Wilfrid, aided by the lorgnette, took a long and critical survey of the new Emperor.
He beheld a man as different in appearance from his father Paul as the day is from the night. Alexander exhibited in his person all the beauty of the Romanoff family. His figure, over six feet in height, was well proportioned and graceful in movement; his hair, light brown in colour, with a tendency to curl. His face was singularly handsome; he had eyes of a dark blue, a profile purely Grecian, and a complexion as clear and almost as colourless as marble. In short, it was no wonder that all the ladies in St. Petersburg were in love with him, for, externally, he was just the sort of man to captivate a woman’s imagination. To add to his attractiveness the graces of his mind were, according to Pauline, far superior to those of his person. His conversation was lively and charming. In scholarship he far surpassed his equals in age; indeed, his grandmother Catharine had kept him to his studies so closely as somewhat to impair his eyesight.
Wilfrid listened with some indifference as Pauline ran over the list of the Czar’s accomplishments. Truth to tell, Wilfrid felt a latent spirit of antagonism to the new ruler, finding—somewhat absurdly it must be confessed—a ground of complaint in the very fact that he should owe his recovered freedom to the action of this Czar, for the power to set free implies likewise the power to imprison. That the liberty of an Englishman and a Courtenay should depend upon the irresponsible will of an autocrat of twenty-three was galling to his high spirit. That young man, without consulting either judge or jury, could banish Wilfrid from his dominions, and, if he chose, could order Pauline to receive the knout. There was nothing in Russia to stop him. The wealth, the liberty, the lives of sixty millions were at his absolute disposal.
When Pauline went on to speak of Alexander’s swordsmanship, and of how, in that art, he excelled every officer in his army, Wilfrid became more than ever critical and depreciatory. Empire might belong to the Romanoffs, but when it came to a question of swordsmanship, let them not presume too much.
“Can beat every officer in his army, can he?” muttered Wilfrid. “Humph! I shall never be happy till I have crossed swords with his Czarship.”
Alexander did not retire immediately upon his proclamation as Emperor, but remained upon the balcony for the space of two or three minutes, possibly with the object of giving the people time to take a good look at their new ruler.
And then came a grim and significant incident, never forgotten by those who witnessed it.
Just as the Archimandrite Plato was preparing to pronounce a benediction upon the people, and with this view had raised his hand, an action which produced a solemn hush over the vast assembly, there came a sound like the shivering of glass. The panes of a window in the lower part of the palace were falling outward by reason of blows dealt from within, and through the opening thus caused there leaped forth a wild figure.
Alighting upon all fours in the rear of a squadron of horse, he sprang to his feet immediately, and though hands, and even sabres, were put forth to stay his progress, he contrived, by adroitly turning and twisting beneath the horses’ bellies, to elude capture and to gain the open space fronting the palace, thus becoming visible to the Czar and his staff upon the balcony. The incident was not lost upon Wilfrid, who turned his lorgnette upon this sudden apparition.
Some twenty hours previously Wilfrid had seen the man’s face, but now, disfigured all over with medical plasters, it was barely recognisable.