Rebel Princess (17 page)

“No, Your Majesty,” she answered calmly. “I come about another matter; though my son's welfare is dear to me, I know that he receives from you the love and care that I could never hope to give him. I only ask your protection from the slanders that threaten a friendship which has become a great comfort to me in the continued unfaithfulness of my husband.”

In her relief, Elizabeth scarcely heard the last part of the sentence. There would be no need to banish the mother in order to retain the child, for the Empress's fevered brain had been contemplating measures of outrageous severity had Catherine dared to ask for Paul.

She spoke of friendship, of comfort in Peter's unfaithfulness. Mentally Elizabeth could imagine nothing that would please a wife more than the absence of a husband like her nephew; but always people played the hypocrite with her, and Catherine whom she had once loved was no exception.

“What friendship would you have, Madame, that scandal could threaten if it were quite a fitting one?”

The question came at Catherine with something of Elizabeth's old caustic harshness.

But the answer was ready on her tongue and she spoke it bravely.

“I give my word, there is no cause for scandal in my friendship for this person, any more than there was reason in the lies spread by evil tongues about Monsieur Saltykov and myself.… Indeed it has even gone abroad that the Grand Duke is not the father of my son! Such tales are dangerous, Your Majesty. I promise to scotch that rumor vigorously if it should be within my power; so will you not give me your word that I may enjoy a new companionship without fear for the other person or myself?”

For a moment Elizabeth gasped with amazement at the audacity of the creature who sat there so calmly and threatened to expose the fact that the Empress's precious heir was a bastard unless she was given a free hand to begin a fresh amor!

Two years ago Elizabeth Petrovna would have known how to deal with such a situation, and the Grand Duchess would have sobbed out her contrition on the rack before that very night was out; but wine, over-indulgence with Ivan Shuvalov, and bouts of rigorous penance had drained that once formidable constitution to a shell; the cruelty and despotism were still there, but the will to enforce them had weakened.

It required effort to become really angry as of old; Elizabeth saw a vista of complications opening up before her, and quite suddenly she collapsed.

Watching her, Catherine saw the color leave her face and the rage die out of her eyes as they closed wearily.

“You have my permission,” she muttered. “But for friendship alone, remember. One breath of scandal, and you'll be answerable to me! I'll not tolerate immorality, Madame. I've had it in mind to take that nephew of mine in hand for some time. Later, when I am well, I shall attend to him.”

And to you, Catherine Alexeievna, she thought; if I catch you out in one false step, I'll give you reason to regret your impudence this day.…

Catherine took her cold hand and kissed it.

“My humble thanks to Your Majesty,” she said.

That evening most of the court attended a play, including Peter, who sat publicly fondling Elizabeth Vorontzov and getting drunk as usual. Unfortunately the Grand Duchess was unable to be present; she was keeping to her room with a headache, and Sir Charles Hanbury-Williams repeated the story with a perfectly straight face to all who remarked upon her absence.

In the warm, candle-lit privacy of her bedroom Catherine Alexeievna lay in Poniatowsky's arms, his sleeping head on her breast, and there was no sound in that room while the candles burnt themselves out and the fire finally died in the grate.

She slept at last, her lips smiling with the contentment of a woman who has shared and witnessed the first fever of passion in a man who has lost himself in love.

Stanislaus Poniatowsky was no Saltykov; this time it was really he who loved her.

The next months of Catherine's life were the happiest that she had ever known; Poniatowsky was a lover whose adoration warmed and heartened her in secret, while for the first time she thrust her fingers into the tangle of political intrigue and began to grasp at the threads of power.

She saw herself at last through the infatuated eyes of Stanislaus, and listened while he told her again and again that she and not Peter ought to sit upon the Russian throne. So he urged upon her what Catherine already knew; she must gain influence and profit by the change of fortune that had laid Elizabeth low with ill-health and brought Bestujev's friendship to her aid.

One pressing need of hers was money, money for presents and bribes and for the settlement of her own debts.

