An Innocent in Russia Page 6

  He thought that, when he reached St. Petersburg, he would have a word with the British Ambassador, the Earl of Durham, who could certainly make it clear what was Zelina’s social position in England.

  Then he told himself again that he was becoming far too involved with this tiresome child and it was all the more infuriating because it was obviously exactly what her aunt had intended when she had virtually made him responsible for her.

  ‘Dammit, Kathleen Rothbury has made a ‘cat’s paw’ of me,’ he thought. ‘If I had any sense, I would leave the girl to go to the devil in her own way!’

  Then as if the violence of his feelings had communicated itself to Zelina, she said in a frightened little voice,

  “You are looking very – angry, and I am sure it is because I am being such a – trouble to you. If it is all too – difficult, I will go to Stockholm as arranged – and if I lock myself in my cabin nobody will be able to – get at me.”

  With an effort Lord Charnock drove the scowl from between his eyes.

  “I am not angry with you,” he answered, “but with your aunt. She had no right to put you in this position in the first place.”

  “I am sure she did not do it intentionally,” Zelina said, “but Papa always said that she was – ‘frivolous and empty-headed’ and that was why he so seldom saw anything of her.”

  Lord Charnock thought that it must have been a shock to Kathleen Rothbury when her niece had appeared.

  “That is certainly a charitable way of looking at it,” he said, “but remember what I told you, Zelina. This sort of situation must never occur again and, however much you may be tempted, you are to stay with the Princess or some older woman wherever you may be. And do not believe half the compliments you will receive.”

  Zelina laughed and it was a young carefree sound.

  “I think it doubtful that I shall have any, but it would be very exciting if I did.”

  “That is just how you must not consider them,” Lord Charnock insisted.

  “I will try not to and now that you have been so very clever in telling me what to do, I shall remember to myself that if I was a poor, crushed and subservient Governess, nobody ‒ would even look at me.”

  Lord Charnock thought that this was certainly untrue, but it was something he could not explain to her.

  He could only hope that Zelina would follow his advice and most of all would not lose her heart to some young Russian who too late would make it clear that his intentions were strictly dishonourable.

  “Thank you again – thank you – for being so – wonderful and so very – very helpful,” Zelina was saying.

  *

  As Lord Charnock had expected, the British Minister Plenipotentiary at Copenhagen was horrified to hear the chapter of accidents which had resulted in the niece of the Earl and Countess of Rothbury being alone on a British ship and nearly being transferred, again alone, to a Russian vessel.

  “This certainly must not happen, my Lord,” he said to Lord Charnock. “I will have a word with General Suchtelen, who is, as I understand it, waiting to welcome you aboard the Ischora.”

  “I believe I have met the General before,” Lord Charnock said. “His father was, I think, the late Russian Minister to Stockholm.”

  “He was indeed and the General is a very intelligent man, so you should enjoy your sail through the Baltic.”

  “I am looking forward to it,” Lord Charnock replied.

  He went ashore with Sir Henry and Zelina waited in her cabin as she had been told to do.

  Her bags were packed and she was wearing a travelling cape that was extremely pretty, lined and bordered with fur.

  Lord Charnock had told her that it could be very chilly in the Baltic when the winds were coming from the North and it was wise to take no chances.

  Equally she knew that she felt cold because she was frightened.

  Supposing those who were meeting Lord Charnock refused to take her on the Royal Yacht?

  Then she would have to go on alone and now she felt frantically that, if she lost the man she thought of as her guide and protector, it would be even worse than if she had not met him in the first place.

  ‘It has made me aware of how ignorant I am about everything except for the things I have read about in books,’ she thought miserably. ‘I had not realised before that real life is very very different.’

  After what seemed to her hours, she was told that there was a carriage waiting for her on the quayside.

  She jumped up eagerly and in such a hurry to leave the ship that she remembered only with an effort that she should thank the Stewardess for her kindness and tip her generously and also that she must say ‘goodbye’ to the Purser and thank him as well.

  She was surprised to find the Captain waiting for her at the top of the gangplank and, when he wished her bon voyage and told her to take good care of herself in Russia, she felt suddenly afraid that she was leaving behind everything that was England for a very long time.

  Then she remembered that she still had just three days left with Lord Charnock and she hurried down the gangplank to the carriage to find that her luggage was already being piled on top of it.

  She had only to travel a very short distance to another part of the quay to board the Ischora.

  It was a very large and elegant-looking vessel and, once she had been welcomed aboard by Sir Henry Watkin Williams Wynn and General Suchtelen, Zelina was most impressed by her new surroundings.

  The General told her that the ship was a fast sailer and manned by a crew of sixty and Zelina realised its importance when, as the ship weighed anchor, salutes were fired from all the batteries on shore and answered by the Ischora.

  She did not see Lord Charnock until they met at luncheon and by that time Zelina had been astonished and delighted by her cabin.

  Like all the other cabins in the ship, she learnt later, it was fitted out in satins and the walls were of coloured woods that were very beautiful.

