Princess Zara

by Ross Beeckman

  CHAPTER IV

  DAN DERRINGTON'S STORY

  I had known Alexis Saberevski in St. Petersburg; I had known him againin Paris. I had, in fact, encountered him at one time or another inalmost every capital of Europe, and I was therefore not greatlysurprised when, having just left the dining table at my club in my ownnative city, New York, his card was given to me with the informationthat the gentleman was waiting in the reception room.

  I had him up at once, with the courtesies of the club extended to him,and finding that he had dined, we ensconced ourselves in the depths ofa pair of huge chairs which occupied one of the secluded corners of thelibrary, each equally delighted to be again in the company of theother. We had never known each other intimately, and yet we werefriends; friends after that fashion which sometimes comes between menof pronounced characteristics, and which finds its expression in theform of a silent confidence, and an undoubted pleasure in each other'scompany.

  I knew Saberevski to be a particularly strong man. Strong in thehighest and best acceptation and meaning of that word, for he was agiant in intellect and in character.

  He was also a mystery, and this fact possibly rendered him all the moreinteresting to one whose business it had always been to solvemysteries. I do not mean by that that I had ever made any effort todelve into the secrets of Saberevski's past, or to read without hisknowledge and consent, any portion of that history which he kept socarefully veiled; but the mere fact that an air of mystery did pervadehis presence, imparted to him a certain fascinating quality which mightnot otherwise have been apparent.

  I had not encountered him for several years, and our last parting hadoccurred in front of Browne's hotel, Piccadilly, standing near theentrance from Albemarle street. As I received his card from the clubservant, the words he had uttered at that hour of parting returned tome, for I had made a mental note of them, at the time regarding them asbeing of much more import than was nakedly expressed, coming from sucha man. He had said: "I shall probably never return to St. Petersburg orpass across the border of Russia again, Derrington; but I may, andprobably will some day, find myself in New York; when I do, you shallknow of it." That day when I received his card, the last words he haduttered to me recurred to my mind, and it was with unmixed pleasurethat I presently greeted him. I knew that there had been a time when hewas high in place at the court of his native city, St. Petersburg; Iknew that he had been prominent in the favor of Czar Alexander, and Ihad no doubt that he was so still, notwithstanding the positiveassertion once made by him that he would probably never pass theborders of Russia again. But this was only another phase of the mysterythat surrounded him, and it belittled not at all my estimation of theman's character, and the power he could sway if he chose to do so. Howdeeply he was, even at that moment, in the confidence of the Russianemperor, I was one day to understand, although the moment ofcomprehension was many months distant from me then.

  He had dined and so we had cigars served to us in that cozy cornerwhere, with a table which held a box of them, together with some liquidrefreshments and other conveniences, we settled ourselves for anuninterrupted chat.

  "It is good to see you, old chap," he told me in his frank and heartyway; "good to be with you again; to feel the clasp of your hand and tohear your hearty laugh. I have been thinking about you considerably oflate, and this morning when I found that my wandering life had droppedme down in your city, I determined to look you up at once. In mybaggage I found your card which contained this club address; and here Iam." His big, hearty, infectious laugh rang through the room.

  There was no need to tell him of my own delight in his presence. Mymanner of greeting him had demonstrated that without any question ofdoubt. Presently he asked me:

  "What is your particular avocation just now, Derrington? Are you stillat the old game?"

  "Still at the old game," I replied, nodding my head solemnly. "Isuppose I will always be at it in one way or another."

  "Your government won't let you go very far away from its reach," hesaid, with a quizzical smile.

  "Oh, the government! I have cut it, Alexis."

  "What? Left the service?"

  "Temporarily," I replied, and he laughed again as loudly as before.There was reason for his levity, because placing my resignation in thehands of the secretary had become a habit with me. I was periodicallydepressed by the duties of a secret service agent and as oftendetermined to leave the service for good. But as often, I had returnedto it upon the request of one department or another of my government,when my services were required in the line of some particular dutywhich officialdom was pleased to assure me could not be so wellaccomplished by any other person of its acquaintance. That was whyAlexis Saberevski laughed.

  "Is your resignation still on file? Or is it only lying on the tableawaiting action, Daniel?" he asked me, and there was just a touch ofironic suggestion in his manner, which nettled me.

  "The resignation is a fact this time," I replied. "I have earned aperiod of rest, and I propose to take it."

  "Going abroad, Derrington?"

  "No."

  "Prefer to undergo the process of dry rot, here in New York?"

