DubPit had �Pnt for me in order to trll me that Count BenckPndorf required my presence at eight o'clock the next morning to inform nw of tlw (kci sion of His :\Iajesty!
Dubelt was an unusual person; he was probably more intelligent than the whole of the Third Divi sion-indeed, than all three divisions of His Majesty's Own ChancPll ery. His sunken face, sh<JdPd by long. filir moustilchl's. his f<Jtigupd expression, particularly the furrows in his cheeks and forehead, clearly witnessed that his breast hMI hePn tlw hilttleliPid of many pa ssions befort'
thP pale-bhiP uniform had conqtwrcd. or rathPr concealed. cwrything that was in it. His feature's had somPthing wolfish and PH'n foxy about thPm. that is. tlwy expressed the subtle intclligPnce of bPasts of prPy: there was at once evasiveness and arrogance' in them. l iP was always courtPous.
\Yhpn I wPnt into his stud:· he was sitting in a uniform coat without PpaulettPs, and smoking a pipe as he wrotP. He rose a t oncP, asked mp t o sit down facing h i m a n d began with the follo\ving surprising sentNlCP:
Longus's Daphnis and Clrlor. of which he published a French translation.
( Tr.)
Moscow, Petersburg and Novgorod
261
'Count Alexander Khristoforovich has given me the opportunity of making your acquaintance. I believe you saw Sakhtynsky this morning?'
'Yes, I did.'
'I am very sorry that the reason I have had to ask you to see me is not an entirely pleasant one for you. Your imprudence has once more brought His Majesty's anger upon you.'
'I will say to you, General, what I said to Count Sakhtynsky: I cannot imagine that I shall be exiled simply for having repeated a street rumour, which you, of course, heard before me, and possibly spoke of just as I did.'
'Yes, I heard the rumour, and I spoke of it, and so far we a re even; but this is where the difference begins: in n•peating the absurd story I swore that there was noth ing in it, while you made the rumour a ground for accusing the whole police force.
It is all this unfortunate passion de dcnigrcr lc gozwcrncmcnt-a passion that has developed in all of you gentlemen from the pernicious example of the West. It is not with us as in France, where the government is at daggers drawn with the parties, where it is dragged in the mud. Our government is paternal : everything i s done as privately a s possible . . . . W e d o our very utmost that everything shall go as quietly and smoothly as possible, and here mPn, who in spite of painful experience persist in a fruitless opposition, alarm public opinion by stating verbally and in writing that the soldiers of the police murder men in the streets. Isn't that true? You have written about it, haven't you?'
'I attach so little importance to the matter that I don't think it at all necessary to conceal that I have written about it, and I will add to whom-to my father.'
'Of course it is not an important matter, but see what it has brought you to. His Majesty at once remembered your name, and that you had been at Vyatka, and commanded that you should be sent back there, and so the Count has commissioned me to inform you that you are to go to him to-morrow at eight o'clock and he will announce to you the will of His Majesty.'
'And so it is left that I am to go to Vyatka with a sick wife and a sick child on account of something that you say is not important?'
'Why, are you in the service?' Dubelt asked me, looking intently at the buttons of my half-dress uniform coat.
'In the office of the Minister of Home Affairs.'
'Have you been there long?'
'Six months.'
M Y P A S T A N D T H O U G H T S
262
'And all the time in Petersburg? '
'All the time.'
'I had no idea of it.'
'You see,' I said. smiling, 'how discreetly I have behaved.'
Sakhtynsky did not know that I was married, Dubelt did not know that I was in the service, but both knew vvhat I said in my own room, \vhat I thought and wha t I \Vrote to my father . . . .
The trouble was that I was just beginning to be friendly with Petersburg literary men, and to publish articles and, worse still, had been transferred by Count Strogonov from Vladimir to Petersburg, the secret police having no hand in i t, and when I arrived in Petersburg I had not reported either to Dubelt or to the Third Division, which kindly persons had hinted that I should do.
'To be sure,' Dubelt interrupted me, 'all the information that has been collected about you is entirely to your credit. Only yesterday I was speaking to Zhukovsky �nd should be thankft;l to hear my sons spoken of as he spoke of you.'
'And yet I am to go to Vyatka?'
'You see it is your misfortune that the report had been handed in already. and that many circumstances had not been taken into consid,eration. Go you. must: there's no altering that, but I imagine that another tO\vn might be substituted for Vyatka . I will talk it over with the Count: he is going to the Palace again to-day. ·we will try and do all that can be done to make things
<'asier: the Count is a man of angelic kindness.'
I got up and Dubelt escorted me to the door of his study. At that point I could not restrain myself: I stopped and said to him :
'I have onp small favour to ask of you, General. If you want me, plPase do not sPnd constables or gendarmes. They are noisy and alarming, especially in thP PVPning. ·why should my sick wife be mor<' sev<'rPiy punished than any one on account of the sentry business?'
'Oh ! good hcawns. how unpleasant that is,' replied Dubelt,
'how clumsy thPv all arp l You may rest assured that I will not send a polic<'ma.n again. And so .till to-morrow; don't forget, Pight o'clock at the Count's; WP shall meet there.'
It wit's Pxactly as though we were agreeing to go to Smurov's to Pat oysters tog<'thcr.
At Pight o'clock next morning I was in Benckendorf's reception room. I found five or six pNitioners waiting there ; they stood gloomy and anxious by the \vall, started at every sound,
Moscow, Petersburg and Novgorod
263
squeezed themselves together even more closely, and bowed to every adjutant that passed. Among their number was a woman in deep mourning, with tear-stained eyes. She sat with a paper rolled up in her hand, and the roll trembled like an aspen leaf.
Three paces from her stood a tall, rather bent old man of seventy or so, bald and sallow, in a dark-green army great-coat, with a row of medals and crosses on his breast. From time to time he sighed, shook his head and whispered something under his breath.
Some sort of 'friend of the family,' a flunkey, or a clerk o n duty, s a t in the window, lolling a t h i s ease. He got up when I went in, and looking intently at his face I recognised him; that loathsome figure had been pointed out to me at the theatre as one of the chief street spies, and his name, I remember, was Fabre. He asked me:
'Have you come with a petition to the Count?'