The Madonna of the Sleeping Cars (20 page)

“Such a dear boy! What an awful thing! And it was all on my account. It’s an inexcusable judicial error and I have already reported the details to the Foreign Office. But those Downing Street imbeciles have as much heart as a golf ball. They told me that they lacked formal proofs. No, thank you, Lady Chutney—no sugar. Yes, I would like just the tiniest bit of cream. Lord Edwin telephoned me yesterday.”

And Griselda? My sweet, far-away Griselda? My wife. Soon to be my widow. Doubtless she was at this very moment cruising along the coast of Asia Minor on the
Northern Star
. In my sorrowful heart, a hope vacillated like an agonizing little flame, the hope that she would regret my loss, the hope that
she would have some remorse for having failed to reopen her arms to me on board her beautiful white yacht. Dear Griselda, she would surely weep over the news of my assassination. I felt certain of that. I knew that generous heart of hers too well to question her reaction on reading an article in the
New York Herald
, which would inform her brutally that she would remain the Princess Séliman all her life.

I had closed my eyes. My pulse beating furiously, my temples drumming heavily, I lay motionless under my blanket, a living corpse whose thoughts were already wandering aimlessly over the Land of the Beyond. I thought that I was buried, a mass of flesh and bones, beneath the Caucasian soil, being slowly forgotten by everyone who had known me; by the women whom I had loved and who, while polishing their nails, would honor me with a fugitive thought; forgotten by the men for whom I had done favors; forgotten by the friends who had helped me. And in the total oblivion, this inevitable oblivion, I experienced the same dizziness which one feels when contemplating, on a summer night, the innumerable little stars which shine on the robe of the Milky Way. It seemed that the sublime insensibility of a praying fakir was taking hold of me and that my dematerialized self was returning to the astral plane, when a voice outside my cell returned me to reality.

As on the previous occasion, I did not budge. But, through my half-closed lids, I recognized that same pair of eyes, peering at me through the opening.

The eyes observed me for several minutes. Then the little wicket was carefully closed. I cursed the prying individual who had disturbed the comforting coma of my drugged mind, and I was about to turn over so as not to be tempted to look again when loud steps resounded in the corridor.

Some whispered words. Then the door opened.

The jailer muttered, “Number Seventeen.”

He waited on the threshold of my cell. Intrigued, I raised myself on my elbow. “Number Seventeen” appeared—Madam Irina Alexandrovna Mouravieff.

I WAS NOT GREATLY SURPRISED. I HAD MORE OR less anticipated her occult intervention but I had not flattered myself that she would take the trouble to come all the way to Nikolaïa.

Yet there she stood, at the entrance to my cell, under the unflattering light of the yellow lantern. She contemplated me without evidencing the least bit of emotion. Nothing in her expression betrayed the trend of her sentiments. Her dark bobbed hair was restrained by a little black hat, like a fisherman’s helmet. Her slim body was tightly wrapped in a leather vest with four very mannish pockets. A short khaki skirt, simple in the extreme, fell half way down her legs and black Russian boots reached to her knees. No earrings, so usual with her race, nor any other jewels. Varichkine’s good fairy appeared virtuous to a degree.

Madam Mouravieff’s presence acted on me like a stimulant. An injection of strychnine would not have more quickly dispersed the torpor which invaded me. My
amour propre
pruned its feathers. I was determined that this plotting Slav should never be able to boast of having seen me in a terrified sweat, trembling with anxiety. I threw off the blanket, jumped out of bed and bowed with exaggerated formality:

“Forgive me, madam. Had I foreseen your visit, you would never have found me in this incorrect pose.”

Irina made no answer. She waved the jailer away, came a step nearer, closed the door behind her, and said, “An excellent bluff, my dear Comrade. I only wonder how long you can sustain it.”

Her tone and her words made me shudder, but I joked, “So you are the illustrious Number Seventeen? What a modest pseudonym for a woman of your ability! I had expected an illiterate revolutionist, brutal and uncouth. How fortunate I am to discover instead a lovely Muscovite, intelligent and well-bred—an adversary worthy of my best endeavor. It is too good to be true.”

“Carry on—I enjoy your remarks.”

“I have completed my speech, madam. Now I am all ears.”

