Though convalescent, I was still too feeble to think of saddle-work; and the Hospoza Volhonski had no means of transmitting me otherwise than mounted, or of having me--even when able to travel--guided to the British camp, without aid from her brother, of whom we had no tidings for weeks; so the time slipped away at Yalta pleasantly enough for me. To conceal me entirely from all the visitors who came there was an impossibility; thus, though dressed in plain clothes now, and generally passing for a German shut out from business at Sebastopol, I ran hourly risks of suspicion and discovery. Some of Volhonski's abrupt and ill-judged remarks, or some perhaps of mine, which had escaped me when delirious under the double effect of wound and wine, rendered Valerie a little reserved in her demeanour towards me for the first day or two after I was able to leave my room; but she was so frank in nature and so gay in spirit, that this unusual mood rapidly wore away. We had many visitors from the Valley of Inkermann and from Sebastopol itself, as the city was left unblockaded on one side; and the tidings they brought us--tidings which we eagerly devoured--varied strangely. Once we were informed that it had been assaulted, and that all the outworks were in the hands of the Allies; next we heard that another Inkermann had been fought--that the Allies had been scattered and the siege raised; that the Austrians had entered Bulgaria; that torpedoes had blown up the sunken ships; and that the British fleet was actually in the harbour, shelling the town and burning it with rockets and red-hot shot. But all reports converged in one unvarying tale--the dreadful sufferings of our soldiers among the snow in the trenches, where young men grew gray, and gray-haired men grew white with misery. And so the Christmas passed; and when the Russian bells by hundreds rang the old year out from the spires, the forts, and the ships that lay above the booms and bridge of boats, the new year's morning saw the black cross of St. Andrew still waving defiantly on the Mamelon, and Redan, and all the forts of Sebastopol.
Once among our visitors came Prince Menschikoff himself, Valerie advised my non-appearance, much to my relief; but I heard the din of voices, the laughter, and the sound of music in thesalonor great dining-room where adéjeûnerwas served for him and his staff, while the band of the Grand Duchess Olga's Hussars were stationed in the marble vestibule, and played the grand national anthem of Russia and Luloff's famous composition,Borshoe zara brangie--God save the Emperor. After the Prince's departure we had the huge mansion entirely to ourselves again, and any longings I might have to rejoin the Welsh Fusileers and share the dangers they underwent, together with my natural anxiety to hear of my friends in their ranks, I was compelled to stifle and seek to forget, when tidings came that a great body of Tchernimorski Cossacks had formed a temporary camp between Yalta and the head of the long Baidar Valley, thus, while they remained, completely cutting off all my chances of reaching either Balaclava or the Allied camp; so there was nothing for me now but to resign myself to a protracted residence in the same luxurious mansion with the brilliant Valerie (and her watchful chaperone), with the somewhat certain chance of losing my heart in the charms, of her society. Madame Tolstoff assuredly kept guard over us with Argus eyes; but a few of the devices in the heart that laugheth at locksmiths enabled me to elude her at times; while, fortunately for me, the language we spoke was perfectly unknown to her; yet "the Tolstoff," as I used to call her, seemed, I knew not why, to exercise considerable control over Valerie. In her youth she had been carried off by Schamyl's mountaineers from a Russian outpost, and was a detained for three years in the Caucasian chief's seraglio, where, with all my heart, I wished her still. But while enjoying all the good things of this life at Yalta--grapes, melons, and pineapples from Woronzow's hothouses at Alupka, oysters from Hamburg, pickled salmon from Ladoga, sterlit from the Volga, sturgeon from the Caspian Sea, reindeer's tongue from Archangel, Crimean wines that nearly equalled champagne, imitation Sillery from the Don, Cliquot, Burgundy, and Bordeaux,--I thought often with compunction of the wretched rations and hard fare of our poor fellows who were starving in the winter camp. Volhonski was wealthy, and thus his sister and her attendants were able to command every luxury. His rank was high, for he claimed, as usual with all the Russian nobles of the firsttchinnor class, to be descended from Ruric the Norman--Ruric of Kiev and Vladimir--who, more than a thousand years ago, founded the dynasty by which Muscovy was governed prior to the accession of the Romanoffs. All the best families in the land boast of a descent from Gedemine the Lithuanian, or from this Ruric and his followers; a weakness common also to the English aristocracy, whose genealogical craze is a real or supposed descent from those who were too probably the offscourings of Normandy. Beauty belongs peculiarly to neither race nor nation; yet somehow Valerie seemed to me, in her bearing and style, the embodiment of all that was noble and lovely; and though always graceful, her air and sometimes the carriage of her head seemed haughty--even defiant.
