The Exile: A novel about Taras Shevchenko

by Zinaida Tulub

  The message moved the poet deeply. That same day he wrote her a long letter, thanked her for not forgetting him, and added such lines: “Not so much time has passed, but what a lot has changed within me at least. You would not recognize in me now the former foolishly passionate and exalted poet! Now, I am all too prudent. I am now the veritable opposite of the former Shevchenko.”

  Yes, severe life had taught him quite a few things, and now he knew much better what he had to desire for his homeland.

  “I’ll send her a self-portrait. Tomorrow I’ll finish it and send it off. Let her see what’s become of me,” he said to himself, and put the letter into the drawer or his desk.

  Sophia Ivanovna kept her word. A week had not passed since their first conversation when the batman Guriy came running to Shevchenko: “Taras Grigorievich, the lady wants to see you. She said you take along the paints and something to paint on.”

  Shevchenko wiped his hands, showed Bronek what he had still to do, and went to see the Gerns.

  “Oh, here you are,” Sophia Ivanovna said on meeting him. “Let me introduce: Nikolai Grigorievich Isaiev, and this is a good acquaintance of ours, the artist Taras Grigorievich Shevchenko.”

  “Are you a relative of the late General Isaiev?” Shev­chenko asked as he shook hands with the ensign.

  “No, just a namesake,” the officer replied laconically. “Excuse me for interrupting your urgent work, but I would like to ask you paint my portrait.”

  “With pleasure. In oils or water colors?”

  “In water colors so far and after New Year — I am expect­ing a promotion for the New Year — I will ask you to make a full-length portrait.”

  “Would an album-size portrait be all right with you?”

  “Of course.”

  “May I ask you to follow me to my studio?”

  The officer was not too keen to yield to the suggestion.

  “No, it’s inconvenient for me. It would be better for me to sit for the portrait here, if Sophia Ivanovna has nothing against it, of course.”

  The hostess did not object, but only suggested they go to her boudoir lest any unexpected guests disturb the artist.

  “Wonderful!” Isaiev said, getting on his feet, and went ahead as a person who knew every corner of the house.

  He sat down on a low armchair upholstered with rose plush and edged by dark-green tassels.

  “How much for the watercolor?” the ensign asked care­lessly while Shevchenko was lowering the curtains to the middle of the side window so as not to spoil the lighting.

  “Thirty rubles,” Shevchenko said decisively.

  “Hum, a bit expensive,” Isaiev said with a slightly wry face. “All right, I agree, although you could have reduced the price a bit, because I have a lot of acquaintances, and quite a few of them, especially the ladies, would like to have their youth and beauty retained on canvas.”

  Shevchenko did not say anything in reply, opened his paint box, poured himself a glass of water, and started to work.

  The officer was young, handsome and smart looking. He made it a point to emphasize that he was a person from the capital, a reveler, fence, and lady killer; he asked casually to have his military bearing accentuated, along with the distinctive mark of a man’s profession leaves on him, which makes the viewer always discern an actor, military man or priest regardless of the clothes they were in a painting.

  As Shevchenko retouched a highlight of the sitter’s eyelashes and turned round at the hostess’s voice, his brush unexpectedly grazed against the bridge of the nose on the portrait. The brush left a barely visible line, which made Isaiev’s face rougher than it actually was. Shevchenko reached for the brush and wanted to undo the damage, but Sophia Ivanovna’s exclamation stopped him.

  “Oh, it’s just wonderful! Take a look, cher Nicholas. What a severe warrior you are here, a hero!”

  “It happened accidentally. It’s just a slip of the brush,” Shevchenko began to explain.

  But Isaiev saw the change, and said, “Yes, wonderful! Don’t touch it! That’s just what I was telling you about. A wonderful talented work! Everyone wants to have his … how should I put it … inner spirit captured on canvas. As a patriot, officer, and mainstay of our most illustrious monarch, it is only natural for me to wish all this to be reflected in my features.”

