“There he will fall on Russia, Danilovitch.”
“Here we can meet him,” replied Mentchikoff.
Peter frowned; his dark head with the full short curls was bent low over the stains of wine on the malachite table; carved wooden dishes with birds’ heads, full of fruit, beakers of pierced steel and horn, had been pushed aside by the sweep of his right arm; the light of the candles fixed to the white walls of the pavilion shone on his stooping figure, and the harsh, earnest face and brilliant caftan of Mentchikoff.
Peter, staring at the smears of red on the green, was seeing those vast disputed provinces that he coveted, Ingermanland and Karelia ceded to Sweden nearly 100 years ago, Livonia and Esthonia lost by Poland to the same power in 1660; the possession of these lands would secure that Baltic port which had been the dream of Ivan IV, and which was so passionately desired by this first Czar who had beheld and loved the sea; the first ruler of Russia who had aspired to seize the trade with Asia and open up sea-going commerce. He had believed that the boy King of Sweden would be utterly incapable of defending his provinces, and that his secret league with Denmark and Poland would be easily and successfully pursued to a victorious conclusion.
Now Denmark had fallen out of the fight and Poland was a wavering ally; but Peter still put some faith in Augustus, because of the trained Saxon soldiery.
So he remained for a while, staring at that crude map, his swift mind filled out with all detail; then he suddenly smeared the wine spillings together with his open hand and looked up at Mentchikoff, who was regarding him eagerly.
“This is a more difficult task than punishing the Strelitz or subduing the Cossacks,” he said, with glittering eyes. “Surely it is more pleasure, Danilovitch, to overthrow free men than to put one’s feet on the neck of serfs.”
“The Cossacks will join Karl,” remarked Mentchikoff, kindling eagerly at the Czar’s fire.
“To-morrow we return to Moscow,” said Peter, and his face was as fierce as it had been in the days after his return from his travels, when the streets of the capital had run red with the blood of the old Moscovite army, which had revolted against his foreign reforms.
He pushed back his tangled hair with his wine-stained hand.