I rodestraight to the monastery at Troitsa, hoping to find opportunity for serving the Tsar Peter with distinction. This, it seemed to me, might prove the hour of his destiny, unless indeed terror should have rendered him unfit to assert himself. But I found matters went strongly for Peter and against Sophia, for there flowed into Troitsa a constant stream of soldiers, some from Preobrajensky, others Streltsi deserters, some serf soldiers sent in hurriedly by the Boyars who were on Peter’s side, and even the newly-enrolled men of Gordon’s and Lefort’s regiments, upon whom the Regent had depended the most. There would be no fighting, and no opportunity for distinction, for the weight all tilted naturally to one side.
As for Tsar Peter, after hiding himself for a day or two in the forests, the prey of helpless terror, he found heart of grace and came to Troitsa, from which safe retreat he dictated terms to his sister the Regent, which terms were noterms, indeed, since she herself was now compelled to take the veil, while he possessed himself of the throne, whence from this time he reigned as undisputed Tsar, though Ivan, for a while, made a show of sitting conjointly with his brother upon the highest seat.
Now that Peter reigned I had great hopes to turn the tables upon Mazeppa. This time surely the luck was mine! for here was I in Moscow, driven hither, moreover, by Mazeppa himself, just in the nick of time! Destiny had dealt the good cards into my hands for once, and the old fox, Mazeppa, should be smoked out of his hole!
Meanwhile I went, not without anxiety, to see my Vera. Mazeppa’s words, even though I did not believe them, had been somewhat disquieting. Had the Tsar stolen her from me? Not her heart, indeed—I felt sure that that was my own—but her hand. If he should have announced his intention to choose her for his bride, what could she have done, with none to help her escape the undesired splendour of this betrothal?
I found the house of Boyar Kurbatof, like many another mansion in Moscow during these days, in trouble and disorder—the Boyar himself under arrest, Vera almost beside herself withhelpless misery, knowing not what she should do or where she should go.
If I had had any doubt of her good faith towards me, her reception of me when I arrived unexpectedly would have dissipated such doubt. She flew to meet me with a scream of delight and lay for a moment locked in my arms, weeping tears of joy and relief.
‘Are you mine, Vera, are you mine?’ I murmured. ‘Tell me quickly!’
‘Oh, whose should I be?’ she whispered back. ‘Have I ever been other than yours, dear Chelminsky?’
‘Not the Tsar’s?’ I said. ‘It was told me that he would have none but you, and I feared—I know not what; for this Peter is not like that Ivan!’
‘I stood well with his Highness,’ Vera laughed, ‘for three months after you had gone. Then he wearied of me, and Olga Kostromsky was favourite. Then Avdotia Lapouchine appeared, and he is betrothed to her: have you not heard?’
The news relieved me greatly, though I did not tell Vera how much, lest she should think me lacking in the virtue of trustfulness.
‘And what of Mazeppa?’ I asked.
Then Vera told me that though Mazeppa, upon receiving his nomination as Hetman, hadpresumed to visit once again the home he had outraged, in order to resume his suit for Vera’s hand, the old Boyar her father had caused his servants to expel him from the house without deigning to speak to him or give him any answer to his insolent advances.
Mazeppa’s words to me had conveyed a very different meaning.
As for the Boyar’s arrest, her father had been so indignant, said Vera, over the conduct of Tsar Peter, who had seemed to choose Vera for his bride and had afterwards passed her over for another, that he had violently sided with the Regent so soon as differences arose, lending her money and serf-levies from his estates, which conduct brought about his arrest by Peter’s orders, as soon as the young Tsar heard of it.
Having thus made sure of my Vera, I hastened again to Troitsa in order to push my interest with Tsar Peter; but his Highness was so busy that I could not obtain his ear.
‘Wait,’ he said, ‘good Chelminsky; let us first see what I am; my sister’s sins still hang about my neck!’
Therefore I waited a week, and a second week, the Tsar being now in Moscow, and at the end of that time I obtained from Peter the saying that there might soon be reason for making a changein the office of Hetman, and that I should have the next nomination!
This was something, though not much.
Then suddenly, as I walked one day within the Kremlin walls, I met Mazeppa.
He greeted me friendly, as though there had never been a difference between us, thanking heaven that he had been able at our last meeting to allow me to escape from Batourin:
‘My captains were all dead against mercy,’ said he. ‘I had no easy matter, believe me, to bring them to an agreement concerning thee. Why didst thou rebel against me, Chelminsky? Canst thou not be happy unless thy head stands higher than my own?’
