CHAPTER XV
More than one of her admirers noted that La Belle Quéro was not in her best form to-night. Her acting lacked its usual spontaneity, and several times she sang flat.
Those who thought themselves in the know, put down the inequality of her performance to some recent tiff with Prince Zouroff. But this was only a surmise, not a fact. Zouroff, of course, was in her thoughts, but only in connection with Corsini.
It was the danger threatening the handsome young Italian that caused her to sing flat and provoke those unflattering comments amongst her usually loyal audience.
Again in the early part of the evening she had sought him in his private room, and for the second time endeavoured to dissuade him from going to the Zouroff Palace. He was convinced in his own mind that it was unworthy jealousy of the Princess Nada which had prompted her action.
Perhaps, a short time ago, he would have felt a certain amount of pity for an affection that was so thoroughly misplaced. But Golitzine’s plain hints had destroyed his former feelings of friendship. He could only regard her interference now with resentment.
He looked at her very steadily. “Give me some intelligent reason for breaking my promise, Madame, and I will go so far as to say I will consider it.”
She turned pale and bit her lip in manifest agitation. What he asked her was precisely what she could not do. After that none too veiled threat of Zouroff’s, that if she failed him he would show her no mercy, she dare not betray him by telling the truth.
But she was a woman of considerable resource and she thought she might get round him by appealing to his pride.
“I do not know that I can advance any very sufficient reason, except that we have been good friends, and it annoys me to find you refusing to place a proper value on yourself.”
“How am I making myself cheap by playing at the Zouroff Palace, Madame? Like yourself, I am an artist and follow my art; certainly because I love it, but also because it procures me a substantial reward. If I play for the Countess Golitzine and others, I can play without loss of dignity for the Princess Zouroff.”
She saw her opportunity, and took advantage of it swiftly. “I am not speaking of women, my good friend. It is the Prince himself who is in my mind. You have told me half a dozen times that this man treats you with the greatest hauteur, hardly deigns to return your salutation. He is, after all, the master of the house. It seems to me that if you respected yourself, as I should wish you to do, you would refuse to give him the chance of insulting you.”
Corsini could easily have retorted that La Belle Quéro, in her professional capacity, attended many houses where the women showed her as scant courtesy as the autocratic Prince displayed towards him; but he was of too chivalrous a nature to hurt the pride of a woman.
Anyway, she did not give him the real reason, which he still believed to be that unworthy jealousy of the charming young Princess.
He shrugged his shoulders in real, or assumed, indifference. “I must not say too much about this Zouroff, because we all know he is a great friend of yours. He certainly might take a lesson in manners, but I don’t know that his want of them affects me very greatly.”
“Still, his discourtesy hurts you, or you would not have dwelt upon it so often as you have done,” retorted Madame, woman-like following out her point.
Corsini rose; he was rather tired of the argument.
“If it is so, Madame, I shall not pay him the compliment of staying away. I would not give him the triumph of thinking that he was capable of hurting me.”
She saw it was useless. “It must be as you wish, Signor;” there was a note of sadness in her voice as she turned away. She left the room, murmuring to herself, “I have tried my best. It is the sister who draws him, and she must wish as fervently as I do that he would stay away.”
It was early in the evening when she had sought this interview, and as the hours sped on, bringing Corsini nearer to the time of his appointment, her agitation increased. If she could only know if the Princess had thought of anything, if she had taken any steps to prevent the tragedy which she felt sure was impending.
With a woman of her nervous and excitable temperament, to express a wish was to carry it swiftly into execution. The Opera finished early that night. She drove home at once to her villa, summoned her maid, and bade her change her costume.
A few moments later she came back to the waiting carriage, attired in clothes befitting a woman of the poorer classes, and drove to within a short distance of the Zouroff Palace. She walked on foot to the servants’ entrance and demanded to see the Princess’s maid, Katerina, on very urgent business.
The girl came to the door, wondering who her visitor could be, what was the cause of this imperative summons.
The prima donna laid her finger on her lips to impress caution and secrecy.
“We must speak very low, if you please. I am Madame Quéro, the person you showed yesterday into your young mistress’s room. Can you convey a message from me to her now?”
Katerina looked at the strange visitor who had disguised herself so successfully. Had she met her in the street, she would have passed her by without knowing her. But now that Madame Quéro had recalled herself to her recollection, she at once recognised the popular singer, in spite of her humble attire.
“If you don’t mind waiting a few moments, Madame, I think I can manage it. But I am afraid I shall have to ask you to wait outside. Am I to take a letter?”
