Polonaise (49 page)

‘A Kingdom of Poland, you mean? Something for them to fight for?'

‘Exactly. And meanwhile the Tsar is at Vilno. I wish we'd have news from there!'

‘So do I!' She smiled at him. ‘If you're going to be in time for dinner, you ought to be changing your dress.'

‘Devil take it, so I should!' And then, ‘Forgive me. I do treat you like an old friend, do I not?'

‘Well, we are.'

The Princess drove her new French maid distracted, changing her mind several times before she finally settled on a low-cut white dress. ‘How do I look, Denise?'

‘Madame is exquisite as always.' Privately the girl thought the
ingénue
effect a mistake. ‘Some jewels, perhaps?'

‘My new pearls.' She had bought the pearl choker when she sold off the hoarded grain from her barns.

Joining her little court in the salon, she knew a moment's doubt, not of herself but of Glynde. He had always looked his best in evening-dress, but now, contrasted with the elegant young blades of Warsaw, he seemed just faintly shabby, a hint
of rust about the black breeches, the suggestion of a crease to the well-tailored coat. She must get him some new clothes before she burst the story of their long romance on Warsaw society. No. That would not do. Not their long romance. Nothing must cast the slightest doubt on Casimir's paternity. She smiled and held out her hand.

‘Welcome again!' He could not kiss hands as the young Poles did. ‘You look a queen tonight, Highness.'

‘Always so gallant! You are admiring my pearls? More suitable for a widowed lady than emeralds or diamonds, do you not think?'

‘They must have cost a fortune.'

‘Oh, no! I got them for nothing from poor Princess – I'd best not mention her name. But her son is in our army, her Russian estates have been confiscated. It was doing her a real kindness, she said, to buy them from her.'

‘These are sad times, Highness. Will you indulge me with a few moments private talk after dinner?'

‘As many as you like. I need to talk to you, too.' Could her new approach be working already? Had it taken so little to bring him back to her feet?

But when the long meal and all its toasts were over, and they were alone, he went straight to business. ‘Highness, I've been thinking about the news you brought. I don't at all like the sound of it. Do you think that even now you should perhaps move your family to Vinsk?'

‘Are you mad? Right into the path of Napoleon's army! I've already warned Miriam to be ready for anything. But she will be safe enough. My presence and Casimir's in the Duchy guarantees her safety from the French, and the palace's.'

‘But what about yours? And Casimir's? The Russians are arming all along the border. Remember the troop we met, going to Vinsk last year? Suppose they send a southern army, below the Pripet Marshes? Herr von Stenck thinks it likely. The Tsar has good German advisers, he says.'

‘But you know the Tsar. He won't listen to them. The very fact that Napoleon has gone north to Dantzig will concentrate his mind up there. Anyway, this is all idle talk. How can you imagine me so base, Mr. Rendel, as to consider turning my coat now, when the die is as good as cast.' She smiled. ‘It is
your anxiety for me that speaks, and I thank you for it.'

‘Anxiety for Casimir too. I don't like to think what would happen if the Russians really did come here to Rendomierz. You know how he feels about them still.'

‘And yet you suggest I take him there?'

‘Yes. To learn they are just people, like the rest of us. If not to Vinsk, then to Petersburg, Princess, to the Ovinski Palace there. Safe in the heart of Russia.'

‘Nothing of the kind! You know how Napoleon moves! We'd find ourselves engulfed in the tide of the triumphant French army. Having proved ourselves traitors to their cause: the cause of Polish freedom. Have you gone a little off your head, dear Mr. Rendel? Or are you beginning to think of ways of getting home to England?'

‘Why in the world should I do that? Thanks to your goodness, Highness, I am a man of means here. There I'd be a pauper. Besides, here I have an occupation I enjoy; there I'd be an idle young man about town all over again. Highness!' He crossed the little room to where she stood, half turned away to look out of the window at drizzling rain. ‘You aren't trying to suggest that you wish to dispense with my services?'

‘Good God no! Never that!' She turned to him, suddenly an eager girl, both hands outstretched. ‘How could you possibly imagine such a thing!'

‘I'm relieved! And you will forgive me for taking the liberty of an old,' he paused, ‘friend, and giving you bad advice out of a full heart?'