‘I shall conspire and rebel again, never fear!’ I laughed. ‘You have not yet quite done with me, Mazeppa! As for thy mercy, I think it was a lie: thou wouldst have had me shot or captured. Rather it was thy captains that stayed thy hand!’
‘Believe as you will,’ he replied angrily; ‘what is it to me? Only remember, the Ukraine is not safe for thee in future. Because of thy own foolishness there is no longer room in our country for Mazeppa and for Chelminsky also.’
‘Is Mazeppa among the prophets?’ I laughed. ‘Neither to me is it given to know the future, myfriend, nor to thee. I may yet stand very high among the Cossacks!’
‘Think’st thou so? Hast thou spoken to his Highness as to this foolish ambition of thine? No? Then understand that I have been before thee in this matter, and that thou shalt henceforth whine and beg to him in vain, for nothing will come of thy entreaties!’
And indeed, when I at last obtained the Tsar’s ear, I found that Mazeppa had been before me, and that in his own mysterious fashion he had not only pleased the Tsar by his manner and bearing (he whom the Tsar had disliked up to now!), but also inspired confidence by his political arguments.
So that when I spoke to the Tsar on the subject of the Hetmanate, he put me somewhat brusquely aside, saying that the present Hetman’s attitude was correct and pleasing, and that it would be unnecessary to make any change.
‘But what of thy promises, Tsar?’ I said bitterly. ‘Instead of fulfilling them to my advantage, thou has exalted my enemy over my head!’
‘Not I, Chelminsky; thou art suffering, my man, for the deeds of my sister and Galitsin, which should be a glory to thee, seeing that I have suffered and am suffering the same. This Mazeppa has shown me, moreover, that he willmake as good a Hetman as thou. His speech is the very incarnate genius of the Cossack race; learn from him awhile, my friend, and in time thou shalt take his place!’
I was bitterly disappointed by the Tsar’s conduct, and I doubt not my looks showed it, for he laughed and clapped me upon the shoulder. ‘Look not so mournful, man!’ he said. ‘On the whole I have done well by thee, for have I not left thee that wench of thine, Vera?’ The Tsar burst into a roar of laughter, in the midst of which I bowed myself out of his presence, hurt and indignant.
When I told Vera of my disappointment and of the Tsar’s boast that he had left her to me as an act of friendliness, she flushed and told me that he had left her, indeed, to me, but out of no friendliness. ‘Ask him what befell when he grew more familiar than was pleasing to me?’ she said. And though I did not ask his Highness, I know now that Vera actually boxed the Tsar’s ears on one occasion, thereby immensely raising his respect for her as well as his admiration, though not his affection, which had already begun to wane in favour of others. The Tsar Peter’s heart was ever of the butterfly nature, flitting from flower to flower and remaining longest there where most honey is obtainable.
To which respect and admiration of the Tsar Vera added much when presently she went with me to claim forgiveness for her father.
The Tsar grew angry when Vera proffered her request, but when he made a show of refusing it Vera grew angry also.
‘A worthy Tsar, thou!’ she exclaimed, ‘that beginnest thy reign by taking vengeance upon old men, and by breaking promises to those who have well served thee!’
‘What mean you by that, minx?’ exclaimed Peter angrily. ‘May I not punish those who have offended me? And as for promises, what promise have I made that I will not one day redeem?’
‘My father was loyal to the Regent while her Highness claimed the obedience of the Boyars. Is there offence in that? Ifthouhadst been reigning Tsar instead of a Tsar in leading-strings, and he had lent thee treasure and men, would that have been a crime? Up to the moment of thy proclamation the Boyars were her Highness’s men, not thine. To-day my father would serve thee, even as he served the Regent.’
‘Well, we shall see; it may be that I shall test his loyalty through his purse,’ said Peter, laughing. As to the broken promise—is this fellow Chelminsky thy husband, that thou shouldst speak thus boldly for him?’
‘As forever he has been husband of my heart, let woo who would!’ said Vera.
The Tsar flushed and looked for a moment as though he would reply passionately; but though his face worked and his head jerked round in the manner I have since learned to know as the forerunner of that cruel mood into which he too frequently relapses now in middle age, he recovered himself and laughed aloud.
‘By the Majesty of Saint Cyril, wench,’ he said, ‘thou art a bold one: darest thou marry such a minx, Chelminsky?’
‘I must marry her or die, Tsar,’ I said, ‘wherefore I dare less to marry.’
