Stolen Souls Part 22

At nine o'clock on the next evening, Paul Denissoff, pale-faced and haggard-eyed, entered the hall of the great house of the Orlovskis.

"I must see madame at once," he said to a lackey. "Take me to her."

A few moments later he was ushered along a s.p.a.cious corridor filled with palms and exotics, through a great white and gold ballroom, and presently admitted into a small, exquisitely furnished little apartment, wherein sat Adine, in a lounge chair, doing fancy needlework.

"Ah, Paul?" she cried, starting to her feet. "Why, what ails you?"

"Hush, Adine," he said hoa.r.s.ely, when the door had closed. "Some one has denounced you to the executive as a traitor. The council have pa.s.sed sentence of death, and I--I have drawn the fatal number. You must fly--you must leave Russia at once--to-night--for at midnight I must return here to--_to murder you_!"

"_Dieu_!" she gasped. "Then my secret has been divulged! I confess--it is true, Paul. I have been guilty of double dealing, but it was to save--Hark! Listen!"

There were sounds of voices outside the door, which a moment afterwards was flung open, revealing two ordinary-looking individuals, accompanied by several grey-coated police officers.

"Paul Denissoff," exclaimed one of the detectives, stepping forward, "in the name of our father, the Tzar, I arrest you for conspiracy."

"By Heaven! I'll not go with you. I--"

In a moment he had drawn a revolver and placed himself on the defensive; but a second later the weapon was wrenched from his grasp. Adine, pale and weeping, threw herself between him and his captors, but she was roughly thrust aside, and he was handcuffed and conveyed away to the Police Bureau.

The a.s.size Court of St. Petersburg was crowded to suffocation, for a great trial of Nihilists was concluding. Paul Denissoff, as a preliminary to his punishment, had been kept in solitary confinement in one of the cells deep down under the fortress of St. Peter and St. Paul.

Together with thirty other revolutionists, including those arrested in the Bolshaia Ssattovaia, he was now brought up for sentence. The rays of the afternoon sun were slanting across the court, lighting up the dais whereon sat the grave-looking judge, over whose head hung the golden double-headed eagle, surmounted by an _ikon_, or picture of the Virgin.

Those in court were breathless, for sentence was about to be delivered.

Presently the judge spoke.

"Prisoners," he said, addressing the motley row of eager-faced men and women before him, "you have all been found guilty of conspiracy to cause the death of His Imperial Majesty the Tzar. There is but one sentence the _Swod_ allows me to p.r.o.nounce, and it is that you shall be banished and kept at labour at the mines for the remainder of your lives."

Above the sobs and wailing which came from the public portion of the court sounded a shrill, piercing, hysterical shriek. Paul, turning sharply, saw that a poorly-clad woman, sitting in the front row of the spectators, had fainted. Her clothes were common, her hair was parted in the middle and brushed back severely; but, notwithstanding the disguise, he recognised her. It was Adine Orlovski.

Two years had gone by. Colonel Solovieff, promoted to the rank of general, had been appointed by the Tzar as Governor of the Asiatic Province of Trans-Baikal.

In the whole of Siberia there is no region more desolate than around the Nerchinsk silver mines of Algachi and Pokrovski. Situated far away in Eastern Siberia, near the Mongolian frontier, and distant five thousand versts from St. Petersburg, there is not a tree or bush to be seen in any direction, and the rolling, snow-clad hills suggest in general contour the immense surges and mounds of water raised by a hurricane.

The buildings at the entrance to the Pokrovski mine consist only of a tool-house, a shed for the accommodation of the Cossacks of the guard, and a few log-built cabins occupied by convicts allowed out on licence for good behaviour; while dotted here and there are sentry-boxes, before which stand Cossacks leaning on their rifles.

It is impossible to imagine a more terrible and hopeless existence than that to which Paul Denissoff had been consigned, working all day in the damp, muddy galleries of the mine, and at night trudging through the snow back to the close, foul prison of Algachi. It was, indeed, worse than the life of any pariah dog, for, recognising the hopelessness of the situation, he had given way to that inertness begotten of despair.

He had been toiling with his pick for nearly fourteen hours in the gloom of one of the lower galleries of the mine, when an armed warder came and told him it was time to leave. Casting down his pick, he sighed, and rose from the crouching position in which he was compelled to work. The dim candlelight showed he had aged considerably. The iron fetters upon his feet clanked ominously as he walked, and upon his ragged, mud-stained clothes was st.i.tched the great yellow diamond denoting a life sentence.

Presently prisoner and warder came to the foot of the shaft, and both ascended the rickety ladders which led to the surface. At length they emerged into the light of day, and saw standing before one of the log-sheds a row of silent convicts guarded by Cossacks, waiting to be marched back to prison. Paul walked over and joined them. The wind was biting cold, and snow lay deep upon the road.

