The Secret City Part 25

"I think he does see that already, poor Nicholas," said Nina with wisdom beyond her years.

"To bring Nicholas and Vera together," said Semyonov, "that's what we have to do, you and I. And believe me, dear Nina, I on my side will do all I can to help you. We are friends, aren't we?--not only uncle and niece."

"Yes," said Nina breathlessly. That was all that there was to the conversation, but it was quite enough to make Nina feel as though she had already won her heart's desire. If any one as clever as her uncle believed in this, then it _must_ be true. It had not been only her own silly imagination--Lawrence cared for her. Her uncle had seen it, otherwise he would never have encouraged her--Lawrence cared for her....

Suddenly, in the happy spontaneity of the moment she did what she very seldom did, bent forward and kissed him.

She told me afterwards that that kiss seemed to displease him.

He got up and walked away.

VII

I do not know exactly what occurred during that afternoon. Neither Lawrence nor Nina spoke about it to me. I only know that Nina returned subdued and restrained. I can imagine them going out into that quiet town and walking along the deserted quay; the quiet that afternoon was, I remember, marvellous. The whole world was holding its breath. Great events were occurring, but we were removed from them all. The ice quivered under the sun and the snowclouds rose higher and higher into the blue, and once and again a bell chimed and jangled.... There was an amazing peace. Through this peaceful world Nina and Lawrence walked. His mind must, I know, have been very far away from Nina, probably he saw nothing of her little attempts at friends.h.i.+p; her gasping sentences that seemed to her so daring and significant he scarcely heard. His only concern was to endure the walk as politely as possible and return to Vera.

Perhaps if she had not had that conversation with her uncle she would have realised more clearly how slight a response was made to her, but she thought only that this was his English shyness and gaucherie--she must go slowly and carefully. He was not like a Russian. She must not frighten him. Ah, how she loved him as she walked beside him, seeing and not seeing the lovely frozen colours of the winter day, the quickly flooding saffron sky! The first bright star, the great pearl-grey cloud of the Neva as it was swept into the dark. In the dark she put, I am sure, her hand on his arm, and felt his strength and took her small hurried steps beside his long ones. He did not, I expect, feel her hand on his sleeve at all. It was Vera whom he saw through the dusk. Vera watching the door for his return, knowing that his eyes would rush to hers, that every beat of his heart was for her....

I found them all seated at dinner when I entered. I brought them the news of the shooting up at the Nicholas Station.

"Perhaps, we had better not go to the theatre," I said. "A number of people were killed this afternoon, and all the trams are stopped."

Still it was all remote from us. They laughed at the idea of not going to the theatre. The tickets had been bought two weeks ago, and the walk would be pleasant. Of course we would go. It would be fun, too, to see whether anything were happening.

With how strange a clarity I remember the events of that evening. It is detached and hangs by itself among the other events of that amazing time, as though it had been framed and separated for some especial purpose. My impression of the colour of it now is of a scene intensely quiet.

I saw at once on my arrival that Vera was not yet prepared to receive me back into her friends.h.i.+p. And I saw, too, that she included Lawrence in this ostracism. She sat there, stiff and cold, smiling and talking simply because she was compelled, for politeness sake, to do so. She would scarcely speak to me at all, and when I saw this I turned and devoted myself to Uncle Ivan, who was always delighted to make me a testing-ground for his English.

But poor Jerry! Had I not been so anxious lest a scene should burst upon us all I could have laughed at the humour of it. Vera's att.i.tude was a complete surprise to him. He had not seen her during the preceding week, and that absence from her had heightened his desire until it burnt his very throat with its flame. One glance from her, when he came in, would have contented him. He could have rested then, happily, quietly; but instead of that glance she had avoided his eye, her hand was cold and touched his only for an instant. She had not spoken to him again after the first greeting. I am sure that he had never known a time when his feelings threatened to be too much for him. His hold on himself and his emotions had been complete. "These fellers," he once said to me about some Russians, "are always letting their feelings overwhelm them--like women. And they like it. Funny thing!" Well, funny or no, he realised it now; his true education, like Nina's, like Vera's, like Bohun's, like Markovitch's, perhaps like my own, was only now beginning. Funny and pathetic, too, to watch his broad, red, genial face struggling to express a polite interest in the conversation, to show nothing but friendliness and courtesy. His eyes were as restless as minnows; they darted for an instant towards Vera, then darted off again, then flashed back. His hand moved for a plate, and I saw that it was shaking. Poor Jerry! He had learnt what suffering was during those last weeks. But the most silent of us all that evening was Markovitch. He sat huddled over his food and never said a word. If he looked up at all he glowered, and so soon as he had finished eating he returned to his workshop, closing the door behind him. I caught Semyonov looking at him with a pleasant, speculative smile....

