CHAPTER XIV.
THE DEED WHICH RANG THROUGH RUSSIA.
It was not destined that Olga should leave Russia yet.
A terrible event happened within the next few hours, the report ofwhich rang through Russia like a clap of thunder, convulsing the wholenation, and shaking for the moment the entire social fabric to itslowest foundations. And one of its smaller consequences was to ruin myplans and expose me to infinite personal peril.
Olga was to start at noon, and I proposed to see her an hour beforethen, for what I knew would be a very trying ordeal. But I was at thathour in the midst of a very different kind of interview.
Outside official circles I was one of the first men to learn the news.Just before ten o'clock a messenger came with a request for me to go atonce to the chief Police Bureau. I started in the full conviction thatfor some cause Tueski had changed his mind and meant to arrest me. Iwas of course helpless: and could do no more than scribble a hasty lineto Olga telling her of my appointment, asking her not to wait for me,and bidding her good-bye. But I did not send it. The police agentsaid with great politeness he would prefer my not doing anything then:I could send the note equally well from the Bureau. I knew what thatmeant, and yielded.
The moment I arrived at the office I could see that some event ofaltogether unusual importance and gravity had occurred. The air wasladen with the suggestion of excitement. There was an absence of thatorderly, business-like routine always characteristic of Russian publicoffices. The police agents were present in exceptionally largenumbers; hurrying through the corridors, thronging the rooms, andstanding in groups engaged in animated discussion.
I was kept waiting some time, perhaps half an hour, before a word wasspoken to me by anyone in authority; and then I was ushered into thepresence of a man I did not know.
"I am sorry to trouble you, Lieutenant Petrovitch, but there are one ortwo questions you can answer--and I need not say that as a Russianofficer, bearing the Emperor's commission, we shall look to you toreply very fully."
I bowed. It was a fit preface to a conversation which should end assuch things generally did. But at any rate I should learn what theyintended to do with me. Before he spoke again I asked that the letterI had written to Olga might be sent; but he put the question aside,with a curt reply that it could wait until the Emperor's business wasfinished; and again I bowed in acquiescence. I could do nothing.
"Please to tell me exactly what passed between you and M. Tueskiyesterday," he said. "And particularly how you obtained the permitsfor yourself and sister. I invite you to be particularly frank."
The question startled me. I couldn't understand it.
"Your question surprises me," I replied, to gain a little time tothink. "M. Tueski himself knows, and can surely tell you everything."
"I ask my questions in the name of the Emperor, sir," returned myexaminer, sternly.
"M. Tueski had done me the honour of trying to have me murdered, and Iwent to see him to demand the reason. He did not deny it. I persuadedhim in the end to abandon his private malice and prevailed upon him togive me the permits for myself and my sister to leave Russia for awhile. When he had given them to me I left him."
"Where are they?"
"Here is one. The other is with my sister, who leaves Moscow atmidday."
"You may stop her attempting to leave. It will be useless. What elsepassed?" And he then plunged into a close cross-examination of me, thereal object of which I could not guess, unless it meant that Tueski hadin some way got into a mess for letting me have the permits. Ianswered all the questions as fully as possible, taking care only toavoid mentioning Paula Tueski's name in connection with the compactwith her husband.
To my surprise I seemed to satisfy the man for the time. When he hadabout turned me inside out, he sat for some minutes looking over myanswers and comparing them with some of his notes: after which heremained thinking closely.
"What did you do after leaving M. Tueski?"
"I went straight to my rooms to my sister and Madame Tueski; togetherwe drove Madame Tueski to her house; I then went home with my sister,remained there about an hour, or perhaps less; and went home and tobed."
"You have told me all you know, Lieutenant?"
"You can ask M. Tueski," I returned.
He fixed his eyes steadily on me while I could have counted twenty, andthen said slowly and with deep emphasis:--
"M. Tueski is dead."
"Dead!" I repeated in the profoundest surprise.
"Murdered. Found this morning in the lower part of his own house witha dagger thrust through his heart."
"Murdered?" I could scarcely believe my ears.
"Yes. 'For Freedom's sake'," said the man with a curl of the lip. "Atleast, so a message on the dagger said. Now you can understand thesignificance of my questions."
I understood it all well enough: far better than the man himself evenimagined; and I was completely beaten as to what the inner meaning ofthis most terrible event could be.
One of my first reflections was that if any of the suspicions of myNihilism, which the dead man entertained, were chronicled anywhere, myarrest and that of Olga would certainly follow; and we should both bedoomed.