In the many opportunities afforded by propinquity and close residence together in the same house, and by our speaking a language which we alone understood, I know not all I said to her then, nor need I seek to remember it now; suffice it, that softly and imperceptibly the sentiments of those who love are communicated and adopted; and so it was with me. She was catching my heart at the rebound--at the ricochet, as we might say in the trenches. I was beginning to learn that there were other women who might love me--others whom I might love, and who were not worshippers of Mammon, like--ah, well--Estelle Cressingham. If Pottersleigh died or broke his old neck in the hunting-field, where he sometimes rashly ventured, would Estelle--I thrust her image aside, and turned all my thoughts to Valerie; yet my second choice seemed, by the peculiarity of our circumstances, a more ambitious one and more hopeless of attainment than the first. Daily, however, I strove to win her heart and to inspire her with that pure passion which, as a casuist affirms, can only be felt by the pure in spirit, as all virtues are closely connected with each other, and the tenderness of the heart is one of them. Was the devil at my elbow, or my evil angel, if such things be, whispering in my ear? Or how was it, that whenever I grew tender with Valerie, the image of Estelle came revengefully, yet sadly, to memory, as of an idol shattered, but certainly not by me? Oddly enough I still wore her ring on my finger--the single pearl set in blue and gold enamel--a gift I had as yet no means of restoring, and could not give away. "Have you ever looked at a portrait till it haunted you?" asks a writer. "Have you ever seen the painted face of one, it may be, who was an utter stranger to you, yet that seemed to fill your mind with a sort of recognition that sent you out over the sea of speculation, wondering where you had seen it before, or when you would see it again? The eyes talk to you and the lips tell you a dreamy story."
Such, then, was the haunting character of the face of Valerie. Her beauty and her graces of manner filled up all my thoughts, and her strange dark eyes seemed to say that if it was impossible we had known each other in the years that were past, we might be dear enough to each other in the future; and I hoped in my heart that ours should be one; thus yielding blindly to the influence, to the charm of her presence and the whole situation. Once she was at the piano, and sang to me with wonderful grace and brilliance "The Refusal," a Russian gipsy song, in which a young man makes many desperate professions and promises of love to a giddy young beauty, who laughs at them and rejects him, because she values nothing so much as her own liberty. When turning the leaves for her, the pearl ring of Estelle--a ring so evidently that of a lady--caught her attention, and I saw Valerie's colour heighten as she did so. I instantly drew it off; I felt no compunction in doing so then, and said, "You admire this ring, apparently?"
"Nay--do not say so, please," said she, bending over the instrument; "when a lady admires thus, it seems only another fashion of coveting."
"In this instance that were useless," said I, laughing, "as the ring is not mine to bestow; otherwise I should glory in your accepting it."
"Is it your wife's?"
"My wife's!"
"Yes. Have you one in that wretched little island of yours?" she continued, sharply.
"No," I replied, delighted by this undisguised little ebullition of jealousy.
"To whom does it belong, then?"
"The wife of another, to whom it shall be restored in England."
"This is very strange--it has, then, a history?" said she, bending her dark eyes on mine.
"Yes."
"And this history--what is it?"
"I cannot--dare not tell you."
"Indeed!" Her black lashes drooped for a moment, and she passed a white hand nervously over her golden braids. "And wherefore?"
"It would be to reveal the secrets of another."
"Another whom you love?" she asked, hurriedly, while her teeth seemed to glitter as well as her eyes, for her lips were parted.
"No, no; on my honour, no!" said I, laying my right hand on my breast, and feeling that then I spoke but the truth and without the equivocation, to which her questions were forcing me. Then Valerie seemed to blush with pleasure, and my heart beat lightly with joy. I should certainly have done something rash; but the inevitable Madame Tolstoff was in the room, embroidering a smoking cap for her son the colonel, then in command of the 26th at Sebastopol; so I was compelled to content myself by simply touching the hand of Valerie, and by caressing it tenderly, while affecting to admire a beautiful opal ring she wore, and urging her to continue her music. The whole episode partook somewhat of the nature of a scene between us, and even the usually self-possessed Valerie seemed a little confused, as she once more laid her tapered fingers on the ivory keys.
"I am very far from perfect in my music, or anything else, perhaps," she said.
