The Czar: A Tale of the Time of the First Napoleon/Chapter 37
CHAPTER XXXVII.
AT NICOLOFSKY.
"Do noble things, not dream them, all day long;
So making death, life, and that vast for ever,
One grand sweet song."
"YES, the first snow of winter is falling. Does my Clémence regret exchanging the flowers of France for the snows of Russia?"
"Do I?" she asked, looking confidingly into Ivan's face while she leaned on his arm. They were standing at a window in the old castle of Nicolofsky, watching the white flakes as they fell gently to the ground. It was night, but a full moon shed its soft, pure radiance, over the peaceful scene. "Our first night at home, Ivan," she continued. "I shall love this place. I am so glad we came here at once."
"And I am so glad to hear you say so. I have often felt, Clémence, that it was too generous, too unselfish of you and your mother to agree in counselling me to decline the Emperor's offer of a post in the Army of Occupation, which would have kept us together in France, perhaps for years."
"You know, Ivan, that you are needed here."
"I know it. I must get rid of Dmitri at once; and my only way of doing so is by being my own steward. I fear he has used my poor friends here very hardly. Yet, according to his light, he has been faithful; and after Zoubof's letter, pleading his cause so earnestly, I could not well set him aside for another. It is true I neither respect Zoubof nor like him,—though he has behaved very courteously to me, being evidently well satisfied with whatever arrangements the Emperor made with him about the estate."
"If you are your own steward, Ivan, will you not have to remain here all the year?"
"Not quite, m'amie," Ivan answered smiling. "That would be too great a sacrifice. For this winter, indeed, I purpose keeping my princess a captive in fetters of frost and snow; and perhaps next summer we may content ourselves with a visit to Moscow, our martyr city, of which it is indeed true that we think upon her stones. But, if God will, the following winter must be spent in St. Petersburg."
"I should be well content to stay here and work amongst these poor, faithful-hearted people, who gave us such a loving welcome to-day. Some of them wept with joy to see you again, Ivan."
"Yes, Clémence, I love them dearly; and they love me with the love they gave poor little Ivan Barrinka long ago. Still—the capital has attractions—"
Clémence smiled. "It was a sacrifice for you to abandon the army," she said.
"How could I do otherwise? God gave me these people. Besides," Ivan added, "my great temptation to remain in the service was the hope of one day becoming an imperial aide-de-camp. But for these posts there are far too many candidates already. It will now be necessary for the Czar to place his army upon a peace-footing, and a very difficult task that will be.—But, m'amie, you have not told me yet what you think of this old, tumble-down owl's nest of a castle?"
"The château is much better than I expected, Ivan. A few judicious repairs will do a great deal; and we can adorn and beautify as much as we like. I mean to have the loveliest of gardens, in spite of the climate; and to induce the good folk here, if possible, to care for and cultivate a few flowers for themselves."
Ivan shook his head. "And share the common fate of reformers," he said. "The mujik is a good fellow, but you will find it hard to move him. He hates change, even change for the better. If he ever learn to read his Bible, as I hope with God's blessing he will, I think his favourite text will be, 'Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths.'"
"And yet," said Clémence, "you tell me he is wonderfully pliable and imitative; that if you take the little mujik from his village you can make of him anything you please—soldier, valet, coachman, musician, even scholar or artist."
"Yes; and you can make anything you please of a bar of iron—under certain conditions. But it would be almost as easy to bend the cold iron with your hand as to change the ways of the bearded mujik under the roof of his own izba.—But I think, dearest, we must rejoin our friends; I hear preparations for supper in the next room."