"I can scarcely realise it," I said. "It is horrible!"
"So these wretches will find," returned my interlocutor. "Thesecarrion! But now, in view of this--and I have told you because of thecandid manner in which you have answered my questions--is thereanything you noticed in your visit yesterday to help us."
Clearly, he did not suspect me; and no records had been found yet.
"No. The place seemed alive with inmates--like a rabbit warren.Enough to have held it against a regiment. Good God, what villains!" Icried in horror. Mine was genuine feeling enough, for some of theterrible effects to myself were fast crowding into my thoughts. Irecalled my encounter with my Nihilist comrade on the very threshold ofthe house.
"Of course, those permits will be withdrawn now, Lieutenant," said theofficial as he dismissed me. But his manner was much less severe andcurt than at the outset. "As a matter of fact they ought never to havebeen granted, though I cannot explain why just now. But under thecircumstances you will probably feel personally unwilling to leaveRussia at such a juncture."
"I should feel myself a traitor," said I, grandiloquently; and in factI did feel very much like one as I left him, rejoicing that I stillbreathed the fresh air of heaven instead of the foetid atmosphere of agaol.
One thing was certain now--neither Olga nor I could hope to escape yet.Any attempt would be fatal. The murder of such a man would mean thatthe lurid search light of suspicion would fall in all directions, onthe guilty and guiltless alike. The liberty certainly, and probablythe life, of every suspected Nihilist in Moscow at the moment were atstake: and the slightest trip or false step on our part would amount toa direct invitation to ruin.
As I walked back sadly and thoughtfully to my rooms, I had abundantproofs of the terrible effects of the assassination.% The police agentswere everywhere, watching, raiding, arresting; and in my short walk Imet more than one gloomy party of them, each with its one or twoprisoners in their midst, hurrying on foot or in hired carriages to thepolice stations.
It is not my business, however, to describe here the scenes thatfollowed the most daring, most secret, most thrilling, and save one,most terrible assassination that ever convulsed Russia. The murder ofthe Czar stirred the surface of the world more, because it had more ofthe pageantry of crime about it; but the death of the Chief of theSecret Police caused a much deeper sense of insecurity, and spread afar greater dread of the secret power of Nihilism.
Who had done it? To me it was an inscrutable mystery; unless it hadbeen the man I had seen near the house. But what I had to consider wasnot whose hand had driven the dagger home, but rather what the effectswould be to me and to her for whose safety I now felt more fears andconcern than I had felt for myself in all my life.
One incid
ent in the interview I had just had impressed me greatly: thereference which the official had dropped as to the power behind Tueskiin dealing with me. My questioner had seemed to know about it thatmorning: and all this perplexed me.
As soon as I reached my rooms I had to hurry off to the barracks inresponse to an urgent summons; and I joined readily in the excitedconversation of my comrades about this latest Nihilist stroke. Thenews was only beginning to leak out, and it assumed the wildest shapes;nor did I feel at liberty to reduce the rumours to facts.
Before the morning's work was over orders came that the troops were tobe paraded for duty in the streets: and we were told off for patrolwork in different parts of the city to protect the railway stations,and other public buildings. All that day we were kept on duty; and asother troops came pouring in from other centres the whole place seemedunder arms like a beleaguered town.
All day and all night the raids and surprise visits by the police werein progress, and hundreds, if not thousands of men and women must havebeen arrested, until the gaols were crowded to suffocation point, andevery spot where prisoners could be packed was crammed and choked withsuspects.
The cries and curses of men and the shrieks of women made the airstifling.
We were not relieved until late at night, having been all day withoutfood; and even then we were kept in the barracks in readiness for anydisturbance.
The next day's programme was much the same; and I fretted at not beingable to either see or send to Olga. Knowing of her brother's Nihilismshe would surely think I had been arrested; while I on my side wasafraid for her.
In the afternoon of the third day we got leave from duty and frombarracks for a few hours; and I went straight off to Olga. Meanwhilenot a hint had been obtained as to the identity of the assassin.
I found Olga white and wan and ill on my account; and when we met I wason my side almost too moved for speech. At first I could do no morethan glance into her eyes as we clasped each the other's hand.
"You are looking frightfully ill, Olga," I said at length.
She returned my look without a word and then her brow contracted, shebreathed deeply as if in pain, and turning away wrung her hands with agesture of despair.
