Even while Ivan Yourivitch was conferring with his startled mistress, I saw a tall figure in Russian uniform--the eternal long gray greatcoat--appear at the room door, and I was instinctively glancing round for some weapon wherewith to defend me, when to my astonishment Volhonski entered, somewhat splashed with mud, certainly, and powdered with snow, but whole and well, without a wound, and with a cry of joy Valerie threw herself into his arms. Wholly occupied by his beautiful sister, to whom he was tenderly attached, fully a minute elapsed before he turned to address Madame Tolstoff and then me. Was it selfishness, was it humanity, was it friendship, or what was the sentiment that inspired me, and caused so much of genuine joy to see Volhonski appear safe and untouched?--I, who from the trenches had been daily wont to watch with grim satisfaction the murderous "potting" of the Ruskies from the rifle-pits, and literal showers of legs, arms, and other fragments of poor humanity, by their appearance in the air, respond to the explosion of a well-directed shell! He now turned to me with astonishment on recognising my face in that place, and with the uniform of the Rifle Militia.
"By what strange caprice or whirligig of fortune do I find you here?" he exclaimed, as he took my hand, but certainly with a somewhat dubious expression of eye; "you have not come over to us, I hope, as some of our Poles have lately gone to you?"
"No," I replied, almost laughing at the idea. "Don't mistake me; I came here as a fugitive, glad to escape you and your confounded Cossacks; but I thank God, Volhonski, that you eluded my pistol on the cliffs yonder."
"Then it was you, Captain Hardinge, whom I followed so fast and so far from that khan on the Kokoz road? By St. George, my friend, but you were well mounted! In our skirmish one of your balls cut my left shoulder-strap, as you may see; the other shred away my horse's ear on the off side, making him swerve round so madly that he threw me--that was all. You, however, fell into the sea--"
"And was soaked to the skin; the reason why, 'only for this night positively,' as the play-bills have it, I appear in the uniform of the Imperial Rifle Militia, after finding my way here by the happiest chance in the world," I added, with a glance at his smiling sister. "Marshal Canrobert--"
"Has fallen back with his slender force from Kokoz. You had a despatch for him, I presume, by what fell from you at the Tartar caravanserai?"
"Precisely."
"Ah, I thought as much."
"I should not have been touring so far from our own lines else. It concerned, I believe--if I may speak of it--an émeute among the Poles in Sebastopol."
"A false rumour spread by some deserters; there was no such thing; and be assured that our good father, the Emperor, is too much beloved, even in Poland, to be troubled by disaffection again."
Volhonski now threw off his great coat, and appeared in the handsome full uniform of the Vladimir Infantry, on a lapel of which he wore, among other orders, the military star of St. George the Victorious, which is only bestowed by the Czar, for acts of personal bravery, like our Victoria Cross.
"How came you to know of me and of my despatch?" I inquired, while Yourivitch replaced the wine and some other refreshments on the table.
"I had Menschikoff's express orders to watch, with a sotnia of Cossacks, Canrobert's flying column on the Kokoz road; and the Tartars were prompt enough in telling me of your movements--at least of the appearance of an officer of the Allies, where, in sooth, he had no right to be. But, my friend, you look pale and weary."
"He has no less than three lance-wounds!" urged Valerie.
"Three!"
"In the arms and shoulder."
"This is serious; but take some more of the Crimskoi--it is harmless wine. Excuse me, Captain Hardinge, but of course you are aware how dangerous it is for you to remain long here?"
"I have no intention of remaining a moment absent from my duty, if I can help it!" said I, energetically.
"So we must get you smuggled back to your own lines somehow--unless you consent to become a prisoner of war."
"I have already given my parole of honour."
"Indeed! to whom?"
"To the Hospoza Volhonski," said I, laughing.
"More binding, perhaps, than if given to me; yet as I don't wish to avail myself of your promises to Valerie, but for the memory of past times," he added, with a pleasant smile, "to see you safe among your friends, I must contrive some plan to get you hence without delay."
"Why such inhospitable haste?" asked Valerie.
"Think of the peril to him and to us of being discovered here--and in that dress, too!"
"I fear I shall not be able to ride for days," said I, despondingly, as sensations of lassitude stole over me.
"I fear that with Valerie for your nurse, you may never return to health at all," said Volhonski, laughing, as he knew well the coquettish proclivities of his sister; "hence, to insure at least convalescence, I must commit you to the care of old Yourivitch or Madame Tolstoff."
Joy for her brother's safe return made Valerie radiant and splendidly brilliant; while some emotion of compunction for her temporary hostility to me, led her to be somewhat marked in her manner, softly suave; and this he observed; for, after a little time, he said, smilingly,
"You and my Valerie seem to have become quite old friends already; but remember the moth and the candle--gardez-vous bien, mon camarade Hardinge!"
"I don't understand you, Paulovitch," said Valerie, pouting.
"As little do I," said I, colouring, for the Colonel's speech was pointed and blunt, though his manner was scrupulously polite; but with all that, foreigners frequently say things that sound abrupt and strange to English ears.
"This stupid soldier is afraid that, if left in idleness, you will fall in love with Madame Tolstoff--or me," said Valerie; "he is thinking of the Spanish proverb, no doubt--Puerto abierto al santo tiento."
"I am thinking of no such thing, and did but jest, Valerie," said her brother, gravely, while he caressed her splendid hair. "Madame Tolstoff, our dear friend, is an experienced chaperone; and beside that, you are safe--set apart from the world--so far as concerns the admiration of men."
