"Yes; here is the document, and it concludes thus: 'as I and the Regiment of Smolensko will shortly march into St. Petersburg, Captain Carl Ivanovitch Balgonie need not return to Novgorod; but until then, shall attach himself to your staff, and remain in Schlusselburg, where, erelong, you may require all the good service he can render you.—WEYMARN.'"
Great were the mortification and disgust of Balgonie on learning that he was to remain for an indefinite period in a place so revolting and uncomfortable, and with no other society than that of three military jailers,—cruel, hard-hearted, and avaricious Muscovites of the worst kind; and with these orders died his hopes of revisiting, as he intended, Louga, on his return, and of seeing Natalie again.
Under ban as all the household of Mierowitz would be now, should he ever see her more? Every way fate and the tide of events seemed to be against him and her, already in the very dawn of their love.
"And now, gentlemen," said the Governor, lowering his voice, "the Empress's dispatch contains only two lines, thus: 'A scheme is formed to free Prince Ivan. Let him not fall alive into the hands of those who come to seek for him!' Nor shall he!" exclaimed Bernikoff with ferocious enthusiasm, as he dashed a cup of vodka among his quass, and drained the goblet, after shouting, "The health of Her Imperial Majesty Catharine Christianowna—hurrah!"
"Hurrah, hurrah!" added Vlasfief and the Lieutenant.
Balgonie also, as in duty bound, essayed to "hurrah," but the sound died away on his lips.
CHAPTER XIV.
CHARLIE'S FIRST DAY IN SCHLUSSELBERG.
Full of anxious thoughts, he passed more than half of the succeeding day on the ramparts of the castled-prison, alone, avoiding Colonel Bernikoff, Captain Vlasfief, and their subaltern, Tschekin, none of whom were consonant to his taste, for all were deep gamblers and heavy drinkers.
His mind was full of care for Natalie and all her family. Some desperate and revengeful plot, of which the desertion of her brother and of his cousin Usakoff was but the beginning, the means to an end, was certainly hatching—a plot that might too surely end in bloodshed, in the savage punishment and the ruin of all.