The Most Interesting Stories of All Nations

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"Oho! that's better. You should have begun by asking that!"
answered the newcomer, settling himself comfortably on his chair
and toying with his pistols. "How much do you earn?"

"We get little enough! Just five rubles," answered the red-headed
man.

"That's too little. I need a great deal more. But you are lying,
brother! You would not stir for less than twenty rubles!"

"Thanks for the compliment!" interrupted Pacomius Borisovitch.

The fair-haired man nodded to him satirically. "I need a lot
more," he repeated firmly and impressively; "and if you don't give
me at least twenty-five rubles I'll denounce you this very minute
to the police--and you see I have my witnesses ready."

"Sergei Antonitch! Mr. Kovroff! Have mercy on us! Where can we
get so much from? I tell you as in the presence of the Creator!
There are ten of us, as you see. And there are three of you. And
I, Yuzitch, and Gretcka deserve double shares!" added Pacomius
Borisovitch persuasively.

"Gretcka deserves nothing at all for catching me by the throat,"
decided Sergei Antonitch Kovroff.

"Mr. Kovroff!" began Pacomius again. "You and I are gentlemen--"

"What! What did you say?" Kovroff contemptuously interrupted him.
"You put yourself on my level? Ha! ha! ha! No, brother; I am
still in the Czar's service and wear my honor with my uniform! I,
brother, have never stained myself with theft or crime, Heaven be
praised. But what are you?"

"Hm! And the Golden Band? Who is its captain?" muttered Gretcka
angrily, half to himself.

"Who is its captain? I am--I, Lieutenant Sergei Antonitch Kovroff,
of the Chernovarski Dragoons! Do you hear? I am captain of the
Golden Band," he said proudly and haughtily, scrutinizing the
company with his confident gaze. "And you haven't yet got as far
as the Golden Band, because you are COWARDS! Chuproff," he cried
to one of his men, "go and take the mask off Finch, or the poor boy
will suffocate, and untie his arms--and give him a good crack on
the head to teach him to keep watch better."

The "mask" that Kovroff employed on such occasions was nothing but
a piece of oilcloth cut the size of a person's face, and smeared on
one side with a thick paste. Kovroff's "boys" employed this
"instrument" with wonderful dexterity; one of them generally stole
up behind the unconscious victim and skillfully slapped the mask in
his face; the victim at once became dumb and blind, and panted from
lack of breath; at the same time, if necessary, his hands were tied
behind him and he was leisurely robbed, or held, as the case might
be.

The Golden Band was formed in the middle of the thirties, when the
first Nicholas had been about ten years on the throne. Its first
founders were three Polish nobles. It was never distinguished by
the number of its members, but everyone of them could honestly call
himself an accomplished knave, never stopping at anything that
stood in the way of a "job." The present head of the band was
Lieutenant Kovroff, who was a thorough-paced rascal, in the full
sense of the word. Daring, brave, self-confident, he also
possessed a handsome presence, good manners, and the worldly finish
known as education. Before the members of the Golden Band, and
especially before Kovroff, the small rascals stood in fear and
trembling. He had his secret agents everywhere, following every
move of the crooks quietly but pertinaciously. At the moment when
some big job was being pulled off, Kovroff suddenly appeared
unexpectedly, with some of his "boys," and demanded a contribution,
threatening instantly to inform the police if he did not get
it--and the rogues, in order to "keep him quiet," had to give him
whatever share of their plunder he graciously deigned to indicate.
Acting with extraordinary skill and acumen in all his undertakings
he always managed so that not a shadow of suspicion could fall on
himself and so he got a double share of the plunder: robbing the
honest folk and the rogues at the same time. Kovroff escaped the
contempt of the crooks because he did things on such a big scale
and embarked with his Golden Band on the most desperate and
dangerous enterprises that the rest of roguedom did not even dare
to consider.

The rogues, whatever their rank, have a great respect for daring,
skill, and force--and therefore they respected Kovroff, at the same
time fearing and detesting him.

"Who are you getting that passport for?" he asked, calmly taking
the paper from the table and slipping it into his pocket. Gretcka
nodded toward Bodlevski.

"Aha! for you, is it? Very glad to hear it!" said Kovroff,
measuring him with his eyes. "And so, gentlemen, twenty-five
rubles, or good-by--to our happy meeting in the police court!"

