The Intriguers

Corsini thought deeply before he answered. Had Zouroff actually discovered the part she had played in his rescue, and was this his revenge?

“My advice, Princess, is to leave the Palace, and either seek shelter with some relatives or claim the protection of Golitzine and Beilski; if necessary of the Emperor himself. The Prince, you know doubtless, is not a favourite at Court.”

“I know,” said Nada quickly. “But think of the awful scandal when all this is blazoned forth. For my poor mother’s sake I want to avoid that.”

The Italian spoke very gravely. “The scandal will, of course, be regrettable. But compared with your own safety, I should not give it a moment’s consideration.”

He stood up, and his calm left him as he thought of the danger she ran with this brutal brother, who seemed capable of any villainy.

“You asked for my advice, Princess. I have given it and repeat it. Leave this house at once and acquaint Beilski with all you have told me.”

“You mean leave it now – to-day?” she faltered. “And my poor mother lying so ill upstairs.”

“That, of course, from what I know and can guess of the Prince would provide him with an excellent reason for carrying out his plans as quickly as possible,” observed Corsini bitterly.

The poor young Princess seemed overwhelmed by the position. She felt Corsini’s advice was sound, and yet she shrank from taking such a decided step. The Prince had used a similar threat before, and nothing had come of it.

“I think I will wait till I see him again to-morrow,” she said presently. “I shall know by his mood if he has forgotten the incident. Nothing will occur to-day. He has gone out, and left word that he will not be home till late to-night.”

Yes, he would be late home to-night; Corsini knew that for certain. He still persisted, however, in his point.

“Delays are dangerous, Princess. I will help you any way you like. And it will be wise to take advantage of his long absence to make your escape. Tell me your destination, and I will myself bring round a carriage to some quiet entrance where you can slip out unobserved. I have not told you that I go about with a bodyguard with which the General furnished me. The carriage shall be told to go at a walking pace. I and my attendants will keep it in sight till you are safely at your destination.”

She thanked him warmly, but still persisted that she would prefer to wait till to-morrow. If she changed her mind before the day was out, she would slip out with her maid and take a passing conveyance.

Corsini took her hand and held it for a little time in his, while he gazed earnestly into her troubled eyes, from which she could with difficulty keep back the tears.

“My heart bleeds for you, dear lady. I wish I could convince you, and I hate to leave you here. Will you let me know to-morrow to what course of action you have made up your mind?”

She promised that she would, and the young man left her with feelings of dire foreboding. Please Heaven, this night’s work would turn out so well that very shortly Zouroff would be rendered harmless and impotent. To let him loose on the world was like letting a wild and savage beast out of its cage.

The Prince did return to the Palace about the middle of the afternoon. Was his message, that he would not be home till late at night, simply a blind to lull his sister into a false sense of security? He did not go near her; he went up to his own apartments by a private staircase, only used by himself.

He summoned his valet, Peter, and gave him some very minute instructions. Peter, knowing what was in store for his truculent master, would have liked to offer a little sensible advice, to dissuade him from the course he was bent on pursuing.

But the habits of long obedience, the fear that if he opposed him in the smallest detail he might draw suspicion upon himself, weighed heavily on him. Reluctantly he agreed to obey Zouroff’s orders. Later on, when Zouroff was caged himself, he might be able to undo the mischief he had promised to abet.

The Prince stole out of the Palace as silently as he had entered it. Nobody but Peter and another servant, as much in his confidence as the valet himself, knew that he had been there.

It was a very busy day with him. A few more hours should see the end of all this plotting and scheming, should see his well-laid plans mature. The thought of vengeance, and a sense of coming triumph, induced in him a certain exultation which expressed itself in his resolute glance, his assured bearing. He made his way on foot to the villa of Madame Quéro. He had made up his mind to have a little reckoning with her, in order to wind up his final accounts.

The beautiful singer received him graciously. A woman of capricious moods, she had, for a brief space, admitted to herself that she had not treated him quite fairly, had been found lacking in the spirit of true comradeship. After all, Zouroff had loved her in his rough, masterful way, and he had always been generous.