At last Vera, Nina, Lawrence, and I started for the theatre. I can't say that I was expecting a very pleasant evening, but the deathlike stillness, both of ourselves and the town did, I confess, startle me.

Scarcely a word was exchanged by us between the English Prospect and Saint Isaac's Square. The square looked lovely in the bright moonlight, and I said something about it. It was indeed very fine, the cathedral like a hovering purple cloud, the old sentry in his high peaked hat, the black statue, and the blue shadows over the snow. It was then that Lawrence, with an air of determined strength, detached Vera from us and walked ahead with her. I saw that he was talking eagerly to her.

Nina said, with a little shudder, "Isn't it quiet, Durdles? As though there were ghosts round every corner."

"Hope you enjoyed your walk this afternoon," I said.

"No, it was quiet then. But not like it is now. Let's walk faster and catch the others up. Do you believe in ghosts, Durdles?"

"Yes, I think I do."

"So do I. Was it true, do you think, about the people being shot at the Nicholas Station to-day?"

"I daresay."

"Perhaps all the dead people are crowding round here now. Why isn't any one out walking?"

"I suppose they are all frightened by what they've heard, and think it better to stay at home."

We were walking down the Morskaia, and our feet gave out a ringing echo.

"Let's keep up with them," Nina said. When we had joined the others I found that they were both silent--Lawrence very red, Vera pale. We were all feeling rather weary. A woman met us. "You aren't allowed to cross the Nevski," she said; "the Cossacks are stopping everybody." I can see her now, a stout, red-faced woman, a shawl over her head, and carrying a basket. Another woman, a prost.i.tute I should think, came up and joined us.

"What is it?" she asked us.

The stout woman repeated in a trembling, agitated voice, "You aren't allowed to cross the Nevski. The Cossacks are stopping everybody."

The prost.i.tute shook her head in her alarm, and little flakes of powder detached themselves from her nose. "_Bozhe moi_--_bozhe moi_!" she said, "and I promised not to be late."

Vera then, very calmly and quietly, took command of the situation.

"We'll go and see," she said, "what is really the truth."

We turned up the side street to the Moika Ca.n.a.l, which lay like powdered crystal under the moon. Not a soul was in sight.

There arrived then one of the most wonderful moments of my life. The Nevski Prospect, that broad and mighty thoroughfare, stretched before us like a great silver river. It was utterly triumphantly bare and naked.

Under the moon it flowed, with proud tranquillity, so far as the eye could see between its high black banks of silent houses.

At intervals of about a hundred yards the Cossack pickets, like ebony statues on their horses, guarded the way. Down the whole silver expanse not one figure was to be seen; so beautiful was it under the high moon, so still, so quiet, so proud, that it was revealing now for the first time its real splendour. At no time of the night or day is the Nevski deserted. How happy it must have been that night!...

For us, it was as though we hesitated on the banks of a river. I felt a strange superst.i.tion, as though something said to me, "You cross that and you are plunged irrevocably into a new order of events. Go home, and you will avoid danger." Nina must have had something of the same feeling, because she said:

"Let's go home. They won't let us cross. I don't want to cross. Let's go home."

But Vera said firmly, "Nonsense! We've gone so far. We've got the tickets. I'm going on."

I felt the note in her voice, superst.i.tiously, as a kind of desperate challenge, as though she had said:

"Well, you see nothing worse can happen to me than has happened."

Lawrence said roughly, "Of course, we're going on."

The prost.i.tute began, in a trembling voice, as though we must all of necessity understand her case:

"I don't want to be late this time, because I've been late so often before.... It always is that way with me... always unfortunate...."

We started across, and when we stepped into the s.h.i.+ning silver surface we all stopped for an instant, as though held by an invisible force.

"That's it," said Vera, speaking it seemed to herself. "So it always is with us. All revolutions in Russia end this way--"

An unmounted Cossack came forward to us.

"No hanging about there," he said. "Cross quickly. No one is to delay."

We moved to the other side of the Moika bridge. I thought of the Cossacks yesterday who had a.s.sured the people that they would not fire--well, that impulse had pa.s.sed. Protopopoff and his men had triumphed.

We were all now in the shallows on the other bank of the ca.n.a.l. The prost.i.tute, who was still at our side, hesitated for a moment, as though she were going to speak. I think she wanted to ask whether she might walk with us a little way. Suddenly she vanished without sound, into the black shadows.

"Come along," said Vera. "We shall be dreadfully late." She seemed to be mastered by an overpowering desire not to be left alone with Lawrence.