Irina shrugged her shoulders. She sat down on the bench. I chose the edge of my bed. As she made no remark, I continued:

“My bachelor quarters are most uncomfortable. I apologize.”

“Stop the comedy, Séliman. Fear is written on your face. You’re a good actor and you might fool the average person. But I know you are shaking like a leaf, way down inside. You don’t come from the stock of men who die smilingly for a noble cause. And besides, your cause is anything but noble. Great men don’t sacrifice themselves with serenity for a few oil wells, a financial organization, and the caprice of a conceited Englishwoman.”

“You are wrong there, madam. A real gentleman can stare into the jaws of death simply to set an example for less fortunate human beings.”

“An example of what?”

“Of
savoir vivre
.”

“That is real French!” she said disgustedly. She crossed her knees, unbuttoned her leather coat, and continued, “Having indulged in an overdose of repartee, shall we get down to business? I presume you have had ample time to connect the chain of events which brought you here.”

“To use a melodramatic phrase, the whole thing was a frame-up, I suppose?”

“Well, has not drama been Russian currency for the last seven years? In any event, the telegram which I signed ‘Edwin Blankett’ had the desired effect. You came, you saw, and you are conquered.”

“How do you say ‘
vae victis
’ in Russian, madam?”

Irina ignored my question. She looked me up and down. “If all your beautiful women, those lovely painted dolls with tinted hair and sparkling jewels, could see you now, how sorry they would feel! Although you are not particularly attractive with your scraggly beard and your wrinkled clothes.”

Irina indulged in a bitter laugh. “Where is the handsome Prince Séliman, illustrious habitué of Ritz hotels on two continents? This is a good chance to remark truthfully: Life is a Russian mountain, a sequence of ups and downs. Here you are, suspended on the rocky edge of an abyss. Were you to fall over, what a thrill for the pretty ladies of the polo field and the baccarat table!”

She playfully kicked over the soup bowl which I had left on the floor and continued:

“Yesterday,
hors d’œuvres
,
paté de foie gras, soufflé
, Napoleon brandy. Today, soup, smoked herring, stale water. Please forgive us, Prince. We are unable to get one of Sherry’s old chefs and Prunier refuses to send us oysters. Caviar? Oh, yes. But we haven’t enough to share with our prisoners; we have to keep it to exchange for capitalist gold. They eat our fish eggs while we
threaten their digestive processes with the money they pay us. Caviar plus propaganda equals world-wide Revolution.”

I had arisen in my turn. “Do you really feel so bitterly toward me, Madam Mouravieff?”

“You have been the purveyor of unhappiness for me. You stole my lover only to place him in the arms of a woman whom I hate. I know all about it. Lady Diana knocked Varichkine’s feet out from under him. She wanted the Telav concession. To make sure of it, she threw herself at him. Then, more to humiliate me than for any other reason, she refused his proposition and forced him into an offer of marriage. They will be man and wife within a month because, up to now, I have been unable to annul the concession. If Moscow, for political reasons, refuses to comply with my request, I shall act in my own way. You were foolhardy enough to disregard my warning! You will regret that audacity, Prince. You will learn in a cruel school that true love is something one doesn’t scoff at in the land which lies between the Dnieper and Ural.”

She moved toward the door. I followed with the intention of asking her to wait a little. But she turned abruptly and with her back to the door and her right hand in the pocket of her leather coat, she ordered:

“Stop where you are. I don’t want to shoot a hole in my uniform. Besides, this little experience is far too interesting to end so abruptly.”

“Do you imagine that I could ever forget myself where a woman is concerned—even an enemy?”

“You haven’t inspired me with much confidence.”

“Permit me to say a few words before you go, madam. You have full power to determine my fate?”

“Absolutely.”

“You are the supreme judge?”

“Yes.”

“Then do you mind telling me when you will make your final decision?”

“I can’t tell you that. Perhaps tonight. Perhaps not for two weeks. I have spied on you through this peep-hole. I enjoy that and I want to do it some more. I won’t be satisfied until I see you a little more anxious—a little more disciplined—and a little bit dirtier. I will choose my own hour for returning you to your soft berth of Royal Highness. That is, if I don’t decide on the supreme chastisement. I don’t know myself. Living is such an absurd occupation.”

