before long, and so that you may know what is expected of you. Certain
events may be taken beforehand as a sure signal for assembly--such as
the death of either emperor, of the King of Prussia, or of Bismarck, the
declaration of war by any of the great powers. There is always something
seething on the Indian frontier, and one day the English will awake.
The Warsaw papers will not have the news; but the _Czas_ and the other
Cracow journals will tell you soon enough, and you can all see the
Galician papers when you want to, despite their censors and their
police!”
A contemptuous laugh from the fat man confirmed this statement. This was
his department. In many men cunning takes the place of courage.
At this moment the steam-whistle of the iron-works farther up the river
boomed out across the plain. The bells of the city churches broke out
into a clanging unanimity as to the time of day, and all the workers
stirred reluctantly. The dinner-hour was over.
Kosmaroff rose to his feet and stretched himself--a long, lithe, wiry
figure.
“Come,” he said. “We must go back to work.”
He glanced from face to face, and any looking with understanding at his
narrow countenance, his steady, dark eyes, and clean-cut nose must have
realized that they stood in the presence of that rare and indefinable
creation--a strong man.
X
A WARNING
It is a matter of history that the division of Poland into three saved
many families from complete ruin. For some suffered confiscation in the
kingdom of Poland and saved their property in Galicia; others, again in
Posen had estates in Masovia, which even Russian justice could not lay
hands upon--that gay justice of 1832, which declared that, in protesting
against the want of faith of their conquerors, the Poles had broken
faith. The Austrian government had sympathized with the discontent of
those Poles who had fallen under Russian sway, while in Breslau it was
permitted to print and publish plain words deemed criminal in Cracow and
Warsaw. The dogs, in a word, behaved as dogs do over their carrion, and,
having secured a large portion, kept a jealous eye on their neighbor's
jaw.
The Bukatys had lost all in Poland except a house or two in Warsaw, but
a few square miles of fertile land in Galicia brought in a sufficiency,
while Wanda had some property in the neighborhood of Breslau bequeathed
to her by her mother. The grim years of 1860 and 1861 had worn out this
lady, who found the peace that passeth man's understanding while Poland
was yet in the horrors of a hopeless guerilla warfare.
“Russia owes me twenty years of happiness and twenty million rubles,”
the old prince was in the habit of saying, and each year on the
anniversary of his wife's death he reckoned up afresh this debt. He
mentioned it, moreover, to Russian and Pole alike, with that calm
frankness which was somehow misunderstood, for the administration never
placed him among the suspects. Poland has always been a plain-speaking
country, and the Poles, expressing themselves in the roughest of
European tongues, a plain-spoken people. They spoke so plainly to Henry
of Valois when he was their king that one fine night he ran away to
mincing France and gentler men. When, under rough John Sobieski, they
spoke with their enemy in the gate of Vienna, their meaning was quite
clear to the Moslem understanding.
The Prince Bukaty had a touch of that rough manner which commands
respect in this smooth age, and even Russian officials adopted a
conciliatory attitude towards this man, who had known Poland without one
of their kind within her boundaries.
“You cannot expect an old man such as I to follow all the changes of
your petty laws, and to remember under which form of government he
happens to be living at the moment!” he had boldly said to a great
personage from St. Petersburg, and the observation was duly reported in
the capital. It was, moreover, said in Warsaw that the law had actually
stretched a point or two for the Prince Bukaty on more than one
occasion. Like many outspoken people, he passed for a barker and not a
biter.
It does not fall to the lot of many to live in a highly civilized town
and submit to open robbery. Prince Bukaty lived in a small palace in
the Kotzebue street, and when he took his morning stroll in the Cracow
Faubourg he passed under the shadow of a palace flying the Russian
flag, which palace was his, and had belonged to his ancestors from time
immemorial. He had once made the journey to St. Petersburg to see in
the great museum there the portraits of his fathers, the books that his
predecessors had collected, the relics of Poland's greatness, which were
his, and the greatness thereof was his.
“Yes,” he answered to the loquacious curator, “I know. You tell me
nothing that I do not know. These things are mine. I am the Prince
Bukaty!”