"Do not say so," I whispered; "yet had you been more perfect than you are, I think no other woman in this world would have had the chance of a lover."
"How--why?"
"All men would be loving you, and you only."
"This is more like the inflated flattery of a Frenchman than the speech of a sober Briton," said Valerie, a little disdainfully.
"Does it displease you?"
"Yes, certainly."
"Why?"
"People don't love when they flatter," was the pretty pointed and coquettish response, and preluded an air with a crash on the keys, thus interrupting something I was about to say--heaven only knows what--a formal declaration, I fear.
"You admired my opal. Listen to the story of itsorigin; I doubt if the story of your ring is half so pretty," said she. And then she sang in English the following song, which she had been taught by her governess, a song the author of which I have never been able to discover; but then and there, situated as I was, the English words came deliciously home to my heart, and I quote them now from memory:--
"A dew-drop came, with a spark of flameIt had caught from the sun's last ray,To a violet's breast, where it lay at rest,Till the hours brought back the day.With a blush and a frown a rose look'd down,But smiled at once to view,With its colouring warm, her own bright formReflected back by the dew!Then a stolen look the stranger tookAt the sky so soft and blue,And a leaflet green, with its silvery sheen,Was seen by the idler, too.As he thus reclined, a cold north windOf a sudden blew around,And a maiden fair, who was walking there,Next morningan opalfound!"
"A dew-drop came, with a spark of flameIt had caught from the sun's last ray,
To a violet's breast, where it lay at rest,Till the hours brought back the day.
With a blush and a frown a rose look'd down,But smiled at once to view,
With its colouring warm, her own bright formReflected back by the dew!
Then a stolen look the stranger tookAt the sky so soft and blue,
And a leaflet green, with its silvery sheen,Was seen by the idler, too.
As he thus reclined, a cold north windOf a sudden blew around,
And a maiden fair, who was walking there,Next morningan opalfound!"
I ventured to pat her shoulder approvingly. I glanced furtively round; the Tolstoff had gone out of the room, and somehow my arm slipped round Valerie, who looked up at me, smiling archly, yet she said, firmly,
"Pray don't."
"How much longer am I to keep this silence?" I asked.
"How--what silence?"
"To be thus in suspense, Valerie," I added, lowering my voice and bending my face towards her ear.
Her smile passed away, her white lids drooped, and perplexity and trouble stole over her eyes, as she drew her head back.
"I do not know what you mean, or whither your conversation tends," she said.
"You know that I love you!"
"No, I don't."
"You must have seen it--must have guessed it--since the happy hour in which I first saw you."
"Do not speak to me thus, I implore you," said she, colouring deeply, and covering her face with her beautiful hands.
"Why, Valerie, dearest, dearest Valerie?"
"I must not--dare not listen to you."
"Dare not?"
"I speak the truth," said she, and her breast heaved.
"Will you marry me, Valerie?"
"I cannot marry you."
"Why?"
"O heavens, don't ask me! But enough of this; and here comes Madame Tolstoff, to announce that thesamovar--the tea-urn--is ready."
In my irritation I muttered something that she of the redsarafan, Madame Tolstoff, would not wish graved on her tombstone, and resumed my previous task of turning the leaves at the piano; but Valerie sang no more then, and for two entire days gave me no opportunity of learning why she had received my declaration in a manner so odd and unexpected. I could but sigh and conjecture the cause, and recall the words of her brother on the night he first met me at Yalta; and if it were the case that a convent proved the only barrier, I was not without hopes of smoothing all such scruples away.
In the growth of my passion for Valerie I forgot all about the probable opposition of her brother, the Count, to my wishes. Indeed, he entered very little into my schemes of the future; for the perilous contingencies of war caused life to be held by a very slight tenure indeed; so we might never see him again, though none would deplore more than I the death of so gallant a fellow. Then, in that instance, did one so lovely as Valerie require more than ever a legitimate protector, and who could be more suitable than I? I felt convinced at that time, that those who loved Valerie once could never feel for another as they had loved her. She was so full of an individuality that was all her own. Was it the coquetry of her manner, the strange and indescribable beauty of her dark eyes, the coils of her golden hair, the smile on her lips, or the subtle magnetism the kisses of those lips might possess, that entangled them? God knows, but I have heard that those who loved her once were never quite the same men again. If Valerie married me, with what pride and exultation should I display her beauty, if occasion served, before Estelle and her dotard Earl, as a bright being I had won from hearts that were breaking for her, and as one who was teaching me fast to forgether, even as she had forgotten me! A Russian wife, at that crisis of hostility and hatred, seemed a somewhat singular alliance certainly; what would the regiment say, and what would my chief friend old Sir Madoc, with all his strong national prejudices, think? I should be pretty certain to find the doors of Craigaderyn closed for long against me. These, however, were minor considerations amid my dreams; for dreams they were, and visions that might never be realised;châteaux en Espagnenever, perhaps, to be mine!