"That I never shall be, I hope!" said she, smiling and pouting again.
By Jove, can it be that she is destined for a nunnery? What the deuce can he mean by all these strange hints and out-of-place remarks? thought I, and not without secret irritation. Perhaps the keen Muscovite read something of this in my face, for he now clinked his glass against mine, and filled it with beautifully golden-coloured Château Yquem, bright, cool, and sparkling from its white crystal flask; and to this champagne soon succeeded; unwisely for me, though it was champagne in its best condition, that is, after being just six years in bottle, as Yourivitch assured us; and now our conversation became more gay and varied, and, as I thought, decidedly more pleasant. He gave me some recent news from the immediate seat of war, and from our own lines, that proved of interest to me.
The Retribution man-of-war, with the Duke of Cambridge on board, was said to have been lost, or nearly so, in the late great storm, which the Russians naturally hoped would delay the arrival of transports with reinforcements and supplies for the Allies; and he added that if the generals of the latter "had but the brains to cut off all communication with Simpheropol, Sebastopol would surrender in three days!" He mentioned, also, that the Greeks at Constantinople had taken heavy bets that it would not fall before Christmas, which seemed likely enough, as Christmas was close at hand now; and that there was a rumour to the effect that General Buraguay d'Hilliers--one of the veterans of the retreat from Moscow--had landed at Eupatoria, and given battle to General Alexander Nicolaevitch von Luders, and defeated him with the 5th Infantry Corps of the Russian Army; a most improbable story, as D'Hilliers was at that moment with his army in the Aland Isles! And now Valerie, wearying of war and politics, shrugged her pretty shoulders, and gradually led us to talk on other topics. As she was well read and highly accomplished, there were many subjects on which we could converse in common, as she was wonderfully familiar with the best works of the English and French writers of the day, and knew them quite as well as those of Tourguéneff, Panaeff, Longenoff, Zernina, and others who were barely known to me by name. I was afterwards to learn, too, that she was a brilliant musician; and with all these powers of pleasing, was a Russian convent, with its oppressive atmosphere of religion and austerity, to be her doom? When I compared, mentally, the Russian with the English woman of rank--Valerie with Estelle--I could see that the latter, with less of a nervous temperament, was more quiet and unimpressionable, and with all her beauty less attractive; the former was more coquettish and seductive, more full of minute, delicate, and piquante graces--the real graces that win and enslave; more mistress of those witching trifles that at all times can inspire tenderness, provoke gallantry, and awaken love. The brilliant Valerie would have shone in a crowded salon, while Estelle Cressingham, with all her pale loveliness, would simply have seemed to be the cold, proud, aristocratic belle of an English drawing-room.
Valerie was fascinating--she was magnetic--I know not how to phrase it; and what now to me was Estelle--the Countess of Aberconway--that I should shrink from drawing invidious comparisons?
When I retired that night to a spacious and magnificent apartment, and to a luxurious Russian couch, the pillows of which were edged with the finest lace--ye gods! a laced pillow after mine in the camp, a tent-peg bag stuffed with dirty straw--I was soon sensible of the difference of sleeping indoors and within a house, after being under canvas and accustomed so long to my airy tent. I felt as if stifling; and to this was added the effect of the wines, of which, incited by the hospitality of Volhonski, I had partaken too freely. I forgot all about my promises to be up betimes, even before daybreak, in the morning, and to ride with him as near to our posts as he dared venture, to leave me in a place of safety; I forgot that if I remained in secret at the castle or château of Yalta, the great danger and the grave suspicion to which I subjected him, his sister, and all there; I forgot, too, the risk I ran personally of being taken and shot as a spy, perhaps, after short inquiry, or no inquiry at all. I thought only of the brilliant creature whose voice seemed hovering in my ear, and the remembered touch of whose velvet hand seemed still to linger in mine.
The more I saw of Valerie Volhonski, the more she dazzled, charmed, and--must I admit it?--consoled me for the loss I had sustained in England far away. She seemed quite aware of the admiration her beauty excited--of the love that was inspiring me, and she seemed, I thought, in my vanity, not unwilling to return it! Why, then, should I not ask her to love me? What to us were the miserable ambitions of emperors and sultans; the intrigues and treacheries of statesmen; the wars, the battles, the difference of religion, race, and clime? And so, as the sparkling cliquot did its work, I wove the shining web of the future, and gave full reins to my heated fancy as the hours of the silent night stole on. But the morning found me ill, feverish, decidedly delirious; and Volhonski, to his great mortification, had to leave me and ride off with his Cossacks, and reach Sebastopol by making a long detour through that part of the country which we so stupidly left open--round by Tepekerman and Bagtchi Serai, and thence by the Belbeck into the Valley of Inkermann. I must have been in rather a helpless condition for at least two days--days wherein the short intervals of ease and sense seemed to me wearisome and perplexing indeed; while to see Madame Tolstoff and old Ivan Yourivitch gliding noiselessly about my room in fur slippers, caused me to marvel sorely whether I was dreaming or awake; whether or not I was myself, or some one else; for all about me seemed strange, unusual, and unreal.
On the morning of the third day I was greatly better, and on passing a hand over my head, found that my hair was gone--shorn to a crop of the true military Russian pattern, doubtless by a doctor's order. Then I saw Madame Tolstoff and Valerie Volhonski standing near and smiling at my perplexity.
"You miss your dark brown locks," said the latter, with one of her most seducing smiles; "forgive me; but I am the Delilah who made a Samson of you!"
