CHAPTER XXV.NAJINE AND HER LOVER.
Onreaching the head of the stairs, I opened the door upon a pretty picture. Madame de Brousson had discreetly left the lovers alone, and they were standing together before the fire, M. de Lambert’s arm around Najine, and the firelight shining on their faces. They started at my unexpected entrance, and her cheeks were rosy with blushes as she saw the smile in my eyes; but she came up to me, and clasped my hand in both hers.
“I have to thank you, monsieur,” she said, “for all you have done for me and for M. de Lambert.”
I laughed softly. “Nay, mademoiselle,” I replied gently, “M. de Lambert owes more to you than to any one, and I trust that he has properly thanked you.”
She laughed a little at this, and glanced mischievously at her lover. “I believe he is grateful, monsieur,” she said archly.
“Jesting aside, mademoiselle,” I went on gravely, “we have no time to lose; M. de Lambert must leave Moscow to-night.”
She started and glanced sadly at her lover, and he looked back at her with eager interrogation.
“Alas!” she exclaimed, “so soon! Do you believe it necessary, M. le Maréchal?”
“Mademoiselle,” I replied, “do you yourself believe that the czar is likely to stand by his action to-night?”
She was silent for a moment, and then shook her head. “I cannot tell,” she said sadly; “he is a passionate and changeful man, and acts, I fear, too often on the impulse of the moment.”
“Mademoiselle,” I replied, “I have the assurance of Alexander Mentchikof that the czar may change at any moment. M. de Lambert must leave Moscow at once, and for all time, if he would be safe; and you must bid him farewell unless—”
I paused and glanced at Guillaume.
“I have told her,” he said, “and she raises a thousand objections to the haste and the danger.”
“I thought you a brave woman, mademoiselle,” I remarked.
“It is not for myself,” she cried with feeling; “it is for him.”
I looked from one to the other. “Ah, mademoiselle,” I said quietly, “I see how it is. I will leave you to M. de Lambert’s persuasion; but time presses, and I shall presently return;” and I went out to find my wife, for I saw that Najine was on the point of yielding, and that her lover would be a far more effective argument than my best eloquence.
I found Zénaïde waiting with impatience for thereturn of Pierrot. She had arranged everything in her own mind, and was full of impatience to carry out her designs.
“They must be married at once,” she said with decision; “every hour counts, and Najine has selected this time to hesitate and increase our embarrassments, while I have been looking for Madame Zotof at any moment.”
I smiled. “A more terrible infliction than the czar,” I admitted; “but mademoiselle will yield. We must go straight to the Kremlin, find a priest, and have the knot tied.”
“There will be a difficulty about the priest,” Zénaïde said.
I showed her Mentchikof’s signet, and explained briefly his cautions and fears.
“The signet will probably help us,” she said thoughtfully. “Meanwhile we must prevail upon Najine to consent at once.”
As she spoke, there was a hasty tap upon the door, and I opened it to admit Pierrot.
“Monsieur and madame,” he said hurriedly, “the Zotofs are coming. I left Touchet with the carriage at some distance that they might not see us approach, and I have put out the lights at the front of the house.”
“Wise Pierrot,” I said, “put out all the lights that show at the windows;” and then I turned to my wife for suggestions.
“It is, as I thought,” she said; “the czar intendsthat Madame Zotof shall undo all that he has done. We must get mademoiselle and M. de Lambert out by the rear door.”
“Will that be possible, Pierrot?” I asked.
“If no time is lost, monsieur. They will first try the front door, and it is possible that they may believe that we have already departed.”
I shrugged my shoulders. “Not while Madame Zotof is of the party,” I said.
Zénaïde had already gone to hasten mademoiselle’s decision, and I followed. At the first note of danger Najine’s spirit awoke, and she was as quick to act as we could desire. I saw by M. de Lambert’s face that he had overcome her scruples to a hasty marriage, and I felt that we could now proceed without further delays. In a few moments both women were cloaked and hooded for the street, and preceded by Pierrot we crept down the stairs to the door at the rear. We were half-way down when we were startled by a loud knock at the front.
“They have come!” exclaimed mademoiselle beneath her breath, pausing to listen.
“The more reason for haste,” I said, taking her hand and leading her forward. Then I called to Pierrot, “Is there any one at this entrance?”
He was listening at the door, and in a moment opened it and looked out. “Safe as yet, monsieur,” he said.
