CHAPTER XXXIIIRECONCILIATION
For three hours the unconscious Czarina lay as one dead; then life began slowly to return, news received with feelings of intense relief by Wilfrid and Ouvaroff, who, seated by the cheerful light of a log-fire—Prince Sumaroff, it seemed, hated the national stove—were discussing the situation.
“It’s satisfactory to know that Baranoff has gone to his long account,” remarked Wilfrid.
“It’s impossible to be sorry,” returned Ouvaroff, “though I would have saved the unworthy wretch if I could, but he sank like lead, and never rose again.”
The entrance of Prince Sumaroff put an end to this conversation.
“Gentlemen,” he said, taking a seat between them, “that the Empress has been spending a month of religious seclusion in the Convent of the Ascension, a story I have hitherto believed, is evidently untrue. You, I think, can clear up this mystery. As you shall see by-and-by, I do not ask this from idle curiosity.”
Thereupon Wilfrid frankly told the whole story of his dealings with the Czarina, beginning with Baranoff’s offer at Berlin, and ending with the events of that very night, Ouvaroff confirming him in such parts as he was able.
When Wilfrid had finished, Sumaroff rose to his feet.
“Pardon my absence for a few minutes. When I return I shall have a pleasant surprise for you.”
Wilfrid and Ouvaroff resumed their interrupted talk.
“And your suspicion of me——?” said Wilfrid.
“Was the prompting of Baranoff. Long before I met you at Berlin he had assured me that the Czarina, theGrand Duchess Elizavetta she was then, had a secret lover in some Englishman. He refrained from giving the name, however, till the night of that ball. ‘To-night,’ said he, ‘I will point out to you the favourite of the Grand Duchess.’”
“And he did it,” said Wilfrid, “by writing my name upon a card and sending it to you as we sat together. And you could believe him! Serge, my boy——”
Wilfrid stopped on seeing the Prince enter, leading by the hand a girl who seemed reluctant to come forward.
It was Nadia of the Silver Birch, as pretty as ever, but deadly pale and so timid that after one glance at Wilfrid she averted her eyes, and did not look at him again.
“Now, Nadia, tell your tale,” said Prince Sumaroff. “It is the only way to set matters right.”
So Nadia told how, bribed by Baranoff with the price of her own and her father’s freedom, she had introduced the Englishman into the bedroom of the Czarina—whom she then only knew as a great lady. Immediately upon doing so she had apprised the Czarina’s maids, who (themselves in the plot) were awaiting her summons. Then, having done the work assigned her, Nadia had fled to a room above, where the removal of a knot of wood in the flooring had enabled her to observe all that passed in the chamber below. She could thus testify to the lady’s innocence and the Englishman’s honour. Her father having died shortly afterwards, Nadia had come to St. Petersburg and entered the service of Prince Sumaroff. One day when she was on the Nevski Prospekt there rode by in state a lady, whom she recognised with fear and trembling, and who, she learned from a bystander, was the new Czarina. After a long struggle with herself she resolved to confess her misdeed and chose for the occasion the night of the masquerade. Putting her statement into writing and having incidentally learned from the Princess Sumaroff in what costume the Czarina intended to appear, Nadia had watched her opportunity to present the letter to her, saying no more about it than that its contents would exonerate her and Lord Courtenay from a false charge. The Czarina eagerly took the missive, but said she wouldreserve the reading of it till she should have returned to the Winter Palace. “‘And,’ she added, ‘since I am known to you by my costume, I may be known to others, and therefore, good Nadia, in order that I may be incognita, you and I in this quiet nook here must exchange costumes for a time.’” It was agreed that they should meet again in the same spot an hour after midnight; and so the two parted, the Empress in the plain grey domino and Nadia in the rich brocaded silk. The Czarina, however, failed to appear at the time and place appointed, a fact that puzzled Nadia very much. The Empress during a whole month having taken no notice of her and her writing though the matter was one of vital interest to her good name that very day, Nadia, moved by some indefinable fear, had revealed all to the Prince and Princess of Sumaroff.
“And you are willing to tell this story in the presence of the Czar himself?” asked Ouvaroff.
Nadia expressed her willingness, even though the telling should end in her exile to Siberia.
“I will answer for it that no hurt shall befall you,” said Ouvaroff. “The Czar will be more pleased than angry to hear your tale. But it’s as well for Baranoff that he has gone to his account.”