She had played him false in this respect, that she had allowed herself to be attracted by the handsome young Italian, to the extent of thwarting the Prince’s plans in regard to him. And it was to no purpose. Corsini was in love with the Princess Nada, no doubt a hopeless passion on his part. But he would never give a thought to her save in the way of friendship. And that was the last thing that the passionate heart of the Spanish woman desired.

When, therefore, Zouroff entered her boudoir, in apparently one of his best moods, she felt some of his old attraction for her returning. She little knew what deep anger against her was burning in his heart.

But he was a skilful diplomatist; he showed nothing of this. He kissed her fondly, with the warm kiss of a man who hoped some day to make her his wife.

“Ah, my dear sweetheart, how pleasant to see you again!” said the base hypocrite. “I have had a busy day. Things are going well. It will not be long before my utmost ambitions are realised.” He spoke confidently; he was ever an optimist, and he believed in his own particular star.

La Belle Quéro felt an inward qualm. Corsini was nothing to her now. And, in that brief interview with Nada, she had surmised, through all her girlish dignity and reticence, that the Princess was more than half in love with him. Otherwise, would she have been so eager to save him?

But if Zouroff triumphed, as he seemed to have every hope of doing, the Italian’s fate would be sealed. And Le Belle Quéro was sure she could not save him a second time. The fates would not be propitious to her again.

“Old friends are best, my dear,” said the Prince in his most agreeable tones, as he seated himself in one of the luxurious easy-chairs and lighted a cigarette. “Somehow a little cloud seems to have come between us lately, I should like to remove it.”

Madame Quéro looked a little uneasy. She knew full well to what he was alluding. Her obvious tendresse for the young director had occasioned a good deal of talk; no doubt some of it had floated to Zouroff’s ears.

“Do not let us speak of clouds, Boris. We have been long and good friends. Let us be good friends again.”

“With all my heart,” responded the Prince, with his most charming smile. “Well, I have come to tell you I shall not be at the Opera to-night. I have to see a great many people, make a great many arrangements. I cannot tell you how sorry I am; I know it is one of your great nights. But you understand – business must always come before pleasure.”

Madame assented good humouredly. “It has always been so with you, Boris, at any rate. You are a great man in many ways, perhaps a little too optimistic, a little too sure of yourself.”

The Prince smiled his confident smile. “A pessimist is not much good in this world, my dear. Believe in yourself and your star, and you will become a leader of men.”

“Perhaps,” sighed Madame Quéro. She was beginning to be very attracted to him again. He was certainly in a most charming mood to-night; she felt herself carried back to the old days when she had been infatuated with him, with his virility, his assurance, even the hint of that brutal strength which lay at the back of his plausible exterior.

At length the Prince rose. “I wonder whether you would do me a little kindness. It is a long time since we had a meal together and I told them at home I should not be back till late to-night, after the meeting here. You have given instructions to Stepan to be in readiness?”

Yes, she had given instructions to Stepan.

“Then you will give me a little snack before you start for the Opera? No prolonged, heavy meal, we have neither of us time for that, just something light.”

“But, of course, Boris. You are always welcome to my hospitality, such as it is. You will be here an hour before I have to start for the Opera?”

The hypocrite bent low and kissed the hand she extended to him. “I will be here on the tick of the clock. Au revoir, my old sweetheart, who has come back to me again.”

He went out, intent on his dark schemes. He plumed himself on the fact that he had played his rôle quite well. And she, this treacherous woman who had sold him on account of her sudden fancy for Corsini, had also played her part perfectly. It was diamond cut diamond, but he was sure he would cut deeper of the two.

He was back to the minute. It was a light meal, but Madame Quéro, persuading herself that she was happy in this sudden reconciliation, had provided him some dainties that he was very fond of. Zouroff was in the highest spirits; he praised everything, drank her health several times in the excellent champagne she had provided. The singer ate sparingly and drank very little. It was a gala night at the Opera, she had to be careful of her voice, of those liquid notes which were presently to charm the house.

The moments fled swiftly, it was time for her to start. Zouroff was going on foot to the house of a fellow conspirator.

