CHAPTER I

Prince Mentchikoff returned at once to Russia to put before the Czar the new turn of events in Poland.

Peter was still at Marli, superintending the building of his new capital which was rising out of the filled dykes and drained marshes of the desolate flats of the banks of the Neva.

Mentchikoff was almost beside himself with fury at the news he brought, but his rage was as nothing beside that of the Emperor.

Peter glared at his friend with a wrath he could hardly sustain; but contrary to his use, he made a terrible effort to control himself that he might hear the tale to the full.

He had been, at first, vexed at seeing Mentchikoff, thinking that he should not have left the newly regained Varsovia, but now he admitted that the Prince had done right to bring news so tremendous himself.

He sat on a gilt leather arm-chair, in the little front room of his cottage, dressed in a rough green frieze riding suit, his boots muddy and a riding switch in his hand; he had just returned from a visit of inspection of St. Petersburg, where streets, shops, palaces, and churches were already covering the outlines of the city.

Mentchikoff stood before him in the rich costume of a Russian general, European in cut, but Eastern in color and embroidery, a diamond in his sword hilt, a star on his breast, lace at his throat and wrists.

His long brown and lean face, with the sharp bright black eyes and thick lips, was pale with the intense passion of a fierce and uncivilized nature.

“This is what he did, Peter Alexievitch! I put him back in Varsovia; he did not want to give battle at Kalisz--one knows why now! And one morning he was gone--gone! With his woman and his valets--gone! To Altranstadt--to the camp of the Swede!”

“You were properly fooled,” muttered the Czar, in a stifling voice.

Mentchikoff made not the least attempt to deny this.

“There was one Pfingsten, one of his Germans, whom he sent to Karl--and who brought his terms writ on a bit of paper, and he, this cursed Augustus, signed and fled, to put himself at Karl’s mercy.”

The Emperor’s eyes showed red, a faint dew besprinkled his forehead, he bent his whip across his knee till it cracked, then flung it away and buried his face in his hands, running his fingers into his dusky curls.

“Mdle. D’Einsiedel came to me, the very day before--for months she had been trying to find me--to tell me about Patkul. The whole thing was kept secret, but it seems that he was arrested when you were called to Astrakan. Of course Augustus knew the Swede would ask for him.”

“_My_ ambassador--_my_ general!” groaned Peter.

“When the Elector fled, this lady went back to vantage of his hurried departure to order at once the release of Patkul, but there was much delay, he having been moved from Sonnenstein to Königstein; the messenger reached the governor of this place in time--the Countess von Königsmarck was very active in this intrigue--but he tried to get Patkul to pay ransom, knowing of his wealth, and while this argument was in progress the Swedish officers arrived, and Patkul is now in Altranstadt, fastened in a cellar with a great iron chain round his waist.”

Peter raised his face which was quite distorted, the eyes infected with blood, the lips livid.

“May the Devil overtake Augustus and torture him in Hell forever!” he stammered. “May he be steeped to the lips in sorrow and bitterness, the vile, false coward.”

He ceased with a sob of sheer fury; he had always despised Augustus, but never believed him capable of this; disloyalty and cowardice were the two unforgiveable crimes in the eyes of the Muscovite; his primitive nature did not recognize the usual excuses offered by diplomacy for the actions forced by necessity on states and princes; nothing could palliate the Elector’s conduct in his eyes; he considered that he had been treated with black treachery and base ingratitude, and that Augustus had behaved with the utmost villainy. He certainly was incapable of such conduct himself; he would have died cheerfully sooner than submit to an enemy, and though he might punish even his own family with savage cruelty if he suspected them of treachery, he would never have deserted a friend or have betrayed an ally.

Through all the Elector’s misfortunes Peter had been staunch to him, and, to the best of his ability, held out a helping hand; and when he remembered that last Conference at Grodno, the amiable flattery of the Saxon, the mutual promises, the sworn treaties, the vows of friendship and mutual help against the Swede, and thought how the Elector had taken advantage of his hurried departure to order at once the arrest of the man who was a valuable asset in dealing with the enemy, he was shaken by an excess of fury.

“Danilovitch!” he cried, “I shall never forgive you that you did not discover this traitor and bring him in chains to me!”

“I shall never forgive myself, Peter Alexievitch,” replied the Prince simply. “But who would have thought of such vileness? He has that smooth Western way of lies and smiles.”

“The woman Königsmarck is in this.”

“I do not think so. I know that she did her best to save Patkul; she has more courage than he, and I think, more honor. She is a friend, too, of Mdle. D’Einsiedel--that child will die of this, Peter Alexievitch.”

“What will they do with Patkul?” asked Peter fiercely.

“He is to be tried by a council of war. Karl treats him as a rebellious subject. He will suffer a cruel death.”

In Karl’s place Peter would have behaved with the same severity; he had never shown mercy to those whom he judged rebels, and therefore he did not feel the fury of hate towards Karl that he felt towards Augustus, but he was conscious of a certain wonder that this young king whom he had regarded with secret admiration as being much greater than himself, could indulge in the same bloodthirsty vengeances.

