CHAPTER X.
A COURT FAVOURITE.
It was evening in the Winter Palace—evening of the day on which Vladimir Mellikoff had entered on the first stage of his new mission: to make war upon a woman.
Within the Palace all was hushed and still; the servants passed to and fro with noiseless footsteps and that well-trained air of repose only attainable by long and constant effort. For once no official or social entertainment was on hand, and the Imperial Family were enjoying the novelty of a comparatively quiet evening—a novelty, whose rarity precluded any possibility of its charm waxing dim.
The great State apartments, the Onyx Hall, and the Salle des Palmiers were empty, dark, and silent, hiding their wonderful treasures in the gloom and shadows: their priceless tables of malachite and lapis-lazuli; their jewel-encrusted frames to pictures rarer and more valuable than the gems that surrounded them. From out the dark corners started a thousand and one memories of bygone kings and dynasties—of that great and licentious Catherine II., to whose energy Petersburg owes so much, and the Winter Palace its existence; of Peter, also called the Great, who first raised his nation from out of its barbarism; of Napoleon, and his restless ambition; of Nicholas, who died broken-hearted when Sevastopol fell; of Alexander, the wise and beneficent, father of the Tsar who now occupies the Imperial throne, and who strove in vain to stem the current of mad republicanism that spread disaffection broadcast from the Baltic to the Caspian, and which gathering strength year by year and month by month, rolled on like some gigantic wave far out at sea, tossing high above the surrounding breakers, riding fearlessly to its doom, and breaking with devastating effect against the ill-protected breakwaters of monarchical institutions and traditions.
When the Court was alone, so to speak, and free from the onerous duties of perfunctory ceremonial, the Tsarina—whose nature was as gentle and loving and peaceful as that of her sister, the beloved Princess of England's hopes—shunned the vast State chambers, and held her petites réunions in a smaller suite of apartments, within which were gathered every luxury of modern civilisation, and where, when the heavy plush portières were drawn, the great stoves emitting the heat of a furnace, and the logs piled high on the low fire-dogs, it was possible to forget the ice and snow without, even as in looking upon the various spoils and souvenirs of every clime and country, from the rich silks and perfumed woods of the Orient, to the more homely comforts of Great Britain, it was possible to forget that this was Petersburg, and become oblivious to those frowning walls and cruel dungeons, mocked by the names of the two Apostles, St. Peter and St. Paul.
Nevertheless, there they stood, grim, real, dauntless, and within them languished the poor "prisoners of hope," wrapped, at least let us pray, in that merciful and dreamless sleep, which the dark hours bring even to the most miserable.
This favourite set of rooms of the Tsarina's opened one from another, each growing smaller until the last was reached, which was indeed a veritable nest of down for the fair Danish dove who had mated with the bold Russian eagle. Here the Empress received her most privileged guests, and permitted audiences that were of a peculiarly private or domestic order. Here, too, would come the Tsar, and throwing himself down into one of the low velvet ottomans, put from him his habitual air of reserve and anxiety, and enter with affectionate raillery into the spirit of the hour; or should such be his mood, at a sign all would withdraw, leaving him alone with the Empress, who at such times threw aside the conventionalities of a life hedged in by etiquette, and became only the loving, faithful wife, the intelligent companion, the cheerful counsellor and consoler.
Much indeed might the walls of that blue chamber have revealed could they have spoken: secrets on which hung the fate of nations; decisions that were to make history; and confidences that wrung tears of blood from the stern Tsar, whose heart, like that of his father, loved his mighty empire, but who, unlike him, failed to inspire complete trust in his nation's heart.
On these occasions, the larger room of all was given up to the use of the Court; and here gathered the different ladies and gentlemen attached to the personnel of their Imperial Majesties; and here, too, were often admitted particular friends of the bedchamber ladies, the maids of honour, the equerries, and other official personages of the Court. The orders, however, for such entrance were somewhat difficult to obtain, and each person who entered was keenly watched by a member of the secret committee of the Chancellerie, whose function, unknown to any but himself, obtained for him the fullest opportunities of scrutiny.