‘Of course. Specially now you admit it is bad advice. But I'd forgive you anything, Mr. Rendel, you must know that. As the old friend that you are. Anything.' He had not meant to take her hands, found himself holding them as she smiled up at him.

‘I thank you from my heart.' Bending to kiss the smooth little hands that lay so snug in his, he had a sudden vision of Jenny's strong brown fingers. ‘Then forgive me now, Highness, if I take my leave. I promised Casimir I'd see their new uniforms tonight.'

‘Deserting me for my son?' Playfully.

‘For my duties.' He smiled, bowed and left her.

* * *

‘You'll go to the ball at Zakret?' Miriam asked Jan, who was still dividing his time between Vilno and Vinsk.

‘I must. If only I could take you with me! There will be no one to touch you there.'

‘Not even the little Countess Tysenhaus the Tsar has taken such a fancy to? You're a shameless flatterer, Jan.'

‘I love you.' Kissing her fingers. ‘The Tsar can have his little girls. When are you going to marry me, Miriam?'

‘If you still want me to; the day we sail for America. You know that such a marriage would be a disaster for you here. I have to take your word for it that it would not be there.'

‘Will not be there.' But in his heart he knew she was right. As an unattached young American, he had the entrée everywhere in Russia. Married to Miriam, Jewish housekeeper to a Polish aristocrat, he would be an outcast. ‘I wish we could marry today and start home tomorrow!'

‘But we can't.' She did not make it a question.

‘If there was only any news! Nothing from across the border since Narbonne left for Dresden. To see the Tsar riding about the countryside and dancing with the Polish ladies, you'd think this really was just a normal visit. And now this ball! And nothing from the Brotherhood?'

‘I'm beginning to be afraid the last messenger I sent failed to get through.'

‘The Princess won't have had your warning? Have you sent again?'

‘Not yet. I hate to risk a man's life unnecessarily. There are so few, now, that one can trust. I have kept hoping to hear.'

‘Send again, Miriam. Today. The one thing I do know is that there is a Russian army operating in the south. I'd never forgive myself–'

‘You care so much about the Princess?' She was looking at him thoughtfully.

‘Idiot!' He bent to kiss her. ‘It's the child. It's Casimir … And Jenny Peverel. I'd not like her to come to harm. Nor my old friend, Glynde Rendel.'

‘I thought you disliked him.'

‘For a while. Ridiculous. I'm ashamed of it now. Do you know how much you have changed me, love?'

‘For the better, I hope? Jan! If you're going to this ball, it's time you left.'

‘And I must go, my darling. Promise me that if you're worried about anything, you'll send to the Russian camp.'

‘I promise.' But she knew they would take no notice. ‘Come back soon, Jan.'

‘You know I will.'

His officers were giving the ball for the Tsar at Zakret, the country house he had just bought from General Bennigsen, in order, as he charmingly said, to be truly a citizen of the Vilno district. There had been a moment of complete catastrophe when the temporary dance-room, built for the occasion, collapsed because of faulty construction, killing one workman. But, ‘Only one serf,' had been the general, relieved conclusion. And no need to cancel. The weather was hot, they would spread carpets on the lawn and begin the ball out of doors. After all, in June, there were only a few hours of darkness, and a full moon.

Arriving late, Jan was glad to find Adam Czartoryski in the crowd of people watching the Tsar open the ball by treading a polonaise with his Generals' wives on the carpeted lawn. The air was heavy with the scent of orange trees in tubs, light cloud masked the full heat of the setting sun. ‘Your master wins all hearts,' he told Adam in the English they always used.

‘And so he should.' Adam smiled as the Tsar returned Madame Barclay de Tolly to her husband and led out the young Countess Tysenhaus. ‘I hope he breaks none. That child is only sixteen. Her father favours the French, I understand. Well,' Jan was aware of his wry smile, ‘so does mine! These times try us all. I want to speak to you.' He took Jan's arm and led him clear of the crowd to a terrace, from which they could see the last glow of the setting sun on the ornamental cascades of the Vileka River. ‘We had a report on you the other day,' he said when they were out of earshot.

‘A report on me?' Jan managed a tone of innocent surprise.

