The Price of Power

Chapter Nineteen.

Orders in Cipher

“And pray, Trewinnard, why are you so extremely desirous of following this woman into exile and speaking with her?” inquired the Emperor in French, as I sat with him, a week later, in a small, dismal, tapestried room in the old Castle of Berezov, the Imperial hunting-box on the edge of the Pinsk Marshes, in the Government of Minsk.

Dressed in a rough shooting-suit of drab Scotch tweed, he sat upon the edge of the table smoking a cigarette after a hard day after wild boar.

I had driven since dawn from the wayside station of Olevsk, three hundred miles south of Moscow, where I had arrived tired and famished from my long night and day journey of a week from Brighton.

On arrival in Moscow I had learnt that His Majesty was hunting at Berezov, and a telegram prefixed by the word “Bathildis,” had at once been replied to by a command to audience. Hence I was there, and had placed my appeal before him.

He was much puzzled. In his eyes Madame de Rosen was a dangerous revolutionist who had conspired to kill him, therefore he regarded with entire disfavour my petition to be allowed to see her. There was annoyance written upon his strong features, and by the expression in his eyes I saw that he was entirely averse to granting my request.

“I am anxious, Sire, to see her upon a purely private matter. She was a personal friend,” I replied.

“So you told me some time ago, I recollect,” he remarked, twisting his cigarette between his fingers. “But Markoff has reported that both she and her daughter are highly dangerous to the security of the State. He was speaking of them only the other day.”

I bit my lip fiercely.

“Perhaps he may be misinformed,” I said coldly. “As far as I am aware – and I know both the lady and her daughter Luba intimately – they are most loyal subjects of Your Majesty.”

“Tut,” he laughed. “The evidence put before me was that they actually financed the attempt in the Nevski. I had a narrow escape, Trewinnard – a very narrow one,” he added. “And if you were in my place how would you, I wonder, treat those scoundrels who attempted to kill you – eh?”

“I have no knowledge of the true facts, Sire,” I replied. “All I petition Your Majesty is that I may be granted an Imperial permit for the post-horses, and a personal order from yourself to see and speak with the prisoners.”

He shrugged his shoulders, and thrust his hands deeply in his breeches pockets.

“You do not tell me the reason you wish to see her,” he said with a frown of displeasure.

“Upon a purely private matter,” I said. “To ask her a question concerning a very dear friend. I beg that Your Majesty will not refuse me this request,” I added, deeply in earnest.

“It is a long journey, Trewinnard. I believe she has been sent beyond Yakutsk,” he remarked. “But, tell me, were you a very intimate friend of this woman? What do you actually know of her?”

“All I know of her,” I replied, “is that she is suffering a great wrong, Your Majesty. She is in possession of certain information which closely concerns a friend. Hence my determination to try, if possible, to amend matters.”

“What – you yourself desire to make amends – eh?”

“Not exactly that, Sire,” I replied. “I wish to learn the truth concerning – well, concerning a purely private matter. I think that Your Majesty is convinced of my loyalty.”

“Of course I am, Trewinnard,” was his quick reply. “You have rendered me many important personal services, not the least being your kindness in looking after the welfare of that harebrained little flirt Tattie. By the way, how is she? As much a tomboy as ever, I suppose?” And his big, strong face relaxed into a humorous smile at thought of the girl who, at her own request, had been banished from Court.

“She is greatly improving,” I assured him, with a laugh. “She and Miss West are quite comfortable, and I believe enjoying themselves immensely. Her Highness loves England.”

“And so do I,” he sighed. “I only wish I could go to London oftener. It is to be regretted that my recent visits there have not exactly found favour with the Council of Ministers.” Then, after a long pause, he said: “Well, I suppose I must not refuse this request of yours, Trewinnard. But I fear you will find your winter journey an extremely uncomfortable one. When you are back, come direct to me. I would like to hear the result of your observations. Let me see? Besides the permit to use the post-horses, you will require an order to speak with the prisoner, Marya de Rosen, alone, and an order to the Governor of Tomsk, who has the register which will show to which settlement she has been deported.”

