CHAPTER XLV.--EVIL TIDINGS.

I had now time amply to observe and to appreciate that which had impressed me powerfully at first--the wonderful beauty of the lady who protected me, and who spoke English with such marvellous fluency. If the artist's pencil sometimes fails to convey a correct idea of a woman's loveliness--more than all of her expression--a description by mere ink and type can give less than an outline. In stature she was fully five feet seven, full-bosomed and roundly limbed, and yet seemed just past girlhood, in her twentieth or twenty-second year. Her skin was fair, dazzlingly pure as that of any Saxon girl at home; while, by strange contrast, her eyes were singularly dark, the deepest, clearest, and most melting hazel, with soft voluptuous dreamy-looking lids, and long black lashes. Her eyebrows, which were rather straight, were also dark, while the masses of her hair were as golden in hue as ever were those of Lucrezia Borgia; they grew well down upon her forehead, and in the light of the shaded lamp by which she had been reading, ripples of sheen seemed to pass over them like rays of the sun. Her features were very fine, and her ears were white and delicate as if formed of biscuit china, and from them there dangled a pair of the then fashionable Schogoleff earrings of cannon-balls of gold.

Her dress was violet-coloured silk, cut low but square at the neck, with loose open sleeves, trimmed with white lace and ruches of white satin ribbon, and its tint consorted well with the fair purity of her complexion. Every way she was brilliant and picturesque, and seemed one of those women whom a man may rapidly learn to love--yea, and to love passionately--and yet know very little about. Once in a lifetime a man may see such a face and such a figure, and never forget them. The dame, in the red sarafan, was a somewhat plain but pleasant-looking old Muscovite lady, whose angularity of feature and general outline of face reminded me of a good-humoured tom cat; and while playing idly with the leaves of her book, she regarded me with a rather dubious expression of eye; for British prisoners did not quite find themselves so much at home in Kharkoff and elsewhere, nor were they so petted and fêted, as the Russian prisoners were at Lewes, among the grassy downs of Sussex. My repast over, and the massive silver tray removed by Ivan Yourivitch, a conversation was begun by the younger lady saying, a little playfully,

"You must give me your parole of honour, that you will not attempt to leave this place in secret, or without permission."

"From you?"

"From me, yes."

"Did not duty require it of me, I might never seek the permission, but be too happy to be for ever your captive," said I, gallantly; but she only laughed like one who was quite used to that sort of thing, and held up a white hand, saying,

"Do you promise?"

"I do, on my honour. But will this pledge to a lady be deemed sufficient?"

"By whom?"

"Well, say Prince Menschikoff."

"We shall not consult him, unless we cannot help it; besides," she added, with a proud expression on her upper lip, "what is he, though Minister of Marine, Governor of Finland and Sebastopol, but the grandson of a pastry-cook!"

"Prince Gortchakoff, then?"

"They are cousins; but do not take rank even in Russia with the old families, like the Dolgourikis and others, who are nobles of the first class."

On the suggestion, apparently, of the elder lady, whom she named Madame Tolstoff, she proceeded to ask me many questions, which I cared not to answer, as they had direct reference to the strength of our forces, and the plans and projects of the Allied Generals regarding Sebastopol; and though my information was only limited to such as one of subaltern rank could possess, I knew how artfully the most important military and political secrets have been wormed from men by women, and was on my guard. Her excellent English she accounted for by telling me that in her girlhood she had an English governess. She told me, among other things, that she had gone in her carriage, with hundreds of other ladies from Sebastopol, Simpheropol, and Bagtchi Serai (or "the Seraglio of Gardens"), to see the battle of the Alma. It began quite like a prasnik or holiday with them all, as they had expected, among other marvels, to see St. Sergius, whose sacred image was borne by the Kazan column, till the latter was routed by the Highland Brigade, and bundled over the hill, image and all, though Innocent, Archbishop of Odessa, in one of his sermons to the garrison of Sebastopol (published in the Russian Messenger) confidently predicted a fourth appearance of the patriotic saint on that occasion; but my fair informant added, that when the fighting began, she had driven away homeward in horror.

She quizzed me a little about the small dimensions of the island in which we dwelt, an island where the people elbowed each other for lack of room; she asked me if it were really true that our soldiers were sailors; and if it was also true that our Admiral in the Baltic always carried a little sword under one arm, and a great fish under the other, alluding to a popular Moscow caricature of Sir Charles Napier. It was impossible not to laugh with her, for her charming tricks of foreign manner, the arch smiles of her occasionally half-closed eyes, and her pretty ways of gesticulation with the loveliest of white hands, from which she had now drawn the gloves, were all very seductive; moreover the Russians have a natural mode of imbuing with heartiness every phrase and expression, however simple or merely polite. She always spoke of the Czar with more profound awe and respect than even Catholics do of the Pope, or Mahometans do of the Sultan; but it should be borne in mind that in Russia, as Golovine says, "next to the King of Heaven, the Czar is the object of adoration. He is, in the estimation of the Russian, the representative and the elect of God; so he is the head of his church, the source of all the beatitudes, and the first cause of all fear. His hand distributes as bounteously as his arm strikes heavily. Love, fear, and humble respect are blended in this deification of the monarch, which serves most frequently only to task the cupidity of some, and the pusillanimity of others. The Czar is the centre of all rays, the focus to which every eye is directed; he is the 'Red Sun' of the Russians, for thus they designate him. The Czar is the father of the whole nation; no one has any relation that can be named in the same day with the Emperor; and when his interest speaks, every other voice is hushed!"