Ivan had brought with him to Nicolofsky an alert, clever young German doctor, and a gray-haired French priest. It had been his wish, no less than that of Clémence herself, that his wife should enjoy the rites of her own communion; and Henri, who spent much of his leisure in visiting the poor, discovered amongst them an old acquaintance of the family, who seemed exactly suited for the post of domestic chaplain to Madame la Princesse Pojarsky. M. Grandpierre, a relative of the valued and faithful steward of the De Talmonts, was the curé of a country parish in La Vendée when the war broke out. He stoutly exhorted his parishioners to fight for their King; marched with them to the field; ministered to the wounded and shrived the dying, often amidst the rain of Republican bullets. When the cause he loved was lost, he took refuge in Paris; and there, after years of poverty, Henri found him in a garret of the Faubourg St. Antoine. Many sorrows had tamed his fiery spirit; he was now a humble, simple-minded old man, much more likely to be the pupil of Clémence than her teacher. Dr. Krausekopf, a rising young physician from Heidelberg, had been added to the establishment of Prince Pojarsky, because Russian doctors were few and unskilful; and Ivan knew it would be quite useless to introduce a Frenchman in that capacity, at least if he wished the mujiks of Nicolofsky to profit by his skill. With the exception of the priest and the doctor, the household contained only two foreigners, the waiting-woman of Clémence, who was a widow, and her child, a little girl.
The next morning, a deputation from the village came to the castle to welcome their lord. Ivan went to meet them in the great hall; but he turned back again, saying to Clémence as he took her hand, "Come, dearest; I want to show my wife to the man who sheltered my helpless childhood at his own peril. The good old starost is there, Clémence; and Pope Nikita, the father of Anna Popovna."
If anything could have made the mujiks of Nicolofsky doubt the infallibility of their "Barrinka"—their loved prince and master—it would have been his marriage with a Frenchwoman, a child of the accursed race who had outraged the soil of holy Russia. But when the graceful, gracious lady, with her sweet face, came amongst them, and accepted their homage with such cordial and winning kindness, their prejudices gave way; and they vanished entirely when she took in hers the great hard hand of the aged starost, saying in broken Russian, "Let me thank you, bativshka, for all the love you showed little Ivan Barrinka. I must go soon and see your wife, who was his nurse." For the priest too she had a word of kindness; and to each of the rough, bearded mujiks she gave her hand, which they were fain to kneel and kiss. The starost gazed at her with tearful eyes, and said something apart to Ivan. "He tells me," Ivan explained, "that he thinks you so like my mother, whom I never knew. But he prays that your fate may be happier than hers."
The months that followed were spent by Clémence and Ivan in endeavours to benefit their people. Ivan repaired, as far as he could, every wrong of which Dmitri had been guilty; and it was not his fault if any mujik in Nicolofsky lacked bread, kvass, and kasha in abundance, wool and sheepskins for clothing, or a well-built and comfortable izba. He tried to restrict the consumption of vodka, and to promote honesty, cleanliness, and truthfulness; though, it must be added, with only partial success. Clémence did her part; and the peasants soon learned to trust her as their own and their children's friend. They loved her still better when she acquired Russian enough to be an intelligent and sympathetic listener; and in her turn to tell simple Bible stories, chiefly of our Lord's life and death, and most of them to her hearers new and fascinating as a romance.
In the long evenings, Clémence and Ivan, with M. Grandpierre and Dr. Krausekopf, gave many an hour to earnest, united study of the Scriptures. The individual character and experience of each shed a special light upon these readings. Ivan represented happy, confident, child-like trust; Clémence devout thoughtfulness, rather tending towards asceticism; Krausekopf intellectual doubt; and the old priest a dim and groping faith, which, however, was growing every day more clear and strong. Each helped the other; and the one great, ever-present Teacher, who never fails those who seek him, was helping all.
Letters came to them regularly with tidings of their absent friends. One day in the early spring Ivan entered the morning room of Clémence with a radiant face, and in his hand a large packet. "The post has come. Here, my Clémence," he said, as he shared the spoils with her. "Our friends have been good to us this time;" and he sat down at the window to enjoy his own portion.