At a sign from Prince Sumaroff, Nadia disappeared.
“I invited the Count here this evening,” he said, “and in Nadia’s presence taxed him with his guilt. Unable to deny it and rendered craven by fear, he implored me to keep the matter a secret from the Czar. Moved by his entreaties, I said, ‘Write me out a confession and I’ll give you three days within which to get out of Russia.’ I little thought when he stepped into the boat that the hand of Death was already upon him. Heaven, you see, would not let him escape.”
“He met with a just doom,” commented Wilfrid, “dying by the very death he had appointed for another.”
For it was evident now that the four liveried ruffians at the masquerade were Baranoff’s hirelings and that it was not the Czarina’s life they sought, but Nadia’s.
“I think,” mused Sumaroff, “that we are now in aposition to effect a reconciliation between the Czar and Czarina.”
“I would give much to see it,” remarked Wilfrid. “Through me,” he added moodily, “an empress seems destined to forfeit both husband and crown.”
“You have nothing to reproach yourself with,” said Sumaroff cheerfully. “You have acted throughout as an honourable man. Let us review the points in your favour. First, there’s the affair at the Silver Birch.That’ssatisfactorily explained.”
“The kiss in the garden witnessed by the Czar,” said Wilfrid.
“Merely a reward for a great service to the State.”
“She lingered very much over it.”
“Still the Czar must overlook it. Doubtless,” he added, with a twinkle in his eye, “he, too, has lingered considerably over the kisses he has bestowed upon the fair Pauline.”
“The four weeks of love-making at Castle Runö?”
“To be pardoned, when the circumstances are considered.Shehad forgotten her identity;youbelieved her to be an unwedded woman. The Baroness can testify to the truth of this—is testifying, perhaps, at this very moment.”
“All very good,” returned Wilfrid. “But there’s another difficulty—the greatest. The Czarina herself is opposed to a reconciliation. In her present state of mind, Alexander is an object of dread to her.”
“He’ll soon cease to be so,” replied Sumaroff with a mysterious smile. “But the hour is late; let us to bed. If the plan I have in view succeeds, by this time to-morrow all will be in harmony again.”
And so ended the most memorable day in Wilfrid’s career, a day in which he had won and lost the love of a wedded empress! It was a pleasure to think, as Prince Sumaroff had remarked, that through it all his honour had remained stainless.
Late in the forenoon of the following day Wilfrid was summoned to the presence of the Czarina. At first he demurred. Better, he thought, for the interests and happiness of both that they should never meet again.
“You had better see her,” said Prince Sumaroff, appreciating Wilfrid’s hesitation. “The sequel will, I trust, prove the wisdom of this advice.”
So persuaded, Wilfrid was conducted to a small cabinet where, the Prince retiring, he found himself alone with the Czarina.
She was seated, pale and stately, in an antique high-backed chair, her eyes grave and sorrowful. Her manner was in singular contrast with that of the previous evening. She was no longer the “Princess Marie” of his love-dream; she seemed to have waked up to the consciousness that she was an empress, between whom and Wilfrid was an impassable gulf. He had been hoping that she might forget her love for him, and yet, now that his wish was realised, it sent a pang to his heart.
“Be seated, Lord Courtenay.”
Grimly contrasting this formal title with the caressingly spoken “Wilfrid” of the previous evening, he sat down and waited for her to proceed.
She set her beautiful eyes upon him and said in a tone approaching almost to awe:—
“Do you know who it was that came upon us last night in the Sumaroff Gardens?”
Last night!The event was distant by four weeks, yet she spoke of it as occurring but a few hours previously. For a moment Wilfrid stared blankly at her. Then the truth flashed upon him, and he realised the cause of her altered manner.
There had happened to her mind one of those phenomena which, by no means rare, are yet extremely puzzling to students of psychology.
The shock of her second immersion in the Neva had nullified the effects of the first, and had caused the return of her memory, with this defect, however, that the intervening period was a complete blank. She had no recollection whatever of the love episodes at Runö.
Wilfrid’s silence, due to his surprise, drew from the Empress a reiteration of her question.
“Do you know who he was?”
“I shall be pleased to learn his name from you.”
“He was my husband—the Czar, Alexander Paulovitch!”
She watched him keenly as if to mark the effect of her words. Wilfrid, therefore, endeavoured to simulate amazement.