  "Yes; for a time at least."

  "Is there nothing on the other side of the water, that attracts you?"

  "Nothing at all."

  He switched his right leg to his left knee and blew a cloud of smokeinto the air.

  "You're not a lazy chap, Dan," he remarked, as if he were deeplyconsidering the verity of that statement. "One wouldn't pick you out asa blase individual who is tired of everything the world has to offer.You are as filled with energy and nervous force as any chap I everknew; and you are not yet thirty-five."

  "Quite true," I admitted.

  "Yet, like a craft that has fought its way through stormy seas aroundthe world, you sit there and try to assure me that you are content totie up against a rotting wharf, in an odorous slip, and pass the restof your days in inaction. It isn't like you, Dan."

  "It looks very enticing to me just now, however."

  "The trouble is," he said, "that your American diplomacy and youramazing politics over here, offer no opportunities to a man of yourtalents. You should go against the pricks of European intrigue. Youought to butt in, as you fellows express it, upon French statecraftwhich leaves nothing to be desired in the way of double dealings. Youshould try Austrian lies, or German brutalities, or Italian and Spanishsophistry, or English stupidity. Believe me, one of these would offermany points of interest which should interest and engage yourattention."

  "Why not Russian cruelty?" I asked. "That seems to be the onlyimportant nationality you have omitted."

  "Why not?" he repeated after me.

  "You seem to have tired of it yourself, Saberevski."

  He shrugged his shoulders, leaning back in his chair, and thesuggestion of a shadow passed across his handsome face.

  "Dan," he said with an entire change of tone that startled me intorenewed interest, "I haven't any doubt that you have always regarded meas a queer sort of chap, more or less shrouded by a mystery you couldnot fathom. And you were right."

  "I have never----" I began. But he raised a hand to arrest me.

  "I know it," he said. "You do not need to assure me of that. You aretoo much of a man, and your character is too broad and deep, for youever to attempt an intimacy which was not invited. But it is mypleasure just now, old man, to give you a little bit of my history. Itmay interest you. And it may lead to a change in your views; notregarding you, but in connection with myself. I am a much older manthan you are; fifteen years and more, I should say. All my life, up tothe time we last parted, has been passed in the personal service of hismajesty, the czar. I have been as close to him as any man can everobtain, and I am probably the only one who has enjoyed his confidenceto the extent of retaining it in the face of studied opposition on thepart of the greatest nobles of the empire. But I have retained it, Dan,and to such an extent that I suppose myself to be the only man livingto-day, against
whom Alexander would not permit himself to beinfluenced. There is a reason for it and a good one, but I need not gointo that."

  "No," I said. "You need not tell me this at all, Alexis. I am quiteglad enough to see you and to have you here, without explanation."

  He made a gesture of impatience.

  "As if I did not know that," he added; "but as I said a moment ago, itis my pleasure to recite some of these things to you, because since Icame into this room and grasped your hand I have been impressed by theidea that there is a great work for you to do; a great duty for you toperform. A stupendous obstacle to human development exists in one partof Europe to-day, which I believe you could overcome and demolish, ifonly you could be convinced of it. I wonder, Dan, if you would give thesubject any thought if I were to suggest it to you?"

  "Try," I said.

  "I wonder if you would seriously consider one of the greatestachievements that remains undone in Europe to-day," he added,meditatively.

  "The obstacle to which you just now referred?" I asked.

  "Yes."

  "What is it?"

  "Nihilism."

  "Hell!" I replied with emphasis.

  But he took me literally, and not even the suggestion of a smile showedin his face as he replied:

  "That is the fitting word, Dan. It is hell. It is worse than that tohundreds of thousands of human beings, from the lowest _mujik__ of thesteppes, to the czar himself. It is a word which carries with it acertain magic which always spells the word death. It is death to thosewho antagonize it, and it is death to them that uphold it. It is deathto the minister, the governor, the official, and it is death to thepoor devil who plots in the dark, secretly with his fellows, againstthe powers that rule him. Nihilism is well named, for it means nothingand it ends in nothing. _Nihilo nihil fit!_ Whoever named therevolutionists of Russia so, builded better than they knew."

