Ivan saluted him with due respect, but answered in the negative.
“Ah! then I shall have the trouble of speaking to the marshal about you,” returned the count, with an air of annoyance, at which Ivan was scarcely surprised, for Rostopchine’s manner on the preceding evening had made him fully aware that he desired to retain him in his own service. So he answered deferentially, “Instead of imposing that trouble upon your excellency, I shall avail myself of the third proposal you did me the honour to make, and very humbly entreat of you to intrust me with despatches for his Imperial Majesty.”
Ivan was utterly amazed at the count’s reception of this request. “Then you are as great a fool as I took you for the first day I saw your face. And,” added Rostopchine, with one of his resounding Russian oaths, “you could not possibly be a greater!”
Such an address from such a personage, and in the presence of a score of witnesses, might well have disconcerted an older man than Ivan, especially as he could not in the least imagine the cause of it. But to every one’s astonishment he stood his ground, and answered with the utmost coolness and self-possession, “Your excellency’s opinion may be correct, but it must have some better foundation than my choosing to embrace an offer which you yourself condescended to make to me last night.”
“He sees no difference between last night and this morning,” remarked Rostopchine, turning to his officers, but speaking in a voice quite loud enough for Ivan to hear. “He is in a mighty hurry to go and tell the Czar that the Kremlin is destroyed.” Then addressing Ivan directly—“I understand you perfectly, young gentleman: you prefer the air of a court to that of a camp, and had rather dangle your feet in the Czar’s ante-chamber than use your hands fighting the French.”
If Ivan had not just been performing most hazardous services with signal intrepidity, he might have been angry. But he knew that no one present doubted his courage for an instant, Rostopchine perhaps least of all. So he only bowed, and answered with extreme sang-froid, “That being the case, when shall I have the honour of waiting upon your excellency to receive your commands for St. Petersburg?”
“I will send them to you in half-an-hour; you need not show your face here again.”[35]
Ivan returned to the tent of his friend with, strange to say, a more cheerful air than when he left it. He seemed to be rather exhilarated than otherwise by his encounter. “Every one knows the count’s temper,” he said, after detailing the adventure. “I was not going to lose the reward of all I have passed through during the last six weeks for a few rough words. Only for the hope of seeing the face of my Czar, and telling him I tried to serve him faithfully, I should once and again have lain down to die.”
“It is well known,” answered Adrian, “that Count Rostopchine does not love the Czar—but he loves Russia.” Then, to Ivan’s surprise, Adrian told him that he himself hoped to be the companion of his rapid journey to St. Petersburg. His mother’s death had left the pecuniary affairs of the Wertsch family in confusion, and of course the intervention of “government” was necessary for their arrangement. Amongst other matters, the term of years for which one of their estates had been granted by the crown was now expired, and a new grant would have to be solicited. While Ivan was engaged with the count, Adrian had asked for and obtained a short leave of absence, that he might take advantage of his friend’s telega; for Ivan, as one travelling upon public business, would be authorized to require, at every post-house, the swiftest horses that could be obtained.
This explanation had not long been finished, when a fine young man, the son of Rostopchine, entered the tent. He brought Ivan his father’s letter to the Czar, and the other documents necessary for his journey. Then he offered him a supply of money, which Ivan, under the circumstances, was glad to be able to decline—the contents of a purse of ducats, found accidentally in one of the abandoned palaces of Moscow, sufficing for his present needs. Lastly, young Rostopchine lingered to say, “My father desires me to tell you that he has mentioned you to the Czar in very handsome terms, though not more so than you have fully deserved.”