XXII: A DRUNKEN ORGY
WHEN I came to myself again I was in a long, low room, lighted by smoking torches, and filled with the fumes of liquor and crowded with soldiers. I was bound with heavy cords to a chair that was standing on a table at the end of the room, and my bonds cut cruelly into my arms and about my knees and ankles. It was evident that I had been long unconscious, for they had ceased to heed me, and were intent upon their liquor and their dice. I did not stir; indeed, I had but little space in which to move even a finger, but I kept quite still, that I might watch them and learn something of my situation. The room was evidently in one of the huts of the Streltsi, in the Zemlianui-gorod, and its walls were of logs stuffed with tow, and the rafters overhead were black with greasy smoke, while the air reeked with a strong mixture of garlic, beer, raw brandy, and oil of cinnamon—a luxury fetched from the cellars of the boyars.
Below me the dark, savage faces scowled over the dice and the liquor—their hair and beards so long and ragged that it must have been many weeks since they had visited the hair-market, a place where the Muscovites went to be trimmed, and where the barbers, cutting the hair, flung it on the ground and let it lie, until the earth was covered with a soft, uncleanlymat; as curious as any sight in Moscow. But these rioters, who had returned to their barracks with their spoils and their prisoners, heeded nothing but their drink and their game, and they were already deep in their cups, drunkenness being a besetting sin with both the men and women, especially of the lower classes. They were bloody, too, and unwashed, wild as savages, some naked to the waist, and now and then a tipsy brute shouted out a ribald song, and again two clenched in a fight over their dice, and fell on the floor and rolled there, and I saw a knife flash and heard a cry—like a wild beast in pain—and only one rose up to play again, yet the others paid no heed, but let the murderer throw his dice with red hands. Two others dropped from their seats and fell into a drunken sleep upon the floor, and were kicked aside, slept on, and snored.
It was a filthy scene, and while I looked at them I thought of the Princess Daria, and groaned in spirit. Where was she? How fared it with her, alone in that house, without even a slave to defend her? If my bonds had been fiery cords they could not have cut more deeply into my flesh, while my soul cried out with impatience to fly to her aid. Meanwhile the men drank and cursed and sang, and the smoke from the torches rose and hung above my head in a black cloud. And, in the midst of it, the door opened and one who seemed to be of higher rank than theothers stood and looked at them; a tall man, with a fierce face and a great purple mark across his forehead. At the sight of him they shouted, and held up their cups to pledge him.
“Drinking yet, ye dogs!” he said contemptuously; “and we have not slain that arch traitor, the Jew, Von Gaden—nor the Prince Voronin.”
At this I pricked up my ears, but I kept my eyes closed, scenting danger. The Streltsi shouted and snarled.
“To-morrow, Martemian, son of Stenko,” they said, “to-morrow, you shall lead us—to-night we are aweary.”
He spat at them. “Weary,” he said; “drunk, ye devils, drunk! And who is the German there?”
“’Tis the French goldsmith, Martemian,” they cried, “and he is dead, or as good as dead.”
“Better dead,” he retorted. “A goldsmith has no use save to give us his hide or his gold.”
At this pleasantry they laughed and clapped each other on the shoulder, and the man in the door, suddenly opening a pouch he carried, threw a handful of roubles in their midst.
“Your pay,” he said, “your pay—as we get it! Catch who can.”
They fell upon the floor grovelling for it, and fighting and rolling over, like swine in a pen, and he laughed harshly.
“Bless thee, O Martemian Stenkovitch!” they cried; “thy gift is good in our sight, and fair.Prebavit!” which is to say, “Add to it!”
Again he tossed a handful, and again they rolled and grovelled and fought for it, and one man stabbed another and threw the body through the window, crying as he did it:
“Thy gift is good, O Martemian, son of Stenko—prebavit!”
But at this he swore.
“Prebavit!” he cried, mocking; “prebavit!Yea, and ye would slay each other for it, and tear each other as a pack of wolves, until only the blood and hair and bones remained.Prebavit!By Saint Nikolas of Mojaïsk, no! but thepravezhto every man of you unless ye bring me Von Gaden’s head to-morrow!” and with that he flung away, cursing them.
Von Gaden, the Jewish physician of the late Czar, was much hated in Moscow and was, on the third day, cruelly tortured and executed. But of him I knew nothing.
The second gift of roubles had borne a very devil’s harvest among these drunken, savage creatures. No sooner had the man who gave it gone than they fell to fighting again, each one determined to have the other’s share. One great brute beat out another’s brains with a club, and a small man stabbed the victor in the back, and while he was rifling the pockets ofhis victim, a fourth threw him out the window and grappled with a fifth over the two dead bodies. While others, too stupefied to care even for gold, drank and drank yet more deeply, and one torch after another burned out and semi-darkness fell upon the hideous scene, and I was as little heeded as the dead bodies that lay upon the floor. The liquor meanwhile was doing its work, and one by one the survivors of the fray fell from their seats to the floor and slept, or lay stupid; until, at last, only two old gamesters played at dice in the filthy room, and between them was a pile of stolen gold. And I watched, watched narrowly, hoping for a chance to break loose, though my bonds held like iron. Yet these two villains played and drank, and neither showed a sign of failing, though the heavy breathing of the sleepers came even from under the table where I was tied.
