The rebellion of the Princess

by Mary Imlay Taylor

I bowed profoundly.

“I thank you, Princess,” I replied drily; “I pray you wait here while I go, but a few steps, to the stable and bring the horses.”

“I will wait, monsieur,” she said, and cast down her eyes, blushing painfully under my glance.

I delayed no longer, but taking a taper, went hastily through the house, and finding the back door, unbarred it, and went out into the court; here, for security’s sake, I locked the door of the house and put the key away in my bosom, fearing to leave any bolts undrawn, even while I went to the stable. The lock was hard, and I had to keep the taper shielded by my hand, until I got it fastened, and then, remembering the darkness of the outhouses, I carried it carefully across the yard and entered the stable with it in my hand. The horses, two in number, were in their places, and I began to look about for saddles and bridles for them, moving as speedily and as softly as I could. There was no sound, or I heard none, save the occasional stamp of one of the horses, and I had found my saddle, in the farthest corner from the door, when my taper began to flicker, as if from a sudden draught, and looking up over it, half dazzled by it, I thought I saw someone opening the door. Instinct made me extinguish my taper, and then I saw plainly the burly figure of a man standing on the threshold, outlined sharply by the red glare that suddenly blazed behind him. There were no windows, and but one outlet. I drew my pistol, but, as I did it, the court-yard suddenly swarmed with men and torches, and the fire streaming in the darkness showed me that the fellow on the threshold was Kurakin’s red-bearded steward. He seized a light, and flinging the radiance full on my face, he shouted gleefully:

“We have him, friends! Here is the knave of a goldsmith who beats honest men!”

It was his hour of vengeance, but his last.

I took deliberate aim and, the next instant, he wallowed in his blood upon the floor, and his torch went out. Then, I sprang—if I could only get out, and so lead them away from the house and from her! I knocked another villain senseless in the doorway; I leaped out, and, in a moment, the blaze of torches surrounded me, half a dozen men shouted madly, and I rushed headlong for the gate. I gained it, and they followed. Another moment and I had trailed them ten—twenty yards from the house, and then they were upon me; they had me down and blows rained on me. I fired once more and someone fell heavily upon me; I got a blow on the head, and lights and voices went out together into utter darkness.

XXII: A DRUNKEN ORGY

WHEN I came to myself again I was in a long, low room, lighted by smoking torches, and filled with the fumes of liquor and crowded with soldiers. I was bound with heavy cords to a chair that was standing on a table at the end of the room, and my bonds cut cruelly into my arms and about my knees and ankles. It was evident that I had been long unconscious, for they had ceased to heed me, and were intent upon their liquor and their dice. I did not stir; indeed, I had but little space in which to move even a finger, but I kept quite still, that I might watch them and learn something of my situation. The room was evidently in one of the huts of the Streltsi, in the Zemlianui-gorod, and its walls were of logs stuffed with tow, and the rafters overhead were black with greasy smoke, while the air reeked with a strong mixture of garlic, beer, raw brandy, and oil of cinnamon—a luxury fetched from the cellars of the boyars.

Below me the dark, savage faces scowled over the dice and the liquor—their hair and beards so long and ragged that it must have been many weeks since they had visited the hair-market, a place where the Muscovites went to be trimmed, and where the barbers, cutting the hair, flung it on the ground and let it lie, until the earth was covered with a soft, uncleanly mat; as curious as any sight in Moscow. But these rioters, who had returned to their barracks with their spoils and their prisoners, heeded nothing but their drink and their game, and they were already deep in their cups, drunkenness being a besetting sin with both the men and women, especially of the lower classes. They were bloody, too, and unwashed, wild as savages, some naked to the waist, and now and then a tipsy brute shouted out a ribald song, and again two clenched in a fight over their dice, and fell on the floor and rolled there, and I saw a knife flash and heard a cry—like a wild beast in pain—and only one rose up to play again, yet the others paid no heed, but let the murderer throw his dice with red hands. Two others dropped from their seats and fell into a drunken sleep upon the floor, and were kicked aside, slept on, and snored.