"What is the matter? What has happened to you? There must besomething..." I stopped, or rather the sight of the white face alldrawn and quivering with pain stopped me.
"Oh, it is too horrible, too awful! God have mercy on us! God havemercy on us!"
Bad as things were so far as I knew them, this dejection seemeddisproportionate and excessive. She was like a mad woman distraughtwith fear or grief; and she waved her hands about as if wrestling withemotions she could not conquer.
"Oh, it can't be true; it can't be," she moaned; and then came suddenlyto me, turned my face to the light holding it between her whitetrembling hands, and gazed at me with a look of mingled anguish, fear,doubt, wildness, and--love; her lips parted and her bosom rising andfalling as if with the strain of her passionate feelings.
When her scrutiny was over, her hands seemed to slip down and she fellon her knees close to me and I heard her muttering prayers withvehement fervour.
"What does this mean, Olga?" I asked gently, bending down and laying myhand on her shoulder. She looked round and up at my touch, and triedto smile. Then she rose and standing opposite to me, put her hands onmy two shoulders so that her face was close beneath mine. And all thetime she was muttering prayers. Then, in a voice all broken andtremulous, she said:--
"Brother, swear as you believe there is a God in Heaven, you willanswer truly what I ask."
"I will. I swear it," I answered, wishing to quiet her.
"Did you really do this?"
"Do what?" I asked, not understanding.
"Kill Christian Tueski?"
"Did I kill him? No, child, certainly not." I spoke in the greatestastonishment.
"Oaths may bind you to secrecy, I know. But for God's sake, tell methe truth--the truth. You can tell me. I am...." I felt her shudder.
"Is it this which has been driving you distracted? There is no cause.I know no more by whose hand that man came by his death than a babeunborn."
"Say that again, Alexis. Say it again. It is the sweetest music Ihave heard in all my life."
I repeated the assurance, and a smile of genuine relief broke out overher face. Next she cried and laughed and cried again, and then satdown as if completely overcome by the rush of relief from a too heavystrain.
"What does all this mean?" I asked quietly, after a while. "Try andtell me."
"I have been like a mad thing for two days. Let me wait awhile. Iwill tell you presently. Oh, thank God, thank God for what you havesaid. It drove me mad to think you should have been driven to this byme; and that perhaps for my sake you might have been urged to do such ahorrible thing. Waking and sleeping alike I have thought of nothingbut of your suffering torture and death. And all through me--throughme." She covered her face in horror at the remembrance of herthoughts: but a moment later took away her hands to smile at me.
"You have not told me yet what made you think anything of the sort."
"I will tell you. As soon as I heard the news, I knew of course thatas I had been mixed up in some old Nihilist troubles, it would behopeless for me to think of leaving Moscow; and when the police agentcame I let him understand that I had given up all thought of travellingyet. Then I was all anxiety for news of you, and in the afternoon Iwent to your rooms. I found the door shut and could hear nothing.Then I began to fear for you. I am only a woman."
She stopped and smiled to me before resuming. Then with a shudder shecontinued:--
"Then a most strange thing happened, Borlas came to me just at dusk;and he looked so strange that at first I thought he had been drinking.Saying he had a message from you he waited until I had sent the servantaway.
"'What is it?' I asked.
"For answer he gave me a sign that made my heart sink. I knew it toowell, and I looked at him with the keenest scrutiny. Had the Nihilistsput a spy on you even in your own servant? Then I saw--that it was notBorlas, but a man so cleverly made up to resemble him that I had beenat first deceived.
"'What do you want here?' I asked, now with every nerve in my body atfull tension.
"'Do you know?' and the light in his eyes seemed to flash into mine.
"'Do I know what?' I could see there was something behind all this.
"He bent close to me, though we were of course alone, and spoke hisreply in a fierce whisper.
"'Tell your brother that after this proof our hearts beat but for him;our plans shall all wait on him; every man of us will go to his deathsilently and cheerfully at his mere bidding. He leads, we follow. Hehas nobly kept his pledge for the cause of God and Freedom.'
"As I heard this my heart seemed to stop in pain. I had to hold to thetable to save myself from falling."
"'Do you mean,' I gasped, 'that Alexis has murdered....'
"'Silence, sister,' replied the man sternly. 'That is no word for youto utter or for me to hear. Your brother is as true a friend asRussian Liberty ever had; and I thank my God that I have ever beenallowed to even touch the hand that has dealt this vigorous blow anddone this noble and righteous act.'
"'I will tell him,' I said.
