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 forget her, 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 Espagne never, 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 the eikon above 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 keep you as 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 probably en route for 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 dinner à 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 military capote, 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 his papirosse, 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 a junker, 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 the peitchka.
"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 the bativina, 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 some papirosses, 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 a third.
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 talk
Across 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 here still."
"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 analysing any report that I may transmit with you, a mere English captain!"
And rising from the table with these ominous words, he bowed to the eikon, crossed himself after the Greek fashion, inserted a papirosse into 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 had he to 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.