  When Sir Henry told her that he had managed at a moment’s notice to provide her with a lady’s maid as far as St. Petersburg, she was also aware how eloquently Lord Charnock must have described her social position.

  “I am afraid that my wife is rather annoyed with me for depleting our household, Miss Tiverton,” he said, “but it is important that you should have a woman with you, not only to wait on you but to help preserve the proprieties when you are travelling in a ship in which otherwise there are only men.”

  “Please will you thank your wife for me very very sincerely?” Zelina asked him.

  “Lord Charnock has told me all about your unselfishness in leaving your own maid in England,” Sir Henry went on, “but I am sure that Davey, who is a very experienced woman, will do her best to see to your comfort.”

  “It is so kind of you,” Zelina murmured, feeling somewhat guilty when he spoke of her unselfishness.

  Davey was a woman nearing fifty with grey hair who looked like a rather formidable English Nanny.

  She was, Zelina thought, exactly the right type of lady’s maid a young girl should travel abroad with and she knew that her mother would have approved and she was sure that Lord Charnock would also.

  The conversation at luncheon was interesting but, of course, completely impersonal.

  Besides the General there was a doctor who was apparently resident aboard the Royal Yacht and there was also a librarian who was returning to St. Petersburg from Europe where he had been purchasing books on behalf of his Imperial Master.

  Zelina talked to him eagerly and found that he spoke a great number of languages and was so fluent in English that it was hard to believe that he was a pure-bred Russian.

  When the meal was over, Lord Charnock said to Zelina,

  “I want you to come on deck and have a last glimpse of Denmark. You will find the view of Copenhagen from here really beautiful and I am only sorry you could not see more of that delightful country.”

  Zelina followed him onto the deck and, as they stood lo
oking back at the land they had left behind, he said in a low voice,

  “There is something I forgot to tell you.”

  “What is it?” Zelina asked.

  “Whatever you say in Russia is always likely to be listened to, noted and recorded.”

  Zelina looked startled before she queried,

  “Are you speaking of the – Secret Police, of whom I have heard? But then I am of no importance.”

  “Everybody who is foreign is of importance to the members of that organisation,” Lord Charnock declared. “That is why you should not mention them by name.”

  “You do not – think that they might be – interested in me?”

  “Of course it also depends who you are speaking about.”

  “It must be very – difficult for – somebody like you, my Lord.”

  “It is difficult for everybody who visits Russia and that is why I am warning you. Think before you speak on any subject that is in the least controversial and never, never criticise the powers-that-be!”

  She was aware that he was referring to the Czar and she said swiftly,

  “I will be ‒ careful, my Lord, and thank you for – warning me.

  Almost as if he thought that they might be overheard even though they were on deck, Lord Charnock pointed to the coast they were leaving and said to Zelina,

  “I do wish from here that you would be able to see the Castle of Drottingholm, such a curious old building.”

  “You have travelled to so many places, my Lord,” Zelina said. “I forgot to ask you if you have ever been to Russia before.”

  “Not in an official capacity,” Lord Charnock replied. “But as a young man I stayed in St. Petersburg with some relatives of the Czar soon after he came to the Throne and twice I have stayed with Russian friends on their estates in other parts of the country.”

  “I wish you had time to tell me about them,” Zelina remarked.

  “I am sure you will find that the librarian is willing to give you a verbally guided tour of every famous building in Russia,” Lord Charnock replied.

  Zelina knew that he was joking. At the same time she thought that he had no wish to tell her about his own experiences in Russia and that once again he was rebuking her for being too curious.

  The librarian was only too pleased to offer her quite a number of books to read on the voyage and she found that after those first few moments with Lord Charnock on deck she was never again alone with him.

  The weather became fine and calm and, after they had sailed with considerable speed up the Baltic, they sailed past the entrance to the Gulf of Bothnia and the Island of Aland and anchored at the entrance to the Gulf of Finland.

  Zelina found that, when it was dark, the ship usually anchored near to the shore and then set off again at first light.

  It was Davey, the lady’s maid, who told Zelina, when from the porthole she could see the towers of Tallin that they were now exactly twenty-four hours from St. Petersburg.

  The Northern Lights appeared and after dinner they went on deck where the Russian crew danced and sang for them.

  It was something that Zelina gathered was always done for distinguished visitors. She thought that Lord Charnock looked rather bored, but to her it was inspiring in a way that was very hard to describe.

  The dancing was very graceful notwithstanding that it had at times a grotesque savagery about it that was almost violent.

  Yet the vivid music that Zelina was certain was the same as that played by the Russian gypsies moved her in a way that she had not expected.

  She had always wanted to see the dancing and hear the singing of gypsies and the violins seemed to play on her heart.

  As she sat forward in her chair, her eyes fixed on the man dancing wildly in front of them, she had no idea that Lord Charnock was watching her.

  She was aware only that the music was arousing feelings in her that she had never known existed and for Lord Charnock, whatever he had thought before, it redoubled his conviction that it was wrong for anyone so young and inexperienced to be left alone amongst a people whose emotions were often uncontrollable.

