnia.”
“Monsieur Rouletabille, have you discovered something?”
“Good Lord, yes, I have discovered something, Monsieur Koupriane. You
don’t suppose I have come so far to waste my time, do you?”
“Something no one else knows?”
“Yes, Monsieur Koupriane, otherwise I shouldn’t have troubled to feel
concerned. Something I have not confided to anyone, not even to my
note-book, because a note-book, you know, a note-book can always be
lost. I just mention that in case you had any idea of having me searched
before my departure.”
“Oh, Monsieur Rouletabille!”
“Eh, eh, like the way the police do in your country; in mine too, for
that matter. Yes, that’s often enough seen. The police, furious because
they can’t hit a clue in some case that interests them, arrest a
reporter who knows more than they do, in order to make him talk.
But--nothing of that sort with me, monsieur. You might have me taken to
your famous ‘Terrible Section,’ I’d not open my mouth, not even in the
famous rocking-chair, not even under the blows of clenched fists.”
“Monsieur Rouletabille, what do you take us for? You are the guest of
the Tsar.”
“Ah, I have the word of an honest man. Very well, I will treat you as an
honest man. I will tell you what I have discovered. I don’t wish through
any false pride to keep you in darkness about something which may
perhaps--I say perhaps--permit you to save the general.”
“Tell me. I am listening.”
“But it is perfectly understood that once I have told you this you will
give me my passport and allow me to depart?”
“You feel that you couldn’t possibly,” inquired Koupriane, more and more
troubled, and after a moment of hesitation, “you couldn’t possibly tell
me that and yet remain?”
“No, monsieur. From the moment you place me under the necessity of
explaining each of my movements and each of my acts, I prefer to go and
leave to you that ‘responsibility’ of which you spoke just now, my dear
Monsieur Koupriane.”
Astonished and disquieted by this long conversation between Rouletabille
and the Head of Police, Matrena Petrovna continually turned upon them
her anguished glance, which always insensibly softened as it rested on
Rouletabille. Koupriane read there all the hope that the brave woman had
in the young reporter, and he read also in Rouletabille’s eye all the
extraordinary confidence that the mere boy had in himself. As a last
consideration had he not already something in hand in circumstances
where all the police of the world had admitted themselves vanquished?
Koupriane pressed Rouletabille’s hand and said just one word to him:
“Remain.”
Having saluted the general and Matrena affectionately, and a group of
friends in one courteous sweep, he departed, with thoughtful brow.
During all this time the general, enchanted with the promenade, told
stories of the Caucasus to his friends, believing himself young again
and re-living his nights as sub-lieutenant at Tills. As to Natacha,
no one had seen her. They retraced the way to the villa along deserted
by-paths. Koupriane’s call made occasion for Athanase Georgevitch and
Thaddeus, and the two officers also, to say that he was the only honest
man in all the Russian police, and that Matrena Petrovna was a great
woman to have dared rid herself of the entire clique of agents, who
are often more revolutionary than the Nihilists themselves. Thus they
arrived at the datcha.
The general inquired for Natacha, not understanding why she had left him
thus during his first venture out. The schwitzar replied that the young
mistress had returned to the house and had left again about a quarter
of an hour later, taking the way that the party had gone on their
promenade, and he had not seen her since.
Boris spoke up:
“She must have passed on the other side of the carriages while we were
behind the trees, general, and not seeing us she has gone on her way,
making the round of the island, over as far as the Barque.”
The explanation seemed the most plausible one.
“Has anyone else been here?” demanded Matrena, forcing her voice to
be calm. Rouletabille saw her hand tremble on the handle of the
rolling-chair, which she had not quitted for a second during all the
promenade, refusing aid from the officers, the friends, and even from
Rouletabille.
“First there came the Head of Police, who told me he would go and find
you, Barinia, and right after, His Excellency the Marshal of the Court.
His Excellency will return, although he is very pressed for time, before
he takes the train at seven o’clock for Krasnoie-Coelo.”
All this had been said in Russian, naturally, but Matrena translated the
words of the schwitzar into French in a low voice for Rouletabille, who
was near her. The general during this time had taken Rouletabille’s hand
and pressed it affectionately, as if, in that mute way, to thank him for
all the young man had done for them. Feodor himself also had confidence,
and he was grateful for the freer air that he was being allowed
to breathe. It seemed to him that he was emerging from prison.
Nevertheless, as the promenade had been a little fatiguing, Matrena
ordered him to go and rest immediately. Athanase and Thaddeus took their
leave. The two officers were already at the end of the garden, talking
coldly, and almost confronting one another, like wooden soldiers.
Without doubt they were arranging the conditions of an encounter to
settle their little difference at once.
The schwitzar gathered the general into his great arms and carried him
into the veranda. Feodor demanded five minutes’ respite before he was
taken upstairs to his chamber. Matrena Petrovna had a light luncheon
brought at his request. In truth, the good woman trembled with
impatience and hardly dared move without consulting Rouletabille’s
face. While the general talked with Ermolai, who passed him his tea,
Rouletabille made a sign to Matrena that she understood at once. She
joined the young man in the drawing-room.
“Madame,” he said rapidly, in a low voice, “you must go at once to see
what has happened there.”
He pointed to the dining-room.
“Very well.”
It was pitiful to watch her.
“Go, madame, with courage.”
“Why don’t you come with me?”
“Because, madame, I have something to do elsewhere. Give me the keys of
the next floor.”
“No, no. What for?”