  “All right, let it be,” Shevchenko responded calmly. Suddenly he also wanted to leave and even intensify this repugnant “essence” which Isaiev had to vividly spoken about.

  He worked for another three hours, and then put the brushes aside.

  “That’s enough for today. I’m tired. What about seeing me tomorrow at the same time?”

  “All right, if you want it that way,” the ensign agreed.

  On the third day the portrait was finished. Isaiev went into raptures about it and gave Shevchenko the thirty rules at once, without any attempt at haggling. Three days later a liveried lackey delivered Shevchenko a perfumed letter on expensive lilac-colored paper with a golden coat of arms stamped on it. The message was from Baroness Blaramberg, the wife of the Quartermaster General of the Orenburg Military District.

  The baroness invited Shevchenko to pay her a call the next day at one o’clock: she wished to have her portrait painted.

  Baroness Blaramberg met him affably, invited him into her boudoir, and started asking him in great detail when he had graduated from the Academy, which of his canvases had been entered in exhibitions, and whose portraits he had done. She mentioned casually that she was acquainted with old Venetsianov and Shchedrin, knew Tropinin, “a born artist just like you,” she added, and commented enthusiastically about the Italian landscapes of Shchedrin. Overall, it proved that she loved and knew art, and Shevchenko suddenly thought that it would be a pleasure to be talking with her twice a week about everything that was so dear to him as an artist.

  She commissioned as half-length portrait. Then she went over to what must have been the most important thing for her: in what dress?

  Her chambermaid brought in a heap of gowns and dresses of various color, design and purpose. Shevchenko inspected each dress and put it on the baroness’ shoulder to see how it reflected on her face. What they liked most was a black velvet gown with a large décolleté and a riding habit of ordinary blue. The baroness, however, wavered indecisively.

  “But in a riding habit you have to sit outdoors, on a porch somewhere, a verandah or in a park lane, while now it is November. I will simply freeze. It fits me so nicely, though …”

  “So we’ll postpone my work till next spring, or you will sit in black: and in spring, if you find my work good enough, I will make your portrait outdoors, in a riding habit on horseback like Brüllow painted the Shishmariov sisters or his Woman on Horseback and other ladies.”

  “A wonderful idea!” the baroness exclaimed for joy. “I agree.”

  Shevchenko gave a smile. He had never painted such beautiful and graceful animals as horses which could really give an artist many moments of pleasure in his work. In high spirits at the prospect of such a new and distinctive challenge, he came to an agreement on the fee as well as on the days and hours of the sittings, and took his leave.

  However much Butakov hurried to have all the work finished, he realized that the materials of his expeditions would reach the capital only by the New Year. He could not deliver a carelessly done or unfinished work — that would be tantamount to him abusing the scientific value of an effort that had taken him two years to accomplish. So he worked almost twenty hours a day and hurried on Shevchenko and Zaleski all the time.

  At last, on the twelfth of December, the members of the expedition delivered the material to the military governor Obruchev.

  Along with the album, Butakov handed in an extensive economic and scientific account of the expedition, as well as large geographical, topographical, geological, hydrological and navigation charts of the sea, its islands and coasts. A number of soldiers, accompanied by Werner and Shevchenko, carried the chests
with the collections that were ready to be sent off to St. Petersburg.

  In Obruchev’s large study there was, apart from Gern, an aide on duty. Two orderlies stood at the door.

  After everything had been laid out on a long conference table, Butakov, Pospelov, Werner and Shevchenko — all of them in dress uniform — stood to one side and looked impatiently at the little door near the desk, over which loomed a one and a half life-size portrait of the czar. The aide had disappeared behind that door to report to the gover­nor that the members of the expedition were waiting for him.

  “Why isn’t Maksheiev with us? He’s here in Orenburg, after all?” Shevchenko inquired quietly.

  “I saw him and invited him to join us. But he said that ho took part in the work of the expedition only occasionally, so he thought it inconvenient to come,” Butakov replied.