And the curator of St. Petersburg went away, sorrowful, like the young
man who had great possessions.
For Russia had taken these things from the Bukatys, not in punishment,
but because she wanted them. She wanted offices for her bureaucrats on
the Krakowski Przedmiescie, in Warsaw, so she took Bukaty Palace. And to
whom can one appeal when Caesar steals?
Poland had appealed to Europe, and Europe had expressed the deepest
sympathy. And that was all!
The house in the Kotzebue had the air of an old French town-house, and
was, in fact, built by a French architect in the days of Stanislaus
Augustus, when Warsaw aped Paris. It stands back from the road behind
high railings, and, at the farther end of a paved court-yard, to which
entrance is gained by two high gates, now never opened in hospitality,
and only unlocked at rare intervals for the passage of the quiet
brougham in which the prince or Wanda went and came. The house is
just round the corner of the Kotzebue, and therefore faces the Saski
Gardens--a quiet spot in this most noisy town. The building is a low
one, with a tiled roof and long windows, heavily framed, of which the
smaller panes and thick woodwork suggest the early days of window-glass.
Inside, the house is the house of a poor man. The carpets are worn thin;
the furniture, of a sumptuous design, is carefully patched and mended.
The atmosphere has that mournful scent of better days--now dead and
past. It is the odor of monarchy, slowly fading from the face of a world
that reeks of cheap democracy.
The air of the rooms--the subtle individuality which is impressed by
humanity on wood and texture--suggested that older comfort which has
been succeeded by the restless luxury of these times.
The prince was, it appeared, one of those men who diffuse tranquillity
wherever they are. He had moved quietly through stirring events; had
acted without haste in hurried moments. For the individuality of the
house must have been his. Wanda had found it there when she came back
from the school in Dresden, too young to have a marked individuality
of her own. The difference she brought to the house was a certain
brightness and a sort of experimental femininity, which reigned supreme
until her English governess came back again to live as a companion with
her pupil. Wanda moved the furniture, turned the house round on its
staid basis, and made a hundred experiments in domestic economy before
she gave way to her father's habits of life. Then she made that happiest
of human discoveries, which has the magic power of allaying at one
stroke the eternal feminine discontent which has made the world uneasy
since the day that Eve idled in that perfect garden--she found that she
was wanted in the world!
The prince did not tell her so. Perhaps his need of her was too obvious
to require words. He had given his best years to Poland, and now that
old age was coming, that health was failing and wealth had vanished,
Poland would have none of him.
There was no Poland. At this moment Wanda burst upon him, so to speak,
with a hundred desires that only he could fulfil, a hundred questions
that only he could answer. And, as wise persons know, to fulfil desires
and answer questions is the best happiness.
Father and daughter lived a quiet life in the house that was called
a palace by courtesy only. For Martin was made of livelier stuff, and
rarely stayed long at home. He came and went with a feverish haste; was
fond of travel, he said, and the authorities kept a questioning eye upon
his movements.
There are two doors to the Bukaty Palace. As often as not, Martin made
use of the smaller door giving entrance to the garden at the back of the
house, which garden could also be entered from an alley leading round
from the back of the bank, which stands opposite the post-office in the
busier part of Kotzebue Street.
He came in by this door one evening and did not come alone, for he was
accompanied by a man in working-clothes. The streets of Warsaw are well
lighted and well guarded by a most excellent police, second only as the
Russians are to the police of London. It is therefore the custom to go
abroad at night as much as in the day, and the Krakowski is more crowded
after dark than during the afternoon. Kosmaroff had walked some distance
behind Prince Martin in the streets. Martin unlocked the gate of the
garden and passed in, leaving the gate open with the key in the lock. In
a minute Kosmaroff followed, locked the gate after him, and gave the key
back to its owner on the steps of the garden door of the house, where
Martin was awaiting him, latch-key in hand. They did it without comment
or instruction, as men carry out a plan frequently resorted to.
Martin led the way into the house, along a dimly lighted corridor, to
a door which stood ajar. Outside the night was cold; within were warmth
and comfort. Martin went into the long room. At the far end, beneath the
lamp and near an open wood fire, the prince and Wanda were sitting. They
were in evening dress, and the prince was dozing in his chair.
