The Red Symbol Part 32

"Guessed it first time," he drawled. "Could any one else in this world garble quotations so horribly? If he would only give 'em in German they would be more endurable, but he insists on exhibiting his English. By the way, he has relinquished his vendetta."

"That on Carson's account?"

"Yes, he believes the murderer, or murderers, must have been wiped out in that affair where you came to grief so signally. He had heard about it before he saw your stuff, though no official account was allowed to get through; and he gave me some rather interesting information, quite gratuitously."

"Does it concern me, or--any one I know?" I asked, steadying my voice with an effort.

"Well, not precisely; since you only know the lady by repute, and by her portrait."

I remembered that Von Eckhardt was the one person besides myself who was aware of Anne's ident.i.ty, which I had betrayed to him in that one unguarded moment at Berlin, for which I had reproached myself ever since. True, before I parted from him, I had exacted a promise that he would never reveal the fact that he knew her English name; never mention it to any one. But he was an erratic and forgetful individual; he might have let the truth out to Southbourne, but the latter's face, as I watched it, revealed nothing.

"Oh, that mysterious and interesting individual," I said indifferently.

"Do you mind telling what he said about her?"

"Not at all. It appears that he admires her enthusiastically, in a quite impersonal sort of way--high-flown and sentimental. He's a typical German! He says she is back in Russia, with her father or uncle. She belongs to the Va.s.silitzi family, Poles who have been political intriguers for generations, and have suffered accordingly. They're actively engaged in repairing the damage done to their precious Society in that incident you know of, when all the five who formed the executive, and held and pulled the strings, were either killed or arrested."

This was startling news enough, and it was not easy to maintain the non-committal air of mild interest that I guessed to be the safest.

Still I think I did manage it.

"That's queer," I remarked. "He said the Society had turned against her, condemned her to death."

Southbourne shrugged his shoulders slightly.

"I'm only repeating what he told me. Thought you might like to hear it.

She must be an energetic young woman; wish I had her on my staff. If you should happen to meet her you can tell her so. I'd give her any terms she liked to ask."

Was he playing with me,--laughing at me? I could not tell.

"All right, I'll remember; though if she's in Russia it's very unlikely that I shall ever see her in the flesh," I said coolly. "Did he say just where she was? Russia's rather vague."

"No. Shouldn't wonder if she wasn't Warsaw way. McIntyre--he's at Petersburg in your place--says they're having no end of ructions there, and asked if he should go down,--but it's not worth the risk. He's a good man, a safe one, but he's not the sort to get stuff through in defiance of the censor, though he's perfectly willing to face any amount of physical danger. So I told him not to go; especially as we shan't want any more sensational Russian stuff at present; unless--well, of course, if you should happen on any good material, you can send it along; for I presume you are not going over to Soper, eh?"

"Of course I'm not!" I said with some warmth. Soper was chief proprietor of several newspapers in direct opposition to the group controlled by Southbourne, and he certainly had made me more than one advantageous offer,--the latest only a week or two back, just after my Russian articles appeared in _The Courier_.

"I didn't suppose you were, though I know he wants you," Southbourne rejoined. "I should rather like to know what you are up to; but it's your own affair, of course, and you're quite right to keep your own counsel. Anyhow, good luck to you, and good-bye, for the present."

I was glad the interview was over, though it left me in ignorance as to how much he knew or suspected about my movements and motives. I guessed it to be a good deal; or why had he troubled to tell me the news he had heard from Von Eckhardt? If it were true, if Anne were no longer in danger from her own party, and was again actively a.s.sociated with it, her situation was at least less perilous than it had been before, when she was threatened on every side. And also my chances of getting into communication with her were materially increased.

I related what I had learned to Mishka, who made no comment beyond a grunt which might mean anything or nothing.

"Do you think it is true?"

"Who knows? It is over a fortnight since I left; and many things may happen in less time. Perhaps we shall learn when we return, perhaps not."

In some ways Mishka was rather like a Scotsman.

A few days later his preparations were complete. The real or ostensible object of his visit to England was to buy farm implements and machinery, as agent for his father, who, I ascertained, was land steward of part of the Zostrov estates, and therefore a person of considerable importance.

That fact, in a way, explained Mishka's position, which I have before defined as that of "confidential henchman." I found later that the father, as the son, was absolutely devoted to their master, who in his turn trusted them both implicitly. They were the only two about him whom he could so trust, for, as he had once told me, he was surrounded by spies.

Mishka's business rendered my re-entry into the forbidden land an easily arranged matter. Several of the machines he bought were American patents, and my role was that of an American mechanic in charge of them.

As a matter of fact I do know a good deal about such things; and I had never forgotten the apprenticeship to farming I had served under my father in the old home. Poor old dad! As long as he lived he never forgave me for turning my back on the farm and taking to journalism, after my college course was over. He was all the more angry with me because, as he said, in the vacation I worked better than any two laborers; as I did,--there's no sense in doing things by halves!

It would have been a very spry Russian who had recognized Maurice Wynn, the physical wreck that had left Russia in the custody of two British police officers less than three months back, in "William P. Gould," a bearded individual who spoke no Russian and only a little German, and whose pa.s.sport--issued by the American Minister and duly _vised_ by the Russian Amba.s.sador in London--described him as a native of Chicago.

Also we travelled by sea, from Hull to Riga, taking the gear along with us; which in itself minimized the chance of detection.