“Is this Sweden’s famous clemency?” he asked bitterly. “Is he then so magnificent?”

He was silent, communing with his own soul; he thought he would have been more chivalrous than Karl, and not taken advantage of the weakness of Augustus to demand the surrender of a man in the employ of another monarch.

From that moment the cold knightly figure of the Scandinavian, vested with all the virtues to which he himself might never hope to aspire, was smirched in the eyes of Peter.

“The Muscovite prisoners were slain after Fraustadt--by whose orders?” he said. “And now this. This man is no better than I,” he added, with a strange simplicity, “and I shall defeat him.”

Then his thoughts turned to Augustus, and he flashed from brooding into wrath.

“How was the Elector received at Altranstadt?” he demanded.

“The Swede met him privately, they say, and treated him with a cold civility. Their talk was of trifles, mainly of the boots Karl wore, which he had never been without, he said, for ten years, save to sleep, and then Stanislaus Leczinski came, and Augustus had to salute him as King of Poland.”

“Is it possible there lives a prince so spiritless!” exclaimed Peter.

“He must have suffered,” said Mentchikoff with satisfaction. “After Kalisz Sweden’s terms became harder. Augustus had to send the archives and State jewels to Stanislaus, cause his name as King of Poland to be effaced from all documents and monuments, and write a letter of congratulation to Stanislaus.”

“And that is the mercy he obtained by throwing himself on the compassion of Karl!” cried the Russian, “and I was allied with such a prince! What does he mean to do now?”

“Karl is supposed to retire from Saxony and leave him in peace,” said Mentchikoff dryly. “As for the Palatine of Posnania, he has a poor gift in the throne of Poland--the factious nobles, such as the Sapieha, have laid waste what the Swedes and your Muscovites have spared. The country is a smoking ruin.”

“And that is what the King of Sweden has achieved by his conquest,” said Peter grimly. “Why does he so favor Stanislaus Leczinski?”

“No one knows--perhaps because he knows how to flatter him.”

Peter gave his favorite an ugly look.

“Do you think that is the sole reason for the friendship of kings?” he demanded.

Mentchikoff saw his danger and fell on one knee, kissing passionately his master’s rough hand; he knew that there is nothing an absolute prince dislikes more than the insinuation that he is ruled through his vanity and adroitly influenced by flattery, even though he is seldom led by any other means or persuasion.

Peter was mollified by this act of homage.

“If you flattered me, Danilovitch, I should love you no longer,” he said.

“If I had been a flatterer,” replied Mentchikoff, “I should not have brought you this ill news, Peter Alexievitch.”

The Czar rose, raising his favorite also to his feet. He did not feel any ill-will towards the Prince for his failure to detect the secret negotiations of the Elector; all the force of his ardent soul was absorbed in fury against his faithless ally.

“Patkul must be saved,” he said. “Am I to submit to this treatment? I will appeal to England, to Holland, to the Empire!”

Mentchikoff did not voice his thoughts, which were that the name of Karl now sounded so terribly in Europe that it was doubtful if any nation would dare to interfere with him, besides the fact that the countries mentioned by Peter were engaged in a costly war with France.

He frowned at the floor and was silent; he could see no way by which Peter could come by satisfaction and vengeance save through his own genius and might.

“Patkul shall not die,” said Peter. “Karl would not dare.”

“There are the Swedish prisoners who might be executed in reprisal,” remarked Mentchikoff.

This suggestion suited Peter’s breed and training, and, perhaps, his disposition, but that prudence and foresight that distinguished him from his predecessors caused him to reject a proposal that was useless and dangerous.

“There are more Muscovites in Sweden than Swedes in Muscovy,” he said grimly. “I will take another vengeance. I will march on Poland.”

He paused and tore at his neckcloth as if to loosen it and give himself air.

“Of all those who joined against Karl, there is only Russia left,” he added, with a terrible look. “But Russia will defeat him--listen, Danilovitch, I will not stop until I have crushed him, beaten him, reduced him, as he has crushed, beaten, and reduced Augustus! And if he slays Patkul----”

He paused and added in a low voice: “I loved Patkul.”

He took a turn about the room in a great and increasing agitation.

“Seven years have I fought him--with no weapons but those that I could forge myself well; he had everything to his hand, and he conquered. But I am ready now. Are not things different, Danilovitch? I have built a city and a fort, a navy; I have trained an army--can I not defeat Karl of Sweden?”

“I never doubted,” replied Mentchikoff, a look of fiery enthusiasm in his little dark eyes, “that your Majesty would bring down this insolent braggart.”

“To break him, Danilovitch!” cried the Czar. “To smash his invincible armies, to send his veterans flying before me, to make him fly--to drive him to ruin, to exile, to make the glory of his victories disappear like smoke before the sun! That would be an achievement, Danilovitch!”