"Mr. Kovroff! Allow me to speak to you as a man of honor!"
Pacomius Borisovitch again interrupted. "We are only getting
twenty rubles for the job. The whole gang will pledge their words
of honor to that. Do you think we would lie to you and stain the
honor of the gang for twenty measly rubles?"

"That is business. That was well said. I love a good speech, and
am always ready to respect it," remarked Sergei Antonitch
approvingly.

"Very well, then, see for yourself," went on the red-nosed
Pacomius, "see for yourself. If we give you everything, we are
doing our work and not getting a kopeck!"

"Let him pay," answered Kovroff, turning his eyes toward Bodlevski.

Bodlevski took out his gold watch, his only inheritance from his
father, and laid it down on the table before Kovroff with the five
rubles that remained.

Kovroff again measured him with his eyes and smiled.

"You are a worthy young man!" he said. "Give me your hand! I see
that you will go far."

And he warmly pressed the engraver's hand. "But you must know for
the future," he added in a friendly but impressive way, "that I
never take anything but money when I am dealing with these fellows.
Ho, you!" he went on, turning to the company, "some one go to
uncle's and get cash for this watch; tell him to pay
conscientiously at least two thirds of what it is worth; it is a
good watch. It would cost sixty rubles to buy. And have a bottle
of champagne got ready for me at the bar, quick! And if you don't,
it will be the worse for you!" he called after the departing
Yuzitch, who came back a few minutes later, and gave Kovroff forty
rubles. Kovroff counted them, and put twenty in his pocket,
returning the remainder in silence, but with a gentlemanly smile,
to Bodlevski.

"Fair exchange is no robbery," he said, giving Bodlevski the
passport of the college assessor's widow. "Now that old rascal
Pacomius may get to work."

"What is there to do?" laughed Pacomius; "the passport will do very
well. So let us have a little glass, and then a little game of
cards."

"We are going to know each other better; I like your face, so I
hope we shall make friends," said Kovroff, again shaking hands with
Bodlevski. "Now let us go and have some wine. You will tell me
over our glasses what you want the passport for, and on account of
your frankness about the watch, I am well disposed to you.
Lieutenant Sergei Kovroff gives you his word of honor on that. I
also can be magnanimous," he concluded, and the new friends
accompanied by the whole gang went out to the large hall.

There began a scene of revelry that lasted till long after
midnight. Bodlevski, feeling his side pocket to see if the
passport was still there, at last left the hall, bewildered, as
though under a spell. He felt a kind of gloomy satisfaction; he
was possessed by this satisfaction, by the uncertainty of what
Natasha could have thought out, by the question how it would all
turn out, and by the conviction that his first crime had already
been committed. All these feelings lay like lead on his heart,
while in his ears resounded the wild songs of the Cave.

V

THE KEYS OF THE OLD PRINCESS

It was nine o'clock in the evening. Natasha lit the night lamp in
the bedroom of the old Princess Chechevinski, and went silently
into the dressing room to prepare the soothing powders which the
doctors had prescribed for her, before going to sleep.

The old princess was still very weak. Although her periods of
unconsciousness had not returned, she was still subject to
paroxysms of hysteria. At times she sank into forgetfulness, then
started nervously, sometimes trembling in every limb. The thought
of the blow of her daughter's flight never left her for a moment.

Natasha had just taken the place of the day nurse. It was her turn
to wait on the patient until midnight. Silence always reigned in
the house of the princess, and now that she was ill the silence was
intensified tenfold. Everyone walked on tiptoe, and spoke in
whispers, afraid even of coughing or of clinking a teaspoon on the
sideboard. The doorbells were tied in towels, and the whole street
in front of the house was thickly strewn with straw. At ten the
household was already dispersed, and preparing for sleep. Only the
nurse sat silently at the head of the old lady's bed.

Pouring out half a glass of water. Natasha sprinkled the powder in
it, and took from the medicine chest a phial with a yellowish
liquid. It was chloral. Looking carefully round, she slowly
brought the lip of the phial down to the edge of the glass and let
ten drops fall into it. "That will be enough," she said to
herself, and smiled. Her face, as always, was coldly quiet, and
not the slightest shade of any feeling was visible on it at that
moment.

