Читать книгу The Tsar's Dwarf - Peter H. Fogtdal - Страница 19

I’VE BEEN LIFTED UP FROM MY STOOL AND SET ON TOP of the table. My small legs dangle helplessly, my hands are pressed flat on the oak surface, and I’m trying to understand the man in front of me. His name is Vasily Dolgoruky. He is the tsar’s envoy at the court of Frederik IV, and he is inordinately drunk.

“Danish is a homespun language not suited to silken tongues!”

Dolgoruky looks at me through glazed eyes. He has poured more vodka into my goblet. I consider declining, but I’ve learned that it’s futile when in the company of Muscovites.

“Whereas Russian…” Dolgoruky smiles blissfully, “is like a plaintive breeze…a poem that rolls around in the mouth like the most delicious Rhine wine.”

The Russian envoy is a man with red eyes and a malicious mouth. He has long since cast off his Western wig, and his voice has grown hoarser as the evening has progressed.

“Russian sounds like a beautiful language,” I say diplomatically.

I have been given lodgings at Merchant Edinger’s house along with Peter’s envoys, but I haven’t seen the tsar since coming here. It’s rumored that he is not pleased with the king. The Danish troops are not ready to occupy Scania. And the summer is on the wane. It’s now or never, if the Swedish king is to be defeated.

At that moment Dolgoruky stands up. He stares straight ahead. He reaches out for his goblet.

“We must drink a toast to the tsar!”

“But with your permission, we have already—”

The envoy grabs hold of me and lifts me up in front of his face. It’s clear that he thinks he can frighten me, but I’ve seen uglier faces than his.

Dolgoruky puts me back down on the table. I land on my tailbone and feel an urge to scream. The liquor numbs me nearly as much as Dolgoruky’s breath.

I catch sight of another Russian lying under the tiletopped table. His white singlet is hanging out of his trousers, one arm is hugging a crumpled sofa cushion. The knowledge that I’m not the first to fall gives me renewed strength.

“Prost !”

We drink from the Bohemian goblets. I have a hard time swallowing the vodka. It gets stuck in my throat and comes up again. I notice that I can no longer feel my knees.

I set down the goblet with a grimace. If I’m to follow the rules of etiquette, then it’s my turn to propose a toast to His Majesty Frederik IV, but I just can’t do it. I look down at Dolgoruky’s leather boots, pondering what’s in store for me, and when I might see the tsar. Will he take me to Russia and give me away, handing me over to someone else at random?

At that moment Æreboe comes staggering toward us. His chin is glistening with vodka, and his wig is askew on his head. He seems extremely drunk; his eyes are vacant and veiled. Today the notarius has come here to negotiate with Vasily Dolgoruky. I have no idea how the negotiations have gone. I know only that the Russians have been complaining about one thing after another: about the fact that they are called Muscovites, even though the tsar’s court is in Petersburg; about the fact that the delegation receives only eight jugs of liquor a day, when it has a need for fourteen; and most importantly, about the fact that the tsar’s one hundred titles were not declaimed at the official banquet at the castle. Instead they were abbreviated to forty-two. The Muscovites are suffering from a perpetual need to complain.

Dolgoruky looks at Æreboe, his eyes swimming.

“Have you got yourself anything to drink, Eerenbom?”

Æreboe nods and sits down. His lips are cracked. I’ve never seen him look so wretched. If I had any maternal feelings in my body, I would have tried to comfort him.

“I’m about to drink your dwarf under the table, Eerenbom.”

“Is that so?”

“I am not impressed by its capacity. The Russian dwarves are much hardier than the Danish.”

Æreboe stares at the envoy, then at me, as if he doesn’t understand what we’re talking about.

“A toast to your king,” says Dolgoruky.

“We’ve already toasted Frederik IV eleven times tonight!”

Dolgoruky laughs boisterously. “That’s eleven times too few!”

“With all respect, Your Grace, things are done differently in the Kingdom of Denmark and Norway…”

“The Kingdom of Denmark and Norway!” Dolgoruky squints his eyes. “Who cares about the Kingdom of Denmark and Norway? You Danes are so arrogant that it turns my stomach! The only thing you think about is getting Scania back. Negotiating with you is like negotiating with mules.”

I glance at Rasmus Æreboe and scuttle away.

“…Prussia and Saxony-Poland are proper allies. The tsar has respect for them. It’s even possible to respect the Swedes, because at least they can fight, but the Kingdom of Denmark and Norway…” Dolgoruky leers. “The tsar has no faith in the Danish army. You lose every war you get into. When was the last time you won on the battlefield—the time of the Vikings?”

Æreboe snarls something in Russian. Dolgoruky replies. For several minutes the discussion surges back and forth between the two men. I sit a short distance away and watch those hotheads; how they vie with each other, how they argue in a way that women would never argue. Why are men so proud? Is it something that’s part of their cocks? Or has God merely blessed them with a smaller-sized brain?

“You should have seen His Majesty the Tsar when he read that book your kings hate. What’s it called?”

Æreboe flinches. “I have no idea what you are referring to.”

“An Account of Denmark As It Was in the Year of Our Lord 1692…a splendid piece of writing.” Dolgoruky nods spitefully. “The tsar doesn’t usually read books, but he found the German translation profusely entertaining.”

Æreboe’s cheeks grow hot. “With all due respect, Count Dolgoruky, I have no desire to listen to your foolishness. You know quite well that Molesworth’s book is a scandalous text, insulting to Denmark and the Danish monarchy—”

“But Molesworth is right!” Dolgoruky laughs. “Copenhagen Castle is a rats’ nest. Danish cheese is the lousiest in the world, but your mutton is even worse! There are epileptics on every street corner, your capital is a provincial backwater overflowing with shit, and your taxes are the highest in Europe.”

“I’m warning you…”

“You have no proper artists, no proper artisans. You can’t even produce any proper idiots! Everyone is equally mediocre in spirit. No one takes the initiative for anything. Is there anything at all that you Danes have mastered?”

Æreboe stands up, looking furious. His face has swollen, and he fumbles for his sword.

“You Danes simply have to learn that you’re nothing but pimples on the face of Europe!”

The notarius is still trying to pull out his sword, but he’s too sloshed to find it. I scuttle down to the floor. At that moment everything starts to move: the carved door frames and the painting of Cupid with the apple cheeks.

Rasmus Æreboe has finally gotten hold of his sword, but at the same instant Dolgoruky’s head falls backwards. He dangles from his chair and then slides down to the floor, where he sprawls in an awkward position. A stream of vomit seeps out over his double chins, just like some sort of Italian fountain.

I look at Dolgoruky and Æreboe. Then I wipe the sweat from my brow.

It has been yet another interesting evening with the Muscovites.