Vera laughed and pressed my arm. ‘Make him Hetman, Tsar,’ she said: ‘he will serve thee better than the fox thou hast set up.’
But in this matter the young Tsar was immovable.
‘Good Lord, girl,’ he said, ‘must all things go as thou wouldst have them? He shall be Hetman of all the Cossacks now in Moscow—does that satisfy thee?—with reversion at Batourin when Mazeppa shall have proved himself the fox you think him!’
And with this appointment, which was indeed an excellent one, I was obliged to remain content, hoping ever that Mazeppa must one day showhimself for what I knew him to be. Yet though the Tsar received from far and near almost daily complaints of Mazeppa’s deceitfulness—how he misruled his Cossacks, coquetted with Pole, Swede and Tartar, and was faithless to every friend he possessed—yet Peter, in this one instance, mistook his man from first to last; believing his word, trusting him in face of overwhelming evidence, and standing his friend and ally through every attempt, whether political or private, to shake his faith in the Hetman. The Tsar was usually a better judge of character than he showed himself in Mazeppa’s case!
A fox among foxes, and certainly the most plausible liar the world has ever seen, was this fox Mazeppa, with whose cunning my poor feeble wits had lately essayed to cope. And will it be believed that the great and wise Tsar himself was perhaps the only human being who was blind to the real character of the man? Was he indeed blind? Rather men will say that if Mazeppa was a fox, Peter was no less; and that he saw his advantage in being served by such a Hetman!
Nevertheless there came a day, after many years, when at length the scales fell from Peter’s eyes. For Mazeppa himself—at the first great opportunity in his life when he must choosedefinitely a side—proved that he was but a dabbler in politics, and that he no more understood the greatness of his master than the rest of the world had then realised it.
That day was one of those stirring ones which preceded the battle of Pultowa.
Bythis time Vera and I were both middle-aged, and as happy a married pair as were to be found in all Russia. The old Boyar Kurbatof was dead long since, and Vera was a rich woman, possessor of three thousand souls, or serfs, and the mother of five children. My place in the realm and in the esteem of the Tsar was high, for I commanded almost more Cossacks in Moscow than Mazeppa could assemble under arms at Batourin.
As for the Tsar Peter, none assuredly would have recognised him at this time for the stripling of Preobrajensky—he who had once been wont to take life no more seriously than as a long holiday, to be spent in playing with pleasure armies and toy fleets, in the drinking of much beer and honey-mead, and in rioting with stable youths, and perhaps also with the other sex of that class.
For see him now the great Autocrat, the genius of a powerful nation, whose incarnatespirit he is; the rival of Charles of Sweden, with whom he will throw at Pultowa for an empire. Great he is to-day, and yet how small! for the taste for debauchery and drunkenness, begun in boyhood, has survived; and when the Tsar is not busy fashioning his empire within and without, upsetting the old Russia and building up the new, showing his greatness here, there, and everywhere, he is buffooning, drinking, revealing all that is small and grotesque in his marvellous character, without shame and without reserve, as though he neither knew nor cared to know what is deemed seemly and expedient in civilised societies.
Yet, though Peter rarely showed the slightest respect for women, his attitude towards Vera was ever most dignified and respectful. He had soon wearied of Avdotia Lapouchine, the Tsaritsa, and had condemned her to take the veil; but though from that time onwards his relations with women had altogether lacked chivalry, an exception was always made in Vera’s favour. As for Mazeppa, I saw him but rarely. And so the years rolled on, until the great day of Pultowa.
Charles of Sweden had marched within a few days’ journey of Moscow, which he might have sacked had he thrown himself immediately against the city; but when about to do so he received aletter from Mazeppa which caused him to sweep round through Batourin in the Ukraine, Mazeppa’s capital, in order to pick up a contingent of fifty thousand lances offered by the Hetman for use against his most faithful and indulgent master, the Tsar.
For Mazeppa had made the fatal mistake of believing that the sun of the Swede was in the ascendant, whereas the light now reddening in the sky was the dawn of Russia’s great day: the day of her New Beginning.
Now Peter, ignorant of Mazeppa’s treachery, had meanwhile sent orders that the Hetman and his fifty thousand men should hold themselves in readiness to join the Russian army at a moment’s notice. Mazeppa replied by letter that he was ill of the gout and unable to move. A second missive on the following day, written by a secretary, explained that the Hetman was dying, and had already received the last offices of the Church. When he had despatched this last letter, Mazeppa left Batourin with as many of his lances as he could persuade that treachery such as his would prove the best policy—about two thousand men. Two thousand dupes out of the promised fifty thousand!