“I will wait outside, certainly. No, no letter, it might excite suspicion. Just take this message to your mistress: Has she been able to take any steps with regard to the matter we spoke of yesterday? A few words, yes or no, will do for an answer.”
The door was closed, and La Belle Quéro, one of the idols of St. Petersburg, waited in the darkness for a message to be delivered by a lady’s maid. For a moment, as she stood there, she laughed a little hysterically at the situation.
The Zouroff Palace had never opened its doors to her, even in a professional capacity, for the Princess was a grande dame, and very rigid in her social views. But there were other great houses, presided over by hostesses with a more elastic code for people of genius who had entertained her as a guest.
It was, to say the least of it, a little bizarre that she should be waiting outside the servants’ quarters, dressed in working-woman’s attire, because she did not want one lover to injure another man who might have been a lover had he chosen.
The minutes sped by; it seemed an eternity to the anxious woman waiting there. Then at last the door was opened cautiously, and Katerina spoke in a low voice.
“A thousand pardons for keeping you waiting so long, Madame, but it was very difficult to get hold of the young Princess. There is a big reception on to-night.”
“I know, I know,” interrupted the singer eagerly. This obliging girl, like most of her class, was apt to be garrulous. “Has she sent an answer?”
Katerina looked a little offended. Her good-humoured young mistress never interrupted her, even in her most prolix moments. She spoke stiffly.
“Yes, Madame, I was coming to that in a second. She has taken certain steps which she devoutly hopes will insure the result you both desire, but of course she cannot be certain.” Suddenly the maid’s tone changed, and she dropped a very profound curtsey. “It is very kind of you, Madame, but it was really not necessary. I am only too pleased to have been of use.”
The change in tone was due to the fact that Madame Quéro had slipped into her hand a substantial sum of money, immediately afterwards disappearing into the darkness.
Although not happy nor assured, she felt relieved to know that something had been done to thwart the Prince’s sinister designs.
She walked swiftly to her carriage, and on her way passed Corsini, who was going in the direction of the Palace with his beloved violin-case in his hand. It was a peculiarity of the Italian that he never drove where he could walk. She shuddered as she wondered if he was going to his doom, or if the Princess’s fervent hopes would be realised.
For a moment a wild impulse urged her to turn back and run after him, to blurt out the truth and implore his silence. But the instinct of self-preservation prevailed and the impulse was combated.
Zouroff’s dark threat rang in her ears. And if the Prince’s suspicions were correct, Corsini was in the pay of Golitzine. If that were true, she would entreat his silence in vain. Even gratitude for his escape would not blind him to his obvious duty.
Corsini ascended the staircase, and the first person he met on entering the handsome gilded music-salon was the master of the house. To the Italian’s intense surprise the Prince held out his hand and greeted him with an apparent show of cordiality.
“Ah, good evening, Signor. You are a little late – is it not so? Many of your admirers have been asking after you and fearing that you were not able to come.”
Nello, a man of a most frank and trusting disposition, was almost overcome by this condescension. Had he misjudged the man after all? A great Russian nobleman of ancient lineage might be disposed to look down upon meaner persons who could boast of neither wealth nor origin. At any rate, he was behaving well in his own house, was not reminding him of the difference between their stations.
“I am afraid I am a little late, Prince. But I will make amends. If they desire an extra encore they shall have it.” Thus Nello, a little elated by Zouroff’s subtle suggestion that he was a person of great importance in the world of art, and his audience was waiting impatiently for his arrival.
He played very beautifully that night. The enthusiasm of his listeners was so great that he had to grant not one, but three encores. At last he left the platform.
The Princess Nada met him as he descended the few marble steps.
“You have surpassed yourself to-night, Signor. There are many waiting to pay you compliments. But will you first come and have a brief chat with me?”
Was there anything he could more ardently desire? To gaze for a few moments into those beautiful eyes, to listen to those soft, kind tones – were not a few moments spent like this worth much more than all the applause he had received?
She led him to a small divan in the spacious salon, that was fortunately not occupied. She sat at one end, he at the other; but they were not very distant.
He was very agitated. His close proximity to this beautiful young woman, the product of centuries of high breeding, the delight of her presence, the perfume that stole to him from her abundant hair, the hundred and one subtle allurements that a daughter of the classes possessed for a son of the people, intoxicated him. She was indeed the woman of his dreams, a star set so high in the firmament that he could only gaze respectfully at its light.
She brought him to earth with the simple question: “You must be very tired after your fatigues of the day and night; it is some time past twelve now. How do you propose to return to your hotel? I suppose you have your carriage waiting to take you back?”