“Not a second’s delay, for the love of Heaven. Do what I tell you on
your side, and let me do mine. The keys! Come, the keys!”
He snatched them rather than took them, and pointed a last time to
the dining-room with a gesture so commanding that she did not hesitate
further. She entered the dining-room, shaking, while he bounded to the
upper floor. He was not long. He took only time to open the doors, throw
a glance into the general’s chamber, a single glance, and to return,
letting a cry of joy escape him, borrowed from his new and very limited
accomplishment of Russian, “Caracho!”
How Rouletabille, who had not spent half a second examining the
general’s chamber, was able to be certain that all went well on that
side, when it took Matrena--and that how many times a day!--at least
a quarter of an hour of ferreting in all the corners each time she
explored her house before she was even inadequately reassured, was
a question. If that dear heroic woman had been with him during this
“instant information” she would have received such a shock that, with
all confidence gone, she would have sent for Koupriane immediately,
and all his agents, reinforced by the personnel of the Okrana (Secret
Police). Rouletabille at once rejoined the general, whistling. Feodor
and Ermolai were deep in conversation about the Orel country. The young
man did not disturb them. Then, soon, Matrena reappeared. He saw her
come in quite radiant. He handed back her keys, and she took them
mechanically. She was overjoyed and did not try to hide it. The general
himself noticed it, and asked what had made her so.
“It is my happiness over our first promenade since we arrived at the
datcha des Iles,” she explained. “And now you must go upstairs to bed,
Feodor. You will pass a good night, I am sure.”
“I can sleep only if you sleep, Matrena.”
“I promise you. It is quite possible now that we have our dear little
domovoi. You know, Feodor, that he smokes his pipe just like the dear
little porcelain domovoi.”
“He does resemble him, he certainly does,” said Feodor. “That makes us
feel happy, but I wish him to sleep also.”
“Yes, yes,” smiled Rouletabille, “everybody will sleep here. That is the
countersign. We have watched enough. Since the police are gone we can
all sleep, believe me, general.”
“Eh, eh, I believe you, on my word, easily enough. There were only they
in the house capable of attempting that affair of the bouquet. I
have thought that all out, and now I am at ease. And anyway, whatever
happens, it is necessary to get sleep, isn’t it? The chances of war!
Nichevo!” He pressed Rouletabille’s hand, and Matrena Petrovna took,
as was her habit, Feodor Feodorovitch on her back and lugged him to his
chamber. In that also she refused aid from anyone. The general clung to
his wife’s neck during the ascent and laughed like a child. Rouletabille
remained in the hallway, watching the garden attentively. Ermolai walked
out of the villa and crossed the garden, going to meet a personage in
uniform whom the young man recognized immediately as the grand-marshal
of the court, who had introduced him to the Tsar. Ermolai informed him
that Madame Matrena was engaged in helping her husband retire, and the
marshal remained at the end of the garden where he had found Michael and
Boris talking in the kiosque. All three remained there for some time
in conversation, standing by a table where General and Madame Trebassof
sometimes dined when they had no guests. As they talked the marshal
played with a box of white cardboard tied with a pink string. At this
moment Matrena, who had not been able to resist the desire to talk for
a moment with Rouletabille and tell him how happy she was, rejoined the
young man.
“Little domovoi,” said she, laying her hand on his shoulder, “you have
not watched on this side?”
She pointed in her turn to the dining-room.
“No, no. You have seen it, madame, and I am sufficiently informed.”
“Perfectly. There is nothing. No one has worked there! No one has
touched the board. I knew it. I am sure of it. It is dreadful what we
have thought about it! Oh, you do not know how relieved and happy I
am. Ah, Natacha, Natacha, I have not loved you in vain. (She pronounced
these words in accents of great beauty and tragic sincerity.) When I saw
her leave us, my dear, ah, my legs sank under me. When she said, ‘I have
forgotten something; I must hurry back,’ I felt I had not the strength
to go a single step. But now I certainly am happy, that weight at least
is off my heart, off my heart, dear little domovoi, because of you,
because of you.”
She embraced him, and then ran away, like one possessed, to resume her
post near the general.
Notes in Rouletabille’s memorandum-book: The affair of the little cavity
under the floor not having been touched again proves nothing for or
against Natacha (even though that excellent Matrena Petrovna thinks
so). Natacha could very well have been warned by the too great care with
which Madame Matrena watched the floor. My opinion, since I saw Matrena
lift the carpet the first time without any real precaution, is that they
have definitely abandoned the preparation of that attack and are trying
to account for the secret becoming known. What Matrena feels so sure
of is that the trap I laid by the promenade to the Point was against
Natacha particularly. I knew beforehand that Natacha would absent
herself during the promenade. I’m not looking for anything new from
Natacha, but what I did need was to be sure that Matrena didn’t detest
Natacha, and that she had not faked the preparations for an attack under
the floor in such a way as to throw almost certain suspicion on her
step-daughter. I am sure about that now. Matrena is innocent of such a
thing, the poor dear soul. If Matrena had been a monster the occasion
was too good. Natacha’s absence, her solitary presence for a quarter of
an hour in the empty villa, all would have urged Matrena, whom I sent
alone to search under the carpet in the dining-room, to draw the last
nails from the board if she was really guilty of having drawn the
others. Natacha would have been lost then! Matrena returned sincerely,
tragically happy at not having found anything new, and now I have the
material proof that I needed. Morally and physically Matrena is removed
from it. So I am going to speak to her about the hat-pin. I believe that
the matter is urgent on that side rather than on the side of the nails
in the floor.