Natasha propped the old lady up with her arm. She drank the
medicine given to her and lay down again, and in a few minutes the
chloral began to have its effect. With an occasional convulsive
movement of her lower lip, she sank into a deep and heavy sleep.
Natasha watched her face following the symptoms of unconsciousness,
and when she was convinced that sleep had finally taken complete
possession of her, and that for several hours the old woman was
deprived of the power to hear anything or to wake up, she slowly
moved her chair nearer the bedstead, and without taking her quietly
observant eyes from the old woman's face, softly slipped her hand
under the lower pillow. Moving forward with the utmost care, not
more than an inch or so at a time, her hand stopped instantly, as
soon as there was the slightest nervous movement of the old woman's
face, on which Natasha's eyes were fixed immovably. But the old
woman slept profoundly, and the hand again moved forward half an
inch or so under the pillow. About half an hour passed, and the
girl's eyes were still fastened on the sleeping face, and her hand
was still slipping forward under the pillow, moving occasionally a
little to one side, and feeling about for something. Natasha's
expression was in the highest degree quiet and concentrated, but
under this quietness was at the same time concealed something else,
which gave the impression that if--which Heaven forbid!--the old
woman should at that moment awake, the other free hand would
instantly seize her by the throat.

At last the finger-ends felt something hard. "That is it!" thought
Natasha, and she held her breath. In a moment, seizing its
treasure, her hand began quietly to withdraw. Ten minutes more
passed, and Natasha finally drew out a little bag of various
colored silks, in which the old princess always kept her keys, and
from which she never parted, carrying it by day in her pocket, and
by night keeping it under her pillow. One of the keys was an
ordinary one, that of her wardrobe. The other was smaller and
finely made; it was the key of her strong box.

About an hour later, the same keys, in the same order, and with the
same precautions, found their way back to their accustomed place
under the old lady's pillow.

Natasha carefully wiped the glass with her handkerchief, in order
that not the least odor of chloral might remain in it, and with her
usual stillness sat out the remaining hours of her watch.

VI

REVENGED

The old princess awoke at one o'clock the next day. The doctor was
very pleased at her long and sound sleep, the like of which the old
lady had not enjoyed since her first collapse, and which, in his
view, was certain to presage a turn for the better.

The princess had long ago formed a habit of looking over her
financial documents, and verifying the accounts of income and
expenditure. This deep-seated habit, which had become a second
nature, did not leave her, now she was ill; at any rate, every
morning, as soon as consciousness and tranquillity returned to her,
she took out the key of her wardrobe, ordered the strong box to be
brought to her, and, sending the day nurse out of the room, gave
herself up in solitude to her beloved occupation, which had by this
time become something like a childish amusement. She drew out her
bank securities, signed and unsigned, now admiring the colored
engravings on them, now sorting and rearranging them, fingering the
packets to feel their thickness, counting them over, and several
thousands in banknotes, kept in the house in case of need, and
finally carefully replaced them in the strong box. The girl,
recalled to the bedroom by the sound of the bell, restored the
strong box to its former place, and the old princess, after this
amusement, felt herself for some time quiet and happy.

The nurses had had the opportunity to get pretty well used to this
foible; so that the daily examination of the strong box seemed to
them a part of the order of things, something consecrated by
custom.

After taking her medicine, and having her hands and face wiped with
a towel moistened with toilet water, the princess ordered certain
prayers to be read out to her, or the chapter of the Gospel
appointed for the day, and then received her son. From the time of
her illness--that is, from the day when she signed the will making
him her sole heir--he had laid it on himself as a not altogether
pleasant duty to put in an appearance for five minutes in his
mother's room, where he showed himself a dutiful son by never
mentioning his sister, but asking tenderly after his mother's
health, and finally, with a deep sigh, gently kissing her hand,
taking his departure forthwith, to sup with some actress or to meet
his companions in a wine shop.

When he soon went away, the old lady, as was her habit, ordered her
strong box to be brought, and sent the nurse out of the room. It
was a very handsome box of ebony, with beautiful inlaid work.

The key clicked in the lock, the spring lid sprang up, and the eyes
of the old princess became set in their sockets, full of
bewilderment and terror. Twenty-four thousand rubles in bills,
which she herself with her own hands had yesterday laid on the top
of the other securities, were no longer in the strong box. All the
unsigned bank securities were also gone. The securities in the
name of her daughter Anna had likewise disappeared. There remained
only the signed securities in the name of the old princess and her
son, and a few shares of stock. In the place of all that was gone,
there lay a note directed "to Princess Chechevinski."