Time, dragging with leaden feet, went on, and still they played and cursed each other, and once, one of them sang a Russian song, a wild melody, not without sweetness, and his voice was full and rich, and flung its notes out, like a great bell, in the night.
“‘My mother is—the beauteous sun,’”
he sang;
“‘And my father—the bright moon;My brothers are the many stars,And my sisters—the white dawns!’”
“‘And my father—the bright moon;My brothers are the many stars,And my sisters—the white dawns!’”
“‘And my father—the bright moon;
My brothers are the many stars,
And my sisters—the white dawns!’”
And while he sang, he won and gathered in the roubles. Then the other, a smaller and paler rogue, who had his knife drawn under the table, began to quarrel with him, purposely, as I saw.
“Ivan Andreivitch,” he growled, “you sing and cheat—look you, the gold is mine!”
The big fellow laughed and brought his fist down on the table.
“Curse you, Nikolas!” he roared, “’tis mine, you thief, and son of a thief!”
At which the white face—sudden and swift as a tiger—thrust him in the breast with his long knife, and the other sighed and rolled over—dead—upon the table.
Then did I see terror—terror of men and angels—on the murderer’s face. He stood with his knife dripping, his features set like a mask, his eyes staring, his teeth chattering, and he looked askance even at the dead. It was the fit that comes upon some men after they have killed. So he stood, for full ten minutes, and then gathering up the gold with eager hands, and hiding it about his person, he turned and fled out into the night.
And I sat and stared. There was the same low room, only one torch burning now, and on the floor dead men and drunken sleepers, and no one to watch. Surely, no man ever saw a sight more horrid or more blasting, but I had no time to meditate upon it. I setto work to gnaw at my bonds and struggled to be free, and yet to no purpose. I could neither bite nor break them, and the golden moments slipped away—as sand runs through the fingers. I struggled desperately; I even succeeded so far as to roll over, chair and all, upon the floor, but, though the crash of my fall startled all the sleepers, it did not break a cord, and I lay—no better off—bound fast upon the floor. The noise that I made in falling had roused one of the wretches, however, so far that he did not sink back, as the others did, into slumber. Instead, he raised himself on his elbow and watched me struggle, and, at last, he began to put two and two together, and his thirst came upon him and he sat up and stared at me.
“I want more brandy!” he said thickly. “Have you taken it?” and he lurched to his feet and tried to drain a drop from the empty flagon on the gamblers’ table.
“I can show you more drink,” I said craftily, “if you will cut these bonds.”
“Where is it?” he demanded, and fell to hiccoughing, and, reeling toward me, “where is it, brother?”
“Undo this cord,” I said, holding out my hands, “and I will take you to it.”
He leered at me slily, as if he suspected me, and then he began to fumble with the knots and the perspiration stood out on my forehead. I started atevery sound lest someone should come upon us, and the tipsy fool fumbled and cursed.
“Be swift!” I whispered, “be swift, friend, and I will show you a river of drink.”
At this he swore with joy, and wrenching at the knot, until the cord cut my wrists, he got it loose and I pulled my hands out. Once with free fingers I made short work of the bonds on my ankles and leaped up, just as he began to curse me, and cry out that I had fooled him.
“Come!” I said, and pushed him toward the window.
He reeled against it and I sprang upon the sill. The night was black before me and the city seemed full of noises, cries, and discordant sounds, and above, in the sky, there was that luminous pallor that precedes the dawn.
“Where’s your drink?” the tippler mumbled, trying to pull me back, but I knocked him aside.
“Yonder!” I said; “go to the river, fool, and drink it dry,” and I dropped out of the window and left him cursing, too far gone to follow me, though I think he tried.
I felt my way along by the wall of the house; I was in the court-yard, acul-de-sacbetween the huts, and it was like pitch, but at last I came to a gate and, fumbling at the latch, got it open and went out into a street—a street that I did not know—in the Zemlianui-gorod,and beset on all sides with dangers, seen and unseen. I went swiftly forward, guided only by the dimly seen towers of the Kremlin, until the light above grew fuller and I saw the crosses gleam on the cathedrals, and so kept steadily on.
The wild night—full of its horrors—was spent; another day was breaking, and here and there I stumbled on a man lying in the street, either dead or in a drunken stupor, and once or twice I turned aside to avoid a group of tipsy ruffians, but, in places, there was quiet, the quiet of fear or worse, and I went on. The thought that I might be too late drove me well-nigh to madness and winged my feet, yet the way seemed endless.
But at last I came in sight of Kurakin’s house, and beyond it saw Le Bastien’s, the windows still shuttered. There were no signs of outrage, the street was quiet, the house closed and silent. I hurried to the door and tried it and found it barred within. My heart beat high with hope, and I made for the rear door and, crossing the court, tried my key in the lock, but here, too, there were bars within.
Day dawned, a ghastly whiteness shone on the scene, even the sky was white rather than blue. I beat upon the door. Silence. Then I heard a step within, and beat upon the door and shouted. At my voice the bars were lifted, the door opened softly, and Maluta’s white face and great ears appeared.
“Where is the Princess Daria?” I cried, pushing past him.
He fell to trembling, his teeth chattered, he clutched at my knees.
“Be not angry, O my master,” he cried shrilly; “as the saints live, I know not—she is not here!”