On the morning of the third day after the musical performance recorded in the preceding chapter, Valerie met me, accompanied by Madame Tolstoff. Her face wore a bright smile, and interlacing her fingers, she raised her eyes to theeikonabove the fireplace, and said to me, "O Hospodeen, have I not cause to thank Heaven for the news a Cossack has just brought me, in a letter from Colonel Tolstoff?"
"I hope so; but pray what is the news?" I. asked, while drawing nearer her.
"My brother Paulovitch has been taken prisoner by your people."
"Call you that good news?" I asked, with surprise.
"Yes, most happy tidings."
"How?"
"My brother will now be safe, and I hope that they will keep him so till this horrible and most unjust war is over."
"Unjust! how is it so?" I asked, laughing.
"Can it be otherwise, when it is waged against holy Russia and our good father the Czar?"
I afterwards learned that Volhonski had been taken prisoner in that affair which occurred on the night of Sunday, the 14th January, when the Russians surprised our people in the trenches, and captured one officer and sixteen men of the 68th, or Durham Light Infantry, into whose hands Volhonski fell, and was disarmed and taken at once to the rear.
"I am so happy," continued Valerie, clapping her hands like a child, "though it may be long, long ere I see him again, my dear Paulovitch! He will be taken to England, of course."
"Should you not like to join him there?" I asked, softly. "Yes, but I cannot leave Russia."
"Why?"
"Do not ask me; but we may keepyouas a hostage for him," she added, merrily; "do you agree?"
"Can I do otherwise?" said I, tenderly and earnestly.
"Of course not, while those Cossacks are in the Baidar Valley. Poor Paulovitch! and this was his parting gift!" she continued, and drew from her bosom--and none in the world could be whiter or more lovely--a gold cross; and after kissing, she replaced it, looking at me with a bright, coquettish, and most provoking smile, as it slipped down into a receptacle so charming. "And dear Madame Tolstoff is so happy, too, for her son arrives here to-morrow; he has been severely bruised by the splinter of a shell in the Wasp Battery, and comes hither to be nursed by us."
I cannot say that I shared in "dear Madame's" joy on this occasion, and would have been better pleased had Valerie seemed to be less excited than she was. Moreover, I feared that the arrival of a Russian officer as an inmate might seriously complicate matters, and completely alter my position; and a pang seemed to enter my heart, as I already began to feel with wretchedness that Valerie might soon be lost to me. I had no time to lose if I would seek to resume the subject of conversation on that evening when Madame Tolstoff arrived just in time to interrupt us; but Valerie seemed studiously never to afford me an opportunity of being with her alone. This was most tantalising, especially now when a crisis in my affairs seemed approaching. Moreover, I had already been at Yalta longer than I could ever have anticipated. The love of the brother and sister for each other was, I knew, strong and tender; could I, therefore, but persuade her to escape--"to fly" with me, as novels have it--to our camp, now that he was a prisoner, and probablyen routefor England! A meagre choice of comforts would await her in the allied camp; but in the excess of my love, my ardour, and folly, I forgot all about that, and even about the Cossacks who occupied the Pass of the Baidar Valley.