He bade her good-night, and carelessly drew a small box from his pocket. “See, I did not forget you, I have brought a box of your favourite chocolates.” He pointed with his finger to one. “See, here is a fine fat fellow, I will take a smaller one.”

La Quéro could never resist chocolates. She took the big one Zouroff pointed out to her and crunched it in her even white teeth. The Prince laid the box on the table.

“Good-night,” he said. “There is no time to lose. We are both a little late.” He went out, with a strange smile on his face.

Looking back to it in the happy after years, Corsini always declared that of all days this had been the most eventful day in his life.

At the hotel, on the previous evening, he had found waiting for him the note from Ivan the Cuckoo, who did not know at the time he despatched that missive that he was a free man. Corsini, accompanied by his faithful bodyguard, was to repair to Ivan’s mean lodging that night.

Nello was not without a spirit of adventure. He was rather looking forward to what would happen at midnight. He was to change places with Stepan, heavily handicapped as to hearing and speech, and listen to the conversation of the conspirators.

It was a gala night at the Opera. The Emperor and his consort were to be there. On such ceremonious occasions, Corsini was wont to conduct the orchestra himself, as a mark of respect to the autocrat. The Opera given on this particular night was a famous masterpiece in those days, Rossini’s “Semiramide.”

It was a great house. The flower of Russia’s nobility was gathered in the boxes and stalls of the vast building, the men attired in immaculate costume, the women radiant in their flashing jewels. In a far box, Nello saw the charming young Princess with an elderly friend, acting as her chaperon in place of her mother. Evidently she had not taken his advice. He cast a lightning glance around as he bowed to the plaudits of the audience. He was looking for Zouroff, but he could not see him. If the Prince was in the crowded house, he had missed him. Certainly he was not in the box where his sister sat.

He conducted the overture. In a few moments the curtain would rise. Before he had got to the end of the last few bars, there was heard a piercing scream, the cry of a woman. It penetrated to every corner of the building and created an uneasy feeling in the audience.

Nello recognised the situation at once. He beat with his bâton on the desk and started the overture again. Something had happened. He would know in a few minutes.

At last the curtain rose. The stage-manager, looking very agitated, appeared. In a few brief sentences he explained that Madame Quéro had been attacked with sudden indisposition; that he must crave the indulgence of the audience for her understudy, who would take her place.

Corsini dared not leave his desk. On such a night as this he could not affront his Emperor and this brilliant assemblage by deputing his task to a subordinate. He went through the Opera with the conscientious spirit of the artist. But all the time his thoughts were dwelling on La Belle Quéro, the woman who had braved Zouroff’s vengeance in order to save him.

It was evidently a serious indisposition. If it had been only a slight attack, the handsome singer would have pulled herself together and appeared some time in the course of the evening. With her jealous temperament, she was not the woman to give an understudy too big a chance.

At last the Opera was over, the brilliant crowd filed out. Corsini went round to the wings to inquire after La Belle Quéro. One of his subordinates gave him the information he sought.

“Madame Quéro is very ill, Signor. The doctor was called in. He did not seem quite able to diagnose her symptoms. He had her conveyed home and consigned to the care of her own maid and her own physician.”

Corsini at once despatched a messenger to the villa, with instructions to report to him at his hotel. The man came back with disquieting news. The singer was still in a comatose state, and her life was despaired of.

A swift thought swept through the Italian’s mind. Had Zouroff anything to do with this, apparently, fatal illness? Had he discovered the part she had played in his rescue?

And a still more disturbing thought assailed him. If the Prince had taken this swift vengeance on La Belle Quéro, it would not be long before he revenged himself on Nada. If only he could have conveyed a message to that box, to entreat her to fly before it was too late! Zouroff was evidently a scoundrel of the deepest dye who would stick at nothing.

But he could not act himself. Very shortly he must go to the mean lodging of Ivan, and receive his instructions as to taking the place of the deaf and dumb Stepan. In a brief space he would be inside that villa where the beautiful singer lay dying.

He did the best that presented itself to him. He despatched a brief note to Beilski.

