'No Grishenka,' she replied in French after a row, 'it is impossible for me to change as far as you are concerned. You must be fair to yourself: can one love anybody after having known you? I think there is not a man in the world that could equal you. All the more so since my heart is constant by nature and I will say even more: generally, I do not like change.' She was sensitive about her reputation for 'wantonness':
When you know me better you will respect me for I assure you I am respectable. I am very truthful, I love truth, I hate changes, I suffered horribly in the last two years, I burned my fingers, I will not return to that... I am very happy. If you go on letting yourself be upset by this sort of gossip, do you know what I shall do? Lock myself up in my room and see no one but you. When necessary I could do something that extreme and I love you beyond myself.49
Her patience was saintly but not inexhaustible: 'If your silly bad temper has left you, kindly let me know for it seems to persist. Since I've given you no reason for such tenacious anger, it seems to me that it has gone on far too long. Unfortunately, it is only I who find it too long, for you are a cruel Tartar!'50
Their relationship thrived on his wild mood swings, but they were very exhausting. Somehow his appalling behaviour seemed to keep him Catherine's respect and love, even though his moods were openly manipulative. Catherine was excited by his passions and complimented by his jealousy, but, lacking restraint, he sometimes went too far. He threatened to kill any rivals for her heart. 'You ought to be ashamed of yourself,' she ticked him off. 'Why did you say that anyone who takes your place would die? It is impossible to compel the heart by threats ... I must admit there is some tenderness in your misgivings ... I've burned my fingers with the fool [Vassilchikov]. I feared ... the habit of him would make me unhappy and shorten my life ... Now you can read my heart and soul. I am opening them to you sincerely and if you don't feel it and see it, then you're unworthy of the great passion you have aroused in me.'51
Potemkin demanded to know everything. He claimed there had been fifteen lovers before him. This was a rare example of an empress being accused of low morals to her face. But Catherine hoped to settle his jealousies with what she called 'A sincere confession'. This is a most extraordinary document for any age. The modern feminine tone belongs in our confessional twenty-first century, the worldly and practical morals in the eighteenth. The sentiments of romance and honesty are timeless. For an empress to explain her sex life like this is without parallel. She discussed her four lovers before him - Saltykov, Poniatowski, Orlov and Vassilchikov. She regretted Saltykov and Vassilchikov. Potemkin appeared as the giant hero, the 'bogatr' that he so resembled: 'Now, Sir Hero, after this confession, may I hope that I will receive forgiveness for my sins? As you will be pleased to see, there is no question of fifteen but only a third of that figure of which the first [Saltykov] occurred unwillingly and the fourth [Vassilchikov] out of despair, which cannot be counted as indulgence; as to the other three, God is my witness, they were not due to debauchery for which I have no inclination. If in my youth I had been given a husband whom I could love, I would have remained eternally faithful to him.'
Then she confessed her version of the truth of her nature: 'The trouble is only that my heart cannot be content even for an hour without love .. Л This was not the nymphomania that schoolboys have assigned to Catherine but an admission of her emotional neediness. The eighteenth century would have called this a statement of sensibilte; the nineteenth century would have seen it as a poetic declaration of romantic love; today, we can see that it is only one of part of a complex, passionate personality.
Their love for each other was absolute, yet Potemkin's turbulence and the demands of power meant that it was always stormy. Nonetheless, Catherine finished her Confession with this offer: 'If you wish to keep me for ever, show as much friendship as affection and continue to love me and to tell me the truth.'52
8
POWER
She is crazy about him. They may well be in love because they are exactly the same.
Senator Ivan Yelagin to Durand de Distroff
These two great characters were made for each other,' observed Masson. 'He first loved his Sovereign as his mistress and then cherished her as his glory.'1 Their similarity of ambitions and talents was both the foundation of their love and its flaw. The great love affair of the Empress heralded a new political era because everyone immediately appreciated that, unlike Vassilchikov or even Grigory Orlov, Potemkin was capable of exerting his power and would strive to do so at once. But, in early 1774, they had to be very careful at the most sensitive moment in Catherine's reign so far: Pugachev was still rampaging through the territory north of the Caspian, south of the Urals, east of Moscow - and the worried nobles wanted him stopped quickly. The Turks were still not ready to negotiate and Rumiantsev's army was tired and fever- stricken. A false move against Pugachev, a defeat by the Turks, a provocation against the Orlovs, a slight to the Guards, a concession to the Grand Duke - any of these could literally have cost the lovers their heads.
Just in case they were under any illusions, Alexei Orlov-Chesmensky decided to let them know that he was carefully watching the illuminated window of the imperial bathhouse. The Orlov brothers, who had recovered so much ground since 1772, would be the first casualties of Potemkin's rise.
'Yes or no?', 'Le Balafre' asked the Empress with a slight laugh.
'About what?', replied the Empress.
'Is it love?', persisted Orlov-Chesmensky.
'I cannot lie,' said the Empress.
Scarface asked again: 'Yes or no?'
'Yes!', said the Empress finally.
Orlov-Chesmensky began to laugh again: 'Do you meet in the banyaV
'Why do you think so?'
'Because for four days we've seen the light in the window of the bath later than usual.' Then he added: 'It was clear yesterday that you've made an appointment later so you'd agree not to display affection, to put others off the scent. Good move.'2 Catherine reported all this to her lover and the two revelled in it like naughty children shocking the adults. But there was always something menacing in Alexei Orlov's jokes.
Between bouts of love-making and laughter in the banya, Potemkin immediately began to help Catherine on both the Russo-Turkish War and the Pugachev Rebellion. These political actors often discussed how to play a scene: 'Goodbye brother,' she told him. 'Behave cleverly in public and that way, no one will know what we are really thinking.'3 Yet she felt safe with Potemkin, who gave her the feeling that everything was possible, that all their glorious dreams were achievable and that the problems of the moment could be settled.
Catherine was already under pressure about Potemkin. In early March, unidentified but powerful courtiers, including one nicknamed 'the Alchemist' - possibly Panin or an Orlov - advised Catherine to dispense with Potemkin: 'The man you call "the Alchemist" visited ... He tried to demonstrate to me the frenzy of yours and my actions and finished by asking if he wanted me to ask you to go back to the Army: to which I agreed. They are all of them at least trying to lecture me ... I didn't own up but I didn't excuse myself too so they couldn't claim that I'd lied.' But the letters also show Potemkin and Catherine's unity in political matters: