Rebel Princess (16 page)

Sir Charles got up and stood by the bed. He had never seen the other so disturbed before.

“Are you in love with her, my boy?” Poniatowsky looked up at him and then turned his head away on the pillow.

“I don't know, Sir Charles! How can I tell, I've only seen her once, only spoken a half-dozen words to her. Women have never really stirred me, you know that. How many men are there of my age, twenty-three, who have never been in bed with a wench? Well, I tell you this one looked and smiled at me this afternoon and I've never had a moment's respite since.”

Sir Charles bent and patted his shoulder.

“Truth to tell, Stanis, I've not had much peace myself, so you're not alone in that. But don't despair, boy; she seemed mighty gracious to you, and this Narychkin is not in her bedroom yet by your account.”

With that the Ambassador went to his own rooms, and before he fell asleep it occurred to him how suitable it would be if the future Empress of Russia should take one of his own staff as a lover.

That night, while Charles Hanbury-Williams snored peacefully at one end of the house, Stanislaus Poniatowsky turned restlessly upon his bed till dawn. The image of Catherine Alexeievna had taken possession of his mind and refused to be dismissed.

In the palace at Oranienbaum Catherine also lay awake. It had been an exhausting day and a test of her powers as hostess; the Empress had remained at Peterhof with baby Paul, and the despised Grand Duchess had stepped forward to receive the court and all the foreign dignitaries in Elizabeth's place.

Now she lay in her large cold bed, reviewing the incidents.

The English Ambassador had been extremely friendly; Catherine had studied the political situation well enough to guess the reason for his cordiality, but it pleased her immensely to realize that he considered her important enough to seek out. Her resolve to assert her position was growing stronger every day, and Elizabeth, her time divided between Ivan Shuvalov and Catherine's baby son, was making the path extremely easy.

Bestujev, still clinging precariously to the nominal post of Chancellor, was ever at her back as guide and mentor; his day with the Empress was done and he knew it. Elizabeth's sun was gradually sinking beneath the seas of ill-health, and the old statesman had securely attached himself to the star which must inevitably rise.

In one short year Catherine the recluse, the forgotten Grand Duchess, had recovered almost every advantage she had lost as a young bride all those years ago. She had been a foreigner then, still faltering in the Russian tongue, half educated and obsessed with the desire to please, believing she need make no enemies.

Well, time had taught her differently; the lesson had been a harsh one but at least it had been learned.

Only now could she hope to have influence, when the Empress was ageing and the throne coming nearer and nearer to Peter every day.

The court sensed that change was not far off, and the men who had snubbed and sneered at Peter a few years ago were crowding round him in attempts to win his favor, while the women preened themselves like courtesans whenever he appeared. Never had Catherine seen such an example of human opportunism and falseness. They all hated Peter, but within a year or two he might be Czar. And his wife would be Czarina.

There were many who remembered that, and they flocked to pay court to her as well. Aware that the sycophants divided their time between fawning upon her and the Grand Duke's current mistress, Catherine received them with grim amusement in her heart.

Yet in spite of all her plans and vows to live for ambition alone, nothing could banish the fact that Catherine needed love. Her beautiful healthy body cried out for it, and her heart ached for affection and companionship.

Celibacy might have been wiser, but she admitted freely that for her it was a torment and a hindrance. She needed a lover, and most of all she needed to be loved; who else but Leo Narychkin could she choose? Weeks ago Catherine had made up her mind to offer herself to him, yet for some reason she delayed the final move.

She was truly fond of Leo, but familiarity had robbed him of romance. Why even that Polish secretary of the English Ambassador had roused her interest as Narychkin never could. He had a gentle face, she remembered, the face of a poet, a dreamer and an intellectual, refined but sensual.

Suddenly Catherine chided herself for a fool, wasting the night hours thinking about a stranger who had been one of hundreds at Oranienbaum that day.

Tomorrow night, she determined, would find Leo at her side, and that would be the end of her imaginings.