My heart leaped within me, for at first I had feared refusal.

“As Your Majesty pleases,” was my reply, and I added my warmest thanks.

“I’ll write them out now,” he said; and, turning, he seated himself at the little escritoire in the corner of the small, old-world room and commenced to scribble those Imperial decrees which no one within the Russian Empire would dare to disobey.

While he did so I stood gazing out of the small, deep-set double windows across a flat dismal landscape, brown with the tints of autumn – the wide and weedy moat which surrounded the castle, the stretch of grazing-land and then a belt of dense forest on the skyline – the Imperial game preserves.

That silent old room, dull, faded and sombre, was just the same as it had been when Catherine the Great had fêted her favourite Potemkin, the man who for years ruled Russia and who fought so valiantly against the Turks. There, in that very room, the Treaty of Jassy, which gave Russia the littoral between the Bug and the Dniester, had been signed by Catherine in 1792, and again in that room the Tzar Alexander the First had received the news of Napoleon’s retreat from Moscow.

At that small buhl table whereat the Emperor was now writing out my permits the Tzar Nicholas had signed the decree taking away the Polish constitution, and, years later, he had written the final orders to his ill-fated army fighting against the British in the Crimea.

Somewhere in the stone corridor outside could be heard the measured tramp of the sentry, but that, and the rapid scratching of the Emperor’s pen, were the only sounds which broke the quiet.

At last he rose and handed me three sheets of foolscap bearing the Imperial arms – the orders which I sought.

I took them with thanks, but after a moment’s hesitation I ventured to add:

“I wonder if I might request of Your Majesty a further favour?”

“Well,” he asked with a smile, “what is it?”

“That my journey to Siberia should be kept a secret from the police?”

“Eh – what?” he asked quickly, looking at me strangely. “You do not wish the police to know. Why? There is to be no attempted escape, surely?”

“I give Your Majesty my word that Madame de Rosen will not attempt to escape,” I said. “I will, indeed, make myself responsible for her. The fact is that I know I have enemies among the Secret Police; hence I wish them to remain in entire ignorance of my journey.”

“Enemies!” he echoed. “Who are they? Tell me, and I will quickly turn them into your friends,” he said.

“Alas, Sire, I do not exactly know their identity,” was my reply.

“Very well,” he replied at last, selecting another cigarette from the big golden box upon the table, “I will say nothing – if you so desire. But, remember, you have made yourself responsible for the woman.”

“I willingly accept the responsibility,” I replied. “But, Your Majesty, there is another matter. I would suggest that Hartwig be detailed to remain with Her Highness the Grand Duchess Natalia at Brighton until my return. He is there at present, awaiting Your Majesty’s orders.”

At my words he rang a bell, and Calitzine, his private secretary, appeared, bowing.

“Send a telegram at once to Hartwig. Where is he?” he asked, turning to me.

“At the Hotel Métropole, Brighton,” I said.

“Telegraph to him in cipher that I order him to remain with Natalia until further orders.”

“Very well, Your Majesty,” replied the trusted official, bowing.

“And another thing,” exclaimed the Emperor. “Telegraph, also in cipher, to all Governors of Siberian provinces that Mr Colin Trewinnard, of London, is our guest during his journey across Siberia, and is to be treated as such by all authorities.”

“But pardon me, Your Majesty,” I ventured to interrupt, “would not that make it plain to those persons in Petersburg of whom I spoke a moment ago.”

“Ah! I forgot,” said the Emperor. “Write the telegram, and send a confidential courier with it to Tiumen, across the Siberian frontier. He will despatch it from there, and it will then only go over the Asiatic wires.”

“I fear, Your Majesty, that a courier could not reach Omsk under six or seven days, travelling incessantly,” remarked the secretary.

“In seven days will be sufficient time. Both messages are confidential.”

And he dismissed Calitzine with a wave of his hand, the secretary backing out of the presence of his Imperial master.

When the door had closed the tall, muscular man before me placed his hands behind his back and slowly paced the room, saying:

“Well, Trewinnard, I must wish you a safe journey. If you find yourself in any difficulty, communicate direct with me. I must admit that I can’t quite understand the object of this rather quixotic journey of yours – to see a female prisoner. I strongly suspect that you are in love with her – eh?” and he smiled knowingly.

