Part 36 (1/2)
”Gifts?” she asked, with nave joy, an innocent flush upon her pretty cheeks. ”What kind of gifts?”
”Boatfuls of muddy, ragged children for you to wash and dress.”
The girl laughed and clapped her hands with glee.
”Oh, that is capital! Do bring them--the more the better! That is the kind of gift I love.”
The two men, in their sailor's dress, all wet and muddy, hastened off.
”Pushkin,” said Zeneida, accompanying him to the adjoining room, ”that girl is Heaven-sent to you.”
”Since when have you believed in heaven?”
”Be off with you! You are a goose! What news had you of Ghedimin?”
Pushkin shrugged his shoulders.
”He is at home quite well. I saw him through the balcony window, but could not speak to him, as he did not open it. He is a good sort; spirited enough, too, when once he is put up to a thing, but with no self-reliance. He is fond of you, and is really anxious about you; but he knows that your palace is on sufficiently high ground to be out of danger, and that you have a host of friends to protect you. He is hospitable, and is generosity itself, and is certain to subscribe hundreds of thousands for the relief of the sufferers; yet he does not offer to take a soul into his own place, for fear of spoiling his carpets and floors; nor does he send out a cup of soup to them, because he has no wife to stand by him and encourage him in it. He is even philanthropic, yet fears to go out in the damp lest he should get rheumatism. He is an incorporated 'idea,' and he knows it.”
”You are a calumniator! I am convinced that he is ill.”
”He is certainly not ill unto death, or the d.u.c.h.ess would never have left him behind and gone alone to Peterhof.”
”Don't be in such a hurry! What of the Czar?”
”He is rowing about everywhere in his boat. Jakuskin, come here! You met the Czar; tell us about him.”
”Oh, bos.h.!.+” returned the other, impatiently.
”Come, tell. Zeneida likes to hear these things.”
”I have no secrets from her; she knows me through and through, and that I shrink from nothing. Last night in my boat I twice came upon the Czar; we were but an arm's-length one from another. The torches of his bodyguard lit up his figure. He himself was lifting the weeping, raving people out of their windows--the very att.i.tude for a pistol-shot! I had mine loaded in my pocket. I drew it out, and, to escape temptation, held it under water to prevent its going off.”
”Do you see, Jakuskin?” exclaimed Zeneida.
”Draw no conclusions from that. That I would not shoot him at the moment that he was helping his people is no proof that I have given up my plan.
A deed of violence at such a time would have raised up all Christendom against the perpetrator. Let's have no sentiment. I merely let him go free from well-grounded self-interest. Now I will confess to you what I had not yet even confided to Pushkin. For the second time, and not by chance, I met the Czar at the Bear's Paw. Now, the Bear's Paw is in that quarter of the town which unites one end of Unishkoff Bridge with Jelagnaja Street, a locality of whose existence St. Petersburg high life has no idea. And Nevski Prospect, with its n.o.ble palaces, leads up into that labyrinth of squalor and misery. But it is out of the range of the carriage-drive of the magnates. There the sc.u.m of Europe mixes with the refuse of Asia. And any catastrophe brings the refuse to the top. Our worthy friends must have been rather unpleasantly surprised by the Neva's unexpected performance; they had prepared one of another sort.
The rising water washed them out of their cellars into the attics. And they knew how to howl! When the Czar heard so many clamoring voices he had his boat turned in their direction. I followed him at a distance, and saw him himself draw each several man out of the attic windows, and witnessed their humble subjection to him. I had to cram my fists into my mouth to prevent my laughter. The select company of the Bear's Paw was taken off by the Czar to the Winter Palate, and Herr Marat and Company will have received a cup of 'kva.s.s' broth from the imperial hands and returned a teeth-chattering 'thanks.' But a very convulsion of laughter seized me when our friend Dobujoff, got up as Napoleon Bonaparte, crawled out of the shanty. The Czar exclaimed, _'Diantre! Est-ce-que vous etes retourne de Sainte-Helene?_' Upon which Napoleon had to confess that he understood no word of French. Now comes the catastrophe.
Not by hand of man, but by means of a bit of wood. In front of the Bear's Paw a tall pine staff had been erected, on the summit of which was stuck a pitch wreath. From this hung a line which had been steeped in saltpetre, and was evidently intended to have been lighted--probably as the signal. The ma.s.ses of ice was.h.i.+ng up against it had unsettled the staff; it began to totter, and must inevitably have crushed both the Czar and his boat's company had not, fortunately, a man been near who, perceiving their danger in time, seized the line with powerful grip and swayed the staff round so that it fell beside the boat instead of upon it.”
”That man was you!” exclaimed Zeneida.
”No matter! But this much I see, that a n.o.bleman _cannot_ be a common murderer. He is too fastidious about time and place. So to a more favorable opportunity!”
”One thing more,” said Zeneida. ”Did the Czar touch, too, at Petrovsky Garden?”
”No.”
”All right. I will not detain you any longer.”