The Continental Classics, Volume XVIII., Mystery Tales

I

THE LAST WILL OF THE PRINCESS

Princess Anna Chechevinski for the last time looked at the home of her girlhood, over which the St. Petersburg twilight was descending. Defying the commands of her mother, the traditions of her family, she had decided to elope with the man of her choice. With a last word of farewell to her maid, she wrapped her cloak round her and disappeared into the darkness.

The maid's fate had been a strange one. In one of the districts beyond the Volga lived a noble, a bachelor, luxuriously, caring only for his own amusement. He fished, hunted, and petted the pretty little daughter of his housekeeper, one of his serfs, whom he vaguely intended to set free. He passed hours playing with the pretty child, and even had an old French governess come to give her lessons. She taught little Natasha to dance, to play the piano, to put on the airs and graces of a little lady. So the years passed, and the old nobleman obeyed the girl's every whim, and his serfs bowed before her and kissed her hands. Gracefully and willfully she queened it over the whole household.

Then one fine day the old noble took thought and died. He had forgotten to liberate his housekeeper and her daughter, and, as he was a bachelor, his estate went to his next of kin, the elder Princess Chechevinski. Between the brother and sister a cordial hatred had existed, and they had not seen one another for years.

Coming to take possession of the estate, Princess Chechevinski carried things with a high hand. She ordered the housekeeper to the cow house, and carried off the girl Natasha, as her daughter's maid, to St. Petersburg, from the first hour letting her feel the lash of her bitter tongue and despotic will. Natasha had tried in vain to dry her mother's tears. With growing anger and sorrow she watched the old house as they drove away, and looking at the old princess she said to herself, "I hate her! I hate her! I will never forgive her!"

Princess Anna, bidding her maid good-by, disappeared into the night. The next morning the old princess learned of the flight. Already ill, she fell fainting to the floor, and for a long time her condition was critical. She regained consciousness, tried to find words to express her anger, and again swooned away. Day and night, three women watched over her, her son's old nurse, her maid, and Natasha, who took turns in waiting on her. Things continued thus for forty-eight hours. Finally, on the night of the third day she came to herself. It was Natasha's watch.

"And you knew? You knew she was going?" the old princess asked her fiercely.

The girl started, unable at first to collect her thoughts, and looked up frightened. The dim flicker of the night light lit her pale face and golden hair, and fell also on the grim, emaciated face of the old princess, whose eyes glittered feverishly under her thick brows.

"You knew my daughter was going to run away?" repeated the old woman, fixing her keen eyes on Natasha's face, trying to raise herself from among the lace-fringed pillows.

"I knew," the girl answered in a half whisper, lowering her eyes in confusion, and trying to throw off her first impression of terror.

"Why did you not tell me before?" the old woman continued, even more fiercely.

Natasha had now recovered her composure, and raising her eyes with an expression of innocent distress, she answered:

"Princess Anna hid everything from me also, until the very last. How dare I tell you? Would you have believed me? It was not my business, your excellency!"

The old princess shook her head, smiling bitterly and incredulously.

"Snake!" she hissed fiercely, looking at the girl; and then she added quickly:

"Did any of the others know?"

"No one but myself!" answered Natasha.

"Never dare to speak of her again! Never dare!" cried the old princess, and once more she sank back unconscious on the pillows.

About noon the next day she again came to herself, and ordered her son to be called. He came in quietly, and affectionately approached his mother.

The princess dismissed her maid, and remained alone with her son.

"You have no longer a sister!" she cried, turning to her son, with the nervous spasm which returned each time she spoke of her daughter. "She is dead for us! She has disgraced us! I curse her! You, you alone are my heir!"

At these words the young prince pricked up his ears and bent even more attentively toward his mother. The news of his sole heirship was so pleasant and unexpected that he did not even think of asking how his sister had disgraced them, and only said with a deep sigh:

"Oh, mamma, she was always opposed to you. She never loved you!"

"I shall make a will in your favor," continued the princess, telling him as briefly as possible of Princess Anna's flight. "Yes, in your favor—only on one condition: that you will never recognize your sister. That is my last wish!"

"Your wish is sacred to me," murmured her son, tenderly kissing her hand. He had always been jealous and envious of his sister, and was besides in immediate need of money.