It was not without emotions of undefined anxiety that on the following day I heard from Ivan Yourivitch that Colonel Tolstoff had arrived, and would meet me at dinner. The whole of that noon and afternoon passed, but I could nowhere see Valerie; and on entering the room when dinner was announced--a dinnerà la Russe, the table covered with flowers fresh from the conservatory--I was sensible that she received me with an air of constraint which, in her, was very remarkable; while something akin to malicious pleasure seemed to twinkle in the little dark beadlike eyes of Madame Tolstoff as she introduced me to her son the Colonel; at least, by his reception of me I understood so much of what she said, for the old lady spoke in her native Russian. He was a tall, grim-looking man, who, after laying aside the long militarycapote, appeared in the dark green uniform of the 26th Infantry, with several silver medals dangling on his well-padded breast. He had fierce keen eyes, that seemed to glare at times under their bristling brows; and he had an enormous sandy-coloured moustache, that appeared to retain the blue curling smoke of hispapirosse, or to emit it grudgingly, as if it came through closely-laid thatch; a thick beard of the same hue, streaked with grizzled gray hair, concealed a massive jaw and most determined chin. He was huge, heavy-looking, and muscular; and on seeing me, held out a strong, weather-beaten hand but coldly and dryly, as he addressed me in German; and then we immediately recognised each other, for he was the officer who commanded the regiment which had occupied the abattis, and who received me when I took the flag of truce into Sebastopol. Volhonski, I have said, was a noble of the first class--that which traces nobility back for a single century; but Tolstoff was only of the second, or military class, being the son of a merchant, who after serving eight years in the ranks as ajunker, on being made an officer becomes an hereditary noble, with the right to purchase a landed estate. Tolstoff was quite lame--temporarily, however--by the bruises his left leg had suffered from the explosion of a shell. He spoke to me in bad and broken German, though I shall render his words here in English.
"So my friend Volhonski is taken prisoner?" said I.
"Yes; less lucky than you, Herr Captain, who have to be taken yet," he replied, tossing the fag end of his paper cigar into thepeitchka.
"It was in a sortie, I understand?"
"A little one; his party was led astray by their guide towards the trenches."
"Their guide! could one be found?"
"Yes; an officer who deserted to us."
"An officer!" said I, with astonishment.
"Yes; one who was a prime favourite with the Lord Raglan. Strange that he should desert, was it not!"
"With Lord Raglan!" I continued, more bewildered still.
"The devil! You are strangely fond of repeating my words! Anyway he wears a diamond ring that was given him by Lord Raglan for some great service he performed; but as he is to be here to-night, you shall see him yourself."
Guilfoyle! The inevitable Guilfoyle and his ring!
I could have laughed, but for rage at his cowardice, villainy, and treachery, in actually acting as guide in that affair which caused a loss in killed, wounded, and prisoners to our 68th Foot. However, thought I, through my clenched teeth, I shall see him to-night.
"Have you ever seen this officer?" I asked.
"No; but he comes to Yalta with certain reports for my signature. I doubt if Prince Woronzow, who is now Governor of Tiflis in Georgia, knows who--all--honour his mansion by a residence therein. You have made a longer visit among us this time than you did under the flag of truce!"
"Circumstances have forced me to do so, with what willingness you may imagine," said I, justly displeased by his tone and tenor of his speech, which seemed to class me with a rascal and a traitor like Guilfoyle. "I was most fortunate, however, in finding my way here, after escaping death, first at the hands of your Cossacks, and afterwards in the sea."
"Ah, they are troublesome fellows those Cossacks, and I fear you are not quite done with them yet."
"They, and your infantry, too, found us pretty well prepared on that misty morning at Inkermann," said I, growing more and more displeased by his tone and manner.
"Well prepared! By----, I should think so; when people come on frivolous errands with flags of truce, to see what an enemy is about behind his own lines."
I felt the blood rush to my temples, and Valerie, with a piteous expression in her soft face, said something in Russian, and with a tone of expostulation; to which the grim Pulkovnick made no response, but sat silently making such a dinner as seemed to indicate that rations had been scarce in Sebastopol, and keeping Ivan Yourivitch in constant attendance, but chiefly on himself. I could see that the man was a soldier, and nothing but a soldier, a Russian military tyrant in fact, and felt assured that the sooner I was out of Yalta, and beyond his reach--risking even the Cossacks in the Valley--the better for myself.
He was twice assisted by his amiable "mamma," to thebativina, i.e., soup made of roasted beef cut into small pieces, with boiled beetroot, spring onions, carraway-seeds, purée of sorrel, with chopped eggs and kvass. He was thrice helped to stuffed carrots with sauce, to roast mutton with mushrooms, and compote of almonds; and he drank great quantities of hydromel flavoured with spices, and so fermented with hops that it foamed up in the silver tankard and over his vast moustache. But in the intervals during dinner, and often speaking with his mouth very full, he related for the express behoof of his mother and Valerie, a very strange incident, which they seemed implicitly to believe, and which the latter politely translated for me. It was to the effect, that on the night Volhonski was taken prisoner, one of his officers, a man of noble rank, and major of the Vladimir Regiment, was carried into Sebastopol mortally wounded in an attempt to rescue him; and as he was dying, the host was borne to him under a canopy by Innocent, Bishop of Odessa, in person. As the procession passed a tratkir, or tea-house, some soldiers and girls were dancing there to the sound of a violin; and though they heard the voices of the chanters, and the occasional ringing of the sanctus bell, they ceased not their amusement, neither did they kneel, so the host passed on; but like those who were enchanted by hearing the wonderful flute of the German tale, they could not cease dancing, neither could the violinist desist from playing, and for six-and-thirty hours they continued to whirl in a wild waltz--in sorrow and tears, a ghastly band--till, exhausted and worn nearly to skeletons, they sank gasping and breathless on the floor, where they were still lying, paralysed in all their limbs, and hopelessly insane!