“No, Sire,” I replied, “I am not. On my return I hope to be able to show Your Majesty that I have been actuated by motives of humanity and justice – I hope, indeed, perhaps even to receive Your Majesty’s commendation.”

“Ah! you are too mysterious for me,” he laughed. “Are you leaving at once? Or will you remain here, in the castle, until to-morrow?”

“I am greatly honoured and appreciate Your Majesty’s hospitality,” I said. “But I have horses ready, and I am driving back to the railway at Olevsk to-night.”

“Very well, then,” he said with a smile. “Good-bye, and be back again in Petersburg as soon as ever you can.”

And he stretched forth his big sinewy hand and gave me such a hearty grip that I was compelled to wince.

I was backing towards the door, when it opened and the chamberlain Polivanoff, standing upon the threshold, announced:

“General Markoff begs audience of Your Majesty.”

“Ah! Let him come in,” the Emperor replied, smiling.

The next moment I found myself face to face with the man whom I knew to be Natalia’s worst enemy and mine – that bloated, grey-faced man in military uniform, through whose instrumentality no fewer than ten thousand persons were annually being exiled to the Siberian wastes.

We met just beyond the threshold.

“Ah! my dear M’sieur Trewinnard!” he cried, raising his grey brows in evident surprise at meeting me there. “I thought you were in England. And how is your interesting young charge?”

“She is very well, I believe,” was my cold reply.

I passed on, while he, crossing the threshold into the Imperial presence, bowed low, cringing before the monarch whom he daily terrorised, and yet who believed him to be the guardian of the dynasty.

“Ah! I am so glad you have come, Markoff!” I heard the Emperor exclaim as he entered. “I have several pressing matters to discuss with you.”

I passed the two sentries, who presented arms, and followed Colonel Polivanoff along the corridor, full of gravest apprehension.

Ill fortune had dogged my footsteps. Markoff had seen me there. He would naturally inquire of the Emperor the reason of my audience.

His Majesty might tell him.

If so, what then?

Chapter Twenty.

The Land of No Return

The day had been grey and dispiriting, the open windswept landscape a great limitless expanse of newly-fallen snow of dazzling whiteness – the same cheerless wintry tundra over which I had been travelling by sledge for the past four weary weeks to that everlasting jingle of harness-bells.

My companion, the police-agent Petrakoff, a smart, alert young man, wrapped to the tip of his nose in reindeer furs, was asleep by my side; and I, too, had been dozing, worn out by that fifteen hundred miles of road since leaving the railway at Ekaterinburg.

Suddenly I was awakened by Vasilli, our yamshick, a burly, bearded, unkempt ruffian in shabby furs, who, pointing with his whip to the grey far-off horizon, shouted:

“Tomsk! Tomsk! Look, Excellency!”

Straining my tired eyes, I discerned upon the far skyline a quantity of low, snow-covered, wood-built houses from which rose the pointed cupolas of several churches.

Yonder was the end of the first stage of my long journey. So I awoke Petrakoff, and for the next half-hour we sat with eyes fixed eagerly upon our goal, where we hoped to revel in the luxury of a hotel after a month of those filthy stancias or povarnias, the vermin-infested rests for travellers on the Great Post Road of Siberia.

The first sod of the great Trans-Siberian railway had already been cut by the Tzarevitch at Tcheliabyisk, but no portion of the line was at that time complete. Therefore all traffic across Asia, both travellers and merchandise, including the tea-caravans from China, passed along that great highway, the longest in the world.

Six weeks had elapsed since I had left the Emperor’s presence, and I had accomplished by rail and road a distance of two thousand four hundred miles.

Since I had left the railway at Ekaterinburg I had only rested for a single night on two occasions, at Tiumen and at Tobolsk.