The princess signed her will that same day, to the no small satisfaction of her dear son, who, in his heart, was wondering how soon his beloved parent would pass away, so that he might get his eyes on her long-hoarded wealth.

II

THE LITHOGRAPHER'S APPRENTICE

Later on the same day, in a little narrow chamber of one of the huge, dirty tenements on Vosnesenski Prospekt, sat a young man of ruddy complexion. He was sitting at a table, bending toward the one dusty window, and attentively examining a white twenty-five ruble note.

The room, dusty and dark, was wretched enough. Two rickety chairs, a torn haircloth sofa, with a greasy pillow, and the bare table at the window, were its entire furniture. Several scattered lithographs, two or three engravings, two slabs of lithographer's stone on the table, and engraver's tools sufficiently showed the occupation of the young man. He was florid, with red hair; of Polish descent, and his name was Kasimir Bodlevski. On the wall, over the sofa, between the overcoat and the cloak hanging on the wall, was a pencil drawing of a young girl. It was the portrait of Natasha.

The young man was so absorbed in his examination of the twenty-five ruble note that when a gentle knock sounded on the door he started nervously, as if coming back to himself, and even grew pale, and hurriedly crushed the banknote into his pocket.

The knock was repeated—and this time Bodlevski's face lit up. It was evidently a well-known and expected knock, for he sprang up and opened the door with a welcoming smile.

Natasha entered the room.

"What were you dreaming about that you didn't open the door for me?" she asked caressingly, throwing aside her hat and cloak, and taking a seat on the tumble-down sofa. "What were you busy at?"

"You know, yourself."

And instead of explaining further, he drew the banknote from his pocket and showed it to Natasha.

"This morning the master paid me, and I am keeping the money," he continued in a low voice, tilting back his chair. "I pay neither for my rooms nor my shop, but sit here and study all the time."

"It's so well worth while, isn't it?" smiled Natasha with a contemptuous grimace.

"You don't think it is worth while?" said the young man. "Wait! I'll learn. We'll be rich!"

"Yes, if we aren't sent to Siberia!" the girl laughed, "What kind of wealth is that?" she went on. "The game is not worth the candle. I'll be rich before you are."

"All right, go ahead!"

"Go ahead? I didn't come to talk nonsense, I came on business. You help me, and, on my word of honor, we'll be in clover!"

Bodlevski looked at his companion in astonishment.

"I told you my Princess Anna was going to run away. She's gone! And her mother has cut her off from the inheritance," Natasha continued with an exultant smile. "I looked through the scrap basket, and have brought some papers with me."

"What sort of papers?"

"Oh, letters and notes. They are all in Princess Anna's handwriting. Shall I give them to you?" jested Natasha. "Have a good look at them, examine them, learn her handwriting, so that you can imitate every letter. That kind of thing is just in your line; you are a first-class copyist, so this is just the job for you."

The engraver listened, and only shrugged his shoulders.

"No, joking aside," she continued seriously, drawing nearer Bodlevski,

"I have thought of something out of the common; you will be grateful.

I have no time to explain it all now. You will know later on. The main thing is—learn her handwriting."

"But what is it all for?" said Bodlevski wonderingly.

"So that you may be able to write a few words in the handwriting of Princess Anna; what you have to write I'll dictate to you."

"And then?"

"Then hurry up and get me a passport in some one else's name, and have your own ready. But learn her handwriting. Everything depends on that!"

"It won't be easy. I'll hardly be able to!" muttered Bodlevski, scratching his head.

Natasha flared up.

"You say you love me?" she cried energetically, with a glance of anger. "Well, then, do it. Unless you are telling lies, you can learn to do banknotes."

The young man strode up and down his den, perplexed.

"How soon do you want it?" he asked, after a minute's thought. "In a couple of days?"

"Yes, in about two days, not longer, or the whole thing is done for!" the girl replied decisively. "In two days I'll come for the writing, and be sure my passport is ready!"

"Very well. I'll do it," consented Bodlevski. And Natasha began to dictate to him the wording of the letter.