We were to travel by rail from Riga to Wilna, via Dunaburg; and the rest of the journey, rather over than under a hundred and twenty miles, must be by road, riding or driving. From Wilna the goods we were taking would follow us under a military escort.

"How's that?" I asked, when Mishka told me of this. "Who's going to steal a couple of wagon-loads of farm things?"

His reply was enigmatic.

"You think you know something of Russia, because you've seen Petersburg and Moscow, and have never been more than ten miles from a railroad.

Well, you are going to know something more now; not much, perhaps, but it may teach you that those who keep to the railroad see only the froth of a seething pot. We know what is in the pot, but you, and others like you, do not; therefore you wonder that the froth is what it is."

A seething pot. The time soon came when I remembered his simile, and acknowledged its truth; and I knew then that that pot was filled with h.e.l.l-broth!

CHAPTER x.x.xIII

THE ROAD TO ZOSTROV

Even before we left Riga,--where we were delayed for a couple of days getting our goods through the Customs and on to the train,--I realized somewhat at least of the meaning of Mishka's enigmatic utterance. Not that we experienced any adventures. I suppose I played my part all right as the American mechanic whose one idea was safeguarding the machinery he was in charge of. Anyhow we got through the necessary interviews with truculent officials without much difficulty. Most of them were unable to understand the sort of German I chose to fire off at them, and had to rely on Mishka's services as interpreter. The remarks they pa.s.sed upon me were not exactly complimentary,--low-grade Russian officials are foul-mouthed enough at the best of times, and now, imagining that I did not know what they were saying, they let loose their whole vocabulary,--while I blinked blandly through the gla.s.ses I had a.s.sumed, and, in reply to a string of filthy abuse, mildly suggested that they should get a hustle on, and pa.s.s the things promptly.

I quite appreciated the humor of the situation, and I guess Mishka did so, too, for more than once I saw his deep-set eyes twinkle just for a moment, as he discreetly translated my remarks, and, at the same time, cordially endorsed our tyrants' freely expressed opinions concerning myself.

"You have done well, 'Herr Gould,' yes, very well," he condescended to say, when we were at last through with the troublesome business. "We are safe enough so far, though for my part I shall be glad to turn my back on this hole, where the trouble may begin at any moment."

"What trouble?" I asked.

"G.o.d knows," he answered evasively, with a characteristic movement of his broad shoulders. "Can you not see for yourself that there is trouble brewing?"

I had seen as much. The whole moral atmosphere seemed surcharged with electricity; and although as yet there was no actual disturbance, beyond the individual acts of ruffianism that are everyday incidents in all Russian towns, the populace, the sailors, and the soldiery eyed each other with sullen menace, like so many dogs, implacably hostile, but not yet worked up to fighting pitch. A few weeks later the storm burst, and Riga reeked with fire and carnage, as did many another city, town, and village, from Petersburg to Odessa.

I discerned the same ominous state of things--the calm before the storm--at Dunaburg and Wilna, but it was not until we had left the railroad and were well on our two days' cross-country ride to Zostrov that I became acquainted with two important ingredients in that "seething pot" of Russian affairs,--to use Mishka's apt simile. Those two ingredients were the peasantry and the Jews.

Hitherto I had imagined, as do most foreigners, whose knowledge of Russia is purely superficial, and does not extend beyond the princ.i.p.al cities, that what is termed the revolutionary movement was a conflict between the governing cla.s.s,--the bureaucracy which dominates every one from the Tzar himself, an autocrat in name only, downwards,--and the democracy. The latter once was actively represented only by the various Nihilist organizations, but now includes the majority of the urban population, together with many of the n.o.bles who, like Anne's kindred, have suffered, and still suffer so sorely under the iron rule of cruelty, rapacity, and oppression that has made Russia a byword among civilized nations since the days of Ivan the Terrible. But now I realized that the movement is rendered infinitely complex by the existence of two other conflicting forces,--the _moujiks_ and the Jews.

The bureaucracy indiscriminately oppresses and seeks to crush all three sections; the democracy despairs of the _moujiks_ and hates the Jews, though it accepts their financial help; while the _moujiks_ distrust every one, and also hate the Jews, whom they murder whenever they get the chance.

That's how the situation appeared to me even then, before the curtain went up on the final act of the tragedy in which I and the girl I loved were involved; and the fact that all these complex elements were present in that tragedy must be my excuse for trying to sum them up in a few words.

I've knocked around the world somewhat, and have had many a long and perilous ride through unknown country, but never one that interested me more than this. I've said before that Russia is still back in the Middle Ages, but now, with every verst we covered, it seemed to me we were getting farther back still,--to the Dark Ages themselves.

We pa.s.sed through several villages on the first day, all looking exactly alike. A wide thoroughfare that could not by any stretch of courtesy be called a street or road, since it showed no attempt at paving or making and was ankle-deep in filthy mud, was flanked by irregular rows of low wooden huts, reeking with foulness, and more like the noisome lairs of wild beasts than human habitations. Their inhabitants looked more b.e.s.t.i.a.l than human,--huge, s.h.a.ggy men who peered sullenly at us with swinish eyes, bleared and bloodshot with drunkenness; women with shapeless figures and blunt faces, stolid masks expressive only of dumb hopeless endurance of misery,--the abject misery that is the lot of the Russian peasant woman from birth to death. I was soon to learn that this centuries' old habit of patient endurance was nearly at an end, and that when once the mask is thrown aside the fury of the women is more terrible, because more deliberate and merciless, than the brutality of the men.