‘Here is thy chance, Chelminsky,’ said Peter the Tsar. ‘Thou hast waited long. Mazeppa isdead or dying; his lances want a leader: Menshikof shall ride with thy Cossacks, and thou shalt be Hetman of the Ukraine.’
But I was devoted by this time to my own Cossacks, and preferred to remain by the Tsar’s side.
‘Let me wait and see these Ukraine Cossacks—what Mazeppa has made of them,’ said I. ‘Better my own, who are used to me, than his, Tsar, when it comes to fighting! In any case, I will have only thee for master, whether there or here!’
But when Peter with his army reached Batourin, he found that the old fox had left his hole.
The rage of the Tsar when he learned that Mazeppa had proved a traitor was dreadful to witness. He fell writhing in a fit, his head and limbs jerking, his face contorted. When he recovered, he bade Menshikof and his troops throw themselves upon city and castle, burning the place with all it contained; then, having caused an effigy of Mazeppa to be fashioned, he first hanged it in public and afterwards had it dragged through the filth of the streets. Every year since that day Mazeppa’s name is cursed throughout Russia upon the Day of Curses, which is the first Sunday of the long Fast.
But the delay caused by Mazeppa’s adhesion cost the Swedish forces dear, for it compelled them to winter in Russia, and by means of sundry small successes the armies of Peter began to render their position dangerous.
Then Mazeppa actually wrote to the Tsar proposing to deliver both Charles and his armies into his hands; but Peter would have none of him and his promises, fearing more treachery. Instead, the Tsar replied to Mazeppa with shameful words, saying that he would presently have both Charles and Mazeppa also.
And in the summer came the great day, when Charles and his dwindled and hungry army, and with him Mazeppa and his Cossacks—poor deluded men—attacked the Tsar at Pultowa.
All the world knows of that great battle; how the star of Charles fell for ever and that of Peter rose, never to set. How Charles fled with a few men and with Mazeppa, who preserved his own skin intact and tried to spirit away with him, moreover, two barrels of gold pieces which he had taken care to secure.
Yet it must not be said that Mazeppa fought ill on that day. Never did men fight more desperately than our good Cossack fools who had followed the old fox into ruin. Once the Tsar, riding near me at the moment, bade me watchthe old Hetman charge with his fellows. By the saints, the sight did one good, even though they were against us!
‘Curse him!’ cried Peter, ‘his lances kill three to every one of them that falls. Take a thousand of our Cossacks, Chelminsky, and chase the rascals into the Vorskla! Bring me Mazeppa alive, and by all the devils I will make thee head over every Cossack that breathes!’
That was a notable fight. At the first charge, the numbers being in our favour, not a man fell on either side, for neither were our fellows willing to slay their brethren, nor they us; but ours, as they rode through the others’ ranks, hurled reproaches and shameful names at them and at Mazeppa for their treachery, so that when we turned to charge back again Mazeppa’s men were furious and fought like devils, and many scores of saddles were emptied on both sides.
As for me, I had a pass or two with Mazeppa in the crowd, but neither of us struck his best.
‘Ride out of the crush, Mazeppa, and I will follow,’ I said. ‘I must seem to pursue thee, but for God’s sake let me not bring thee alive into the Tsar’s hands, as he would have me do, for thou shalt be torn limb from limb.’
‘Kill me, then, if thou must, Chelminsky, for all is lost!’ he said. ‘Thou hast won in the end,but we have run a good race through life, thou and I!’
‘Ride like the devil, man!’ I said. ‘I will not either kill thee or take thee, but I must seem to strike at thee.’
‘Chelminsky,’ cried Mazeppa, as his horse galloped a few paces ahead of my own, ‘I swear I have been a better friend to thee than to any living soul on this earth. Three times I might have——’
But I interrupted him. ‘Ride, you fool,’ I said; ‘the Tsar watches!’
And at this moment, my horse stumbling over a fallen soldier, Mazeppa’s took a good lead; and though I made a show of following out of sight, I returned—to Peter’s anger and disappointment—without my quarry.
Butone more scene, and I have finished.
The Tsar’s anger against Mazeppa did not end with the victory of Pultowa. Mazeppa had escaped into the territory of the Sultan, and the Tsar actually sent a mission into Turkey offering an immense sum for the surrender of his person, alive.