  At that moment the door curtain moved, and a shortish lean general wearing a worn uniform without any decora­tions quickly entered the study. Butakov stepped forth and reported:

  “In compliance with the instructions of your Excellency, the members of the descriptive Aral Sea expedition have come with the finished charts, landscapes, sketches, ac­counts, and all the other materials, as well as with the scientific collections.”

  “At ease!” the general ordered and shook Butakov’s hand amicably.

  “Alexei Ivanovich, I am very glad you managed to finish your productive expedition in time and so brilliantly. It is a great contribution to Russian science.”

  Butakov bowed, and then turned to his fellow travelers in order to introduce them officially, but the gen­eral came up to them himself.

  “Good day, gentlemen. It gives me pleasure to greet and congratulate you on the great and useful job you have done. Alexei Ivanovich, please introduce them to me.”

  “Ensign Pospelov Ksenofont Yegorovich, navigator with the Baltic Navy,” Butakov said, introducing the young mariner.

  The general strongly shook Pospelov’s hand in a simple and cordial way.

  “Thomas Antonovich Werner, noncommissioned officer with the First Battalion of the Orenburg Special Line Corps,” Butakov continued. “A geologist on our expedition, mineralogist, botanist, ichthyologist, entomologist and the like.”

  In disregard of every military regulation, the general strongly shook Werner’s hand as well.

  “And who did these wonderful landscapes?” the general asked, approaching the table on which were laid out the charts, draughts, albums, and several pictures which were not included in the album because of their larger size.

  “Let me introduce your Excellency to the creator of this beauty, our talented artist Taras Grigorievich Shevchenko, Private with the Fifth Battalion, former student of the Rus­sian Imperial Academy of Fine Arts and former instructor in drawing at the St. Vladimir University of Kiev,” Butakov said, slightly faltering toward the end of the introduction.

  Shevchenko stood stiffly in front of the general and, as regulations demanded, “devoured” the brass with his eyes, but the general extended his hand and said politely:

  “I am very glad to meet you! Yes, we have few talented representatives of the arts in Orenburg. But I was told that you are also a well-known poet. Show me what you have done, please.”

  Shevchenko came up to the table, and opening the album, started first showing the steppe landscapes and new forts along the expedition’s trek, explaining in brief from what direction they had been painted and where the main ramparts and trenches were located, but then he got carried away and told the general about the nature of the steppe, the Aral Sea, its coastal cliffs and coastline, islands, sand­banks, reefs, sudden gales arid squalls. He did not notice how he had been talking like that for over half an hour.

  Then Obruchev asked Butakov and his fellow travelers at length about various details of the expedition, and said at last:

  “I must express to you, Alexei Ivanovich, and all the other members of your expedition, my gratitude for the excellent work, and consider it my duty to ask the emperor and the war ministry to have you decorated and promoted accordingly. And, also to have your fate alleviated,” he added, turning to Shevchenko and Werner.

  34

  The Polish Circle

  “Today, though, I won’t leave you alone,” Zaleski said. “In the evening I’ll take you to our circle. You know yourself that there are quite a few of us Polish exiles here. Not all of them, however, are in the army: some were de­ported to this place to live under police surveillance. I was asked to bring you long ago, but for this dratted work I had no time to breathe. They are good people; you won’t regret coming.”

  “All right, let’s go then,” Shevchenko agreed.

  The first acquaintance with the Polish circle produced a tremendous impression on Shevchenko. It was like a breath of fresh air for him. Throughout the whole morning of the next day following the meeting he recalled what they had talked about and regretted that he had failed to ask them much more than he did and had not made their acquaint­ance earlier. When dusk fell, he picked up the book he had read and hurried to the library for another helping of “men­tal pabulum.”

  At his request, the librarian had kept for him all the latest articles by Belinsky, Dostoyevsky’s Netochka Nezvanova, Goncharov’s novel An Ordinary Story, and Turgenev’s plays. Loaded with these treasures, Shevchenko returned home. Pospelov took to reading one of the books right away, and Shevchenko became absorbed in another the moment he settled in an armchair.