Tolstoff seemed to hasten the ceremonies of the dinner-table to get rid of the ladies; and the moment they rose he gave his mother somepapirosses, or cigarettes, to smoke, and then proceeded, leisurely, to roll up one for himself, after pushing across the table towards me the champagne, which he despised as very poor wine indeed.
"Hah, Yourivitch!" said he, taking up a decanter, and applying his somewhat snub nose thereto; "what is this? corn-brandy!" he added, draining a glassful; "as it is good, I must have a glass;" so he took a second of the fiery fluid. "O, now I feel another man, and being another man, require another glass;" so he took athird.
These additions to the hydromel did not seem to improve his temper, and assuredly I would have preferred to follow the ladies to the drawing-room, than to linger on with him
"In after-dinner talkAcross the walnuts and the wine,"
"In after-dinner talkAcross the walnuts and the wine,"
but that I feared to offend the man unnecessarily.
"Excuse me," said he, as he lay back in his seat, with his coat unbuttoned, and proceeded, very coolly, to pick his teeth with one of those small cross-hilted daggers, the slender blades of which are about four inches long, and which are worn in secret by so many Russian officers, and are all of the finest steel. After a pause, during which he again dipped his long moustache in the foaming hydromel, he said,
"Though Volhonski told me about you, I scarcely expected, Herr Captain, to have found you herestill."
"Where should I have gone--into the hands of the Cossacks, at Baidar?"
"Towards Kharkoff, at all events."
I coloured at this very pointed remark, as it was to that province in the Ukraine that the Russians had transmitted many of the prisoners taken during the war.
"Here I felt myself on a special footing."
"How, Herr Captain?"
"As the guest of the Volhonskis," said I, sternly.
"Though an enemy of Russia?"
"Politically or professionally, yes: but I have the honour to be viewed as a friend by the Count, and also by his sister."
"Ah, indeed! I have heard as much. The Hospoza Valerie is, you see, beautiful."
"Wondrously so," said I, with fervour, glad that I could cordially agree with this odious fellow in one thing at least.
"Then beware," said Tolstoff, his face darkening; "for I don't believe that much friendship can subsist between the sexes without its assuming a warmer complexion."
"Colonel Tolstoff!"
"Besides, the Hospoza Valerie is a coquette--one who would flirt with the tongs, if nothing better were at hand--so don't flatter yourself, Herr Captain."
I felt inclined to fling the decanter at his head; for in his tone of mentor he far exceeded even Volhonski.
"This is a somewhat offensive way to speak of a noble lady--the sister of your friend," said I.
"We shall dismiss that subject; and now for another," said he. "It must be pretty apparent to you, Herr Captain, that you cannot remain here, unparoled, in your present anomalous position."
"I quite agree with you, and feel it most keenly; but I gave my parole of honour to Valerie," I added, gaily and unwisely, for again the face of Tolstoff lowered.
"To let you remain or go free were treason to Russia and the Czar; you must therefore be sent as a prisoner of war to Kharkoff, and--"
"What then?"
"Be treated there according to the report I shall transmit with your escort."
"What will Volhonski say?"
"Just what he pleases; the Count is a prisoner now himself."
I read some hidden meaning in his eyes, though he sat quietly cracking walnuts and sipping his hydromel.
"An officer on duty, I fall into the hands of an enemy--" I was beginning passionately, when he interrupted me, and his eyes gleamed as he said,
"You had a despatch; I think you told Volhonski or his sister so?"
"Yes, Colonel--a despatch for Marshal Canrobert."
"Where is it?"
"I destroyed it."
"Bah!--I thought so," said he, scornfully.
"On my honour, I did so, Colonel Tolstoff!"
"Honour! ha, ha, you are a spy!"