  I was watching Saberevski with some amazement. I had never heard himexpress himself in such terms before, and I had not supposed himcapable, sympathetically, of doing so. I was not without a certain fundof knowledge regarding the subject he had introduced, for myprofessional duties had taken me more than once into Russia, and I hadencountered much of the conditions he described. But I regarded them,as well as Saberevski himself, with the American idea and from anAmerican standpoint. It had always seemed to me so unnecessary thatconditions should exist as I had heard them described over there. I hadalways believed that if the government of Russia would only go aboutthe work differently, it would be so easy to eradicate every phase ofthe so-called nihilism, and especially that branch of it practiced bythose who are called extremists. Evidently Saberevski entertainedsomething of this view himself, although from the standpoint of aRussian, for he ended a short silence between us by saying:

  "I have not finished what I was going to tell you, Dan. I have servedAlexander, the czar, many years, and served him faithfully. There arereasons now why I can serve him no longer, in the capacity and at theplaces where he needs me most. My life which is of small moment, andhis who is my royal master, would not be worth the weight of a featherif I were to show my face at St. Petersburg again. There is nothingremaining for me to do save to sit down quietly in some far country ofthe world, and watch from a distance the passing of events which someday, near or far as the case may be, will end in his assassination.What my work has been and what it would still be if I could remain nearto his imperial majesty, you can guess, and I need not give it a name.But Dan, if I could succeed in convincing you of the opportunity thatwould be yours if you should go there, and if I could know that you hadgone, determined to offer your services where they are most needed,then that far corner of the world where I would wait and watch events,would become a peaceful spot to me, for I know that you could succeedwhere all others have failed."

  Alexis Saberevski and I had many such conversations as that one, afterthat, in which we discussed pro and con the suggestion he had made.

  It grew upon me and grew upon me until I became obsessed by the ideaalthough I did not think that he guessed my eagerness.

  He remained in New York, and virtually became my guest at the club,during more than two months, and we were as constantly together as waspossible and convenient.

  One afternoon while we were chatting as usual, I called his attentionto a paragraph I had seen in the _Herald_ of that morning whichannounced the arrival in New York of a Russian princess. The fact hadnot interested me, but recalling at the instant the idea that she wasmost likely known to my friend, I said:

  "Saberevski, one of your countrywomen, a princess whose name escapes mefor I did not notice it particularly, arrived in the city this morning,and is at one of the hotels. I mention it because you may not have seenthe notice, and might like to pay your respects to her. You will findher name and a column or more of other information concerning her, inthis morning's _Herald_."

  "Thank you," he said, "I will look it up."

  More than a week later while I was walking down Fifth avenue, a hansomcab stopped at the curb beside me, and Saberevski's face looked out.

  "Jump in, Dan," he said. "I want you to take a ride with me;" and withno thought of hesitation, I complied. I did not even ask to be told ourdestination and was somewhat surprised when our conveyance stopped atone of the North river steamship piers.

  "You are not leaving the country, are you, Alexis?" I asked, as we gotdown.

  "No," he replied; "but someone I know is leaving. Will you walk to theend of the pier with me, or will you wait here?" I recalled, later,that even then he left the choice to me.

  I accompanied him to the end of the pier. I asked no questionconcerning the person he had referred to, as sailing that day, andthought it rather strange that he seemed to seek no one, and expressedno desire to go aboard the vessel then about ready to steam away.

  When it had swung into the stream I ran my glance along the decks ofthe vessel from stem to stern, seeking a waving hand or a gesture offarewell directed towards my friend. But I saw none to which he seemedto respond, until the ship was well into the current, when he suddenlyraised his hand and waved it.

  At the same instant he took me by the arm and we returned to ourconveyance.

  The following day at the club he came to me and placed a sealedenvelope in my hand. It bore no address or superscription of any kind;but he said in giving it to me:

  "Dan, I wish you would put this sealed envelope inside one of yourpockets and carry it with you carefully until the time arrives to openit."

  "When will that be?" I asked him.

  "It will be when, some day in the future, you shall be about to departfrom the city of St. Petersburg." And as I showed some astonishment inmy face, he continued: "Fate, or inclination, will take you thereagain, sometime, and the day will naturally follow when you will leaveit. Count this sealed envelope as one of the mysteries in which Idelight to wrap myself. But remember what I have asked you to do."

  "Repeat it," I said to him.

  "When you are about to take your departure from the city of St.Petersburg, if you should go there again, break the seal of thisenvelope and read the contents of a message I have written; or if yourbusiness should detain you there continuously, read it anyhow after sixmonths. That is all."

  "And if I should not go there?" I asked him.

  "In that case, keep the letter until you see me again, and return itunopened."

  Some months later I was in St. Petersburg.