As soon as she was gone the engraver got to work. All the evening and a great part of the night he bent over the papers she had brought, examining the handwriting, studying the letters, and practicing every stroke with the utmost care, copying and repeating it a hundred times, until at last he had reached the required clearness. At last he mastered the writing. It only remained to give it the needed lightness and naturalness. His head rang from the concentration of blood in his temples, but he still worked on.

Finally, when it was almost morning, the note was written, and the name of Princess Anna was signed to it. The work was a masterpiece, and even exceeded Bodlevski's expectations. Its lightness and clearness were remarkable. The engraver, examining the writing of Princess Anna, compared it with his own work, and was astonished, so perfect was the resemblance.

And long he admired his handiwork, with the parental pride known to every creator, and as he looked at this note he for the first time fully realized that he was an artist.

III

THE CAVE

"Half the work is done!" he cried, jumping from the tumble-down sofa. "But the passport? There's where the shoe pinches," continued the engraver, remembering the second half of Natasha's commission. "The passport—yes—that's where the shoe pinches!" he muttered to himself in perplexity, resting his head on his hands and his elbows on his knees. Thinking over all kinds of possible and impossible plans, he suddenly remembered a fellow countryman of his, a shoemaker named Yuzitch, who had once confessed in a moment of intoxication that "he would rather hook a watch than patch a shoe." Bodlevski remembered that three months before he had met Yuzitch in the street, and they had gone together to a wine shop, where, over a bottle generously ordered by Yuzitch, Bodlevski had lamented over the hardships of mankind in general, and his own in particular. He had not taken advantage of Yuzitch's offer to introduce him to "the gang," only because he had already determined to take up one of the higher branches of the "profession," namely, to metamorphose white paper into banknotes. When they were parting, Yuzitch had warmly wrung his hand, saying:

"Whenever you want anything, dear friend, or if you just want to see me, come to the Cave; come to Razyeziy Street and ask for the Cave, and at the Cave anyone will show you where to find Yuzitch. If the barkeeper makes difficulties just whisper to him that 'Secret' sent you, and he'll show you at once."

As this memory suddenly flashed into his mind, Bodlevski caught up his hat and coat and hurried downstairs into the street. Making his way through the narrow, dirty streets to the Five Points, he stopped perplexed. Happily he noticed a sleepy watchman leaning leisurely against a wall, and going up to him he said:

"Tell me, where is the Cave?"

"The what?" asked the watchman impatiently.

"The Cave."

"The Cave? There is no such place!" he replied, looking suspiciously at Bodlevski.

Bodlevski put his hand in his pocket and pulled out some small change:

"If you tell me–"

The watchman brightened up. "Why didn't you say so before?" he asked, grinning. "You see that house, the second from the corner? The wooden one? That's the Cave."

Bodlevski crossed the street in the direction indicated, and looked for the sign over the door. To his astonishment he did not find it and only later he knew that the name was strictly "unofficial," only used by members of "the gang."

Opening the door cautiously, Bodlevski made his way into the low, dirty barroom. Behind the bar stood a tall, handsome man with an open countenance and a bald head. Politely bowing to Bodlevski, with his eyes rather than his head, he invited him to enter the inner room. But Bodlevski explained that he wanted, not the inner room, but his friend Yuzitch.

"Yuzitch?" said the barkeeper thoughtfully. "We don't know anyone of that name."

"Why, he's here all the time," cried Bodlevski, in astonishment.

"Don't know him," retorted the barkeeper imperturbably.

"'Secret' sent me!" Bodlevski suddenly exclaimed, without lowering his voice.

The barkeeper looked at him sharply and suspiciously, and then asked, with a smile:

"Who did you say?"

"'Secret,'" repeated Bodlevski.

After a while the barkeeper said, "And did your—friend make an appointment?"

"Yes, an appointment!" Bodlevski replied, beginning to lose patience.

"Well, take a seat in the inner room," again said the barkeeper slyly.

"Perhaps your friend will come in, or perhaps he is there already."

Bodlevski made his way into a roomy saloon, with five windows with faded red curtains. The ceiling was black from the smoke of hanging lamps; little square tables were dotted about the floor; their covers were coarse and not above reproach on the score of cleanliness. The air was pungent with the odor of cheap tobacco and cheaper cigars. On the walls were faded oleographs of generals and archbishops, flyblown and stained.