So, whenever this lady spoke of him, her eyes seemed to fill with melting light, and her cheek to suffuse with genuine enthusiasm; and as I listened to her, and looked upon her rare beauty, her singular hair, her laughing lips; and her ease of manner that declared a perfect knowledge of the world, I could not but confess that if there is no absolute cure for a heart disappointed in love, there may be found a most excellent balm for it. I know not now all we talked of, how much was said, and more left unsaid, for my new friend had all the airs of a coquette, and could fill up her sentences in a very eloquent fashion of her own, by a movement of the graceful hand, by the tapping of a dainty foot that would peep out ever and anon from under her violet-coloured skirt; with a blush, a smile, a drooping of the sunny brown eyes! Had the wine, the golden Crimskoi, affected me, that, while talking to the fair unknown, I seemed to tread on air; that my love for Estelle--a love thrust back upon my heart--was already--Heavens, already!--being replaced by an emotion of revenge against her, and exultation that the dazzling Russian might love me in her place? She was, indeed, gloriously beautiful; but, then, I have ever been a famous builder of castles in the air, and I was in the hands of one who felt her power and knew how to wield it. The Russian women, it has been truly written, like the gentlewomen of other European countries, who are reared in the lap of luxury, can employ and practise all the accomplishments and seductive arts that most enchant society, and employ them well! They have great vivacity of mind, much grace of manner, and possess the most subtle and exquisite taste in dress; yet the domestic virtues are but little cultivated under the double-headed Eagle, and marriages are too often mere matters of convenience; so there is little romance in the character, and often much of intrigue in the conduct of the Russian lady.

"I trust that your wounds are not painful?" said she, with tender earnestness, after a short pause, during which she perceived me to wince once or twice.

"My immersion in salt water has made them smart, perhaps; and then the blood I have lost has caused such a dimness of sight, that at times, even while speaking with you, though I hear your voice, your figure seems to melt from before me."

"I am so deeply sorry to hear this; but a night's repose, and perhaps the rest of to-morrow may, nay, I doubt not shall, cure you of this weakness."

"I thank you for your good wishes and intentions."

"In that skirmish, fought single-handed by you against our Cossacks, they thrust you into the water--actually into the sea?"

"Yes; by the mere force of their charged lances--horse and man we went over together; but not before I had shot their leader--a resolute fellow--poor Volhonski!"

At this name both ladies started and changed colour, though the younger alone understood me.

"Whom did you say?" she asked, in a voice of terror, while trembling violently.

"Paulovitch Count Volhonski, a name well known in the Russian army, I believe; he commanded the Vladimir regiment at the Alma and in Sebastopol."

"And he--he fell by your hand?"

"I regret to say that he did," I replied, slowly and perplexedly.

"You know him, and are certain of this?"

"Certain as that I now address you--most certain, to my sorrow."

"O Gospodi pomiloui!"[4] she exclaimed, clasping her hands together, and seeming now pale as the new-fallen snow; "my brother--my brother!"

"Your brother?" I exclaimed, in genuine consternation.

"Slain by you--your hand!" she wailed out, wildly and reproachfully.

"O, it cannot be."

"Speak--how?" She stamped her foot as she spoke, and no prettier foot in all Russia could have struck the carpet with a more imperial air. Her eyes were flashing now through tears; even her teeth seemed to glisten; her hands were clenched, and I felt that she regarded me, for the time, with hate and loathing.

"He fell, and his horse, too--yet, now that I think of it," I urged, "he may be untouched; and from my soul I hope that such may be the case, for personally he is my friend."

I felt deeply distressed by the turn matters had so suddenly taken; while Madame Tolstoff, to whom she now made some explanation in Russian, regarded me with fierce and undisguised hostility.

"Then there is yet hope?" she asked, piteously.

"That he may be simply wounded--yes."

"For that hope I thank you, Hospodeen: a little time shall tell us all."

"I was attacked and outnumbered; my own life was in the balance, and I knew him not, nor did he know me, until we were at close quarters, in the moment of his fall. To defend oneself is a natural impulse; and it has been truly said, that if a man armed with a red-hot poker were to make a lunge even at the greatest philosopher, he would certainly parry it, though he were jammed between two sacks of gunpowder. Then I have the honour of addressing the Hospoza Valerie?"

"Yes," she replied, with hauteur; "but who are you, that know my name?"

"I am Captain Henry Hardinge, who--"

"The Hospodeen Hardinge" (Hardinovitch she called it), "who so greatly befriended my dear brother in Germany, and who saved his life at Inkermann?"

"The same."

"I cannot receive you with joy; the present terrible tidings cloud all the past. Yet I have promised to protect you," she added, giving me both her hands to kiss, "and protected you shall be--even should my dead brother be borne here to-night!"

So the slender girl with the dark orbs and golden hair, she of whose miniature I had custody for a little time on that memorable and exciting morning in the Heiligengeist Feld at Hamburg, was now a lovely woman in all the budded bloom of past twenty--a fair Russian, with "more peril in her eyes than fifty of their swords!"

I felt sincere sorrow for the grief and consternation I had so evidently and so naturally excited, and I greatly feared that the hostility of the elder lady, Madame Tolstoff, might yet work me some mischief; though I knew not in what relation she could stand to Volhonski, who, at Hamburg, had distinctly said that his sister Valerie was the only one he had in the world. While I sat silently listening, and not without an emotion of guiltiness in my heart, to their sobs and exclamations of woe, uttered singly and together, the rapid clatter of hoofs, partially muffled by the snow, was heard without; bells sounded and doors were banged; and then Ivan Yourivitch, his old wrinkled face full of excitement and importance, entered the room unsummoned. My heart for a moment stood still.

"What fresh evil tidings," thought I, "does this old Muscovite bring us now?"