“You are the Czarina Elizavetta?” he said in a tone of feigned incredulity.
“I am,” she answered proudly. “And you have dared to address words of love to me, words heard by—byhim!”
“He will surely pardon on learning that I was ignorant of your name and rank?”
“You he may pardon; will he forgive me—me, who listened to you? It was but for a minute, I know. For a minute only I was tempted to forget my duty to him, when I remembered how he was neglecting me for the smiles of Pauline de Vaucluse. One brief minute, yet I fear it will be a fatal one for me!”
It was with a keen sense of anguish that Wilfrid marked her mournfulness.
“Why,” she murmured, “ah! why did I withhold my name on first meeting you at the Silver Birch? It would have prevented many complications. But, believing that I should never see you again, I deemed it best to keep my identity a secret. And when I met you a second time, on that night in the Michaelovski Palace and would have told you my name, you spoke so hardly, so contemptuously of Alexander that somehow I shrank, foolishly shrank, from telling you that I was his wife.”
“Your Majesty, had I known that, I should have refrained from all comment, still less would I have dared to exact a kiss from——”
At this point he was interrupted by the Empress, eager to learn the result of the interview between Alexander and Wilfrid.
“The Czar spoke to you,” she said breathlessly. “What did he say or do?”
“He did precisely what I should have done if I possessed a wife and saw a stranger kiss her. He challenged me to a duel.”
The Czarina’s face showed signs of the liveliest disquietude;in her agitation she half rose from her seat.
“Oh, but you did not fight! You have not accepted!”
“Your Majesty, do not distress yourself. The duel has not come off—never will. Now, may I make so bold as to ask your Majesty what strange event befell you after leaving me. How came you to be in the Neva?”
The Czarina trembled, partly with fear, partly with indignation.
“The recollection turns me cold. I, the Czarina, to be handled so! They could not have known who I was. They could not have meant to kill their Empress. I was seized by four men; one pressed his palm upon my mouth—the others tied my hands and feet. It was the work of a few moments; then I was lifted up and flung into the river. I have a faint recollection of rising to the surface, of battling for life; but everything at this point fades away into oblivion. It seems like a dreadful dream.” She shuddered and added, “I am told by Prince Sumaroff that my life is due to you.”
“I—I had a hand in saving you,” said Wilfrid, referring to the second immersion, while she, of course, was thinking of the first—to her the only one. “I saw you floating on the water and brought you ashore.”
“Then this will be the second time you have saved my life,” she said with a sort of resentment in her tone. “It makes it harder for me to say what Imustsay. Lord Courtenay, you must leave Russia at once. You are anxious to serve me, I know. It is a cold saying, but the best service you can do me is to put a thousand miles between us. Your continuance in St. Petersburg exposes me to suspicion. You have been the means, though innocently, of setting the Czar against me.”
Around her throat she still wore the gold chain with the locket attached, containing Wilfrid’s miniature. She hesitated for a moment and then detached the locket.
“The original cause of all the misunderstanding,” she murmured softly. “But for this Alexander, prompted by Baranoff, would never have begun to suspect me.”
She held forth the locket though her eyes told Wilfrid that she parted from it with sorrow.
He rose, took the locket and remained standing, perceiving that her interview with him was all but over. That pledge of his ill-starred love, the gold ring that he had given her on the previous day, was not now on her finger, and he wondered what had become of it.
“You will leave Russia without delay?”
“Your Majesty, I will.”
He had barely given this promise when he suddenly caught sight of a startling apparition behind the Empress’s chair. Alexander himself!—no longer the furious being of the previous night, but mild and gracious of aspect: nay, with a half-smile upon his lips.
Secreted near he had heard every word freely and spontaneously uttered by the speakers unaware of his presence, and thus had received convincing proof that Wilfrid’s relations with the Czarina had been, from beginning to end, of an honourable character.
The Czarina, apprised of strange happenings by Wilfrid’s stare, turned to ascertain the cause and beheld—her husband!
Startled, she shrank back, hesitating, shivering, terrified, as she recalled the kiss and the embrace in the garden; then, re-assured by his tender and forgiving look, she gasped—
“Sasha!”
“Marie,” he whispered bending over her, “I have come to take you back to my heart!”
Trembling with wild joy she rose to her feet and fell within the arms that opened eagerly to receive her.
