The Madonna of the Sleeping Cars (28 page)

Varichkine started off with great strides. We rushed up the steps, flanked with stone lions, their heads a trifle weather-beaten, their manes encrusted with moss. Varichkine opened the library door. We entered. And we stood rooted in our tracks.

Lady Diana and Irina Mouravieff were standing face to face.

THE PICTURE WILL REMAIN FOREVER ENGRAVED upon my memory. Irina Mouravieff in front of the middle window. A traveling suit and a felt hat; her hands in the pockets of her double-breasted coat. Lady Diana, indifferent, haughty, before the great fireplace on which were carved the arms of the Duke of Inverness. Two tigresses facing one another. The daughter of the Mongols against the daughter of the Celts. Two races. Two worlds.

Above all, two women.

Varichkine and I amounted to a pair of figureheads. Neither one of us dared to move.

Lady Diana was the first to speak. “Varichkine, your premonitions were correct. Madam Mouravieff has presumed to come to my own home to demand an explanation. My butler announced her a few minutes ago. I told him to have her wait here. I have just come in. I was about to ask the cause of all this excitement when you arrived.”

While I approached Lady Diana, Varichkine went to Irina’s side. But she, without a word, walked to the door which we had just opened; closed it deliberately, locked it, and put the key in her pocket. This was too much for Lady Diana, who cried:

“Madam, since you seem to consider this as a conquered territory, I shall be obliged to have you shown out. We are not yet accustomed to the Soviet régime in the United Kingdom and my Glensloy castle has not yet been nationalized.”

She reached out to ring the bell when Irina drew a revolver from her pocket and said:

“Don’t ring! If you do, I fire!”

Varichkine and I wanted to intervene. Irina pointed to the barrel of her gun and went on:

“The same thing applies to you, gentlemen. We are here to speak without witnesses because what Lady Wynham and I have to discuss concerns no one. As you say, Lady Wynham, I have crossed Europe to demand an explanation of your conduct. It is within my rights to do so. I don’t think you will contest the fact that you stole my lover, that you seduced him to buy his complicity—that is to say, to get him to betray his Russian comrades, and that you promised to marry him if he succeeded in his undertaking. He has failed to carry out that beautiful program. Had I not intervened, you would have enriched yourself at the expense of our Georgian proletarians and would be recommencing, thanks to Russian oil, that vicious life of luxury which causes half the misery in the world.… Let me tell you that, to begin with, having allowed you to assure yourself of certain success, my first revenge was to convince my friends in Moscow of the mistake they were making. I am delighted that I was able to accomplish that because, Lady Wynham, it would have annoyed me more than I can say to have gratified, even indirectly, all your wishes, by providing you with the superfluous money which you seem to require in order to live. Having done that act of justice, I decided to interview you merely to let you know that when you took Leonid Vladimirovitch Varichkine away from me, you
not only broke my heart, but you robbed me of every interest I have in life.”

Lady Diana shrugged her shoulders. “Madam, am I forcing you to live a life which is odious to you?”

Irina took a step forward. “Lady Wynham, we are two women fighting for the same man. That is one too many.”

“I agree with you.”

Madam Mouravieff drew still nearer to her rival. Lady Diana, impassive before her adversary, was fearlessly exposing herself to this outburst of mad jealousy. Irina, her revolver in her hand, like a panther at bay watching two suspicious shadows, darted piercing glances at Varichkine and me. Her clear eyes shone beneath the flat brim of her flesh-colored hat.

I interrupted the dialogue. “Madam Mouravieff, there is not the slightest doubt but that one of you would be
de trop
if you insisted on sharing the love of the same man. But let me affirm on my solemn word of honor that you are falsely accusing Lady Wynham. Mr. Varichkine has never been her lover. You have only to ask him.”

Varichkine cried out, his arms extended, “Irina, I swear to you that Lady Wynham and I have never—”

But Lady Diana did not allow Varichkine to finish. “Dear friend,” she said simply, “why make false vows with the idea of disarming Madam Mouravieff? Do you suppose that I want to have recourse to lies in order to appease her anger?”