It was Sir Charles Hanbury-Williams who came forward, smiling and courteous, with large sums from the exchequer of England, which he begged the Grand Duchess to accept. In return he only asked her friendship for his country, and Catherine pledged it.

In the arms of the gentle Pole she discovered the element of security in love; the tranquil knowledge that his love for her was the most genuine and disinterested emotion any woman can expect, and that the fire of physical passion could never burn out the depth of his feeling for her, no matter how fiercely it consumed them both. Nothing would ever efface her image from his heart, and there were moments when Catherine felt strangely sad because she knew herself to be far less the slave of love than he.

While English gold flowed into the Grand Duchess's empty pockets, a second stream found its way into the coffers of another needy subject of the Empress, Chancelor Bestujev.

He, too, was grateful for it, and his ear inclined to Catherine's partisanship for England against France. Frederick of Prussia was about to attack their Gallic ally, and that would encumber Russia with a treaty war. Bestujev's plans for the future could find other uses for Russian arms and money; as Elizabeth suffered yet another seizure and her hated nephew began boasting of his intentions of succeeding her, he decided that the future might soon become the present.

Neither he nor Catherine nor the English Ambassador wanted to see France aided at that moment, and they proceeded to hinder as much as they dared.

With Elizabeth lying ill, they had only the Shuvalov faction to watch, and the new Vice-Chancellor Vorontzov, uncle to Peter's ugly mistress, could be side-tracked into less important channels.

Catherine had her lover, a large bank account and growing political power; Peter's existence was almost forgotten.

But it was he, egged on by the ambitions of Elizabeth Vorontzov and by years of mounting hate and fear of his wife, who watched through informers' eyes and listened with their ears, until he decided that the time had come when he could destroy her.

On the 8th of January, 1758, the blow fell.

Bestujev left a sick-bed to appear at the Conference Hall in answer to a summons from the Empress.

When he set foot there, he was arrested.

Chapter 9

“Have you ever seen a penitent's cell in one of my aunt's nunneries, Elizabeth, my love?”

The Vorontzova shook her head and grimaced across the supper-table at the Grand Duke. “Never, thank God. I've heard of the places and that's enough for my curiosity! Why do you ask me?”

“Because if all goes as I have arranged, that is where my dear wife should be before another day is past!”

Peter sat back in his chair and grinned at his mistress; his sallow face glowed with excitement and his grimy hands shook as they picked at the food on his plate. Ever since the court had been electrified by Bestujev's arrest on a charge of treason, the Grand Duke had been a man transformed; his habitual sullenness had given place to an air of mocking geniality and suppressed triumph; suddenly no one was safe from the clumsy malice of his tongue, and the Vorontzova had found him so domineering that she has wisely asked no questions until he chose to vouchsafe an explanation. Now he had told her, and Elizabeth Vorontzov made no secret of her delight at the news.

“Highness, it cannot be true! Should we be rid of her then?” Peter nodded grimly.

“By God we would! I tell you, Elizabeth, if my aunt listens to me and to Ivan Shuvalov, Catherine will go where she'll no longer hinder our plans. And you know what my plans are.… I mean to divorce her; I've always meant to, since the day I married her. Once I have no wife, then I can think of taking another!”

The Vorontzova flushed and held out her hand to him across the table; he had often spoken these drunken threats and longings, which she had prayed so fervently might be fulfilled. If only Catherine were dead or imprisoned, Peter would marry her.

“When I left her two hours ago, she was in a very nervous mood,” she said. “Not outwardly, Highness; you know her, she shows nothing of her thoughts. She was deadly pale, I noticed, but always with that same smile graven on her mouth. I believe she'd smile at her own execution,” she added, and shivered.

“When I am Czar,” Peter remarked slowly, “if the convent hasn't killed her, then we'll arrange the opportunity for her to prove your statement.”

The Vorontzova roared with laughter at her lover's subtle humor.

“I should like that! If you knew how often she has slighted me, Peter. If you love me, promise me that I shall be revenged! Swear that you will show no mercy.”

