The Green Book Part 41

Zeneida saw the rosy glow suffusing the cheeks of the departing girl and the deathly pallor overspreading those of her who remained, as though the one had stolen the life-glow from the other. Bethsaba stood where she had left her, white, motionless, with sunken head, and arms hanging lifeless at her side.

Zeneida at once divined the secret. She went up to her, but hardly had she taken the girl's hands in hers when, falling before her, bitterly weeping, the poor child hid her face in Zeneida's dress.

"Oh, why did you bring me here?"

Zeneida raised her.

"Stand up. Do not cry. He will be yours."

"What! I take him from her?"

"Humph! Were it only 'her' you had to take him from-- But do not be troubled. Love him; you alone deserve his love."

The poor child shook her head sorrowfully. Now she understood the meaning of "love," and with it what "jealousy" and "resignation" meant.

CHAPTER XXVII

PANACEA

Great natural calamities often have a softening effect upon excited ma.s.ses.

The "great power," the people, and the "little master," the Emperor, made friends again in the general distress.

The storm of November, 1824, had been a universal calamity. History knows no other so wide-spreading in its devastating effects. Not only did it lay St. Petersburg in ruins, but it raged throughout Asia and inundated the sh.o.r.es of California. Sailors saw the clear sea in mid-ocean thick with mud and slime; from India to Syria flourishing towns were laid in the dust by earthquakes; volcanoes burst forth in the Greek Archipelago; in Germany many springs were dried up. The whole world was in a state of upheaval. It was no time to think of revolutions.

Political secret societies changed themselves into philanthropic union.

Party spirit died out. The poor went unhesitatingly to claim relief from the rich, and the doors of the rich were ungrudgingly opened to them. The incitements of the "Irreconcilables" found no fruitful ground.

Prince Ghedimin and Araktseieff vied with each other in their efforts to relieve the distress of the people. Each impartially scattered his hundred thousand of rubles abroad: the one forgetting that his aim had been to free, the other to oppress, the people. The people now were in need of neither sword nor chains--only of bread.

Nor were the ladies of St. Petersburg backward in relieving the distress caused by the inundations. Princess Ghedimin presented her diamonds to the committee, the sale of which brought them in thirty thousand rubles, while Zeneida gave a concert at the Exchange for the sufferers, the tickets for which sold for enormous prices, and which realized forty thousand rubles. Prince Ghedimin presented his wife with diamonds double the value of those she had given away. Zeneida received a wreath of laurel from the _jeunesse doree_ of St. Petersburg and an ode from Pushkin. Thus once more had Korynthia lost the game, and her adversary had triumphed.

Those days of tribulation had made the Czar more reserved than ever. His melancholy had dated from the day on which he had witnessed the burning of Moscow, his capital; and now it had been his fate to witness the ruin of his second capital. One had been destroyed by fire, the other by water. Waking and sleeping, the dread visions were before him.

But the saddest sight to him of all was that pale child's face, to which nothing brought animation. One day he said to Sir James Wylie:

"It is vain to try and cure me; my sickness lies within, not without.

Cure Sophie, and I shall be cured."

The physician was silent.

"Tell me frankly. Have you no hope?"

"None."

"Has your medical skill absolutely no panacea, no remedy to preserve a precious life to us--no remedy which day by day might arrest Death hovering on the threshold, and so prolong that dear life from spring to autumn?"

"Yes, there is such a remedy, sire! But it does not grow among health-giving herbs of India. In illnesses such as these the spirits of the patient are the most important factor. Sorrow, grief, and care hasten the catastrophe, while cheerfulness, an equable temperament, joy, and hope delay it. The love of life renews life."

"Humph! How am I to give her joy, hope, and love of life when I have not got them myself?"

A day came which brought joy to the Czar.

His Governor in the Urals announced to him the discovery of new deposits of gold and platinum, with promise of abundant mining. He sent a specimen of the platinum that had been found. A truly valuable discovery!

At the same time arrived a report from the Governor of Jekaterinograd, notifying the discovery in the great desert of a species of beetle which fed on the exuberant knot-gra.s.s (_poligonum_) of those parts, a useless plant and one impossible to extirpate. The beetle in question, known in the learned tongue as _Coccus polonorum_, is identical with the cochineal, and affords the most beautiful purple and pink dye. He sent the Czar, as a sample, a piece of rose-colored silk dyed with the purple of the native beetle.

This was a greater treasure even than gold and platinum; it grows like a weed, gives no trouble, and will support the inhabitants of those inhospitable steppes.

But the third consignment was the most interesting. The Governor of the Amurs sent from Siberia a cask of wine grown in the Amur country. This is a still greater treasure than gold or bread, for it implies a triumph--a triumph in the face of the whole world, which proclaims Siberia to be a frozen h.e.l.l! See! this wine contradicts it! It is more sparkling than champagne, sweeter than Tokay--at least, one must pretend that it is. Siberia can grow wine! Henceforth every Russian must drink it. Siberian wine must supplant foreign wines for the tables of the great; it must compete with Burgundy, the Rhine, and the Hegyalji. To be exiled to Siberia will no longer count as a punishment; those in search of fruitful soil will settle there of their own free-will. Siberia can grow wine! If any one doubts the future of that country, who would argue with him now? One gives him a gla.s.s and fills it. "Try this; this is Siberian wine!"

The Czar was as happy as a child! He still had one joy left.

And he hurried off, on the strength of it, to the Petrowsky Garden house. He had the platinum, the silk, and the cask of wine brought after him, thinking that what gladdened him must also gladden Sophie. The poor child was looking very pale; she was not allowed to go out at all in the winter; the cold air out-of-doors was rapid poison to her; the heated air within-doors slow poison. A strange country, where the invalid cannot even love his home! He hates the sky which kills him and the earth which keeps him bound. It is the survival of the fittest; if a man be strong enough to enjoy a winter in Russia he thrives; if not, he dies.

In every Russian lady's drawing-room is a special corner fitted up called the "Altana."

It is a s.p.a.ce surrounded by a little railing grown with ivy and containing a bower of Southern plants and flowers which, during the long nine months of winter, thrive and blossom in the artificial light and warmth of lamps and stove, and make one forget the rigorous weather outside.

Alexander had had such a fragrant orange grove fitted up for Sophie when the house had been put in order for her after the inundation. He had not been to see her since the court gardener had carried out his instructions; perhaps it had given her pleasure.

Alas! nothing gave her pleasure.

The Czar asked, "What is amiss with you, my darling?"

"An unspeakable sorrow."

To cheer her, he showed her the treasures he had brought with him--the ore, silk, and wine. But her face did not brighten, she did not smile.

To his good news she had but "How nice! how fortunate! Oh, thank you!"

to say.

"Come, tell me, what is amiss with you? There is something more than bodily illness; it is mental trouble. Tell me, what is grieving you? To whom should you tell it if not to me? Who shall place confidence in me if you do not feel it?"

Then, throwing her arms round her father's neck, and drawing his head down to her, Sophie whispered, very low:

"It is love!"

Then, drawing back with abrupt movement, she buried her face in her hands.

Astonished, the Czar asked, "But where can you have met any one to fall in love with?"

"The flood brought us together."

"And who is the man?"