‘Yes. A dangerous Polish spy!' Could Adam's tone really be
faintly mocking? ‘And the associate of others. Is she so very beautiful, your Jewish lady?'

‘I love her.'

‘Then should you have involved her in your affairs?'

‘But –' He stopped. How much did Adam know?

‘We've a long file on you.' Adam might have read his thoughts. ‘Dating from Tilsit, when we began to think a little about you. Such an odd episode there. Don't say anything. It's not one we wish to know about. But I have been instructed to advise you that you might find the climate of your United States of America more healthy for a while. Particularly now, when the chance of war between your country and England seems to increase daily.'

‘You're telling me to leave?'

‘I'm giving you a word of friendly advice, for your own good. I'd lose no time, if I were you. Get out, Jan, and if you really love your Jewish lady, take her with you. But look, they are serving supper.' Serfs were placing little tables laden with food around the carpeted dance-floor, and people were already gathering round them. The huge moon had risen to outshine the illuminations. Holding out his glass to be refilled, Jan saw a servant speak quickly into Adam's ear.

‘I must leave you for a moment. Stay here. I may need you.' Adam stepped back into the crowd and disappeared.

Food and drink were having their effect. Voices rose, laughs were louder, music playing somewhere nearby was lost among the joyful babble. Jan stood alone, draining his glass, brooding over Adam's terrifying revelations, feeling more alone than ever in his life. He had been watched since Tilsit. Idiot. Fool. Who would he have implicated? Who would he not? That missing messenger. Miriam. Glynde. Jenny Peverel. A servant was about to refill his glass. ‘No!' He threw it to the ground. Miriam. No time to lose. Marry today and leave tomorrow. He turned, looking about for the quickest way out of this perfumed garden and found Adam Czartoryski once more at his elbow.

‘The French are across the Niemen.' Adam's voice, speaking English, was a thread of sound against the background of music and laughter.

‘Across?'

‘The Niemen. It's started. Hell is open. And Vinsk is in their line of march. It's to be secret still. The Tsar will dance this evening out. But …'

‘Thank you, Adam.'

Riding through the moon-drenched night, Jan did the same desperate calculation over and over again. A day's hard ride to Vinsk. Haifa day from Vinsk to the frontier. And the French were across it already. He should never have left Miriam exposed there. But he had thought the French still far off in Prussian Poland. Had the Tsar known they were just across the Niemen? And, knowing, agreed to dance the night away, safe to the east of Vilno? Thinking back, as he guided his horse along the well-known tracks, he was sure that Adam had known how near the French were. It explained the note of urgency in his advice.

And the Tsar wanted the French move kept secret still. Would let his Polish Russian subjects stay ignorantly in their homes to be engulfed by the French advance. He was glad that his shortest way to Vinsk avoided Vilno so he did not have to decide whether to lose precious time giving the alarm there. But when he stopped at noon to bait his tired horse at the hovel of an inn he always used between Vilno and Vinsk he asked the obsequious landlord eagerly for news.

‘News? None, lord. They took my son, my Benjamin, for the army! Now I've no one to send to Vilno. How can I go myself and leave the womenfolk alone here?' As they talked, in the mud-floored main room of the inn, Jan had been aware of women's voices in the loft above; now a dark-eyed girl in her early teens leaned down to ask something in Yiddish, and he remembered being aware on previous visits of a whole troop of little girls in attendance on the brother who had been taken away.

‘You'd best get your family out of here,' he told the man, paying for the horse's miserable fodder. ‘The French are across the Niemen.'

‘The French! May the Lord of hosts protect us. And you, too, lord! You're going to Vinsk?'

‘I must!'

‘Then go carefully, and God be your guide. Poles and Jews alike will be nothing but corn between the millstones from
now on.' And he turned away, to shout in desperate Yiddish to his wife and daughters.

Riding on, Jan was not sure whether to be glad or sorry that he was so easily taken for a Polish nobleman. It had seemed safer, over the years, to dress like a Russian when travelling and he could even speak Russian well enough now, but here in Polish Russia his appearance and fluent Polish made him accepted everywhere as native. Urging his horse on, he thought about what the landlord had said. Jews and Poles, ground alike between the millstones. Had he been mad to assume the Russian army would protect Miriam and Vinsk? And had she known it, and let him go?