Bodlevski, little as he was used to refined surroundings, found his gorge rising. At some of the little tables furtive, impudent, tattered, sleek men were drinking.

Presently Yuzitch made his appearance from a low door at the other end of the room. The meeting of the two friends was cordial, especially on Bodlevski's side. Presently they were seated at a table, with a flask of wine between them, and Bodlevski began to explain what he wanted to his friend.

As soon as he heard what was wanted, Yuzitch took on an air of importance, knit his brows, hemmed, and hawed.

"I can manage it," he said finally. "Yes, we can manage it. I must see one of my friends about it. But it's difficult. It will cost money."

Bodlevski immediately assented. Yuzitch at once rose and went over to a red-nosed individual in undress uniform, who was poring over the Police News.

"Friend Borisovitch," said Yuzitch, holding out his hand to him, "something doing!"

"Fair or foul?" asked the man with the red nose. "Hang your cheek!" laughed Yuzitch; "if I say it, of course it's fair." After a whispered conference, Yuzitch returned to Bodlevski and told him that it was all right; that the passport for Natasha would be ready by the next evening. Bodlevski paid him something in advance and went home triumphantly.

At eleven o'clock the next evening Bodlevski once more entered the large room at the Cave, now all lit up and full of an animated crowd of men and women, all with the same furtive, predatory faces. Bodlevski felt nervous. He had no fears while turning white paper into banknotes in the seclusion of his own workshop, but he was full of apprehensions concerning his present guest, because several people had to be let into the secret.

Yuzitch presently appeared through the same low door and, coming up to Bodlevski, explained that the passport would cost twenty rubles. Bodlevski paid the money over in advance, and Yuzitch led him into a back room. On the table burned a tallow candle, which hardly lit up the faces of seven people who were grouped round it, one of them being the red-nosed man who was reading the Police News. The seven men were all from the districts of Vilna and Vitebsk, and were specialists in the art of fabricating passports.

The red-nosed man approached Bodlevski: "We must get acquainted with each other," he said amiably. "I have the honor to present myself!" and he bowed low; "Former District Secretary Pacomius Borisovitch Prakkin. Let me request you first of all to order some vodka; my hand shakes, you know," he added apologetically. "I don't want it so much for myself as for my hand—to steady it."

Bodlevski gave him some change, which the red-nosed man put in his pocket and at once went to the sideboard for a flask of vodka which he had already bought. "Let us give thanks! And now to business!" he said, smacking his lips after a glass of vodka.

A big, red-haired man, one of the group of seven, drew from his pocket two vials. In one was a sticky black fluid; in the other, something as clear as water.

"We are chemists, you see," the red-nosed man explained to Bodlevski with a grin, and then added:

"Finch! on guard!"

A young man, who had been lolling on a couch in the corner, rose and took up a position outside the door.

"Now, brothers, close up!" cried the red-nosed man, and all stood in close order, elbow to elbow, round the table. "And now we take a newspaper and have it handy on the table! That is in case," he explained to Bodlevski, "any outsider happened in on us—which Heaven prevent! We aren't up to anything at all; simply reading the political news! You catch on?"

"How could I help catching on?"

"Very well. And now let us make everything as clear as in a looking-glass. What class do you wish to make the person belong to? The commercial or the nobility?"

"I think the nobility would be best," said Bodlevski.

"Certainly! At least that will give the right of free passage through all the towns and districts of the Russian Empire. Let us see. Have we not something that will suit?"

And Pacomius Borisovitch, opening his portfolio, filled with all kinds of passports, certificates, and papers of identification, began to turn them over, but without taking any out of the portfolio. All with the same thought—that some stranger might come in.

"Ha! here's a new one! Where did it come from?" he cried.

"I got it out of a new arrival," muttered the red-headed man.

"Well done! Just what we want! And a noble's passport, too! It is evident that Heaven is helping us. See what a blessing brings!

"'This passport is issued by the District of Yaroslav,'" he continued reading, "'to the college assessor's widow, Maria Solontseva, with permission to travel,'" and so on in due form. "Did you get it here?" he added, turning to the red-headed man.