She had put the question in her subtle, woman’s way. She knew it was a fad of Corsini’s that he would never ride or drive where he could walk. When he was rallied upon it by his few intimate friends, he always gave the same explanation that he proffered now.
“It is an eccentricity of mine, Princess, that I always walk wherever I can. Shall I tell you why?”
Nada looked at him kindly. “Yes, tell me why. I cannot tell you whether it is an eccentricity until I know the reason. Personally, I am a very lazy person, and never walk when I can ride.”
Corsini leaned towards her. He could inhale the fragrance of her hair, the stronger perfume that came from the roses she wore in her corsage.
“Princess, may I reveal to you some of my inmost cherished aspirations?” His eyes were glowing, he spoke with unusual vehemence.
“I should be honoured to receive your confidences,” replied the Princess softly.
“Ah, then, since you are so indulgent, I will tell you. My career up to a few months ago was an obscure one. Music is in my blood, as it is in yours. Am I not right?”
“Yes,” replied the Princess, in an even softer voice than before. “Music is in my blood, too. Everything fades into insignificance beside those lovely rapturous sounds, such as you and a few other great artists can evoke and render in your various media: through the voice, the violin, the piano – perhaps the weakest, the least convincing of all.”
She was very lovely, very alluring, thought Corsini. She had considerable mentality, even great spirituality. Alone with his violin and her, he could so charm her that perchance she might cast off her high estate, the estate of the Princess, and venture forth with him into the world of exquisite music and unknown dreams. But the time had not come for that. She had only extended a kind and gentle friendship. He could not, at the moment, ask for more. It would be presumption on his part.
“I trust I shall not weary you,” he said, with a smile of apology. “As a violinist, I have met with some success; as the Director of the Imperial Opera, I am not quite a failure. But these successes, for what they are worth, do not put limits on my ambition. I want to be something greater than either – the successful composer.”
The Princess sighed. “Ah, that is my ambition, too. I have tried every instrument, and failed. I have composed heaps of things, but there is no originality in them. I play Chopin and try to imitate him, Wagner with the same result. I have an artistic instinct, Signor Corsini, but no creative ability. I must be a listener all my life, envying the people who render what I would give all my fortune to express.”
Corsini thought of his interview with Salmoros, when that sedate and experienced financier had expressed the inmost desires of his soul, that he would give a hundred thousand pounds out of his princely fortune to acquire half of the Italian’s executive art.
Corsini looked at her, his artist soul beaming in his expressive eyes.
“It is one of the tragedies of life, Princess. You, like my good friend Salmoros, desire to be an executant, and your fingers refuse to obey the impulses of your soul. You want to be a composer, and you cannot express your ideas. You do not create, you only imitate.”
“Alas, yes,” answered the Princess mournfully.
Corsini half rose from his seat in his agitation. “With me, Princess, it is different. The executive part comes easily to me; I do not worry about that; it is, of course, a gift. But, as I told you, I long to be a composer. That is the reason why I always walk whenever the distance is not too long.”
“Ah, yes, we have wandered far from the original subject,” answered the Princess, realising that Corsini had got upon the great theme of self, and was no longer keen to listen to the recital of her small aspirations.
“Playing in these gilded saloons, shut up in my office at the Opera, my imaginative past is dull and dead. When I walk through the silent streets watching the tide of life as it flows by, the nobleman rolling by in his carriage, the beggar cringing for alms, great thoughts come to me. Overhead at night, the stars, full of mystery and wonder, this petty world beneath! Then, Princess, my imagination awakes. I feel in me some of that divine fire which must have informed the great Beethoven when he composed ‘The Moonlight Sonata,’ some of that inspiration which moved Chopin, Wagner, and the other great masters.”
He waved his arms with a dramatic gesture. “That is why I walk rather than ride. Speaking as a composer, when I am confined in a close space, I am dead artistically. When I walk and look round on life, I find inspiration.”
He was very glowing, very impassioned. Nada felt her pulses thrill as she listened to him. But perhaps, because she was not the full and complete artist that Corsini was, she always leaned to the practical side.
“Oh, please do not think I am not capable of understanding you,” she said. “If I were the artist you are, I should break away from the narrow confines of this Palace and seek inspiration, like you, from the moon and stars, even in the silent streets.”
She paused a moment, and then added, with her full knowledge of what was lying in wait for him, “But all the same, Signor, in spite of the inspiration you may derive, I wish you would not walk home to-night. Give the moon, the stars, the silent streets the go-by for once. Wait for your inspiration till to-morrow.”
He was flattered by that direct appeal to him from such a beautiful girl, but of course, he had no idea of the reason that had prompted it.
