“It was intended to kill Her Highness the Grand Duchess,” and he indicated Natalia, “and also the Englishman, Mr Trewinnard. The General was plotting the death of both of them, fearing that they knew his secret.”
“And in England there was another conspiracy against them—eh?”
“Yes,” replied the man known as the Shoemaker of Kazan. “But Mr Trewinnard and the Chief of Criminal Police, Ivan Hartwig, discovered me, and dared me to commit the outrage on pain of betrayal to my friends. Hence I have been between two stools—compelled by Markoff and defied by Hartwig. At last, in desperation, I sent an anonymous letter to Her Highness warning her, with the fortunate result that both she and her lover—a young Englishman named Drury—disappeared, and even the Secret Police were unable to discover their whereabouts. I did so in order to gain time, for I had no motive in taking Her Highness’s life, although if I refused to act I knew what the result must inevitably be.”
“All this astounds me,” declared the Emperor. “I never dreamed that I was being thus misled, or that Markoff was acting with such cunning and unscrupulousness against the interests of the dynasty and the nation. I see the true situation. You, Danilo Danilovitch, are a Revolutionist—not by conviction, but because of the drastic action of the Secret Police, the real rulers of Russia. Therefore, read that,” and he took from his table the Imperial ukase and handed it to him.
When he had read it he returned it to the Emperor’s hand, and murmured:
“Thank God! All Russia will praise Your Majesty for your clemency. It is the reform for which we have been craving for the past twenty years—fair trial, and after conviction a just punishment. But we have, alas! only had arrest and prompt banishment without trial. Every man and woman in Russia has hitherto been at the mercy of any police-spy or any secret enemy.”
“My only wish is to give justice to the nation,” declared the Sovereign, his dark, thoughtful eyes turned upon the dynamitard whose word was law to every Terrorist from Archangel to Odessa, and from Wirballen to Ekaterinburg.
“And, Sire, on behalf of the Party of the People’s Will I beg to thank you for granting it to us,” said the man, whose keen, highly-intelligent face was now slightly flushed.
“What I have heard to-day from my niece’s lips, from Mr Trewinnard and from yourself, has caused the gravest thoughts to arise within me,” His Majesty declared after a slight pause. “Injustice has, I see, been done on every hand, and the Secret Police has been administered by one who, it seems, is admittedly an assassin. It is now for me to remedy that—and to do so by drastic measures.”
“And the whole nation will praise Your Majesty,” Danilovitch replied. “I am a Revolutionist, it is true, but I have been forced—forced against my will—to formulate these false plots for the corrupt Secret Police to unearth. I declare most solemnly to Your Majesty that my position as leader of this Party and at the same time an agent-provocateur has been a source of constant danger and hourly terror. In order to hide my secret, I was unfortunately compelled to commit murder—to kill the woman I loved. She discovered the truth, and would have exposed me to the vengeance which the Party never fails to mete out to its betrayers. Markoff had given me my liberty and immunity from arrest in exchange for my services to him. He held me in his power, body and soul, and, because of that, I was forced to strike down the woman I loved,” he added, with a catch in his voice. “And—and—” he said, standing before the Emperor, “I crave Your Majesty’s clemency. I—I crave a pardon for that act for which I have ever been truly penitent.”