CHAPTER XXIV

"THEN YOU ARE NOT--?"

The pretty story-teller had had listeners.

As the door opened she perceived three well-known faces, those of Zeneida, Pushkin, her rescuer of the night before, and Jakuskin, the man at the helm of the boat. The two men were covered with mud; it was plain to see that they had just come in again from their work of mercy.

"We were listening to you," said Zeneida. "Your audience were enchanted."

"When I was travelling in the Caucasus," said Jakuskin, "I chanced to hear that very fable. The man with the green eyes is the allegorical symbol of Caucasian fever, so rife there. The meaning of it is, that whoever has received the incubation of that fever, whether he be wounded in battle, mangled by wild beasts, or swallowed up by the sea, will meet no other death than that prepared for him by the green-eyed spectre!"

Bethsaba saw Pushkin standing before her. She gazed into those eyes in which to look out one's very soul must be so sweet, and held out her hand to him.

"I have not yet thanked you for having saved my life. You came just in time. I could not have kept my seat an instant longer."

"But how could the Duchess have allowed you to be there at all?" asked Pushkin, in tones of reproach.

"I begged her to let me do it. I was so sorry for her, for she was so terrified, and even began to cry, a thing I could not stand. Do you know whether she reached home safely?"

"She is perfectly well. I inquired. I assure you that my sole reason for going expressly to her palace to make inquiries was that I knew your first thought would be for her. There is nothing the matter with her. She went off at once last night in her boat to Peterhof, where she is in safety. She must have passed this very castle; but, of course, her only reason for not stopping to take you in was because she felt satisfied that you were in good keeping."

And Bethsaba saw no irony in the words; for, in truth, she felt quite happy in the place where she had those eyes to look into.

"And now I can give you nothing in return for having saved me, for I am so poor."

"Like me," returned Pushkin.

And Zeneida whispered in his ear:

"Oh, the boundless riches that would come from the union of your poverty!"

Bethsaba turned back to her washing apparatus.

"Please let me go back to my work. Duty before everything!"

"Blessed be the hands that perform it!" said Pushkin.

And each word of his was music in Bethsaba's ears.

"Now I know that I love him," thought she to herself. "I am fully convinced of that. But does he love me?"

"We must now leave you," said Pushkin. "I only came to bring you news from Ghedimin Castle. We must be getting back. The flood is still rising; the whole of St. Petersburg is under water. There is no end of work for us to do; but we shall be coming backwards and forwards many times in the course of the day. I shall have many gifts to lay at your feet, dear Princess."

Gifts! Did not her godmother tell her that the Russian youth brings gifts to his lady-love? So then--

"Gifts?" she asked, with naïve 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 Duchess 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, bosh!" 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 attitude 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 noble 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 scum 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 'kvass' 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 êtes retourné de Sainte-Hélène?_' 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 masses of ice washing 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 nobleman _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."

The two men hastened down to their boat. Zeneida went back to Bethsaba. The Princess had by this time dressed all the mujik children.

"Now, children," said Zeneida, "go prettily, hand in hand, to the winter garden; there you will get your breakfast, and then you may play."

Winter garden! palm grove! What sounds for poor children's ears!

Then, turning to Bethsaba, she said:

"Now, dear little Princess, you remain here. Take a good hot bath; it will do you good after your yesterday's exposure. I will be back in an hour. There is a bell; ring for all you want."

Bethsaba's head was all confused. Everything was so new and strange to her.

A pleasant sense of fatigue stole over nerves and imagination after the bath. What a pity that there was no one here to whom she could confide her thoughts and feelings! It would have been so nice! If only Sophie were here! Ah, if she were here there would be no further reason for alarm. Two young girls together are the very essence of heroism! And now she began to wonder what could have happened to Sophie in this dread time. Had any one thought to go to her assistance? had she listened to the alarm signals and thundering cannon with despair in her heart? What tears she must have shed as she looked out of her windows at the rising expanse of icy water! Bethsaba shuddered. Her excited fancy pictured her friend kneeling, with uplifted hands, before her holy images, imploring help. Would that prayer be answered? Or was it but a faint breath, lost in the rushing of the _Auster_?

Folding her hands, she prayed that help might be given to Sophie. Perhaps the combined prayer of two maidens might have greater efficacy. What a pity that there was no holy image in the room! She was forced to shut her eyes, that some Buddhist idol might not think she was addressing her prayer to him.

Thus Zeneida, on her return, found her.

"What, praying again, Princess? This is the time to be up and doing."

"But what can I do?"

"First of all, drink down this wine soup that I have brought for you. I want to see you quite well and strong again, for I want your aid."

"My aid?"

"Now sit down and take your breakfast while I unfold my plan."

Bethsaba trembled. The thought of the dragon in the fairy story struck her, who first feasts the captured children on almonds and raisins and then slays them. She could scarce get down her soup.

"I dare say you know that one-storied house standing in a garden, near the engineer's buildings, where a young girl and her old servant live?"

Bethsaba lost not a syllable.