"'Tell him also, he need have no fear. Not a man who was at themeeting is in the city now, save me; and not a single soul of thethousands these hell dogs of tyranny can seize knows anything--saveonly me. And I would to the Almighty God they would take me andtorture me and tear my flesh off bit by bit with their cursed red-hotpincers that I might use my last breath and my latest effort to tauntthem that I know the hero who has done it, and die with my knowledge asecret.'
"Then this terrible man, you may not know his name, but I know him,left me, telling me it was 'a glorious day for Russia, and that Godwould smile for ever upon you for this deed.' And I--I was plungedinto a maelstrom of agonising fears, racking doubts, and poisonedthou
ghts about you and what I had led you to do."
What Olga said had also immense importance and significance for me. Itshewed me a startling view of my situation. It was clear the Nihilistsattributed the murder to me, and what effect that would have upon us Iwas at a loss even to conjecture.
"The man's blood is not on my hands, Olga; but I cannot be surprised atthe mistake. I will tell you everything;" and I told her then all thathad passed.
"Who can have done it then?" she asked, when I finished.
"It is as complete a mystery to me as to the police. The man I sawnear the house might have done it; but then I suppose it must have beenthe same man who came to you: and in that case he certainly wouldn'thave set it down to me. I am beaten. But I am likely to find thewrongful inheritance embarrassing. I must be more cautious than everto draw down no word of suspicion upon either of us. We must both bescrupulously careful. And thus it will be impossible for you to thinkof getting away."
"It's a leaden sky that has no silver streak," replied Olga. "And thatimpossibility is my streak."
I could not but understand this, and even while my judgment condemnedher, my heart was warmed by her words. But my judgment spoke.
"If you were away my anxieties would be all but ended."
"If I were away my anxieties would be all but unendurable," sheretorted, following my words and smiling. It was not possible to hearthis with anything but delight; but I had my feelings too well undercontrol now to let them be seen easily.
"That may be," I said. "But my first and chief effort will be to getyou safe across the frontier."
She made no answer: but her manner told me she would not consent to gountil it had become a rank impossibility for her to stay. Presentlyshe said with much feeling:--
"If I had been away and the news had come that you had done the thingthese men assert, how do you think I could have borne it? I shouldhave either come rushing back here or have died of remorse and fear andanxiety on your account. It was through me you commenced all this."
"But of my own choice that I continued," I replied. "And believe me,if all were to come over again I should act in just the same way. Ihave never had such a glorious time before; and all I want now is tosee you safe."
Olga paused to look at me steadily.
"You've never told me all the reason why you were so ready to take allthese desperate risks. Will you tell me now?"
"I had made a mess of things generally, as I told you before," Ianswered, with a smile and a slight flush at the reminiscences thusdisturbed by her question.
"Was there a woman in it?" Her eyes were fixed on me as she put thequestion.
"There's a woman in most things," I answered, equivocally.
"Yes, I suppose so." She turned away and looked down, and asked next:--
"Were you very fond of her, Alexis?"
"Judging by the little ripple that remains on the surface now thatshe's gone out of my life, no: judging by the splash the stone made atfirst, yes. But she's gone."
"Yet the waters of the pool may be left permanently clouded. I amsorry for you, Alexis: and if you were really my brother, I would tryand help you two together."
"That's not altogether a very proper thing to say." I spoke lightly,and she looked up to question me. "Her husband might not thank you, Imean: though I'm not quite sure about that;" and then having told herso much, I told her the story of my last meeting with Sir PhilipCargill and Edith. But she did not take it as I wished.
"You must have loved her if you meant to kill her," she said.
"And ceased then, if I left her to live a miserable life."
"I should like to see the woman you have ceased to love," she said,woman-like in curiosity--and something else.
"You may do that yet, if only Alexis Petrovitch can make a safe way forhis sister out of Russia;" and then I added, pausing and looking at herwith a meaning in my eyes which I wished her to understand though Idared not put it in plain words:--"But we shall not be brother andsister then."
She glanced up hurriedly, her face aglow with a sudden rush ofthought--pleasurable thought too--and then looked down again and smiled.
"In that case how should we two be together?" she asked.
"Do you mean that such a time as this will be likely to render us readyto part?"
To that her only answer was another glance and a deeper blush. Then Imade an effort and recovered myself on the very verge.
"But while we are here, we are brother and sister, Olga;" and feelingthat if I wished to keep other things unsaid I had better go away, Ileft her.