"Rascal!" I exclaimed, feeling myself grow white with passion the while; "recall this injurious epithet, or--"
"Or what? Dare you threaten me? I can pick the ace of hearts off a card at twenty paces with a revolver, so beware; and yet I am not obliged to meet any one who is amenable to the laws of war, and is in a position so dubious as yours."
I was choking with rage; yet a conviction that he spoke with something of warrant, so far as appearances went, and of the absolute necessity for acting with policy, if I would leave myself a chance of winning Valerie and escape greater perils than any I had encountered, compelled me to assume a calmness of bearing I was far from feeling.
"Seek neither to threaten nor to trifle with me," said he, loftily and grimly; "you may certainly know the common laws of war regarding the retention of prisoners and the punishment of spies, but you know not those of Russia. If I do not treat you as one of the latter, it is because Volhonski is your friend; but I have it in my power, in treating you as one of the former, to have you transmitted farther than the Ukraine--to where you should never be heard of more. We are not particular to a shade here," he continued, with a sneering smile; "when the Emperor commanded a certain offender to be taken and punished, the minister of police could not find the right individual. What the deuce was to be done? Justice could not remain unsatisfied; so, instead, he seized a poor German, who had just arrived and was known to none. He slit his tongue, tore out his nostrils, sent him to Siberia to hunt the ermine, and reported to the Czar that his orders had been obeyed. So don't flatter yourself that any persons in office among us would be very particular in analysingany reportthat I may transmit with you, a mere English captain!"
And rising from the table with these ominous words, he bowed to theeikon, crossed himself after the Greek fashion, inserted apapirosseinto his dense moustache, and limped away, leaving me in a very unenviable frame of mind. Already I saw Valerie lost to me! I beheld myself, in fancy, marched into the interior of Russia under armed escort, maltreated and degraded, with my hands tied to the mane of a Cossack pony, or a foot chained to a six-pound shot; a secret report transmitted with me--a tissue of malevolent lies--to be acted upon by some irresponsible official with a crackjaw name; to be never more heard of, my sufferings and my ultimate fate to be--God alone knew what!
I was weak enough to feel jealous of this ungainly Tolstoff--this Muscovite Caliban--in addition to being seriously alarmed by his threats, and enraged by his tone and bearing. Had Valerie ever viewed him with favour? The idea was too absurd! If not, what right hadheto advise me concerning her? But then she was so beautiful, one could not wonder that he--coarse though he was--might love her in secret.
Full of these and other thoughts that were vague and bitter, I quitted the table just as Yourivitch was lighting the lamps, and wandered into the long and now gloomy picture-gallery, one of the great windows of which was open. Beyond it was a terrace, whereon I saw the figure of Valerie. She was alone, and in defiance of all prudence and the warning of Tolstoff, I followed her.
She seemed absorbed in thought as I drew near her, and did not perceive my approach. She was leaning on the carved balustrade of the terrace, and gazing at the sea and the scenery that lay below it, steeped in the brilliance of a clear and frosty moonlight. The snow had entirely departed from the vicinity of Yalta, though its white mantle still covered all the peaks of the Yaila range of mountains. About a mile distant on one side lay the town, its glaring white-walled houses gleaming coldly in the moonshine. A beach was there, with most civilised-looking bathing-machines upon it; for prior to the war, Yalta had been the fashionable watering-place for the ladies of Sebastopol, Bagtcheserai, and Odessa, who were wont there to disport themselves in fantastic costumes, and take headers in the Euxinus Pontus. On the other side were lovely valleys and hills, covered with timber--pine-groves dark and huge as those that overhang the fjords of Norway.
In the distance lay the Black Sea--so called from the dark fogs that so often cover it--sleeping in silver light, its waves in shining ripples rolling far away round the points of Orianda and Maragatsch; and Valerie, absorbed in thought, and her dark eyes fixed apparently on that point where the starry horizon met the distant sea.
She wore an ample jacket or pelisse of snow-white ermine lined with rose-coloured silk, and clasped at the tender throat by a brooch which was a cluster of bright amethysts. A kind of loose silken hood, such as ladies when in full dress may wear in a carriage, was hastily thrown over the masses of her golden hair, which formed a kind of soft framework for her delicately-cut and warmly-tinted face, for the cold air had brought an unwonted colour into her usually pale complexion. Her eyes wore an expression of languor and anxiety. Heaven knows what the girl was thinking of; but as she watched the shining sea I could see her full pink nervous lips curling and quivering, as if with the thoughts that ran through her impulsive mind. And this bright creature might be mine! I had but to ask her, perhaps, and I had not so faint a heart as to lose one so fair for the mere dread of asking her. Yet, as I drew near, the reflection flashed upon my mind that for three days at least she had purposely avoided me. Why was this? Had my love for her been too apparent to others? had I underdone or overdone anything? what had I omitted, or how committed myself?