“I have brought Kos to see you,” said Martin, and, turning, he looked
towards the door. The convict's son, the convict, came forward with that
ease which, to be genuine, must be quite unconscious. He apparently gave
no thought to his sandy and wrinkled top-boots, from which the original
black had long since been washed away by the waters of the Vistula. He
wore his working-clothes as if they were the best habit for this or
any other palace. He took Wanda's hand and kissed it in the old-world
fashion, which has survived to this day in Poland. But the careless
manner in which he raised her fingers to his lips would have showed
quite clearly to a competent observer that neither Wanda nor any other
woman had ever touched his heart.
“You will excuse my getting up,” said the prince. “My gout is bad
to-night. You will have something to eat?”
“Thank you, I have eaten,” replied Kosmaroff, drawing forward a chair.
Martin put the logs together with his foot, and they blazed up, lighting
with a flickering glow the incongruous group.
“He will take a glass of port,” said the prince, turning to Wanda, and
indicating the decanter from which, despite his gout, he had just had
his after-dinner wine.
Wanda poured out the wine and handed it to Kosmaroff, who took it with a
glance and a quick smile of thanks, which seemed to indicate that he was
almost one of the family. And, indeed, they were closely related,
not only in the present generation, but in bygone days. For Kosmaroff
represented a family long since deemed extinct.
“I have come,” he said, “to tell you that all is safe. Also to bid you
good-bye. As soon as I can get employment I shall go down to Thorn to
stir them up there. They are lethargic at Thorn.”
“Ah!” laughed the prince, moving his legs to a more comfortable
position, “you young men! You think everybody is lethargic. Don't move
too quickly. That is what I always preach.”
“And we are ready enough to listen to your preaching,” answered
Kosmaroff. “You will admit that I came here to-night in obedience to
your opinion that too much secrecy is dangerous because it leads to
misunderstandings. Plain speaking and clear understanding was the
message you sent me--the text of your last sermon.”
With his quick smile Kosmaroff touched the rim of the prince's
wineglass, which stood at his elbow, and indicated by a gesture that he
drank his health.
“That was not my text--that was Wanda's,” answered the prince.
“Ah!” said Kosmaroff, looking towards Wanda. “Is that so? Then I will
take it. I believe in Wanda's views of life. She has a vast experience.”
“I have been to Dresden and to London,” answered Wanda, “and a woman
always sees much more than a man.”
“Always?” asked Kosmaroff, with his one-sided smile.
“Always.”
But Kosmaroff had turned towards the prince in his quick, jerky way.
“By-the-way,” he asked, “what is Cartoner doing in Warsaw?”
“Cartoner--the Englishman who speaks so many languages? We met him in
London,” answered the prince. “Who is he? Why should he not be here?”
“I will tell you who he is,” answered Kosmaroff, with a sudden light in
his eyes. “He is the man that the English send when they suspect that
something is going on which they can turn to good account. He has a
trick of finding things out--that man. Such is his reputation, at all
events. Paul Deulin is another, and he is here. He is a friend of yours,
by-the-way; but he is not dangerous, like Cartoner. There is an American
here, too. His instructions are Warsaw and Petersburg. There is either
something moving in Russia or else the powers suspect that something may
move in Poland before long. These men are here to find out. They must
find out nothing from us.”
The prince shrugged his shoulders indifferently. He did not attach much
importance to these foreigners.
“Of course,” went on Kosmaroff, “they are only watchers. But, as Wanda
says, some people see more than others. The American, Mangles, who has
ladies with him, will report upon events after they have happened. So
will Deulin, who is an idler. He never sees that which will give him
trouble. He does not write long despatches to the Quai d'Orsay, because
he knows that they will not be read there. But Cartoner is different.
There are never any surprises for the English in matters that Cartoner
has in hand. He reports on events before they have happened, which is a
different story. I merely warn you.”
As he spoke, Kosmaroff rose, glancing at the clock.
“There are no instructions?”
“None,” answered the prince. “Except the usual one--patience!”