We hurried down and out, for there was nowquite an uproar at the front door. We stood a moment listening, Najine’s hand in mine.
“We must run for it!” I exclaimed. And we all ran down the lane like a party of children, and reached the carriage without hindrance. As soon as we were seated within it, the horses started at a round pace, and I laughed as I thought of Madame Zotof beating upon my door for admittance.
“Have a care, monsieur,” Zénaïde said warningly; “do not laugh too soon.”
“You think my mirth premature?” I replied thoughtfully; “it may be so, but I saw so plainly Madame Zotof before that door. I beg your pardon, mademoiselle, but your aunt’s energy is amusing.”
“They will follow us to the Kremlin,” she rejoined quietly. “My aunt never gives up.”
“A worthy quality, mademoiselle,” I remarked, “and madame may follow as soon as the marriage is consummated. She cannot prevail against the church.”
“In any case, madame will not prevail,” remarked M. de Lambert, quietly; “Najine has consented to be my wife, and I trust that I am able to fight her battles as well as my own.”
“There is no doubt about your ability to fight your own, monsieur,” I remarked, laughing to myself as I thought of his duel with Apraxin; but neither Zénaïde nor Najine understood my reference, and I felt M. de Lambert stir uneasily,probably afraid of alarming hisfiancée. I laughed the more, knowing how she admired her lover’s prowess and how little she esteemed the vanquished, for she had a spirit that despised all cowardice and meanness. In spite of my anxieties, I found much food for amusing reflection,—the embarrassment of the czar, finding mademoiselle as a suppliant for her lover; the mad folly of M. Apraxin, and the fury of that shrew Madame Zotof. Meanwhile we had been driving rapidly, and in a quarter of an hour the carriage stopped within the Gate of the Redeemer, and, leaving the women in charge of M. de Lambert, I went to find a priest whom I could trust with this delicate affair. After a little inquiry I was directed to the Cathedral of the Assumption, and, returning for the others, we went there together, and I found the priest whom I sought. It was, however, not an easy matter to induce him to perform the ceremony; our nationality, the haste, and the hour—it was now long past midnight—aroused his suspicions, and he looked long and searchingly at mademoiselle’s muffled figure. It was certain that I would never have prevailed over his scruples without Mentchikof’s signet ring. The sight of it had an immediate effect upon him, and shook his resolution; he dared not offend the all-powerful favorite, and in ignorance of the extent of the risk involved, he finally yielded a reluctant consent to my persuasions, and went intothe center of the church for the ceremony. Najine was agitated, and clung to my wife for support and encouragement, realizing that it was a decisive step, and that she was imperilling her lover’s liberty and perhaps his life, for if the czar’s mood changed it might be the simplest way to make her a widow. M. de Lambert’s own face was pale, but with emotion rather than anxiety, and he stood beside his bride, the picture of a gallant soldier. Mademoiselle had thrown back her hood, and I thought, as I looked at her in the light of the tapers that they held in their hands, that I had never seen a bride more lovely in all the splendid attire of the court, than this young girl in her long gray cloak that fell from throat to feet, the fur-lined hood thrown back, and her face fair and pale as a white lily against the gloom of the vast interior of the cathedral. There were no lights behind us, only those before the altar; and they served to increase the darkness of the nave while illuminating the splendid golden iconostase, blazing with precious jewels around the faces of Madonnas; above was the great dome, about us were the mighty pillars with their images of saints and martyrs, rising one above another, while on every side from the golden background loomed the dark forms of pictured angels and archangels; and on the pavement beneath our feet had knelt, generation after generation, the Grand Dukes of Muscovy and the Czars of all the Russias.
