Читать книгу Gabriel Samara - E. Phillips Oppenheim - Страница 10

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Mrs. Saxon J. Bossington dispensed hospitality in a Fifth Avenue palace, built by a multi-millionaire of world-wide fame and purchased by her obedient spouse at the time of the last oil combine. She entertained lavishly and indiscriminately. Society, diplomacy, and even artists were all alike welcome. Her peculiar fancy, however, was acting as hostess to what she was endeavouring to make known as the "Russian Circle."

"My dear Saxon," she explained to her husband, "no one knows who these people are. All we do know is that they are aristocrats. There's the Grand Duchess, of course, and the General, and Colonel Kirdorff—they are the bluest blood in Russia, but those others aren't pulling the wool over my eyes, though they call themselves plain 'Mr.' and 'Mrs.' and 'Miss.' It's my belief there's more of the Royal Family than one in that little crowd. And Saxon—there's Prince Nicholas now, an Imanoff—"

"What is an 'Imanoff,' anyway?" Mr. Bossington interrupted, giving his coat tails a pull.

"The family name of the Russian Royal Family," his wife declared in a tone of awe.

Mr. Bossington appeared unimpressed.

"Thought they were all wiped out in a cellar or somewhere," he objected.

"All the direct branch were assassinated—murdered," his wife agreed, "in a cellar. The details were too horrible. Some of the others, however, got away, and one or two escaped out of the country. Prince Nicholas is the next heir to the throne of those left alive."

"Well, there isn't going to be any throne," Mr. Bossington observed. "Russia's doing thundering well under her new Republic. That fellow Samara has set her going again. I had an offer for some oil concessions from his Government to-day, made me through Washington. I shall have to send a man over next week."

Mrs. Bossington deemed that the time had come for her great announcement.

"Saxon," she said, "to-night I want you to be at your best. Gabriel Samara, the greatest man in Russia, is coming here."

"You don't say!" Mr. Bossington exclaimed, properly impressed at last. "Does he know anything about oil, I wonder?"

"You can cut out that stuff," his wife enjoined angrily, with a brief relapse into the verbiage of past years. "What I mean, Saxon, is that I want you to be the perfect gentleman to-night—the broad-minded American host. We may get asked to Russia. Come right along into the library now. They'll be here before we know where we are."

"What I want to know," Mr. Bossington demanded, as they crossed the hall, "is how our friends and this man, Samara, are likely to pull together, and where on earth did you come across him?"

A butler in command motioned to a footman, who threw open the door of a magnificent library. It was an apartment which much resembled the interior of a chapel, with vaulted roof, stained-glass windows, and an organ in the far end. There were divans and chairs, a round table at which a score of places were set, and a sideboard, groaning with edibles of every sort, flanked by a long row of gold-foiled bottles. Mrs. Bossington looked around her critically.

"I guess this is cosy enough for them, Saxon," she observed.

"There's plenty of the stuff, anyway," he remarked, with a glance towards the sideboard. "But how did you get hold of this fellow Samara? Those others all seem as if they had stepped out of a dime show, but Samara's the real goods!—as big a man, in his way, as our President!"

"I met him with that little Catherine Borans, the typewriting girl, lunching at the Ritz Carlton," Mrs. Bossington explained. "Of course it's all nonsense about her being really a working girl. There isn't one of them has a better air than she has. They are close-mouthed and all," she went on, listening for the bell. "I tried to get the old General, the other day, to tell me who she was. He just smiled and shook his head. The Duchess seemed on the point of telling me and then she pulled herself up. 'She is of our order, Mrs. Bossington,' was all I could get her to say."

The door was suddenly thrown open. The little stream of expected guests began to arrive; a curious company in their way, but each with his own peculiar claim to distinction. General Orenburg, who first bent over his hostess' hand, was ponderous and bulky, his shabby dinner clothes carefully brushed, the ends of his black tie a little shiny. Nevertheless he bore himself as a man with a great past should. He was accompanied by Prince Nicholas, whose irritation had departed for the evening, but whose manner was still stiff and abstracted. The Grand Duchess entered the room directly afterwards. She had changed her gown since dinner-time and her hair was parted and brushed so smoothly back that it seemed almost like a plastered wig. Cyril Volynia Sabaroff of Perm followed, with his sister Rosa. Behind them came General Kirdorff. They all stood in little groups whilst a footman served coffee and liqueurs. Mrs. Saxon J. Bossington flitted from one to the other, with much to say concerning their expected guest. Her husband listened to the description of a new automobile which some friends of Cyril Sabaroff were soon to put on the market.

"If this isn't too sweet to see you all together!" their hostess exclaimed. "Now I do hope you'll make yourselves comfortable and have your little chat just as though no one were here. There's a table you can sit round and a bite of supper for you later on. I hope you gentlemen will pay a visit to the sideboard whenever you like."

Prince Nicholas detached himself from the others.

"Your hospitality is wonderful, madam," he declared. "We beg that you will not leave us. Colonel Kirdorff has promised to talk to us to-night about the probable result of the Samara type of government, and the General has a few remarks to make concerning these rumours of demilitarisation in Russia."

