“Oh! all that’s nonsense; no one really knows anything about it,” I answered.
“Of course it was a rather delicate affair, and was kept a great secret,” continued Charnomski. “You are right, how should every one know? But I relate all this because I have it from a true source. What became of the other children, and whether any are still living, … is not known.
“The Princess Elizabeth, when a child of two years old, was brought to the relations of Razoumovski, the Cossacks Daragan, to their property in Oukraine, Daraganovka, which the neighbours, countrymen of the new parvenus, styled, in their own fashion, “Tarakanovka.” The Dowager Empress Elizabeth, and after her all the court, in fun called the child the Princess Tmoutarakanova.[17] At first she was not neglected. She was often inquired after. Everything that she needed was always sent to her. But afterwards, especially during her travels, she was lost sight of, and finally quite forgotten.”
The word “Tarakanovka” made me shudder in spite of myself. It sounded to me like a voice of the past. It reminded me of my far-off childhood, of our own little manor, Konsovka, and my late grandmother, Agraffena Vlassovna, who had known much of the past and present court; of the wonderful luck which had fallen to the lot of the shepherd of Lemechevski, who unexpectedly had become, instead of the singer, Aloshki Razouma,[18] a count, and the privately married husband of the empress; of the accession to the throne of the new empress; of the attempt of Merovitch, and of many other events. Through him my grandfather, Irakli Konsov, who was a neighbour of the Razoumovskis in the village Lemesha, was loaded with favours, rose in his service, and died in a very high position.
I remembered another very hazy circumstance. I went once with my grandmother to a name’s-sake day party given by some relations. Our road lay across a village near Baturin, the residence of the Hetman[19] Kiryl Razoumovski. It was a lovely and calm summer’s evening, and we were talking together, grandmother and I. From the open carriage, on both sides of the road, in the twilight we could see the weeping willows, and, scattered here and there between them, the white cottages and windmills, and above the willows and the cottages the church steeple. My grandmother, musing quietly, crossed herself, and then thoughtfully, gently, as if to herself, all at once pronounced the word “Tarakanchic.”[20]
“What did you say, grandmother?” I asked.
“Tarakanchic.”
“What is that?”
“Well, I will tell you, mon ange,” she answered. “Here, a long time ago, in this same village, lived a mysterious person—a lovely, graceful, and fair child, as fair as a lily; but she did not stay long, and where she disappeared to no one knows.”