“Plainly I’m not wanted here,” thought Wilfrid, and he vanished from the apartment.
He had not gone far before he met Prince and Princess Sumaroff, to whom he gave an account of his interview and its dramatic termination.
They received his tidings with smiles of satisfaction.
“So my innocent little artifice has succeeded,” said the Prince. “Early this morning I went to Runö and saw Alexander. The lapse of a few hours had made him more amenable to reason. The Baroness had already half-persuaded him of the Czarina’s innocence. I brought him here and he listened to Nadia’s storyand read Baranoff’s confession. That convinced him. ‘If you require further proof,’ said I, ‘why not secrete yourself and watch Lord Courtenay as he takes his farewell of the Empress? You will be able to judge by their language whether their relations have been guilty or not.’ For I knew, Lord Courtenay, that you would say nothing to the Czarina but what would become an honourable man. You have vindicated my opinion of you, with the happiest results.
“All’s well that ends well,” remarked Wilfrid philosophically.
“But the end has notquitecome,” said Princess Sumaroff with a peculiar smile. “You must put the finishing touch to this reconciliation by making it impossible for Alexander’s thoughts ever to wander again towards the Baroness Runö.”
“And how can I do that?”
The Princess laughed sweetly.
“By making her Countess Courtenay, of course!”
Wilfrid started. Such an idea had never before occurred to him. How could it, with his mind full of Marie? But now that love had become part of his nature, who more capable of satisfying that sentiment than Pauline, in whom he had always taken an interest bordering on affection? Her recent course of deception, censurable as it was, had done little to diminish his regard for her, seeing that she had not sought her own aggrandisement, but the supposed welfare of France.
Princess Sumaroff drew forth a gold ring, set with amethysts, and gave it to Wilfrid.
“Yours. I took it last night from the Czarina’s finger while she slept. She might have been asking awkward questions about it, and it will be better for her to remain in ignorance. Now, why not bestow this ring upon the Baroness? She loves you,—not that she has ever said so—at least to me. I judge by the warmth with which she speaks of your bravery, your honour, your good looks, your accomplishments, your heaven-knows what. It is my firm belief that you are the cause of her refusing an empress’s crown when itwas within her grasp. Don’t let her make the sacrifice in vain. The Baroness is walking in the gardens at this moment, miserable because she thinks she has lost your good opinion. Seek her, and on your return let us have the pleasure of greeting her as the future Countess Courtenay.”
Wilfrid, his heart beating with pleasurable sensations, walked out into those gardens which four weeks before had been the scene of so much mystery and romance.
He found Pauline alone, walking on the terrace that overlooked the river. Her face, sad and pensive, brightened at his approach; and still more when she learned the result of his final interview with the Czarina.
“That is good,” she murmured.
Side by side the two slowly paced the terrace in silence.
Wilfrid was thinking of the words spoken by Princess Sumaroff, Pauline of Wilfrid’s coming departure. He had told her of his intention to leave Russia within a few days; she received the news with a strange sinking of heart. How desolate her future if deprived of his presence! Yet what had she done to deserve his companionship? Nothing! but much to forfeit it; and yet, if the true working of her mind could be known to him, he would see that she was notquiteso bad as he perhaps thought her.
“And you have no word of reproach for me?” she said gently.
“It was wrong of you, but I am willing to forgive you on one condition.”
She looked at him, uneasy in mind as to what his next words would be.
“The condition is that you consent to be Countess Courtenay.”
Greatly daring, he put his left arm around her, and, taking her left hand within his right, drew her towards him.
He had need to hold her: but for his strong grasp she would have fallen to the ground in sheer amazement at words so unexpected.
Recovering somewhat, she strove to put aside hisarms, saying many times over, what she sincerely believed, that she was not worthy of him.
“Do youreallylove me?” she said at last, raising to him eyes in which tears were glittering.
“You are the dearest woman in the world to me—now,” he replied, encircling her finger with a ring that had once adorned the hand of an empress. “It would not be true to say that you are my first love, but then, perhaps,” he added, thinking of Alexander, “neither am I yours.”
But Pauline repudiated this with warmth.
“I have never loved any one but you.”
And with this answer Wilfrid was content.
THE END.