"Very interesting, I'm sure," Mrs. Bossington murmured, sailing away to greet some fresh arrivals—an elderly professor and his wife.

"Will Samara back out, do you think?" General Orenburg asked his neighbour anxiously.

Kirdorff shook his head.

"If he promised, he will come," he declared confidently. "I have that much faith in him, at any rate. He is not likely to break his word."

The greater part of the little company was now assembled. They were about a dozen outside the circle of Catherine's immediate entourage; all Russians and ardent Monarchists, but of various types and positions in the world. They were barely settled in their places round the table, when the eagerly expected event happened. The door was opened and the butler made his announcement.

"Miss Catherine Borans—Mr. Gabriel Santara!"

The newcomers advanced towards their hostess. They exchanged a few words of salutation whilst Samara bowed low and raised her somewhat pudgy fingers to his lips. Then Catherine led him towards the table.

"Please, all of you," she said, "I have ventured to bring a visitor to see you. We have been very curious about him, very critical, sometimes censorious. After all, though, we must remember that he is a fellow- countryman."

There followed a few moments of intense silence. They were all engrossed in their study of this man, the foremost figure in their country; the man who, from their somewhat narrow point of view, stood between them and their desire. Certainly so far as appearance went he was at a disadvantage with none of them. He was well groomed, his evening clothes were impeccable, and he possessed to the fullest extent the natural dignity of a man holding a great place in the world.

"Samara! Gabriel Samara," Alexandrina murmured, studying him through her lorgnettes.

"Samara!" the fair-haired Rosa Sabaroff exclaimed, looking at him with undisguised awe.

"Gabriel Samara!" the General said, under his breath, stiffening insensibly.

The attitude of the little gathering towards their visitor could scarcely be called hospitable. The General and Prince Nicholas both inclined their heads, but did not offer their hands. Samara, however, showed no signs of taking offence. His bow to Alexandrina had been the bow of a courtier. He was himself too interested in his own contemplation of the rest of the party to appreciate their lack of cordiality. Mr. Bossington, as though he judged the moment propitious, introduced himself into the circle.

"Mr. Samara," he said, "glad to meet you, sir. Saxon Bossington, my name— glad to be your host. There's a proposition about oil they were asking me to look into, somewhere north of the Caspian Sea."

Samara smiled.

"You are without doubt, sir, one of the capitalists whom your President mentioned to me," he rejoined politely. "Russia has need of your brains and your money. We think that we can repay all that you have to offer. Our greatest necessity just now is to find employment for a large number of men."

"You are really going to demilitarise then!" Colonel Kirdorff intervened.

Samara, who had been standing a few feet apart, turned once more towards the table.

"You seem to be all my country people," he observed. "Why should I have secrets from you? It is my intention immediately on my return to Russia to demobilise the whole of our Third Army, consisting of about a million men. I should have done so before if I could have been sure of finding employment for them. My mission over here was to arrange something of the sort."

"What about the Germans?" Prince Nicholas demanded bluntly.

Some part of the geniality seemed to depart from Samara's manner. There was a note almost of hauteur in his reply.

"The armies of Russia," he said, "have been trained by and perhaps learned their vocation partly from German officers. Those German officers have been well paid for their labours. For anything else, the army consists of Russian soldiers, bound together for one purpose, and one purpose only—the defence of their country. In my opinion and in the opinion of my counsellors, the necessity for their existence on so large a scale no longer exists."

Samara was still standing. The General rose to his feet and indicated a chair.

"Will you join us, sir?" he invited.

There was a breathless pause—the remainder of the handful of Monarchists sat spell-bound. With a grave bow to the General, Samara accepted the invitation. Prince Nicholas was on his left, the Grand Duchess a little lower down.

"This is a strange day," the General continued. "We never thought to welcome amongst us the head of the Russian Republic. I and my friends, Mr. Samara, represent a broken party; yet a party which has yielded everything except hope. We do not desire to begin our acquaintance under the shadow of any false pretence. Prince Nicholas of Imanoff here, we acknowledge as the hereditary ruler of Russia. We cannot recognise any other government."

Samara bowed his head.

"You have every right to your convictions," he admitted. "If I believed that it was for the good of Russia to enter once more a period of Tzardom, I should myself immediately accept the monarchical doctrine. But I tell you frankly that I do not believe it. I am a Russian by birth and descent and I think that I have earned the right to call myself a patriot. I have worked—I still work—for my country's good as I see it. That is why, with a clear conscience, I have accepted this invitation to come and visit you."

"Our friend speaks well," the General declared, looking around him. "After all, we must not forgot that he has accomplished a great deed. He has freed Russia from the Bolshevists, he has destroyed Soviet rule. If the form of government which he has set up does not wholly appeal to us, it is still a million times better than the one which he has crushed."

"That is common sense," Kirdorff agreed. "Yet it leaves us with this reflection. Bolshevism and Soviet rule were impossibilities. From that hateful extreme we expected the pendulum to swing back to the conditions of our desire. Samara here has intervened. He has intervened—happily, perhaps, for Russia— but disastrously for us. While he lives our cause will languish."