"Valerie!" said I, softly.
She uttered a slight exclamation, as if startled, and then placing her firm, cool, and velvet-like hands confidingly in mine, glanced nervously round her, and more particularly up at the windows of the house.
"I would speak with you," said she, in a half whisper.
"And I with you, Valerie. O, how I have longed for a moment such as this, when I might again be with you alone!"
"But we must not be seen together; and I have but that moment you have so wished for to spare. Come this way--this way, quick; those cypresses in the tubs will shield us from any curious eyes that may lurk at yonder windows."
"O, Valerie!" I sighed with happiness, and as I passed a hand caressingly over her jacket of ermine I thought vengefully of Tolstoft's dark hint about hunting that small quadruped in Siberia; and then as I gazed tenderly into her dark and glittering eyes, I could perceive that their long tremulous lashes were matted.
"Tears--why tears, Valerie?"
She spoke hurriedly. "I have most earnestly to apologise to you for much that I heard the Pulkovnick say during dinner; it was indeed horrid--all!"
"Much that you have not heard was more horrid still."
"It is unbearable! His wounds or bruises must have exasperated his temper. Yet I cannot speak to him of that which I did not hear, as to do so would appear too much as if you and I had some secret confidences, and Madame Tolstoff, I fear, has hinted at something of this kind already."
"I asked you to marry me, dearest Valerie."
"Yes--vainly," said she, with a half-smile on her partly-averted face.
"Vainly--why?"
"Do not press me to say why."
"Could you love me, Valerie?"
"I might."
"Might, Valerie?" (I was never weary of repeating her sweet name; and what meant this admission, if she declined me?) "You do not doubt my love for you?" I urged.
"No, though I fear it is but a passing fancy, born of idleness and the ennui of Yalta."
"Think you, Valerie, that any man could see, and only love you thus? O no, no! But say that you will be mine--that you will come with me to England, where your brother is, or soon shall be--to England, where women are treated with a courtesy and tenderness all unknown in Russia, and where the girl a man loves is indeed as an empress to him, and has his fate in life in her own hands."
"I don't quite understand all this--nor should I listen to it," said she, looking me fully in the face, with calm confidence and something of sadness; too.
Her right hand was still clasped in mine, and as I pressed it against my heart, I placed my left arm round her waist, modestly, tenderly, and with a somewhat faltering manner; for she looked so stately, and in her white ermine seemed taller and more ample than usual, a beauty on a large scale and with "a presence." But starting back, she quickly freed herself from my half-embrace, and said, "Captain Hardinge, you forget yourself!"
"Can it be that you receive my tenderness thus?" said I, reproachfully, and feeling alike disappointed and crestfallen. "I love you most dearly, Valerie, and implore you to tell me of my future, for on your answer depends my happiness or misery."
"I hope that I am the holder of neither. I did not ask you to love me; and O, I would to Heaven that you had never come to Yalta--that we had never, never met!"
"Why--O, why?" I asked, imploringly.
"Because I am on the very eve of beingmarried."
"Married!" I repeated, breathlessly; and then added passionately and hoarsely, "To whom?"
"Colonel Tolstoff, to whom I was betrothed in form by the Bishop of Odessa."
Her refusal was really a double-shotted one, and for a moment I was stupefied. Then I said, in a voice I could scarcely have recognised as my own,
"It was to this tie, and not to a convent, that Volhonski alluded, when hinting that you were set apart from the world?"
"Yes. I thank you from my soul for the love you offer me, though it fills me with distress. I pity you; but can do no more. Alas! you have been here only too long."
"Too long, indeed!" said I, sadly, while bending my lips to her hand; and then hurrying into the house by the picture-gallery, she left me--left me to my own miserable and crushing thoughts, with the additional mortification of knowing that Madame Tolstoff, watchful as a lynx, had overseen and overheard our interview from another angle of the terrace, though she could not understand its nature; but of course she suspected much, and was all aflame for the interests of her suave and amiable son.
However, this was not to be my last moment of tenderness with Valerie. But I was left little time for reflection, as events were now to succeed each other with a degree of speed and brevity equalled only by the transitions and discoveries of a drama on the stage.