“But, Princess, why put an embargo on this exquisite night? As I walk along, great ideas will come to me. I may be able to think of something worthy of Chopin, Schumann, even of the great Wagner himself.”
She leaned forward to him a little from her side of the divan, and her flower-like face was very close to his. He could catch the subtle perfume of her hair, the scent of the roses at her breast.
“It is just a little whim of mine, Signor Corsini. You work very hard, you are devoured by your artistic ambitions which nourish the soul, but consume the body to ashes. Do not incur unnecessary fatigue. You have your carriage waiting?”
“No, Princess, I have never any carriage waiting. I nearly always walk to my hotel – the longer the distance, the better, because I have a longer time for inspiration.”
“I know, I know,” answered Nada quietly. “I fully appreciate all this, but one may sometimes overdo it. I do not think you are looking very well to-night, Signor. You have put too great a strain upon yourself lately. You say you have no carriage waiting. Permit me to supply you with one. The courtyard is choked up with vehicles. You have only to say the word and my maid will bring you one to the side door of the Palace. You can get in there and be driven home at once, without any tedious delay.”
A delightful thought crossed his brain. Was it possible that the Princess had appreciated his respectful homage, his silent devotion? Or was this solicitude for his welfare merely the expression of a womanly compassion for the man outside her world, but claiming the common kinship of art?
His voice broke as he declined her offer. “Ten thousand thanks, but I would not put you to such trouble. You have so many guests to see to. I have already taken up too much of your time. I will walk home as usual and seek my inspiration under the stars.”
Her troubled gaze sought his. If he would only prove amenable, she could still save him – at any rate for a time – from her ruthless brother, with the aid of her faithful maid, Katerina, out of the reach of those scoundrels who were waiting to convey him – she hoped into the arms of General Beilski’s police.
But Corsini was not to be saved to-night, although two women had done their best for him. He took the hand that the Princess offered him.
“You have been so very kind. I shall always cherish you in a warm corner of my heart, for were you not one of my earliest friends? At that time, I had not many friends, Heaven knows.”
“I shall always be your friend, Signor Corsini. I only wish you would allow me to order the carriage to take you home.” The concluding words almost sounded like an entreaty.
But Corsini would pay no attention. He was resolved on walking home to seek inspiration from the clear skies and the silent streets.
At the top of the great staircase the Prince was standing, to all appearances cordiality itself. But, from a far corner of the music-salon, he had been watching with angry eyes the conversation between his sister and Corsini.
But he could afford to be indifferent; he could afford to greet the young Italian with a smile. He had laid his plans cunningly.
Zouroff accompanied him to the door, guarded by a big hall-porter. In a corner of the hall lounged a small dapper man, Peter, his valet, the lover of Katerina.
“Good-night, Signor. Have you no carriage waiting? Ah, no, I understand it is a habit of yours to walk. Good! Exercise is a fine tonic. My secretary will send you a cheque to-morrow for your services. Again, good-night!”
The door closed on the retreating Corsini. Zouroff turned swiftly to the small, dapper man, and whispered in his ear.
“After him, Peter. Come back and tell me that they have done their work.”
The hall-porter opened the door at a sign from his imperious master, and the valet went out with a slow, stealthy tread.
He followed in the wake of Corsini, who marched along gaily, his violin-case swinging from his hand, his thoughts full of the Princess Nada, who had been so sweet to him, so gracious.
He hummed one of the gayest of the many gay airs from “Il Barbiere” as he walked along. It was one of his favourite operas, one in which La Belle Quéro was inimitable.
He was in a very happy frame of mind to-night as he walked through the silent streets. He even thought tenderly of La Belle Quéro, and went to the length of forgiving her for what he had once considered her groundless jealousy of the Princess.
In the midst of these happy thoughts, four black shadows loomed up against him, four men surrounded him.
What a fool he had been not to take the Princess’s advice and drive home! St. Petersburg, like every other populous city, was full of thieves.
Blindly he struck out with his disengaged hand. Shrilly he called out for help.
One of the burly men who had surrounded him threw a handkerchief over his face. In a few seconds his struggles had ceased.
His almost inanimate form was conveyed to the waiting carriage, standing in a side street not far from the Zouroff Palace. It was bundled inside, two of the men mounted the box, the others sat inside, and the horses set off at a fast trot in the direction of the Moscow road.
The valet, Peter, strolled back home. His master was lounging about in the vestibule to await the news. Peter whispered them in his ear.
Zouroff smiled a slow smile of gratified malice.
“The bird is trapped,” he exulted as he ascended the staircase, to mingle once more with his guests.