“Ah yes,” replied Kosmaroff, “we shall be patient.”
He did not seem to think that it might be easier to be patient in this
comfortable house than on the sand-hills of the Vistula in the coming
winter months.
“But be careful,” he added, addressing Martin more particularly, “of
this man Cartoner. He will not betray, but he will know--you understand.
And no one must know!”
He shook hands with Martin and Wanda and then with the prince.
“You met him in London, you say?” he said to the prince. “What did you
think of him?”
“I thought him--a quiet man.”
“And Wanda?” continued Kosmaroff, lightly, turning to her--“she who sees
so much. What did she think of him?”
“I was afraid of him!”
XI
AN AGREEMENT TO DIFFER
The Saxon Gardens are in the heart of Warsaw, and, in London, would be
called a park. At certain hours the fashionable world promenades beneath
the trees, and at all times there is a thoroughfare across from one
quarter of the town to another.
Wanda often sat there in the morning or walked slowly with her father
at such times as the doctor's instructions to take exercise were still
fresh upon his memory. There are seats beneath the trees, overlooking
the green turf and the flowers so dear to the Slavonian soul. Later in
the morning these seats are occupied by nurses and children, as in any
other park in any other city. But from nine to ten Wanda had the alleys
mostly to herself.
The early autumn had already laid its touch upon the trees, and the
leaves were brown. The flowers, laboriously tended all through the
brief, uncertain summer, had that forlorn look which makes autumn in
Northern latitudes a period of damp depression. Wanda had gone out
early, and was sitting at the sunny side of the broad alley that divides
the gardens in two from end to end. She was waiting for Martin, who had
been called back at the door of the palace and had promised to follow
in a few minutes. He had a hundred engagements during the day, a hundred
friends among those unfortunate scions of noble houses who will not wear
the Russian uniform, who cannot by the laws of their caste engage in
any form of commerce, and must not accept a government office--who are
therefore idle, without the natural Southern sloth that enables Italians
and Spaniards to do nothing gracefully all day long. Wanda was wiser
than Martin. Girls generally are infinitely wiser than young men. But
the wisdom ceases to grow later in life, and old men are wiser than old
women. Wanda was, in a sense, Martin's adviser, mentor, and friend. She
had, as he himself acknowledged, already saved him from dangers into
which his natural heedlessness and impetuosity would have led him. As
to the discontent in which all Poland was steeped, which led the princes
and their friends into many perils, Wanda had been brought up to it,
just as some families are brought up to consumption and the anticipation
of an early death.
In her eminently practical, feminine way of looking at things, Wanda was
much more afraid of Martin running into debt than into danger. Debt and
impecuniosity would be so inconvenient at this time, when her father
daily needed some new comfort, and daily depended for his happiness more
and more upon his port wine and that ease which is only to be enjoyed by
an easy mind.
Wanda was thinking of these things in the Saski Gardens, and hardly
heeded the passers-by, though--for the feminine instincts were strong in
her--she looked with softer eyes on the children than she did on the
Jew who hurried past, with bent back and a bowed head, from the
richer quarter of the town to his own mysterious purlieus of the
Franoiszkanska. The latter, perhaps, recalled the thoughts of Martin and
his heedlessness; the former made her think of--she knew not what.
She was looking towards the colonnade that marks the site of the King of
Saxony's palace, when Cartoner came through the archway into the garden.
She recognized him even at this distance, for his walk was unlike that
of the nervous, quick-moving Pole or the lurking Jew. It was more like
the gait of a Russian; but all the Russians in Warsaw wear a uniform.
That is why they are there. There was a suggestion of determination in
the walk of this Englishman.
He came down the wide alley towards her, and then suddenly perceived
her. She saw this without actually looking at him, and knew the precise
moment when he first caught sight of her. It was presumably upon
experience that Wanda based her theory that women see twice as much as
men. She saw him turn, without hesitation, away from her down a narrower
alley leading to the right. It was his intention to avoid her. But the
only turning he could take was that leading to the corner of Kotzebue
Street, and Martin was at the other end of it, coming towards him.