The old lady's fingers trembled so that for a long time she could
not unfold this paper. Her staring eyes wandered hither and
thither as if she had lost her senses. At last she managed somehow
to unfold the note, and began to read:

"You cursed me, forced me to flee, and unjustly deprived me of my
inheritance. I am taking my money by force. You may inform the
police, but when you read this note, I myself and he who carried
out this act by my directions, will have left St. Petersburg
forever.

"Your daughter,

"PRINCESS ANNA CHECHEVINSKI."

The old lady's hands did not fall at her sides, but shifted about
on her lap as if they did not belong to her. Her wandering,
senseless eyes stopped their movements, and in them suddenly
appeared an expression of deep meaning. The old princess made a
terrible, superhuman effort to recover her presence of mind and
regain command over herself. A single faint groan broke from her
breast, and her teeth chattered. She began to look about the room
for a light, but the lamp had been extinguished; the dull gray
daylight filtering through the Venetian blinds sufficiently lit the
room. Then the old lady, with a strange, irregular movement,
crushed the note together in her hand, placed it in her mouth, and
with a convulsive movement of her jaws chewed it, trying to swallow
it as quickly as possible.

A minute passed, and the note had disappeared. The old princess
closed the strong box and rang for the day nurse. Giving her the
usual order in a quiet voice, she had still strength enough to
support herself on her elbow and watch the nurse closing the
wardrobe, and then to put the little bag with the keys back under
her pillow, in its accustomed place. Then she again ordered the
nurse to go.

When, two hours later, the doctor, coming for the third time,
wished to see his patient and entered her bedroom, he found only
the old woman's lifeless body. The blow had been too much--the
daughter of the ancient and ever honorable line of Chechevinski a
fugitive and a thief!

Natasha had had her revenge.

VII

BEYOND THE FRONTIER

On the morning of that same day, at nine o'clock, a well-dressed
lady presented at the Bank of Commerce a number of unsigned bank
shares. At the same time a young man, also elegantly dressed,
presented a series of signed shares, made out in the name of
"Princess Anna Chechevinski." They were properly indorsed, the
signature corresponding to that in the bank books.

After a short interval the cashier of the bank paid over to the
well-dressed lady a hundred and fifty thousand rubles in bills, and
to the elegantly dressed young man seventy thousand rubles. The
lady signed her receipt in French, Teresa Dore; the young man
signed his name, Ivan Afonasieff, son of a merchant of Kostroma.

A little later on the same day--namely, about two o'clock--a light
carriage carried two passengers along the Pargoloff road: a quietly
dressed young woman and a quietly dressed young man. Toward
evening these same young people were traveling in a Finnish coach
by the stony mountain road in the direction of Abo.

Four days later the old Princesss Chechevinski was buried in the
Nevski monastery.

On his return from the monastery, young Prince Chechevinski went
straight for the strong box, which he had hitherto seen only at a
distance, and even then only rarely. He expected to find a great
deal more money in it than he found--some hundred and fifty
thousand rubles; a hundred thousand in his late mother's name, and
fifty thousand in his own. This was the personal property of the
old princess, a part of her dowry. The young prince made a wry
face--the money might last him two or three years, not more.
During the lifetime of the old princess no one had known accurately
how much she possessed, so that it never even entered the young
prince's head to ask whether she had not had more. He was so
unmethodical that he never even looked into her account book,
deciding that it was uninteresting and not worth while.

That same day the janitor of one of the huge, dirty tenements in
Vosnesenski Prospekt brought to the police office notice of the
fact that the Pole, Kasimir Bodlevski, had left the city; and the
housekeeper of the late Princess Chechevinski informed the police
that the serf girl Natalia Pavlovna (Natasha) had disappeared
without leaving a trace, which the housekeeper now announced, as
the three days' limit had elapsed.

At that same hour the little ship of a certain Finnish captain was
gliding down the Gulf of Bothnia. The Finn stood at the helm and
his young son handled the sails. On the deck sat a young man and a
young woman. The young woman carried, in a little bag hung round
her neck, two hundred and forty-four thousand rubles in bills, and
she and her companion carried pistols in their pockets for use in
case of need. Their passports declared that the young woman
belonged to the noble class, and was the widow of a college
assessor, her name being Maria Solontseva, while the young man was
a Pole, Kasimir Bodlevski.