Now in this matter, as in my pursuit of Mazeppa on the battle-field, I played the Tsar false; for, in spite of all I had suffered from the old fox during the long years of our rivalry, I could not see him brought living into the hands of this most ruthless, most savage, most relentless of enemies, Piotr Alexeyevitch.
Therefore, breathing hatred and vengeance against my old rival, I besought the Tsar to allow me to be of the mission, and easily obtained his consent.
With me went a certain young Kotchubey, a deadly enemy of Mazeppa, and another, Kozlof, who loved him no better.
We found Mazeppa in the old ruined mansionof a Pasha, lent to him by the Sultan, who indignantly refused to listen to the offer of the Tsar. Then we of the Tsar’s embassy took counsel together. ‘If the Sultan will not let us have the rascal, we must persuade Mazeppa,’ said Kozlof, ‘that the Tsar will restore to him his favour and the office of Hetman in return for certain secrets concerning the Swedish King which it is necessary that the Tsar should know.’
I made a show of applauding this suggestion.
‘But who shall persuade him?’ I laughed. ‘I think he will suspect thee, Kozlof, and certainly Kotchubey. He and I have been life-long enemies, true, but I complimented him on his fighting at Pultowa, while smiting at him, and it may be that he will believe in my good will.’
Thus I was allowed to undertake the mission.
I found Mazeppa old and broken down. He shed tears when he found it was I that had come.
‘Thou wert like God to me on the battle-field, Chelminsky,’ he said. ‘This mission can be to no evil end, since thou art of it.’
‘Mazeppa,’ I said, ‘God knows why I befriend thee, unless it be that I remember too well the old days, before thy turning against me. It may be that my Vera has softened my heart——’
At her name Mazeppa wept and crossed himself.
‘That is a saint!’ he said. ‘Lord forgive me, I would have done her ill! Thou hadst the best of me there, Chelminsky, and so much the happier am I to-day! Dost know that, if it had been any but thou, I should have killed thee three times?’ he added. ‘Therefore think not too ill of me.’
‘And why, then, was I spared,’ said I, with a laugh, ‘since thou hast never lacked of thy will for fastidiousness?’
‘Well,’ he said, ‘I will tell thee: I have called thee fool and browbeaten thee, ay, and all but ruined and murdered thee. Nay, I have from time to time hated thee with all my soul; yet, throughout I have after a fashion liked thee too well to destroy thee, and in the end I have always remembered that we two fought those three at Ivan Casimir’s Court, and how thou didst ride after me when they stripped and bound me, curse them!’
‘Then here I repay you with a last service,’ I said. ‘Be not deceived by my companions, Mazeppa; our mission is to bring you alive to the Tsar. They will persuade you, as I am now supposed to be persuading you, that Peter will restore to you your office, if you will reveal certain secrets as to the King of Sweden. Do not be persuaded.’
‘Am I a fool, Chelminsky?’ he laughed. ‘Thou hast called me fox many times; be sure I have not changed my skin.’
Then, but a day later, Mazeppa lay dead within the Pasha’s mansion, and Kozlof threw a phial into the stove in my presence.
‘The old devil would not believe my tale,’ he said, ‘but threatened to spit me with his sword: that was last night. Some of the stuff from this phial made a rare flavour to his sauce this morning! If the Tsar has failed in his vengeance Kotchubey has not, neither have I.’
‘What have you done, Kozlof?’ said I, aghast. ‘Have you murdered him in cold blood?’
‘Call it what you like!’ he laughed. ‘He betrayed Kotchubey’s sister and executed her parents, and my father was beheaded by his orders.’
But the people say that Mazeppa died of a broken heart.
His body was brought to Galatz on the Danube, where he was buried—like a true Cossack—within earshot of the rush of a great river. His bones might not lie beside the Dnieper, beloved of Cossacks, because of his treachery towards his Russian master, who became henceforward absolute lord of all the Cossacks’ territory.
‘What shall I say of Mazeppa,’ I asked my Vera, ‘that shall end my record both kindly and yet consistently?’ For it was Vera who bade me write the tale of our friendship and rivalry, our hatred and our reconciliation.
‘I would have you write,’ she laughed, ‘that Mazeppa was very plausible, yet very transparent; hated by most men, adored by many women; that he was brave and also cowardly; impassioned and fascinating, yet mean and repulsive; he was half man and half devil. The Tsar Peter is also both devil and man, but he is great. Mazeppa was only great while men did not discern how small he was. Say,’ Vera ended, ‘as you are fond of saying, that “he was a fox.”’
THE END
Spottiswoode & Co. Ltd., Printers, New-street Square, London