  He could see the breath coming quickly between Zelina’s parted lips and he knew from his vast experience of women that her heart was beating wildly in her breast and that feelings she did not understand were rising inside her almost like a flame.

  ‘That child should go back to England on the first ship!’ he thought, but realised that he could do nothing about it.

  When the dancing and singing were finished and Zelina had clapped her hands until they were sore, she beamed excitedly,

  “That was sublime! An experience I never expected.”

  “You will get used to it,” Lord Charnock told her in a bored voice. “The Russians sing interminably of their sorrows, because they have few joys and so they dance to forget.”

  She knew that he was trying to dampen down her enthusiasm and she smiled at him as she said,

  “To me it is new and it was with the greatest difficulty that I did not get up and dance too.”

  Lord Charnock thought that if she had done so she would have performed with a grace that the Russians, who loved the ballet, would undoubtedly have appreciated, but he merely replied somewhat crushingly,

  “You should not try to compete with those who have danced and sung from the moment they left the cradle.”

  When she was alone in her cabin after Davey had left her, Zelina found herself still throbbing with the feelings that the music and the dancing had evoked in her.

  ‘If this was all there is to Russia, I would just love it,’ she mused.

  Then she remembered what she had read of the cruelties that had been perpetrated in Poland and she felt herself shiver.

  All the same for the first time since she had left England, she had no wish to return not at any rate until she had seen and listened to a great deal more that was Russian.

  Chapter four

  Lord Charnock, looking round the impressive drawing room of the British Embassy, thought with a feeling of satisfaction that he had been very astute.

  He was aware that, when the Earl of Durham’s invitation to Prince Ivan and Princess Olga Volkonsky included Zelina, it set the seal on the impression that she had managed to convey, which was that she had come to Russia solely as a guest and not as an employee.

  Hibbert, who always acted as an experienced spy for his Master, had discovered from the other servants that Zelina was having meals with her host and hostess and they had already introduced her to the Royal Family.

  Lord Charnock deliberately kept out of Zelina’s way and even contrived not to attend certain functions when he reckoned that she would be present.

  He was well aware that, if it was thought that he was in any way interested in her, the fact that she had travelled with him would be the subject of gossip amongst the chattering tongues of St. Petersburg, always ready to assume the worst of every woman, especially if she was outstandingly pretty.

  Watching Zelina dancing with one of the Czar’s attachés, he thought that it would be impossible for any English girl to look more like a traditional English rose.

  The waltz, that was originally a German country dance, had been introduced to England in 1812 by the Princess de Lieven, the wife of the Russian Ambassador.

  But nobody had ventured to dance the waltz at Almack’s, the most exclusive Club in London until Czar Alexander, on his visit to England in 1816, danced it there.

  After that England as well as the rest of Europe adopted the waltz wholeheartedly and in Russia it had particularly caught the fancy of the young Princes.

  The fact that a man could seize his partner round the waist and clasp her to him in public was not only sensational but made flirtation very much easier.

  Lord Charnock noted with approval that Zelina was keeping a respectable distance from her partner, although he was talking to her intimately and looking at her with an expression in his eyes that brought a frown to his Lordship’s face.
<
br />   ‘The girl is really too young for this sort of thing,’ he told himself.

  At the same time he knew that her position, although she was not aware of it, would have been very much more precarious if she had been classed as nothing but a Governess to the Princess’s children.

  Because he was perceptive he had guessed how apprehensive Zelina was feeling when she bade him a conventional ‘goodbye’ after the Royal Yacht had arrived in St. Petersburg.

  There were a number of important officials to meet Lord Charnock and he deliberately left it to General Suchtelen to introduce Zelina and explain why she had been on board the Ischora.

  Only when he was alone with the Earl of Durham did he say what a nuisance it had been to find a young girl on the English ship who was in the predicament of being unchaperoned and without even a lady’s maid in attendance on her.

  He said that it was impossible to allow her to travel on to Stockholm and adding,

  “Sir Henry Watkin Williams-Winn was horrified at the idea.”

  “There was nothing you could do,” the Earl of Durham said, “except bring her with you on the Ischora. I think you might drop a hint to the Russian Ambassador in London that the arrangement anyway had been badly planned and was not what one would expect for the niece of the Earl and Countess of Rothbury.”

  “I shall certainly do so,” the Earl replied, “but you know as well as I do that, if the Russians can muddle things up, they always do.”

  Lord Charnock was quite sure that the Earl would enjoy asserting his authority in the matter.

  It was well known that his ability, sincerity, and charm were marred by a great personal vanity and a susceptibility to flattery. Although he was an extremely intelligent man, this was obviously his Achilles' heel.

  The British Embassy carriages had conveyed Zelina with Davey as a companion to the Volkonsky Palace.

  It had been arranged that Davey would stay with her for a few days and then travel back to Copenhagen on the first available ship leaving St. Petersburg.

  Zelina was very glad to have her because she felt that Davey was a support and a comfort in the part that she had to play.