At the former place I made my first acquaintance with the inhuman exile system, for moored in the river Obi I saw several of those enormous floating gaols, in which the victims of Russia’s true oppressor were transported en route to the penal settlements of the Far East – great double-decked barges, three hundred feet long, with a lower hold below the main deck. Along two-thirds of the barge’s length ran an iron cage, reaching from the lower to the upper deck-cover, and having the appearance of a great two-storied tiger’s cage. Eight of them were moored alongside the landing-stage. Five of them were crowded by wretched prisoners, each barge containing from four to five hundred persons of both sexes and the Cossack guards – a terrible sight indeed.

Provided as I was with an Imperial permit and a doubly-stamped road-passport that directed all keepers of post-stations to provide me with the mail horses, and give me the right of way on the Post Road, I had set forth again after a day’s rest towards Tobolsk.

The first snow had fallen on the third day after leaving Tiumen, and the country, covered by its white mantle, presented always a dreary aspect, rendered drearier and more dispiriting by the gangs of wretched exiles which we constantly overtook.

Men, women, and children in companies from a hundred to three hundred, having left the barges, were marching forward to that far-off bourne whence none would ever return. They, indeed, presented a woeful spectacle, mostly of the criminal classes, all their heads being half, or clean-shaven. The majority of the men were in chains, and many were linked together. Not a few of the women marched among the men as prisoners, while the rest trudged along into voluntary exile, holding the hands of their husbands, brothers, lovers or children. Some of the sick, aged and young were in springless carts, but all the others toiled onward through the snow like droves of cattle, bent to the icy blast, a grey-clad, silent crowd, guarded by a dozen Cossacks, with an officer taking his ease in a tarantass in the rear.

Once we met a family of Jews – husband, wife and two children – in a tarantass, with a Cossack with bayonet fixed alongside. We stopped to change horses with them, as we were then midway between post-stations. The man, a bright, intelligent, middle-aged fellow, addressed us in French, and said he had been a wealthy fur merchant in Nijni Novgorod, but was exiled to the Yenisei country simply because he was a Jew. His eyes were clouded with regret at the bitter consciousness of his captivity. Four thousand of his townsmen had, he said, emigrated to England and America, and then pointing to his pretty, delicate wife and two chubby children, the tears rolled down his cheeks, as he faltered out: “Siberie!” Poor fellow!

That word had all the import of a hell to many – many more than him.

The distance between relays on the Great Post Road was, we found, from sixteen to thirty versts, and the speed of fresh horses about ten versts an hour.

Vasilli, the ugly bearded yamshick who had lost one eye, we had engaged in Tiumen, and he had contracted to drive me during the whole of my journey. He was a sullen fellow, who said little, but on finding that I was travelling with an Imperial permit, his chief delight was to hustle up the master of each post-station and threaten to report to the Governor of the province if I, the Excellency, were kept waiting for a single instant.

Usually, changing operations at the stations occupied anything from forty minutes to two hours, according to the temper or trickishness of the post-horse keeper and his grooms, for they were about the meanest set of knaves and rogues on the face of Asia. Yet sight of my permit caused them all to tremble and cringe and hustle, and I certainly could not complain of any undue delay.

We had set out in a tarantass from Tiumen – the town from which the Imperial courier had despatched the order to the various Governors – but as soon as the snow came I purchased a big sledge, and in this we managed to travel with far greater comfort over the snow than by cart over the deeply-rutted road.

None can know the terrible monotony of Siberian travel save those who have endured it.

Nowadays one can cover Siberia from the frontier to far Vladivostock in fifteen days in a luxurious drawing-room car, with restaurant and sleeping-berth, a bath-room and a piano, the line running for the most part near the Old Post Road. But leave the railway and strike north or south, and the same terrible greyness and monotony will grip your senses and depress you as perhaps no other journey in the world can do.

It was dusk when at last we sped, our runners hissing over the frozen snow, into the wood-built town of Tomsk, and alighted at the Hotel Million, a dismal place with corridors long and dark, and bedroom doors fastened by big iron padlocks and hasps! The full-bearded proprietor wandered along with an enormous bunch of keys, opening the doors and exhibiting his uninviting apartments; and at first I actually believed that Vasilli had mistaken my order and driven to a Siberian prison instead of conducting me to a hotel.