But for Leo the day passed and the evening followed without event; there was no sign from Catherine that his long siege to her heart would be rewarded.

If he noticed that the English Ambassador had sent his secretary over from St. Petersburg to pay a call upon her, the incident held no significance for him.

For the next few weeks Poniatowsky found excuses for visiting Catherine regularly, and Sir Charles encouraged the friendship. By this time Stanislaus was obsessed with passion for the Grand Duchess, and he made no secret of the fact to his friend and protector.

“Every day I love her more,” he declared wretchedly, “and before God there are times when I think that she is not indifferent to me! But what can I do, Sir Charles? I dare not speak of it; even if she took me as her lover how long would it be before the affair was discovered and I ended my days in some hole in Siberia … if I was not assassinated?”

“Damned nonsense, my dear boy,” declared the Ambassador. “What are you quibbling about? There's little risk in having an affair with her, I tell you—have you less courage than Narychkin? She's a young woman of some influence, no one will interfere too much with her, I'll swear. The next time you're alone with her, speak your mind, Stanis, tell her you're like to die of love for her, no woman can resist that, and if she gives you the key to her door, snatch it and don't come back to me till morning!”

But it was not till the court returned to St. Petersburg that Poniatowsky declared himself to Catherine.

They were seated in the gardens, in that very same arbor where Countess Roumiantzov had delivered her lecture to the young bride-to-be nearly fourteen years before.

Now the unhappy bewildered girl had grown into a lovely, passionate young woman, who had lured her hesitant lover to this secluded spot with the express purpose of bringing the situation to a head. Vladyslava had absented herself discreetly and they were quite alone.

He did love her. Catherine knew it well, for he betrayed himself in a hundred different ways, and she herself had fallen victim to that handsome charm she had remembered after their first meeting.

She, who had kept the unhappy Narychkin dangling, only to disappoint his hopes altogether in favor of the Pole, found herself unable to endure the suspense of this strange, hesitant courtship any longer.

But it was he who broke the silence.

“I am grateful for this opportunity to have a few words with you in private, Madame; I was afraid that I should have to leave St. Petersburg without unburdening myself to you except by letter.”

Catherine swung round on him.

“Leave St. Petersburg! But why, is Sir Charles sending you away?” Poniatowsky looked down, avoiding her glance as he answered.

“Only at my request, and very unwillingly at that. But it is quite impossible for me to stay here any longer.”

The next moment he felt Catherine's hand close over his, her fingers slipping into his palm.

“I thought that you were happy here,” she said quietly, aware that her heart was beating hard with fear lest he should really leave her. Stanislaus sighed and for the first time met her eye.

“I will speak plainly to you, Catherine. I am the unhappiest man in Russia because I am so near to the woman I love and yet so far from her. Other men may see you day after day, talk to you, look at you, and be content with only that; but if I cannot possess you then I must go far away, where you will not be in my sight to drive me almost mad with longing!”

There was no doubt of his sincerity. His handsome face was blanched and drawn with wretchedness.

Catherine was no longer the awkward young virgin who had submitted so helplessly to Saltykov; she knew her own attractions and desperation made her bold.

“If you doubt my feelings, dear Stanislaus, then here is your answer,” and she put her arms round his neck and her lips to his mouth.

For some moments there was silence in the arbor, and any passing tattler would have been able to tell all St. Petersburg that the Grand Duchess and Count Poniatowsky were locked in each other's embrace, kissing shamelessly in the middle of the afternoon.

When at last he released her, Catherine put her head down on his shoulder and smiled with content.

“Are you still leaving St. Petersburg, Stanislaus my love?” she whispered.

“You know I can never leave you now. But only one thing will satisfy me, my beloved.… Yet you have a husband who would delight to find you out in some fault, and the Empress's way with us both would be short and terrible.”

He bent and kissed her again, smothering her words of protest, and Catherine clung to him.