“Madame Quéro attacked with sudden illness. It is reported that she is dying. I have certain suspicions of a person well known to us both. Please probe the matter. I cannot go myself. You know where I am due to-night.”

A little later, Corsini, escorted by his vigilant bodyguard, took his way to the mean quarter of the town where Ivan was lodged.

CHAPTER XXII

Ivan met him in the doorway. “You are punctual, Signor,” he said, as he ushered him into the shabby apartment.

“My friend, first of all, you are no longer an outlaw,” cried Corsini cheerfully as he cast his glance round the dingy room. “The Emperor himself has graciously accorded a full and free pardon, and if this night’s work turns out well, there will be a very handsome reward in addition. So, you see, things are marching.”

The outlaw stretched his hands out, and for a moment it seemed as if he would dissolve in tears. Then he recovered himself, and his voice rang out, clear and firm.

“And, at last, Signor, I shall have revenge on those who wronged me and my family.”

“Say rather, Ivan, justice, not revenge,” interrupted the young Italian mildly.

“It is the same, Signor, is it not?” cried Ivan. He pointed with his finger to an inert figure in the corner of the room, apparently inanimate.

“That is Stepan. I have given him a narcotic in order to prevent accidents. He does not look at his best at the moment. But just go and have a peep at him and see the likeness to yourself.”

Corsini crossed over the small room and looked at the prostrate form, of the man, wrapped in a deep slumber, and breathing heavily. Yes, Stepan might have been his twin brother under normal conditions.

“The time is short,” said the outlaw. “We must make you look as like Stepan as possible, with regard to the externals.”

He went to the door and whistled softly. A small, slouching man answered to the summons.

“Paul, my friend,” said Ivan in an imperious tone, “I have told you something of this affair. You have got to convert this gentleman into the speaking likeness of our sleeping friend. Do your little tricks at once.”

The small, slouching man went to work immediately. He stripped off the rough clothes from the slumbering man in the corner, and signalled to Corsini to divest himself of his own garments. In a trice, Corsini was dressed in Stepan’s habiliments. He then proceeded to stain his face and hands.

When all this was finished, he drew back with a sense of pardonable pride in his own deft handiwork.

“Mon Dieu! it is Stepan himself,” he cried enthusiastically.

Corsini took a survey of himself in a small, cracked mirror that hung in the shabby sitting-room. He cast a further glance at the inert form lying in the corner. Yes, in these rough clothes, with his face and hands stained, he could well pass for Stepan himself in a dim and doubtful light.

“It is just about time,” said Ivan, when these preparations had been completed. “My friend Paul will conduct you to the villa. There are seven windows on the ground floor, built very high. Underneath the fourth window the blank wall is of wood. You can feel it. There is a small door with a keyhole in the centre. Here is the key. Paul knows it well; he will lead you to it.”

The small slouching man led Corsini to the villa of Madame Quéro. The four silent men followed in their wake. Arrived at the villa, Corsini slipped easily into the small vestibule to await the arrival of the conspirators.

“You are well in time, Monsieur,” whispered the man, Paul, as he took his departure. “Do not answer the bell too quickly; watch its vibration before you respond. You must remember that Stepan is deaf. You will excuse me for giving you the hint.”

Paul departed. The four guards scattered themselves in various directions, but always ready to assemble together if danger threatened the man they were deputed to watch.

Corsini was alone in the little vestibule. He drew aside the heavy velvet curtains and peered into the inner room, a rather spacious chamber. This was very dimly lighted, too. But evidently Madame Quéro had given her instructions. A cold supper was laid out on the long table, with several bottles of champagne. Upstairs, no doubt, she was lying between life and death, no longer able to take part in these festivities.

The bell vibrated. Nello opened the door and made a low obeisance. Two men came through the narrow doorway. He recognised them at once: they were two highly distinguished noblemen of the Russian Empire. He had seen them several times at the Opera.

The bell vibrated again and again. Five more men passed through, and last came the tall, commanding figure of Zouroff.

In the dim light the Prince made his signs, “They are all here, Stepan?”

And the supposed Stepan replied in answering signs, “I think they are all here, Excellency.”