I had turned toward Lady Diana and I suddenly understood what was going through her mind. She was accusing herself of wrongdoing with the idea of enraging her enemy more than ever and of thus attaining the death she so desired. I was about to speak but Lady Diana imposed silence with one crushing look. She went on:

“Madam, learn the truth from my mouth. I have been
Varichkine’s mistress. And it is beyond me why these gentlemen should try to deceive you. I make it a principle never to deny my acts, my thoughts, or my loves. I wanted your lover from the moment I laid eyes on him. And he loved me too.… We have lived together in Berlin, London, and in this very castle; marvelous hours compared to those which he has spent with you. I have given him kisses which have doubtless made him forget the ones you gave him when you were nothing but a little student, envious of the great ladies who passed you in the street.… I, Lady Diana Wynham, the daughter of kings, I have given him caresses which you, daughter of the proletariat and
nouveau riche
thanks to the Russian revolution, couldn’t even contemplate in your most passionate moments. You have come all this distance to demand an explanation, you, a poor little girl who was walking the streets when they began to slaughter your Grand Dukes! Well, you have it and in minute detail.”

Irina stared at Lady Diana like a tigress about to spring. Fugitive lights flashed in her eyes. The lights of a hatred about to explode.

She cried, “Is that all?”

“Isn’t it enough to tell you that I have held your Varichkine, drunk with love, in my arms?”

“Is that all?”

“That his lips, tired of yours, have trembled on mine like those of someone in dire agony regaining his strength and that, one night, he laughed at the thought of you—you and your imbecile beliefs—your ridiculous ideals?”

Then the drama really began. I can visualize every detail to this day. Madam Mouravieff stood about six feet from Lady Diana. Varichkine was on the right, in front of an old piece of Chippendale, crested with the arms of some member of the
family. I was on the left, breathlessly awaiting the tragic climax of this dialogue.

Lady Diana’s last words had succeeded in setting loose the criminal instinct in the Russian woman’s brain. She raised her right hand in which she firmly grasped her tiny silver-handled revolver. At the same instant Varichkine, having armed himself with a bronze paper-weight, dived for Irina’s arm and succeeded in striking her wrist. A miraculous stroke of luck? Or a remarkably well-turned stroke? The gun went off and, deviated, the bullet went between Lady Diana and me.

Irina was in such pain that she dropped her weapon on the floor. In one bound, Varichkine picked it up, pointed it at her head, and fired.

Irina Alexandrovna Mouravieff fell, stone dead.

Lady Diana was as pale as a ghost. The astonishment, the indescribable sensation which she had experienced, had almost made her faint. I hurried to her assistance. In the meantime, Varichkine was carefully placing the revolver on the floor beside the dead woman’s hand. In the calmest manner possible, as though he had been an indifferent witness to the drama we had just lived, he declared:

“That woman committed suicide in your house, Lady Diana. It is the best thing she could have done after her unsuccessful attempt to murder you. In proof of that, the bullet hole in the wall there, near that picture, will satisfy the most inquisitive investigation. And we won’t fail, the Prince Séliman and I, two honorable witnesses, to give our testimony to the coroner when he arrives. Madam Mouravieff shot herself before our very eyes, because of disappointed love, after having attempted to assassinate you and before we could intervene to prevent the fatal gesture. The revolver, made in Russia before the war, will go still further toward convincing the Scotch juries. With
all these incontestable proofs, they will pronounce their customary verdict: ‘Suicide due to temporary insanity.’ ”

The tranquillity with which Varichkine spoke was astounding. When Lady Diana finally regained her self-control, he asked her:

“I trust, my darling, that you are not angry with me for having diverted the bullet which Destiny had reserved for you?”

She replied, “I thank you, Varichkine. I had thought that this evening I had found the way to quit this life on equal terms. When I saw that woman aim at my breast, I had a clear vision of Death. Now I know what it is like and I shall not call for it again until it comes to take me.”

Lady Diana walked toward the door. On the threshold she turned and, the way one asks a servant to remove a tea tray, she said:

“Gerard, please give me the key and dispose of that woman’s body while Varichkine telephones to the local police.”

The door closed behind her.

Varichkine reflected for a second. Then he decided. “Look. The bullet is lodged in the brain. There is very little blood on the wound. There are traces of powder. That always helps a lot with official doctors. Let’s see. Is everything in order? Is the body in a natural position? Yes. Then let’s tell that sad-faced butler what happened, and have him send the chauffeur for a doctor, although, as a matter of fact, his services will be utterly useless.”