Always Elizabeth and Peter stood in the way of her happiness. Fear of their vengeance was holding Stanislaus back, and it was strong enough to dismiss him altogether; thought of losing him, and the prospect of the last twelve months of loneliness filled her with wild determination.

Not three years ago authority had chosen the destroyer of her virtue and delivered her to him without a qualm. Perhaps the time had come to remind the Empress of that early and convenient lapse. Saltykov had been rewarded for his service to the crown; so far Catherine had received nothing, and now she was going to Elizabeth to ask.…

“We shall have our happiness, my Stanis. I promise you nothing shall keep us apart. And what is more, you'll come to me with the Empress's blessing before many days are done!”

But it was three weeks before Elizabeth Petrovna granted her an interview, and then for the first time in twelve years Catherine found herself in the Empress's private rooms.

While waiting in the antechamber, the Grand Duchess remembered the last occasion when she had entered that inner room with Peter and marveled at the courage she had since achieved to come of her own free will to beard the imperial lioness in her den.

It was a curious feeling, this lack of fear for Elizabeth, and its absence revealed the change that had taken place in her over the years. A few formal words in public, brief encounters at state ceremonies, these were her only contacts with the Empress until now, and yet the prospect of a private interview did not deter her in the least.

Catherine Alexeievna passed into the Czarina's bed-chamber with a serene expression on her lovely face and the intention to blackmail in her heart.

The Empress was lying in bed; she looked childishly small and frail propped up on a pile of satin cushions in the middle of the huge canopied and gilded structure.

Some two weeks had passed since her ladies had carried her to that same bed writhing in a convulsive fit, and the doctors had bled her weakened frame according to the custom of the time, until they could pronounce the poisons drawn from her veins.

This seizure was not the first she had experienced, and Catherine gasped inwardly at the sight of her in a wrapper and night-cap. Stripped of her gorgeous jewels, her dresses and her paint, Elizabeth was revealed as an old woman, tired and sick almost to death.

Her eyes followed the younger woman coldly as she curtsied and seated herself beside the mountainous bed; they grudged her bitterly the health and beauty that shone from her in that room heavy with the scent of illness and decay.

Mixed with her envy, the Empress experienced a sudden wave of panic. What if Catherine had come to ask for her child? There was no other reason for the audience that Elizabeth's tired brain could envisage, and her puffy hands clutched at the bedcovers in alarm.

Little Paul Petrovitch was all she had to live for; lying there, ailing and hideous, she dared not permit Ivan Shuvalov to see his mistress in such a sorry state, but the child was brought to her for hours each day; it lay cradled in her tired arms and smiled the sweet, knowing smile of babies in response to her endearments.

Whatever this self-possessed creature desired of her, it had better not be the custody of her son!

“It was good of Your Majesty to see me. I hope you are recovered now.…”

Elizabeth waved her formalities aside.

“Do not be false with me, Catherine. You have displeased me for too long and pretty courtesies will not avail you. Why have you sought me after all these years? What have you to say to me?”

The Grand Duchess leaned forward in her chair; if the Empress had a mind for frankness, so had she.

“First I would beg your forgiveness for whatever I have done to cause such a breach in your affection for me. In fact, I have lived so long under Your Majesty's displeasure that I have quite forgotten what it is to hear a kind word from you. And not knowing the reason, I have been unable to mend my offending ways.”

They were humble words, but Catherine's tone was not conciliatory. Her instinct told her that weakness now would lose her everything; only boldness might turn the scales in her favor with that travesty of a woman in the bed.

“I have given you the heir you wanted, and I come now to beg for my reward; for some respite from the loneliness that is my married portion.”

Elizabeth raised herself up on the pillows and her haggard eyes were dark with alarm. It
was
the child that Catherine sought.

“If you speak of your son,” she began hoarsely, and the Grand Duchess perceived her agitation and rightly guessed its cause.

Inwardly she was thankful that the Empress's barbarous conduct at her lying-in had utterly destroyed all her maternal love. A request for the solace of her own child's company would have been savagely refused.