Zouroff passed through the heavy curtains. Corsini crouched behind and bent his ears to listen.

At first there was a confused babble of sounds. Everybody seemed to be talking at once. But fortunately they were speaking in French and not in Russian. It was easier for Corsini to catch what they said.

A tall, bearded man was speaking. “This infernal Corsini, for instance. No doubt he is in the pay of Golitzine. We cannot remove him, it seems.”

Zouroff took up the running. “I did my best, you know, gentlemen; but he escaped me, and since then Beilski has put a cordon round him that we cannot break through.”

“And yet Beilski is a fool,” growled the bearded man.

“I know,” answered Zouroff. “Beilski is what you say, but he has got Golitzine at his back, and Golitzine has the intelligence of several monkeys. When Beilski is in doubt, he goes to the secretary.”

Another man spoke. “You know we have every confidence in you, Prince; but we all know of your attachment to La Belle Quéro – by the way, why is she not here to-night, to preside over our festivities?”

Zouroff spoke in a harsh, strained voice. “La Belle Quéro is ill, confined to her room. You have probably not heard that she was attacked with sudden indisposition at the Opera to-night, and that her understudy had to take her place.”

None of the men had been at the Opera, they had not heard. One or two indulged in expressions of sympathy.

The bearded man, a powerful nobleman, only just second to Zouroff himself in importance and length of lineage, continued his remarks.

“I spoke just now of your well-known attachment to La Belle Quéro. Is it possible, Prince, that in an unguarded moment, you may have dropped some hints of your purpose to her? I did not wish, for a moment, to offend your amour propre, but rumour has it that she is very much attracted by this handsome young Italian. It is strange that he should have escaped you, who usually lay your plans so well.”

Zouroff paused for a moment before he replied. These men were as keen-witted as himself; it was impossible to deceive them for long.

“Gentlemen, I will be quite frank with you. One is always a fool where women are concerned. In a moment of ungoverned temper, I did hint to Madame Quéro something that might have set her wits to work, and she may have acted upon that.”

“From her penchant for the Italian?” suggested the bearded man, who, privately, was not too fond of the Prince, and always indulged in a pin-prick when possible.

Zouroff flushed a deep red. It angered him deeply that other persons should know Corsini had been preferred to him.

He looked round the assembly. He knew that the bearded man was bidding for the leadership that had been willingly accorded to himself. If his position were menaced, he must recover it immediately, and by a bold stroke.

He surveyed the small knot of men, his bold bearing and resolute demeanour at once challenging their allegiance, and compelling it.

“Gentlemen, I blench at nothing for the Cause to which we are all devoted, to which we have dedicated our lives and fortunes. On that occasion, I am convinced that La Belle Quéro betrayed me. Well, she will never betray us again. Madame La Quéro’s hours are numbered. That is why she has not appeared to-night.”

The men whom he addressed were as hardened and brutal as himself, with no respect for the sanctity of human life; but, as he spoke, a slight shudder went through the assembly. La Belle Quéro was so handsome, so popular; it seemed a thousand pities that she should be done to death, even in the interests of the Cause.

Zouroff spoke eagerly. At the moment he felt no remorse for having compassed the death of his former sweetheart with that poisoned chocolate. Had she not insulted him by daring to look with favourable eyes on another man?

“Gentlemen, it has ever been one of our fixed rules that anybody who betrayed us, man or woman, it matters not which, should pay the penalty of death. If I betrayed you, I should not complain if that law were put into execution against myself. La Belle Quéro betrayed us; she has paid the penalty.”

Zouroff was logical. The sense of the assembly was with him. The bearded man made a last effort to wrest from him his supremacy, not on the score of disloyalty, but for maladroitness in handling their common affairs.

“I very much regret that Madame Quéro should have allowed her heart to govern her head. She was a very charming woman,” he said smoothly. “Do you happen, by any chance, Prince, to have enemies in your own household?”

“Why do you ask me that question?” queried Zouroff boldly.

“One of my spies told me that Beilski has paid a recent visit to your sister, the Princess Nada. Beilski is not in the habit of paying afternoon calls. Does the young Princess know anything?”