The Green Book Part 77

"Ah, I can guess whither!" she said, laughing. "You are going to see your father, my beloved Maxim."

She had guessed truly!

"You are right, dear granny. That is where I am going." (To the other world.)

"Then take him these kisses--and a hundred more! See, I cannot cry. Old eyes are forever weeping--that is, when one does not want to weep; when one fain would, there are no tears to shed."

Ivan Maximovitch wept in her stead. He was such an "affectionate boy."

"Now, you see, you are going away and leaving me here. And going without having married, without being able to leave me your wife here in your stead."

"But I have married, granny dear," returned Ivan. "And I came purposely to-night to present my wife to you."

"Oh, what a happy day! You are married--you have a little wife! A dear, charming little angel of a wife! And I shall see her soon? That I call indeed a Christmas present!"

But then the old lady must needs temper the joyful news with a little reproach.

"But why have you kept this to yourself until after your wedding, when I have so often told you that I specially wished that your wife should receive her bridal tiara from my hands? That was not right of you! I hope she is of n.o.ble blood."

"She is a Princess Narishkin."

"I suppose you sought the Czar's permission to your marriage?"

"He granted it, grandmother."

"Then I cannot guess why you should have kept it secret from me. Perhaps she did not know Russian when you married, and you were obliged to teach it her first, that she might be able to speak to me, for I know no other language--I am a Muscovite."

Ivan let her suppose that to have been the reason. It was nothing unusual. The St. Petersburg princesses know but little Russian--as little as, at that period, the great ladies of Hungary knew Hungarian.

The sound of the bell at the outer door interrupted their talk. The rustle of a silk dress was heard in the adjoining room. Then Korynthia had fulfilled her husband's wish; she had come, at his entreaty, to meet him at his grandmother's. There were good reasons why Ivan had not gone to her instead of begging her to come here to him--reasons his wife knew well. In society they were to be seen, she leaning on his arm, all affection. But did the husband knock at his wife's door the answer was "You cannot come in." So it had been ever since the night of the 21st of June. Korynthia was unusually pale; her expression cold and resolute.

"Thank you for coming," said her husband to her, in a whisper; and, taking her hand, led her to his grandmother. "My wife, grandmother."

Korynthia bent one knee to Anna Feodorovna, then presented her cheek to the kiss of the "mummy." To-day she was bent on doing all that was required of her. Even the old lady's hand--that hand so withered and parchment-like--she kissed.

The good old woman was beside herself with happiness.

"What a splendid creature! How charming, how lovely she is! How beautifully brought up! And what an exquisite ball-dress she is wearing.

It is easy to see that she has come from the Czar's ball."

Good old lady! She took Korynthia's gown for a ball-dress. In her day silk dresses, trimmed with the delicate lace Korynthia wore upon her dressing-gown, were only worn at court b.a.l.l.s. The grandmother had not seen a fashion-book or interviewed a dressmaker for the past five-and-twenty years. So she thought it was a ball-dress.

"I do not know how the tiara I have been keeping for you will suit that dress. Ihnasko, bring me my jewel-case."

The old lady looked out the antique ornament set with pearls and brilliants, almost worth an earl's ransom, and was in sore perplexity how to place it upon Korynthia's giraffe-like mode of wearing her hair, not arranged to support it. Yet she must, at any price, see it worn.

Korynthia suffered herself to be adorned.

"Ah! now you are handsomer than ever! Wearing that tiara, you can well take her back to the Czar's ball, to be the envy of all."

"No, grandmother, we are not going back," said Ivan. "If you will allow us we will stay with you and pa.s.s our Christmas evening here."

"But what will the Czar say to that?"

"He knows that we are here, and has given us permission to remain."

"Oh, if you have his permission, that is quite another thing, and I shall be glad to have you here. But how can I amuse you? Can your wife play ombre?"

"Oh yes."

"But my cards I play with every day are soiled. I should be ashamed to bring them out."

"My wife will see about getting a fresh pack. Give me permission to tell her where she will find some."

"Of course, dear boy. Ihnasko, you meanwhile can be getting the card-table ready. Dear me! How long it is since I had a game of ombre!

Never since the little dark d.u.c.h.ess and the general's wife have been unable to mount the stairs. Then put out tea and cakes. Now some logs on the fire. We will see who will be the first to get sleepy when once we have warmed to our game. I know I shall not!"

Meanwhile Ivan began speaking in French to his wife, constraining his face to wear as calm an expression as though he were merely explaining whereabouts in his room she would find the cards.

"I am lost. The insurrection which has broken out to-day, and which, I believe, is already quelled, was secretly instigated by me. Prince Trubetzkoi was the _nominal_ Dictator; in reality it was I. I was the guiding hand, he only the mask. Trubetzkoi has already washed his hands of it; he has been to the commander-in-chief and taken the oath of allegiance to the Czar. This leaves me alone in the post of danger. The leadership falls upon me. Nor would I put it back upon his shoulders.

The poor fellow has a young wife who is devotedly fond of him. That I have taken no part in to-day's revolt helps me not in the slightest, for, all the same, I was Dictator. If the papers connected with this movement are discovered I am irrevocably lost, and with me thousands of the highest in the land whose names are inscribed in a book we call 'the green book.' This book must be destroyed!"

"Will you intrust that to me?"

"To whom else? All that I have I possess in common with you. My name, my wealth, my rank are yours; my honor, too, is yours. All this is now at stake; and you can help me--none other."

"Command what shall I do."

"Oh, do not speak so! It is not command, but entreaty. For what I now ask of you I crave as ardently as a man craves forgiveness from his Maker for his sins. That book is in Zeneida Ilmarinen's keeping."

"Ah!"

"I know that you hate her; but without reason, I swear to you! But of what value is the oath of a desperate man? No feeling has ever bound me to that lady that could in any way hurt your woman's pride. It was another tie--far more dangerous to me--but innocuous to you. But you do not believe me. Nor do I ask it. What I do implore is that in this hour of supreme danger you should show yourself magnanimous. If you have had cause of anger against me, forget it for the sake of the honor of the Ghedimin escutcheon, and lose no time in going to Fraulein Ilmarinen's house with this key, which unlocks the hiding-place. I well know the sacrifice I ask of you in begging you to cross that threshold. But I dare not go myself, for were I to be seen in the vicinity of that house I should be at once arrested. But no one will suspect you. See Fraulein Ilmarinen without delay, and tell her of the imminence of the danger, of which she may know nothing. She may have been informed, and, in that case, would certainly have destroyed 'the green book' were it not locked away in a place of safety, only to be broken open with great strength and much loss of time. Throw the book on the fire, and wait until you have seen it reduced to ashes; then hasten back to rescue me from my desperate situation!"

"I will act as beseems a Princess Ghedimin."

"My life and honor I give into your hands."

"I know it." And, taking the key, Korynthia hurried away.

"What a hurry the child is in!" said the old lady.

"She will soon be back."

"With the cards?"

"Yes; with the cards."

"Then, meanwhile, I will make myself smart, that she does not find me looking so untidy."