Cartoner was thus caught in the narrow alley. Wanda sat still and
watched the two men. She suddenly knew in advance what would happen, as
it is often vouchsafed to the human understanding to know at a moment's
notice what is coming; and she had a strange, discomforting sense that
these minutes were preordained--that Martin and Cartoner and herself
were mere puppets in the hands of Fate, and must say and do that which
has been assigned to them in an unalterable scheme of succeeding events.
She watched the two men meet and shake hands, in the English fashion,
without raising their hats. She could see Cartoner's movements to
continue his way, and Martin's detaining hand slipped within the
Englishman's arm.
“What does it matter?” Martin was saying. “There is no one to see us
here, at this hour in the morning. We are quite safe. There is Wanda,
sitting on the seat, waiting for me. Come back with me.”
And Wanda could divine the words easily enough from her brother's
attitude and gestures. It ought to have surprised her that Cartoner
yielded, for it was unlike him. He was so much stronger than Martin--so
determined, so unyielding. And yet she felt no surprise when he turned
and came towards her with Martin's hand still within his arm. She knew
that it was written that he must come; divined vaguely that he had
something to say to her which it was safer to say than to leave to be
silently understood and perhaps misunderstood. She gave an impatient
sigh. She had always ruled her father and brother and the Palace Bukaty,
and this sense of powerlessness was new to her.
While they approached, Martin continued to talk in his eager, laughing
way, and Cartoner smiled slowly as he listened.
“I saw you,” he said to Wanda, as he took off his hat, “and went the
other way to avoid you.”
And, having made this plain statement, he stood silently looking at
her. He looked into her eyes, and she met his odd, direct gaze without
embarrassment.
“Cartoner and I,” Prince Martin hastened to explain, “travelled from
Berlin together, and we agreed then that, much as we might desire it, it
would be inconvenient for me to show him that attention which one would
naturally want to show to an Englishman travelling in Poland. That is
why he went the other way when he saw you.”
Wanda looked at Cartoner with her quick, shrewd smile. It would have
been the obvious thing to have confirmed this explanation. But Cartoner
kept silent. He had acquired, it seemed, the fatal habit--very rare
among men and almost unknown in women--of thinking before he spoke.
Which habit is deadly for that which is called conversation, because if
one decides not to give speech to the obvious and the unnecessary and
the futile there is in daily intercourse hardly anything left.
“You see,” said Martin, who always had plenty to say for himself,
“in this province of Russia we are not even allowed to choose our own
friends.”
“Even in a free country one does not pick one's friends out, like the
best strawberries from a basket,” said Wanda.
“Not a question to be arranged beforehand,” put in Cartoner.
“Not even by the governor-general of Poland?” asked Wanda, looking
thoughtfully at the falling leaves which a sudden gust of wind had
showered round them.
“Not even by the Czar.”
“Who, I am told, means well!” said Martin, ironically, and with a gay
laugh, for irony and laughter may be assimilated by the young. “Poor
man! It must be terrible to know that people are saying behind one's
back that one means well! I hope no one will ever say that of me.”
Wanda had sat down again, and was stirring the dead leaves with her
walking-stick.
“Martin and I are going for a tramp,” she said. “We like to get away
from the noise and the dust--and the uniforms.”
But Martin sat down beside her and made room for Cartoner.
“We attract less attention than if we stand,” he explained. And Cartoner
took the seat offered. “Such hospitality as our circumstances allow us
to offer you,” commented the young prince, gayly, “a clean stone seat on
the sunny side of a public garden.”
“But let us understand each other,” put in Wanda, in her practical way,
and looked from one man to the other with those gay, blue eyes that saw
so much, “since we are conspirators.”
“The better we understand each other the better conspirators we shall
be,” said Cartoner.
“I notice you don't ask, 'What is the plot?'” said Wanda.
“The plot is simple enough,” answered Martin, for Cartoner said nothing,
and looked straight in front of him. He did not address one more than
the other, but explained the situation, as it were, for the benefit of
all whom it might concern. He had lighted a cigarette--a little Russian
affair, all gold lettering and mouthpiece, and as he spoke he jerked
the ash from time to time so that it should not fly and incommode his
sister.