He paused, exhausted by his own passion, and caught hold of the back of the chair in which he had been sitting.

“I did not enter into this war for lust of conquest,” he said, as if justifying himself, yet with an almost wistful dignity. “Not for hate, as Denmark did--not for folly, as Saxony did. I wanted my Baltic ports--the trade, the commerce, the prosperity. No one understands that.”

“These things must be fought for, Peter Alexievitch,” replied Mentchikoff.

“To that end have I built a navy and trained an army,” said Peter sternly. “I perceive that I shall get nothing of what I want as long as Karl of Sweden is master of the North.”

He sat down again with something of a groan; rage at the defection of Augustus so consumed him that he could hardly command his thoughts.

“Sweden does not know,” remarked Mentchikoff, “what he has roused in Russia. He thinks the Muscovites may be scattered by the whip and are not worthy of powder and shot--he insults Augustus with impunity because he does not think that we are to be feared.”

Peter turned his inflamed eyes towards the dark, pearl-crowned ikon that hung above the stove.

“God, help me to do this one thing,” he muttered. “To smite Sweden.”

His face assumed an expression of dark and lowering anger.

“If Patkul is slain,” he added. “Now would Sweden dare?”

Then, with a sudden and entirely unconscious pathos, “Europe will not listen to me--I am only the Czar of Muscovy. They do not take me as a power to be reckoned with, Danilovitch.”

“They do not know you, Peter Alexievitch,” replied Mentchikoff.

Peter pursued his own train of thought.

“He breaks all international law--if Patkul had been the envoy of any other country but Russia the world would have cried out against this treatment.”

Despite his passionate nature and his autocratic position he saw shrewdly enough just how Europe held him.

“I will make my protest, but who will take any notice of it?” he continued.

“Peter Alexievitch, you must make your own protest,” said Mentchikoff, in an energetic tone. “Cannot you defeat Sweden?” added this fiery Russian.

“It has been done,” responded the Czar, with a sudden smile. “You beat them at Kalisz!”

He spoke warmly and without a trace of envy of his subject’s success in a war where he had every time failed himself, thereby, had he known it, showing himself greater than Karl, who had not been able to restrain his jealousy on hearing of Mardenfeldt’s victory at Fraustadt.

With equal generosity and selflessness Mentchikoff replied:

“I was in a little way the forerunner of you, Peter Alexievitch--when you strike, Sweden will quiver to the shock!”

The Emperor fixed on him soft and lustrous eyes, tired and earnest.

“I must call a council,” he said, “but I know what to do--I will descend on Poland with my new army. Karl is likely to remain at Altranstadt?”

“There is no talk of his leaving. The English are sending an envoy to him--at least a rumor says so.”

“They are afraid he will fall on the Empire,” said Peter instantly.

“He will not,” replied Mentchikoff simply. “His design is solely against Russia.”

“He troubles himself not at all about the West?”

“Not at all, I think. He would be Alexander--Saxony is but his Thrace--Russia must be his Persia, and he thinks all his conquests little things beside that battle that must be his Gaugamela!”

“He would dethrone me, and I would break him utterly,” remarked Peter. “It only is to be seen which is the stronger man.”

He pressed Mentchikoff’s hand and left the room abruptly, seeking that comfort which never failed to soothe him in his most gloomy and bitter moods, Katherina, now his wife.

He found her in the garden amid the lilac thickets that were just beginning to be covered with their pale flowers.

The Livonian peasant girl was now rather stout, heavy and indolent in habit, slow in her movements, generally silent, with a good-natured smile on her full lips.

Her extraordinary elevation had in no way altered her disposition; she was as unassuming as she had been when she was the servant of Mentchikoff; she did not mingle in the least in politics of which she understood nothing, but she was intelligent enough to at least feign an appreciation of what Peter was trying to do for Russia, and her quiet sweetness, her placid cheerfulness never grew stale to Peter; he looked upon her almost as his savior, from the devils of melancholy and horror that tore at his soul.

He was not nice in his tastes. Her lack of refinement did not vex him; her over-blown, untidy beauty still satisfied him, neither her manners nor her past troubled him; with a certain grandeur he disdained everything but the fact that she was the one woman he had found wholly pleasing; she went everywhere with him and knew all his secrets; so far she had been faithful to him, perhaps because in her heart she was entirely afraid of him, and, for all her outward calm, very wary.

The Czar flung himself on the seat she reclined on, and put his arm round her shoulders, turning her fair countenance, framed in the long, Russian veil, towards him.

“Saxony has delivered my Patkul to Sweden!” he said.

“Alas, poor gentleman!” cried Katherina, in genuine distress.

Peter kissed her fiercely.

“What do you think I shall do, my rose?” he asked.

“Why, rescue him, Peter Alexievitch.”

“That, if I can--if I am too late--” the veins stood out on his forehead and a light foam gathered on his lips. “Do you not think I shall avenge him?” he asked pitifully.

Katherina answered as if he had been a child.

“Why, of course,” she said.