My wife and I and our attendants stood a little apart to witness the ceremony, while the white-haired priest united the lovers. Softly intoning the service, he placed two golden crowns upon their heads and, clasping their hands in his, led them three times around the great taper that he had lighted in the center of the church, and which shone like a star. I looked at the picture that they made with strange reflections: here was a young and beautiful woman willing to forego the splendors of a throne to become the wife of a French soldier, preferring his love to a power that might have been almost absolute with the czar; for I had seen enough to be convinced that Peter loved Najine with all the strength of his fierce nature, and that she could have swayed him as no other woman ever would. How strange is the course of destiny! Here was a woman who might have been Empress of all the Russias and she preferred to be the wife of a gallant gentleman of the French King’s household. After all, was not her choice wise? For her undoubtedly, but for some women impossible. There are souls that covet the slippery heights of power, that long to rule the destinies of men, and there are women to whom a lot of domestic obscurity would mean bitter unhappiness. I could not imagine Catherine Shavronsky content with such a fate; she would fight for power, while she lived, and wade through the mire of personal degradation to obtainher goal. No cost would be too great, no sacrifice too supreme, for her consuming ambition. Such were my thoughts while I stood listening to the solemn words that made Najine Zotof the wife of Guillaume de Lambert,—strange reflections, no doubt, yet I believe that my wife’s were nearly identical, only that she had a woman’s quick sympathy for the young girl’s emotion; a woman’s appreciation of her purity and truth, which not even the most splendid temptations of a court could sully or corrupt. As for the two lovers themselves, they were too absorbed in each other, too devoutly attentive to the priest, to be conscious of any world outside their own, and I saw Zénaïde’s eyes moist with sympathy as she watched them. The last words of the benediction spoken, M. de Lambert turned to us with radiant eyes, and Najine threw herself into my wife’s arms with a little sob of deep emotion.
“I owe all to you, monsieur,” M. de Lambert said warmly, as he clasped my hand; “I have been a rash fool, and without you would have failed miserably.”
“Nay,” I replied, smiling, “you were no fool in the one quarter where wisdom was most desired, monsieur; and you owe much, too, to Madame de Lambert.”
He smiled at the name, and glanced at Najine, who turned now to me with her own sweet manner, thanking me for all my kindness to her until Iwas myself embarrassed, feeling that I scarcely deserved so much, and so turned it aside with a jest.
“Nay, madame,” I said, “do not thank me too much for making you the wife of a poor man, when,” I added in a low tone, “you might have been an empress.”
She looked up at her husband with a glance of proud affection.
“Not so, M. l’Ambassadeur,” she said with spirit. “I owe you the more thanks, since no queen could be more happy than the wife of a brave and loyal man.”
M. de Lambert bent his head gracefully and kissed her hand. “I am more fortunate than an emperor,” he replied.
“You are both more fortunate,” Madame de Brousson said quietly; “a loyal heart is richer than a crown, and you are happier in each other than either emperors or kings.”
Meanwhile the priest who had performed the ceremony was eager to be rid of us, and, knowing the perils of delay, I too became impatient, and urged upon M. de Lambert the necessity of immediate departure. We had previously decided upon the road that they should travel, and I sent Touchet to Mentchikof with a verbal message that would inform him that the deed was done, and nothing now remained but to get the pair off as speedily as might be. Events had crowded upon each other,but it was now near dawn, and it was necessary for them to leave Moscow while the darkness remained. Mentchikof had furnished me with a pass that would open the gates for them, and I had previously arranged a change of horses for M. de Lambert, anticipating the necessity of his departure, whether he married mademoiselle or not. The priest hurried us out of the cathedral, and Zénaïde and I rode with them a little way to a spot where we could leave the carriage and go to our quarters with Pierrot, while Touchet was to overtake them with the woman, Neonila, and attend them on their hurried journey to France. Najine parted from my wife with tears, for, after all, she had been sorely tried, and was young and estranged from her kindred, and about to go to a strange land to begin a new life far from family and friends; yet so great and so trusting is the love of woman that it will endure all things and believe all things for him who has won it. It touched both Zénaïde and me to observe M. de Lambert’s tender appreciation of her fears and her regrets, for he had that fine gentleness that belongs to the greatest courage,—the tenderness that is a part of a noble spirit. When my wife bade Najine adieu, she turned to him with grave admonition.
“Be considerate of her, monsieur,” she said warmly, “for she is leaving her guardians, her country, her friends, for your sake alone—and there is no richer gift than a good woman’s heart.”
M. de Lambert took my wife’s hands in his, and pressed them to his lips.
“Madame,” he replied, with a thrill of strong emotion in his voice, “I love you for your own goodness and, most of all, for your love for Najine. Fear not that I shall fail in appreciation, for, madame, I value her love above all the riches of this world, as the one gift without price.”
With these words we parted from them and stood watching the carriage as it rolled away with Najine’s fair face outlined dimly in the darkness. They went off together into the night upon a perilous and uncertain journey, but as happy in their confidence as the most fortunate of married pairs; and my wife and I watched and listened, and then we looked up and saw the clouds drifting away and the stars shining. It seemed a happy omen.