There was a tense silence. The significance of those words "while he lives" seemed to make itself felt everywhere. Samara looked around with a faint smile upon his lips—a smile about which there was already a shadow of defiance. It was a strange scene: the eager faces of the little crowd gathered round the table, the wonderful room with its great spaces and unexpected flashes of almost barbaric magnificence, the lavish hospitality displayed upon the huge sideboard, Mr. and Mrs. Saxon J. Bossington, almost grotesque in their position of host and hostess, seated in the background, waiting.

"A true accusation," Samara admitted. "But after all I can honestly assure you that I, who know the temper of the country personally better than you can by the offices of correspondents, have seen few indications of a desire on the part of the people to submit themselves once more to the domination of a monarchy. I had no idea until a few hours ago that I was to have the honour of meeting you this evening—you, Prince Nicholas, or you, General, whose name is still remembered in Russia, or you, Colonel, or your Royal Highness. Let me say this to you, if I may. The Bolshevist days and the days of insane hatreds are over. Russia is a free country—as free to you as to me. Why not come back and live in it?"

"Come back!" the General groaned. "My estates—"

"My mines!" Kirdorff muttered.

"They took from me five hundred thousand English pounds," Alexandrina sighed wearily.

"I will be frank with you all," Samara continued. "There is a new code of laws in Russia to-day. We are prospering to an amazing extent, but we have taken upon our shoulders an immense burden. The Russia of to-day desires to pay the debts of the past. If I alone had power, I would add to those debts the sums and estates of which the Bolshevists deprived you. But in that desire I am almost alone. I spoke of it and my own people listened in silence. But I believe—I believe from the bottom of my heart—that the day will come when Russia will repay you every farthing which you have lost."

"If one could dream of such a thing!" the General faltered.

"My mines are being worked by a Japanese Company," Kirdorff sighed.

"There will be difficulties," Samara admitted, "but we shall overcome them. In the meantime, why live in exile? Russia is your country. Russia is open to you. I am not afraid to invite you all freely and whole-heartedly to return; the sentence of banishment against absentee Monarchists, I promise you, shall be revoked. I am not afraid of your influence. If Russia, at any time, should want a monarchy, let her have it. I will buy a villa in the south of France, be myself an exile, and grow roses. I am but the servant of the will of the people."

"Rienzi said that before he climbed over their shoulders into power," Kirdorff reminded him, with a curious flash in his eyes.

"Rienzi was a man of more ambitious temperament than I," Samara retorted. "Besides, his scheme of government in those days was less wide-flung. He was a dreamer as well as an idealist; I am a practical man. I desire what is good for Russia, and it is certainly not for her good that any of those who might be foremost amongst her citizens are living in exile. General, return to Russia, and an Army Corps or a post at the War Office is yours. You, Colonel Kirdorff, shall have a division whenever you choose to apply for it. There is not one of you who shall be deprived of the opportunity of doing useful work for your country. Why sit here and weave impossible dreams? Why not attune your patriotism to the music of real labour?"

"What about me?" Nicholas asked eagerly.

Samara reflected for a moment.

"Prince," he confided, "I will be frank with you. We are living too near the shadow of regrettable days. Come if you will and be sure of my protection, so far as it goes. You shall have a commission in the army, but an Imanoff, in Russia, even to-day, must take his chance."

Nicholas nodded. Catherine, who had moved round to his side, looked across at Samara.

"Remember this," she insisted. "If the tide of feeling should flow, at any time, towards the re-establishment of Russia's real ruler, it is upon Nicholas here that the people's choice must fall."

Samara listened indifferently. Perhaps in that hour of his magnificent and superabundant vitality, when his brain was at its zenith, his vision unerring, the idea of any serious rivalry between himself and this pale-faced young man of peevish expression seemed an incredible thing.

"All I can say is," he replied, "that if Prince Nicholas cares to come, he is welcome. Such protection as I can afford him he shall have. If he plots against my Government and his plots are discovered, he will be shot. If, by open election of the people or by vote of the Duma, a monarchy is desired, then I shall never lift a hand against him."

The General stroked his grey imperial. Something of the weariness had gone from his face. Something of the languor, indeed, seemed to have passed from each one of them. They had listened to a wonderful message. Samara read their thoughts. He rose to his feet.

"I thank you, General, and all of you for your reception. I fear that in the past you have counted me an enemy. Wipe that out, please. The greatest of possible ties binds us together—our country!"

He bowed low and moved away. Mrs. Bossington arose from her chair and came bustling towards him.

"Now, my dear Mr. Samara," she exclaimed, "I am sure all this talking must have tired you. What it's been about neither Saxon nor I have the slightest idea, for on an occasion like this we make it a rule to keep ourselves to ourselves. One thing, however, I insist upon, you must take a little refreshment before you go."

Samara suffered himself to be piloted by his hostess to the sideboard, ate pâté sandwiches and drank champagne. Presently they were joined by her husband, who was curious about the oil-producing centres of Southern Russia. From the table behind came a drone of subdued but eager voices.