But, as he read, his face changed, and he cast an anxious, sorrowful glance towards Clémence. Almost at the same moment a cry broke from her lips, "Oh, Henri—Henri!" Ivan went quickly to her side, and laid his hand tenderly on her shoulder.
"Henri has—has become a Protestant!" she faltered, in tones of dismay.
"So he tells me," said Ivan. "This letter is from him. He writes like the noble-hearted Christian man that he is. Clémence, you must not grieve for him. He has done well to obey the voice of his conscience."
"But our mother—it is such a blow for her," Clémence said mournfully.
"Yes; I am sorry for her—very. But, m'amie, God will help her to bear it, and bring good out of it in the end. I do not think the change of creed such a weighty matter. What does anything else signify, so long as a man believes in our Lord Jesus Christ?" After a pause he resumed, taking up another letter, "Emile will give us an impartial statement of the case. Let us see what he says."
"Emile has behaved well," Clémence observed, looking over the remainder of her letter. "My mother says Madame de Salgues was so angry, that, but for Emile, she and Henri must have left her house and gone to live in some poor lodging. But Emile reasoned with her, reminding her that he himself was once an infidel and a scoffer, which is worse than a Protestant, yet she never dreamed of forbidding him the house; and so, not being noticed, he grew tired of scoffing, and became in time like other people. He told her Henri would probably do the same; and pleaded, moreover, that his conduct had been always regular and blameless, and could bring nothing but credit to any one."
"He says as much for him here," said Ivan, reading from Emile's letter. "'My cousin is really miserable about the soul of her son, which she thinks to be in peril; while my grandmother is only annoyed at what she considers a social degradation. In the eyes of the one, Protestantism is heretical; in those of the other, it is "bourgeoise." My grandmother fancies that Henri was demoralized by his campaign under the Emperor's standard, whereas Henri himself says that it was only then he learned what religion meant. I cannot profess to understand the matter, not being myself religious; but there is certainly a curious connection, not to say confusion, between saintliness and heresy. Henri is religious—he is "converted;" yet he is called a heretic, and mourned over by your excellent mother-in-law as next to an infidel, and on the highroad to perdition. He has a fast friend in little Stéphanie, who takes his part in season and out of season. I am rather glad of it for the child had almost ceased to be amusing, Madame de Krudener tamed her so effectually.'—You must write to your mother, Clémence," said Ivan, laying down the letter, "and pray her to be tender and patient with Henri."
"That will be needless," Clémence answered. "To my mother Henri will be as a sick child who needs a fourfold share of tenderness. I know her well. Fondly as she clung to him before, he will be closer than ever to her now.—One thing is certain, Ivan. We can no longer hope for a visit from her next summer. Until Henri's education as an architect is finished, no power on earth will move her from his side. Our only hope is that hereafter, through the kindness of the Emperor, some work may be found for him in this country."
"It shall be found," said Ivan, in his bright, confident way. "Here, at least, religious differences create no prejudice. A man may profess what creed he pleases, so that he does not outrage public order, or make proselytes from the national Church. We Russians are very tolerant."
"Is not toleration sometimes only indifference under a mask?" asked Clémence. "Ah, when will men learn the secret of holding truth dearer than life, and yet being gentle and patient with those who do not see it through their eyes?"
"Some secrets are only learned in 'the secret place of the Most High,'" Ivan answered softly.
Neither he nor Clémence was at all aware that they themselves were slipping unconsciously from the moorings of their own ancestral creeds, and that their study of the Scriptures was bringing them nearer day by day to the present standpoint of Henri.
Not long after this sorrow, joy came to the household. When the first days of the short Russian summer smiled upon Nicolofsky, a little guest was sent to the old castle. Very proud was Ivan of his first-born child; and to Clémence it seemed as if no one since the beginning of the world had ever been so happy as she. It was agreed that the babe should bear the name of Madame de Talmont; so a little "Rose" budded soft and fair amidst the snows of Russia, giving promise of one day unfolding its petals in full beauty and fragrance.