  In the morning of the next day, Shevchenko dressed in his velvet jacket and went to see the baroness.

  He visited her three times a week now and worked on her portrait with true passion. Whereas he did Isaiev’s por­trait with a sense of inner opposition and prejudice, this painting aroused in him the real artist.

  The baroness sensed this as well. At times, after having sat motionlessly, she came up to his easel and regarded her likeness with a thoughtful and serious look, after which she returned to the sofa wordlessly and took on the neces­sary posture. But once she remarked:

  “Yes, not many of the artists I have known try to grasp what the sitter is thinking about…”

  Five days after the charts and the album were delivered to the governor, Gern visited Shevchenko’s studio, where the poet was writing poetry most of the time or reading prohibited books and painting landscapes in oil from his Aral sketches.

  “General Obruchev requests that you report at his home after midday. It looks like he wants to commission his por­trait.”

  “So I’ll have to wear a soldier’s uniform?” Shevchenko asked, slightly dismayed.

  “On the first occasion — yes. Then we’ll see. Obruchev is not of the haughty type. By the way, he has already forwarded an inquiry to the Third Department, reminding them about his reference on you sent two years ago and asking whether you could be permitted to draw and paint. In the military line, Obruchev recommended you to a non-com rank.”

  Shevchenko kept silent. Gern picked up his cap and, smoothing down his hair, said in a weary voice:

  “Oh, those promotion lists for the New Year will be the end of me! Every day we compile new lists, from which some names are stricken off and others added. And behind each name there’s a covert struggle going on. I have not a moment’s peace either throughout the day or night.”

  Shevchenko diligently polished his boots, cleaned his uni­form, shaved, and left for the governor’s palace. He entered through the back door, from which came the smells of the kitchen and cheap tobacco. In the kitchen there sat, apart from the cook, an elderly noncom with two medals and a St. George Cross on his chest.

  “Good day!” Shevchenko greeted him, and stopped in in­decision.

  “What do you want?” the noncom asked gravely. “Report to his Excellency that Taras Shevchenko has ar­rived!”

  “Of all the things to ask me!” the noncom muttered, an­noyed. “If you’ve got a complaint, approach your company commander. That’s if you’ve still got some common
sense to get away for your foolishness,” he added gravely, and turned away to indicate that the conversation was over.

  “His Excellency ordered me to report after midday today.”

  “So he ordered you, did he?” the noncom turned round, surprised. “What are you then? A tailor?”

  “No, an artist. Report just that to his Excellency.”

  The noncom shrugged his shoulders, undecided what to do, curled his lower lip, got to his feet, and disappeared behind the door. Several minutes later he was back and beckoned to Shevchenko.

  “Go to the general. Why didn’t you tell me right away that you’re an artist,” he said, seeing Shevchenko through the corridor and rooms of the palace.

  “That’s the door,” the noncom said under his breath, and tiptoed away.

  Shevchenko knocked on the door quietly.

  “Come in!” a voice came from behind the door.

  “Oh, it’s you, Shevchenko.” Obruchev gave a friendly smile when the poet had crossed the threshold. “Good day, good day! I wanted to ask you to paint a portrait of my wife, and then of me, if everything goes all right. Please be seated,” he said, motioning to an armchair near his desk and then pulled a long silken cord behind his back.

  Somewhere far away a bell rang with a barely audible jingle. A lackey appeared in the door noiselessly.

  “Call the lady,” the general said, and turned to Shevchen­ko again. “I will introduce you to my wife now, and you will then agree on the sittings and on everything else.”

  Shevchenko made a bow silently.

  “Well, we’ve sent off your wonderful album to His Impe­rial Highness, and, I hope, your fate will be worked out for the better. We, for our part, will see to it that you get on your feet. Why did you have to get mixed up in this foolish clandestine brotherhood?”

  The general’s wife entered the room, her silken dress rustling softly; she did not look at the soldier sitting in the armchair.