Outside the cabin of one of the convicts of the "free command" stood two well-appointed four-horse sleighs; and while the s.h.i.+vering men were wondering who could be travelling in this remote colony, another sleigh came rapidly along the road, preceded by two mounted Cossacks.

The vehicle drew up before the convicts, and its occupant, flinging off the rugs that covered him, stepped out. The men removed their hats and cheered, but Paul remained motionless. He recognised that the traveller was General Solovieff, the governor. Enveloped in a great sable-lined coat, from beneath which his sword trailed in the snow, he walked with difficulty over to where the captain of the Cossacks stood. After a few minutes' conversation, the captain turned and shouted--

"Let the convict Denissoff come here!"

Paul stepped forward and saluted.

"Ah, yes," said Solovieff, when he saw him, "This is the man; I knew him in Petersburg. He is very dangerous, therefore, in future, he is not to go to the mines. Let him remain in the prison always. You understand?"

"Yes, your Excellency," replied the captain, wondering why such additional torture should be heaped on a prisoner so well-behaved; for he was well aware that work in the mine was even preferable to life in the foul, overcrowded prison.

"But, your Excellency," protested Paul, "I have not been mutinous. I--"

"Silence!" thundered the general. "Get back to your place!"

As he turned, two persons confronted him--a man who wore an official uniform with the Imperial eagle upon his cap, and a woman wrapped in a great fur-lined travelling cloak.

The recognition was mutual, and in a moment he was wringing Adine's hand.

Meanwhile the man had stepped forward, and, addressing the Cossack officer, said--

"Captain YaG.o.dkin, we have not met before, my name is Ivan Torsneff, and I am an aide-de-camp of His Majesty, the Tzar."

"Ah, I remember you, Torsneff!" cried the general, stretching forth his hand. "What brings you here, so far from Petersburg?"

"An unpleasant duty, General Solovieff," replied the Tzar's messenger coldly. Taking an official doc.u.ment from the pocket of his greatcoat, he added, "I have here a warrant from His Imperial Majesty, my august master, ordering Captain YaG.o.dkin to release the prisoner Paul Denissoff immediately; and, further, to arrest and detain at hard labour the governor of the Trans-Baikal, General Solovieff."

"What?" cried His Excellency. "You're mad!"

"Captain YaG.o.dkin," continued Count Torsneff, "In the name of the Tzar, I hand the warrant to you. It is in His Majesty's own handwriting--read for yourself."

The Cossack officer opened it eagerly, read it through, and glanced at the Imperial signature and seal. Then, addressing the governor, he said--

"General Solovieff, you are under arrest, by order of the Tzar!"

"What for?"

"It has been proved by an accomplice of yours, one Sergius Baranoff,"

replied the aide-de-camp, "that you are a murderer--that, with the object of eventually marrying Madame Orlovski, you waylaid and murdered her husband. Afterwards, when she rejected your proposals of marriage, you brought circ.u.mstantial evidence to bear and accused her of the crime. In your absence, the case has been tried in Petersburg, and your sentence is hard labour in the mines for life."

A few hours later, Paul and Adine had started on the first stage of their journey back to civilisation. They are now married, and live happily in one of those charming villas in the pine forest at Arcachon.

CHAPTER NINE.

VOGUE LA GALERE!

Yes, yes, this is the very spot! Here the great tragedy of my life was enacted. Twenty-four weary years of my existence have pa.s.sed, and until this moment I have never summoned sufficient courage to visit it. Ah, Dieu! how all has changed! Paris is herself again.

You may perhaps know the place. Near the Porte de la Muette, a little way down the Boulevard Suchet, in the direction of Pa.s.sy, the fortifications of the city recommence after the open s.p.a.ce which gives access to the Bois. The ponderous walls are the same, though the breaches made by the German sh.e.l.ls have been repaired, and the stones on which I tread bear no traces of the men's blood that once made them so slippery. One hundred paces from the corner of the Boulevard there is a steep little path running up the gra.s.s-grown mound, beside a railing.

Ascend it, and you will find yourself on the top of the great wall, below which, deep down in the fosse, on the outside towards the Bois, there is a well-kept market garden. The only noises on this sunny afternoon are the twittering of birds and the rustling of leaves-- different sounds and a different outlook indeed to that which is indelibly impressed upon my memory. All are gone, gone! and I alone remain--aged, infirm, forsaken, and forgotten!

What matters, though I still wear my faded sc.r.a.p of yellow and green ribbon upon the lapel of my shabby coat--what matters if I am an exile, an outlaw; that here, in Paris, after all these years, I dare not inscribe my proper name in the register? To both friends and enemies I am dead!