THESHADOW OF THE CZAR
By JOHN R. CARLING
Illustrated. 12mo. $1.50.Fifth Edition
“An engrossing romance of the sturdy, wholesome sort, in which the action is never allowed to drag,” (St. Louis Globe-Democrat) best describes this popular novel. “The Shadow of the Czar” is a stirring story of the romantic attachment of a dashing English officer for Princess Barbara, of the old Polish Principality of Czernova, and the conspiracy of the Duke of Bora, aided by Russia, to dispossess the Princess of her throne.
It is not an historical novel—the author makes his own events after the manner of Anthony Hope, and theBoston Heraldis of the opinion that it “excels in interest Anthony Hope’s best efforts.” “Rarely do we find a story in which more happens, or in which the incidents present themselves with more suddenness and with greater surprise,” says theNew York Sun.
“Mr. Carling has a surprising faculty of making it appear that things ought to have happened as he says they did, and as long as the book is being read he even succeeds in making it appear that they did happen so,” says theSt. Louis Star.
“The Shadow of the Czar” fairly captivated two countries. In England theNewcastle Daily Journalsays it “transcends in interest ‘The Prisoner of Zenda.’”
LITTLE, BROWN, & CO., PublishersBOSTON, MASS.
A New Romance by the Author of“The Shadow of the Czar”
THE VIKING’S SKULL
THE VIKING’S SKULL
By JOHN R. CARLING
Illustrated by Cyrus Cuneo. 350 pages. 12mo. $1.50
A tale full of stirring surprises.—Philadelphia North American.
A capital tale of mystery and detection of crime and retribution. The ingenuity with which its intricacies are threaded is really wonderful.—New York Times Saturday Review of Books.
It is a remarkably lively story, with a novel mystery, wrought out of old Norse history, but the scene is modern England for the most part, and all the characters belong to to-day.—Chicago Record-Herald.
The reader who once becomes entangled in its meshes will sit up until the small hours to finish it. It is a romance pure and simple from the outset, and refreshing to a degree.—Brooklyn Eagle.
An engrossing tale of love, adventure, and intrigue, the reading of which makes hours fly on the wings of minutes. An ingenious, dramatic, interest-compelling romance.—Boston Herald.
LITTLE, BROWN, &. CO., Publishers, BOSTONAt all Booksellers’
A Surprising and Engrossing Tale
THE WEIRD PICTURE
THE WEIRD PICTURE
ByJOHN R. CARLING
Author of “By Neva’s Waters,” etc.
Illustrated. 12mo. Cloth, $1.50
Mr. Carling keeps us guessing as he deepens our interest, for the story is a succession of startling surprises.—Detroit Free Press.
The plot is absorbing and well concealed; the reader goes breathlessly from page to page, eagerly wondering what the denouement will be.... The story rotates around Daphne Leslie, a charming young woman, and is replete with thrilling situations.—Public Opinion.
A story of tragedy and love, told in such a manner that the interest of the reader is held from beginning to end, and yet it does not partake of the undue excitement common to novels of this class.—Minneapolis Times.
Leads the reader through a maze of mystery and adventure which holds his imagination in a close grip from the very beginning.—Brooklyn Eagle.
Of pronounced originality and written in a terse, clear-cut style. Having yielded in the least degree to the spell of the story, one is compelled to follow its development to the very end.—Chicago Daily News.
LITTLE, BROWN, & CO., Publishers254 Washington Street, Boston
Grips and Holds the Reader
A LOST LEADER
A LOST LEADER
ByE. PHILLIPS OPPENHEIM
Author of “The Malefactor,” etc.
Fully Illustrated. 12mo. Cloth, $1.50
For his latest hero, Mr. Oppenheim has taken a modern leader who has elected to stand aloof from the conflict of the political world, but he has created a strong, distinct personality, and not merely exploited one already familiar. “A Lost Leader” is as fascinating a story of modern life as novelist has yet conceived, and one that arrests the mind by its fine strenuousness of purpose.
An admirably woven story. The reader will follow its every phase with absorbed interest.—London Morning Advertiser.
The characters are all capitally drawn, and the story is developed with all the skill and power of a born dramatist.—The Northern Whig.
Full of originality and interest from first to last.—London Daily Graphic.
A highly attractive story, with an ingenious plot and daringly up-to-date.—Newcastle Daily Chronicle.
His stories thrill with human interest.—Milwaukee Sentinel.
LITTLE, BROWN, & CO., Publishers254 Washington Street, Boston