The little ship was crossing the Gulf of Bothnia toward the coast
of Sweden.

VIII

BACK TO RUSSIA

In the year 1858, in the month of September, the "Report of the St.
Petersburg City Police" among the names of "Arrivals" included the
following:

Baroness von Doring, Hanoverian subject.
Ian Vladislav Karozitch, Austrian subject.

The persons above described might have been recognized among the
fashionable crowds which thronged the St. Petersburg terminus of
the Warsaw railway a few days before: A lady who looked not more
than thirty, though she was really thirty-eight, dressed with
simple elegance, tall and slender, admirably developed, with
beautifully clear complexion, piercing, intelligent gray eyes,
under finely outlined brows, thick chestnut hair, and a firm mouth-
-almost a beauty, and with an expression of power, subtlety and
decision. "She is either a queen or a criminal," a physiognomist
would have said after observing her face. A gentleman with a red
beard, whom the lady addressed as "brother," not less elegantly
dressed, and with the same expression of subtlety and decision.
They left the station in a hired carriage, and drove to Demuth's
Hotel.

Before narrating the adventures of these distinguished persons, let
us go back twenty years, and ask what became of Natasha and
Bodlevski. When last we saw them the ship that carried them away
from Russia was gliding across the Gulf of Bothnia toward the
Swedish coast. Late in the evening it slipped into the port of
Stockholm, and the worthy Finn, winding in and out among the heavy
hulls in the harbor--he was well used to the job--landed his
passengers on the wharf at a lonely spot near a lonely inn, where
the customs officers rarely showed their noses. Bodlevski, who had
beforehand got ready the very modest sum to pay for their passage,
with pitiable looks and gestures and the few Russian phrases the
good Finn could understand, assured him that he was a very poor
man, and could not even pay the sum agreed on in full. The deficit
was inconsiderable, some two rubles in all, and the good Finn was
magnanimous; he slapped his passenger on the shoulder, called him a
"good comrade," declared that he would not press a poor man, and
would always be ready to do him a service. He even found quarters
for Bodlevski and Natasha in the inn, under his protection. The
Finn was indeed a very honest smuggler. On the next morning,
bidding a final farewell to their nautical friend, our couple made
their way to the office of the British Consul, and asked for an
opportunity to speak with him. At this point Natasha played the
principal role.

'My husband is a Pole," said the handsome girl, taking a seat
opposite the consul in his private office, "and I myself am Russian
on the father's side, but my mother was English. My husband is
involved in a political enterprise; he was liable to transportation
to Siberia, but a chance made it possible for us to escape while
the police were on their way to arrest him. We are now political
fugitives, and we intrust our lives to the protection of English
law. Be generous, protect us, and send us to England!"

The ruse, skillfully planned and admirably presented, was
completely successful, and two or three days later the first
passenger ship under the English flag carried the happy couple to
London.

Bodlevski destroyed his own passport and that of the college
assessor's widow, Maria Solontseva, which Natasha had needed as a
precaution while still on Russian soil. When they got to England,
it would be much handier to take new names. But with their new
position and these new names a great difficulty presented itself:
they could find no suitable outlet for their capital without
arousing very dangerous suspicions. The many-sided art of the
London rogues is known to all the world; in their club, Bodlevski,
who had lost no time in making certain pleasant and indispensable
acquaintances there, soon succeeded in getting for himself and
Natasha admirably counterfeited new passports, once more with new
names and occupations. With these, in a short time, they found
their way to the Continent. They both felt the full force of youth
and a passionate desire to live and enjoy life; in their hot heads
hummed many a golden hope and plan; they wished, to begin with, to
invest their main capital somewhere, and then to travel over
Europe, and to choose a quiet corner somewhere where they could
settle down to a happy life.

Perhaps all this might have happened if it had not been for cards
and roulette and the perpetual desire of increasing their capital--
for the worthy couple fell into the hands of a talented company,
whose agents robbed them at Frascati's in Paris, and again in
Hamburg and various health resorts, so that hardly a year had
passed when Bodlevski one fine night woke up to the fact that they
no longer possessed a ruble. But they had passed a brilliant year,
their arrival in the great cities had had its effect, and
especially since Natasha had become a person of title; in the
course of the year she succeeded in purchasing an Austrian barony
at a very reasonable figure--a barony which, of course, only
existed on paper.

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