Don't trouble yourself, my dove,” the Grand Duke sniggered. “We'll both have our vengeance; leave the manner of it to my aunt. Oh, I cannot wait to see it; to hear her, the liar and whore that she is, account for the letters she wrote to General Apraxin on the Prussian front! To deny that that spying old Englishman Williams gave her money, that she corrupted the Imperial Chancellor himself until he was taking bribes and aiding her intrigues! Ha, I tell you not even the devil himself, whose daughter she is, can help her to escape the consequences.”

He drained his beer mug and flung it into the corner, where it smashed to pieces. Beside himself with hate he sprang up from the table and began pacing the room, while Elizabeth Vorontzov watched him, fascinated yet afraid.

“I have waited so many years for this moment! God knows what I have endured since I set foot in this accursed country; the loss of my freedom, exile from Holstein, and that woman for my wife! Pah! The thought of her sickened me and her nature made it like living with the devil!

“But I've seen a great many things. From the moment I saw her, God knows how many years ago, I didn't trust her! I hated her smooth ways and that damned, deceitful smile! I tell you, she's not human, not like other women; her face is always a mask and behind it there is every evil except fear! She prays and grovels in church, but I swear that too is sham. She worships no God; I've seen those books she reads. My aunt would have the writers of such things torn limb from limb, but their mind is the true mind of my wife, the pious Catherine!”

Elizabeth Vorontzov crossed herself hurriedly.

“Pray God, she goes to that convent cell you spoke of; truly she frightens me.…”

Peter stared moodily in front of him and unconsciously he pulled his cravat loose with a nervous gesture.

“She has always frightened me,” he mumbled. “My aunt is a tyrant and a slut … don't hush me, damn you! I'll call her what I please! She's cruel and mad; I never thought to find a greater devil clothed in female form. But there is something terrible about my wife.… She gets no pleasure out of cruelty, not as most people do. No one believes her capable of evil, because she faints at public floggings, and spends hours feeding the birds at Oranienbaum.… No one knows her as I do, Elizabeth, not even you, who hate her so. But this time she has gone too far.… By morning we'll be rid of her.”

Suddenly he crossed to the table and dragged his mistress to her feet. His ugly face was flushed and twisted with excitement, his hands trembled as they closed round her waist. The Vorontzova responded instantly to his advance; this was to be their night of triumph, and already she saw herself mounting the throne at his side. She, the thick-set, pock-marked failure of the family, had found favor with the man who would hold all Russia at his mercy once the Empress died.

Some hours later, Peter Feodorovitch left her embraces for the long-awaited audience with his imperial aunt.

It was three o'clock in the morning, and at the same moment his wife was being escorted to Elizabeth's apartments to stand her trial.

Outwardly Catherine was very calm. She had been waiting in her rooms fully dressed for this summons; waiting alone, for her women had excused themselves one by one, and her sharp ears had heard the shuffle of a sentry's feet as he took up his position outside her door.

Never in all her life had she been in such mortal danger; the rumor of her downfall had spread through the court like a high wind, and overnight she found herself deserted. They had all counted the Empress in her grave too soon; even the experienced Bestujev, who had spent a lifetime in intrigue, had abandoned his old mistress prematurely.

Elizabeth had lain in her sick-bed and affected not to notice the interference of Catherine and her friends; then she had risen like a tigress and struck, first at her Chancellor, who had been flung into prison, then at the English Ambassador, who at that very moment was sailing back to England, recalled at the Empress's command.

Only Catherine and Poniatowsky remained untouched, surrounded by an ominous quiet that frightened the Grand Duchess more and more. She was the chief target of the anti-English faction, disliked by Ivan Shuvalov, hated by the Vorontzova and by Peter; she knew beyond doubt that they delayed only to compile a formidable case against her and, worst of all, none realized more clearly than she what evidence existed to support their accusations.

Blinded by love for Stanislaus, urged on by Williams and Bestujev, she had committed her views on the war, the Empress and the succession to paper countless times. Until that night those letters had hung over her head like the executioner's sword. If they were found, then no defense was possible.