Irina turned her back. Her short khaki skirt swished through the door. The heavy bolt plowed into the damp wall. Solitude was again my only companion; solitude, that silent monster swollen with sadness.

I am never able to think without a shudder of the hours which followed Madam Mouravieff’s visit to my cell. Uncertainty’s icy drops fell on my naked heart. I trembled. My life depended on that woman’s whim. Paralyzed in her claws, it only remained for me to see, pictured in her pupils, my pardon or my death sentence.

I did my utmost to set at rest the thoughts which zigzagged through my tortured brain, to regain bit by bit the delightful insensibility which had pervaded me before; but
the blue eyes set in the pallid face of that Muscovite cut like knife-blades through my tightly shut lids. Irina had gone. And still I could feel her presence. She seemed to be beside my bed. I saw her sitting on the bench, haughty and impenetrable. I can still remember uttering an exclamation of impatience and revolt like a trapped beast manifesting helplessness. I clenched my fists in an effort to convince myself that I was regaining control of my will-power. I dug my nails into my palms, I drove my head
down into the hard bed and I scowled terribly. Irina’s ghost still watched me.

Time passed. The night was nearly gone. A light shone through the grilled window of my cell. The heels of heavy boots ground on the pebbles in the courtyard. A door slammed. I missed Ivanof. He would have been able to interpret the significance of all this noise.

Suddenly hurried steps echoed through the corridor. A brutal hand turned the key. My jailer appeared in the company of a Red guard whom I had never seen. A revolver in his hand, his cap pulled down over one ear, he growled the fatal words:

“
S veschtami po gorodou
!—Your street clothes.”

The heartless ruffian uttered the awful phrase as indifferently as a corporal of the guard would awaken one of his men for duty. I quavered under the blow. My befuddled mind was incapable of fast reaction. I remember that in the shipwreck of my intelligence, only one thing stayed afloat: the necessity of not trembling before the woman who had condemned me.

I struggled to my feet automatically. I followed the Red guard. The barrel of his revolver was pressed between my shoulder blades. He made me climb a flight of stairs and cross the courtyard. I had a fleeting look at a black sky sparkling with golden stars and I descended into the basement of the next building. As my foot touched the bottom step, I heard the roar of the engine.

I realized that I had only two or three minutes to live. A perplexing problem coursed through my brain: Should I allow myself to be slaughtered like a spring lamb or should I attack the Red guard and die fighting? Strange telepathy. My escort must have divined my thoughts because the cold steel of his revolver touched my neck and by a curt threat, in surly Russian, he conveyed the absurdity of rebellion.

I entered a sort of underground shed, whitened with chalk and brilliantly lighted with three acetylene lamps. At the back, on the right, there was a box of sand, some brown spots on the wall and some dark stains on the floor. Mesmerized by the spectacle, I stood motionless. I could not keep my eyes off that constellation of spots which enlivened the ghastly white wall.

Then a feminine voice startled me: “Well, Prince Séliman! Are you choosing your mural decorations?”

I turned quickly. Irina was there. The Red guard barred the door. My pride kindly lent a smile to my drawn face and I replied:

“Madam, as a crematory oven, this isn’t bad at all. As a
Caveau Caucasien
, I have seen better.”

“You will admit that you’re frightened this time.”

“Yes, I am afraid of staining that pretty little costume of yours.”

Irina gazed at me with more amazement than ever. She was trying to penetrate my mask and to assure herself that the awful sweat of terror was moistening my body. She sought with an inflexible look for some manifestation of anguish. It was as though some strange pleasure were making her nerves vibrate and as though all her instincts, aroused, were secretly palpitating with anticipation. She came still nearer. She stopped only when her face was a few inches away from mine. She was a picture of sadistic irony. I could detect the perfume of
crême de menthe
on her breath. Her pale eyes, luminous rays, shaded by half-closed lids, sought the iris of my pupils to discover the dilation caused by fear.

Her hands clasped behind her back, she smiled drily. “You conceal your apprehension beautifully, Prince Séliman. But I know that your heart is beating desperately. The movement of your jugular vein tells me that. However, you make a very
good showing in the face of death. The Tcheka’s executioner will soon be here. Please pardon the delay.”