"According to water-mark measurements that house stands four cubits lower than this; hence the water which has encroached here to the castle steps has already flooded the ground floor, and is reaching up to the windows of the first story, and the water is still rising. But one cubit more and it will be rushing through the windows in the first story. Now, if the flood lasts another two or three days, which, unfortunately, is but too certain, that poor, delicate child will be in despair. Her only protector dare not go to her help on account of his high position; those he has sent have gone away without accomplishing their errand, for the girl is obstinate and mistrustful. She will not trust herself to strangers, for she dreads meeting the same fate as did Princess Tarrakonoff. There is therefore no other means of saving her from the endangered house than for you to come with us, for she loves and trusts you. On hearing your voice she will readily let herself down from her balcony into the boat; then we will bring her here, and you can occupy the same room together while the danger lasts. You will not be alone in this anxious time, and she will feel comforted in your society; and, the time of peril happily over, we will drive her back to her home."

Bethsaba had forgotten her breakfast while Zeneida was speaking; her eyes opened wider and wider, her cheeks rounded and flushed; she laughed with tears in her eyes; and as Zeneida finished she jumped up from her chair, and, placing both hands on Zeneida's shoulders, looked trustfully into her eyes, as she joyfully said:

"Oh, then, you are not the devil!"

Zeneida broke into a peal of laughter.

"Who told you that I was?"

"My godmother. But I see now that it was all a lie."

"It was only a manner of speaking. If one dislikes any one very much, one says that he or she is a devil."

"It was on account of the stag that my godmother was so angry with you, was it not?"

"Yes; for that."

"But she need not then have frightened me so by telling me that the devil looked just like you."

"Oh, little goose! There is no such thing as a devil. Only that people like to ascribe their own wicked imaginings to an ideal being, who, in reality, has nothing to do with the evil within them."

"But you are a real fairy, then! For you read into my very soul, and how anxious I was about Sophie, and longing to see her. It was just for that that I was praying, that my darling little Sophie might be saved and brought here. And then you come in and bring me, like the message in the Gospel, the comforting answer: 'Go yourself and fetch her!' And do you still venture to affirm that there is no good in prayer?"

"To those who believe it is good," replied Zeneida, kissing the girl's forehead; upon which the latter, throwing her two arms lovingly round Fräulein Ilmarinen's neck, said:

"Let us say 'thou' to each other."

And they signed the compact with a kiss. Then joyously running to the table, Bethsaba drank her wine soup almost at a breath. There was a little left in the glass.

"That you must drink; I left it for you."

And the bond was sealed.

"I am quite ready; let us go," said Bethsaba.

"Wait just a few minutes. We will let the gentlemen get away first. We will go out by the garden gate, and take only one man to steer and another for the boat-hook."

"Then we will row, won't we? I am accustomed to it, and strong as iron."

"It would be no use. The boat can only be sculled through the ice, especially against the current, and that will be done with the boat-hook."

"Well, I am still convinced that you are a good fairy, Zeneida. You will call me Betsi, won't you? And I must tell you that I am not at all afraid of good spirits. Oh, we have so many at home! Tamara is queen of them. For if you were not a fairy, how could you know that the flood was going to last two or three days longer?"

"There is no magic in that, dear little Betsi, for the barometer hanging over there against the wall is pointing to continued storms. Moreover, the city archives tell us that the danger always lasts several days when a southwest wind causes the Neva to overflow its bank."

"Well, that certainly is simple enough. So it was no prophecy? But then you said something else--that that gentleman, Sophie's only protector, could not go to her help. Now what barometer told you that?"

"Humph!" Zeneida, pressing her lips together, reflected for a moment, then said, "Do you know who that illustrious person is?"

"Of course I do. Why, how often have I met him at Sophie's and have told him fairy tales! And Sophie has told me everything; things that no one else knows anything about. But I will tell them to you, for people who love each other must have no secrets--don't you think so?"

"Certainly! Well, then, dear child, all this time that illustrious personage has been unable to go to Sophie, because, since the flooding of the Greater Neva, it has been necessary for him to show himself wherever the danger was greatest, in order, by his presence, to stimulate others to the task of assistance and to insure success. Had he, instead of this, gone to Sophie, who lives on the Lesser Neva, there would have been fearful rioting. Do you understand this?"

"Yes, indeed, I understand too well," returned Bethsaba, sorrowfully.

"But to-day they do not allow that illustrious personage to show himself in the inundated streets."

"Who?"

"His advisers."

"Why not?"

"Because they have discovered a plot against his life."

"Oh, how sad!" sighed Bethsaba. Then her mind flew to the last link of her chain of thought: "A plot against the life of the Czar, and known to Zeneida! From whom could she have obtained the knowledge so quickly? From those two men; but from which?"

Timidly approaching Zeneida, and leaning over her shoulder, she whispered:

"It was not the younger man of the two, was it, who told you?"

"No, no," replied Zeneida, to whom the child's whole soul was revealed. "Fear nothing for him! His hand and heart are clear from it."

"And you are in it?" asked the girl, touching Zeneida's breast with the tip of her finger.