Upstairs, however, the rooms were much better. But there were no washing arrangements whatever, or mattresses or bedding; for every traveller in Siberia is expected to carry his own pillows and bedclothes. Here, however, we put up and ate our evening meal in true Siberian style – a single tough beefsteak – simply that and nothing more.

Afterwards I drove through the snowy, unlighted streets to the Governor’s palace, a long, log-built place, and on giving my name to the Cossack sentry at the door he at once saluted. Apparently he had been warned of my coming. So had the servants, for with much bowing and grave ceremony I was shown along a corridor lit by petroleum lamps to a small reception-room at the farther end.

The furniture was of the cheap, gaudy character which in England would speak mutely of the hire-system. But it had, no doubt, come from Petersburg at enormous cost of transit, and was perhaps the best and most luxurious furniture – it was covered with red embossed velvet – in all Siberia.

Scarcely was I afforded time to look round the close, overheated place with its treble windows, when General Tschernaieff, a rather short, white-haired, pleasant-featured man in a green uniform, with the Cross of St. Anne at his throat, entered, greeting me warmly and expressing a hope that I had had a pleasant journey.

“I received word of your coming. Mr Trewinnard, some weeks ago,” His Excellency said rather pompously. “I am commanded to treat you as a guest of my Imperial Master. Therefore you will, I hope, be my guest here in the palace.”

I told him that I already had quarters at the Hotel Million, whereupon he laughed, saying:

“I fear that you will find it very rough and uncouth after hotels in Petersburg or in your own London.”

I replied that as a constant traveller, and one who had knocked about in all corners of the world, I was used to roughing it. Then, after he had offered me a cigarette, and a lean manservant, who, I afterwards learned, was an ex-convict, had brought us each a glass of champagne, I explained to him the object of my visit.

“Madame Marya de Rosen and her daughter Luba de Rosen, politicals,” repeated His Excellency, as though speaking to himself. “Of course, sir, as you know, all prisoners, both criminal or political, pass through the forwarding-prison here. It is myself who decides to which settlement they shall be sent. But – well, there are so many that the Chief of the Police puts the lists before me and I sign them away to Nerchinsk, to Yakutsk, to Sredne Kolimsk, to Verkhoiansk, to Udinsk, or wherever it may be. Their names, I fear, I never notice. I have sent some politicals recently up to Parotovsk, fifty versts north of Yakutsk. The two prisoners may have been among them.”

“Here, I suppose, they lose their identity, do they not?” I asked, looking at the white-headed official who governed that great Asiatic province. He was sixty-five, he had told me, and had served twenty-seven years in Siberia.

“Yes. Only across the road in the archives of the forwarding-prison are their names kept. When they leave Tomsk they are known in future – until their death, indeed – only by a registered number.”

Then, rising, the white-headed Governor rang a bell, and on his secretary, a young Cossack captain, entering, he gave him certain instructions to go across to the prison and obtain the registers of prisoners during the previous month.

Afterwards, he stretched himself out in his long chair, smoking and asking me questions concerning myself and the object of my journey.

As soon as he learned that I was a British diplomat and personal friend of His Majesty, his manner became much more cordial, and he declared himself ready to do everything in his power to bring my mission to a successful issue.

Presently the secretary returned, carrying two large registers and accompanied by a tall, dark-bearded man in uniform and wearing a decoration, who I learned was the governor of the prison.

He saluted His Excellency on entering the room, and said in Russian:

“Your Excellency is, I believe, inquiring regarding the prisoner Marya de Rosen, widow, of Petersburg, deported by administrative order?”

“Yes,” said the General. “Where has she been sent, and what is her number?”

“She was the woman about whom we received special instructions from the Ministry of Police in Petersburg, Your Excellency will remember,” replied the prison governor.

“Special instructions!” I echoed, interrupting. “What were they?”

But His Excellency, after a moment’s reflection, said: “Ah! I now remember! Of course. There was a note upon the papers in General Markoff’s own handwriting to the effect that she was a dangerous person.”

“Yes. She was one of those when your Excellency sent to Parotovsk,” remarked the prison governor.