Varichkine’s sang-froid seemed little short of supernatural. I followed him in silence.

“Do you suppose that, after all this, Lady Diana might consent to marry me?”

“I doubt it, old fellow.”

He sighed. He went out first. I turned back to have one last
look at that little woman, dressed in beige, coiffed in flesh-colored felt, stretched out on the rug, her arms crossed, her hands inert. It seemed to me that a melancholy specter, convulsed with grief, was flitting around her; it was the executioner of Nikolaïa, the silent monster with the low forehead, the gorilla of the Tcheka, his fist tattooed with a Red star.

THE GARE DE L’EST. A LITTLE WHILE BEFORE, AT the Hotel Crillon, where we were staying, I had informed Griselda that I had one more duty to perform. We had not attended the marriage which was to have taken place in the drawing-room of Glensloy Castle. But I did want to say goodby to Lady Diana, who was leaving by the Orient Express, at exactly two o’clock for an unknown destination.

I was waiting for her on the platform. It was half past one. The early arrivals were wandering through the corridors of
wagon-lits
, placarded
Vienna, Belgrade, Bucharest, Constantinople
. Suddenly I saw a little truck laden with two valises and a toilet case of mauve crocodile which I recognized. I spied Lady Diana following the porter. She was a symphony in pearl gray, from her tiny hat, stabbed through with a diamond ornament, to the tips of her little shoes of alligator skin.

Lady Diana, togged out for a long voyage, tripped lightly along the sunny platform. A smile brightened her lovely face. A perfect indifference to what the future held in store made the blue of her eyes more dazzling than ever. What a miraculous change since that gruesome day when we had exchanged remarks, draped in deep mourning, on the shores of a lake surrounded by wild roses!

“Ah, Gerard! Here so soon! How nice! Really you have
been for me, from start to finish, one of those faithful cavaliers the chatelaines used to dream about in the days when Mary Stuart carried on with Bothwell.… Porter! Put these three valises in compartment number four.… Here are twenty francs. Play them on the races next Sunday.”

She took my arm and half dragged me toward the head of the train.

“My dear Gerard, I have done a great deal of thinking since Madam Mouravieff failed to carry out my wish that day. Can you believe that the drama at Glensloy gave me an entirely new desire to live? Just another twist of my topsy-turvy brain, you will say. Oh, yes! When one has defied something stronger than himself and when that something has failed to take advantage of the situation, he is essentially imbued with respect. When I think that, in order to assure my death, I deliberately accused myself, before that impetuous Slav, of having been mistress of that gentle little Communist! What utter folly! Of course, it’s true that the ruin of my projects in the Caucasus had made me lose my head.”

We had arrived beside the locomotive. We turned around.

I replied, “When all is said and done, Varichkine saved your life even if he didn’t make you rich.”

“He most certainly did. Between me and the ritual of death there was very little but a smile of resignation. Do you still dream of that drama, Gerard? I have been haunted the last three nights by the vision of that cold steel bar suddenly leveled at me. I have seen Mouravieff stretched out on my carpet like an infuriated doll finally lulled to sleep. And then the verdict of the jury, convinced, as is the coroner, that the Russian really shot herself always calms me. It hurt me more to refuse Varichkine’s proposal than to have been the cause of the death of his unfortunate mistress.”

“How did he take your decision?”

“Stoically.”

We had once more paced the length of the platform. We turned again.

Lady Diana continued, “I talked very sensibly to Varichkine. I said to him, ‘My dear, what possible use is there in deliberately entering into an unhappy, complicated, difficult life? You, a political failure, since you aren’t even capable of utilizing your position of eminent Communist to pad your bank account, and I, an outcast of High Society, since I have nothing to show but my pearls and some hypothetical and unsalable possessions? I don’t care enough for you to debase you to the point of making you my penniless lover. On the other hand, I respect you enough not to want to make a fool of you. So take my word for it—it’s best that we part good friends. You will return to Moscow where your comrades will doubtless save you a slice of the Tcheka pie, and I will spend what money I have left in indulging my foremost passion, which is travel. I will take up again my former errant existence, and be the slave only of my caprices.’ ”