Zeneida was startled by the direct questions. Was it childish curiosity, or had it a deeper meaning? Bethsaba remarked her surprise.

"You see, there can be no secrets where love is. I will tell you all I know, and what hitherto I have told to no one--not even to my godmother, whom I believe I fear more than I love. But you I love so very, very much, and that is why I am going to tell what I know, and how awfully they plot against him. He himself told Sophie. In Petrovsko the rebellious soldiers and peasants would not allow him to go farther; they insulted and threatened him to that degree that he had to turn back. Now these people were ragged and starving, and I can understand their being angry with him. But what complaint have you against him? You are rich, beautiful, and fêted. Why, then, are you one of the conspirators?"

An idea flashed into Zeneida's mind. This child might form the link in the chain that was still wanting.

"Come nearer; let us whisper it, that even the walls do not hear. I, too, love you, and will frankly tell you all I know. I, too, am in the conspiracy, and play an important part in it."

"What reason have you?"

"I am a 'Kalevaine.'"

"And what is a 'Kalevaine'?"

"In Soumalain language, that which you are in the Circassian language. A girl who, when she came into the world, had a home she no longer has, whose nation, then Soumalain, is now known as Finnish. Doubtless you remember as clearly as I do the people and places you were among up to your sixth year, whom you may never look on again, and yet whom you never can forget?"

"Oh, it is true."

"Is it not? Amid all the pomp and splendor the world can give, in the midst of the most brilliant court festivities, do you not feel a sudden pang at heart when the thought of your dark native woods flashes across you; of the horsemen, on their fiery steeds, coursing over the rushing mountain streams; of the blue mountains in the far distance, and your ancestral castle, in which, enthroned, your father received the homage of his vassals?"

"Oh yes, yes."

"And even now you remember the legends told you by the murmuring streams of your native land?"

"You are right; you are right."

"Well, then, you see, so it is with me. My recollections, like the mighty roll of the Imatras, are forever surging in my soul. Just as little can I forget those moss-covered rocks, the most ancient peak in the whole world, the Fata Morgana of our Finnish plains; the red-roofed houses, with low beams across the rooms, from which hung strings of loaves; the legends of Kalevala, and its people's freedom, of which my father used so often to tell me. Then I did not understand all he said; now I recall all and--understand him."

"I, too, recall; but I do not understand it yet."

"The Czar has deprived you, as me, of our fatherland; he has deprived our people of their freedom! And, as through him we became orphaned, homeless, so he became a father to us in place of our own fathers. For our little kingdoms he has given us a great one; for our quiet homes, pomp and splendor. As a man, he has been a father to us; as Czar, a tyrant. For the one I cannot be ungrateful to him; for the other I cannot forgive him. So I stand hemmed in by two conflicting duties. As my adopted father, it is my duty to shield his sensitive heart, to protect him from the assassin's dagger, from pain and sickness; but at the same time I am bound to deliver my country from the iron grasp of the tyrant, to snatch from it my people and their freedom. Do you understand?"

"I see you fly before me; but I cannot follow your flight, cannot catch you up. Tell me, is 'he' too in the conspiracy?"

Zeneida knew whom she meant by "he."

"No. He dare not! I will not suffer him to take part in it."

"Oh, then permit me, too, to remain out of it. Had you told me he was in it, I must, too, have been."

"That's right! You shall keep each other out of it. But, all the same, you must stand by me in one part of the hard duty."

"Tell me what I must do! I will obey implicitly."

"Our first thought must be to bring Sophie here, and to acquaint him whose heart is heavy on her account that he need be anxious no longer."

"Will you allow me to be the first to go in to Sophie?"

"You alone; she would not trust any one else."

And Bethsaba could not have desired greater happiness than to be the one privileged to step from the boat on to the balcony of the mysterious house in Petrovsky Garden. The flood had already risen to the balcony, and she it was who might hasten in to the neglected girl and say, "You are saved!"

The poor child was already without provisions or fuel of any description, for everything in the inundated cellar and dining-room was spoiled by water. Wrapped in her furs, she sat at the window, breathing upon it to make a clear space, and gazing with dismay at the huge blocks of ice floating unimpeded over the wrecked fence. Some, with their sharp edges, cut through the great trees opposing them as with a saw; others were tossed lengthwise against their barks, those following hurled upon them, until suddenly a great silver birch would go down with a crash. Once the resistance formed by the trees swept down, the house must follow. A pencil and paper lay prepared upon her writing-table, a carrier-dove in its cage beside it. They had been brought her by the Czar, that she might let him know when danger was imminent.

She was waiting to send off her message until the extreme moment, for she knew the grave difficulties which surrounded his coming to her rescue.

Thus her joy may be imagined on seeing Bethsaba appear on the balcony.

Seizing her pencil, Sophie wrote, with trembling fingers, "I am saved and in good hands; have no further anxiety for me!" Then tying her note on to the carrier-dove's wing, she set it loose. It flew up high in the air, then disappeared in the direction of the Winter Palace.

She did not ask where they were taking her, but followed Bethsaba in good faith.