Turkish Gambit (24 page)

She felt terribly sorry for him. Only more and more often now she found herself pondering the troublesome question of whether it was possible to marry out of pity, and the answer was always that it wasn't. But it was even more unthinkable to say: 'You know, Petya, I've changed my mind and decided not to be your wife.' It would be just like putting down a wounded animal. She was caught in a cleft stick.

A substantial gathering still convened as before in the press club as it migrated from place to place, but it was not as boisterous as in Zurov's unforgettable time. They gambled with restraint, for small stakes, and the chess sessions had ceased with McLaughlin's disappearance. The journalists did not mention the Irishman, at least in the company of Russians, but the two other British correspondents had been made the object of a demonstrative boycott and stopped coming to the club altogether.

Of course, there had been drinking sprees and scandals. Twice matters had almost reached the point of bloodshed, and both times, alas, because of Varya.

The first time, when they were still at Kazanlyk, a newly arrived adjutant who had not fully grasped Varya's status made an unfortunate attempt to joke by calling her 'the Duchess of Marlborough' with the obvious implication that Marlborough himself was Sobolev. Paladin demanded an apology from the insolent fellow, who proved stubborn in his drunken stupor, and they had stepped out to fight a duel with pistols. Varya was not in the marquee at the time, or else she would, of course, have put a stop to this idiotic conflict straight away. Fortunately no harm was done: the adjutant shot wide and when Paladin fired in reply he shot the adjutant's forage cap neatly off his head, after which the offending party sobered up and admitted his error.

On the other occasion it was the Frenchman who was challenged, and once again for a joke, only this time it was quite a funny one - at least Varya thought so. It happened after the youthful Gridnev had begun to accompany her everywhere. Paladin rashly remarked aloud that 'Mademoiselle Barbara' was like the Empress Anna Ioannovna with her famous statue of a little black boy, and the cornet, uncowed by the correspondent's fearsome reputation, demanded immediate satisfaction from him. Since the scene took place in Varya's presence, no shots were ever fired. She ordered Gridnev to be silent and Paladin to take back what he had said. The correspondent immediately relented, acknowledging that the comparison had been an unhappy one and that 'monsieur sous-lieutenant' bore a closer resemblance to Hercules capturing the hind of Arcadia. On that basis they had made up.

At times it seemed to Varya that Paladin was casting glances at her for which there could be only one possible interpretation, and yet outwardly the Frenchman behaved like a genuine Bayard. Like the other journalists, he would spend days at a time away at the front line and they saw each other less often than in the camp near Plevna,- but one day the two of them had a private conversation that Varya subsequently recalled to mind and noted down word for word in her diary (after Erast Petrovich's departure she had felt the urge to write a diary, no doubt for lack of anything to occupy her time).

They were sitting in a roadside korchma in a mountain pass, warming themselves at the fire and drinking hot wine, and after the frost the journalist seemed to get a little tipsy.

'Ah, Mademoiselle Barbara, if only I were not who I am,' Paladin said with a bitter laugh, unaware that he was repeating Varya's beloved Pierre Bezukhov almost word for word. 'If only my circumstances were different, if my character were different, and my fate . . .' He looked at Varya in a way that made her heart leap in her breast as if it were skipping a rope. 'Then I would certainly vie in the lists with the brilliant Michel. Tell me, would I have at least some small chance against him?'

'Of course you would,' Varya answered honestly and then realised that her words sounded as if she were inviting him to flirt. 'By which I mean, Charles, that you would have the same chance as Mikhail Dmitrievich - no more and no less. That is, no chance at all. Almost.'

She had added that 'almost'. Oh that hateful, ineradicable womanly weakness!

Since Paladin seemed more relaxed than he had ever been, Varya asked him the question that had been on her mind for a long time: 'Charles, do you have a family?'

'What really interests you, I suppose, is whether I have a wife?' the journalist said with a smile.

Varya was embarrassed: 'Well, not only that. Parents, brothers, sisters . . .'

But actually, why be hypocritical! she reproached herself. It was a perfectly normal question. She continued resolutely: 'I would like to know if you have a wife as well, of course. Sobolev, for instance, does not hide the fact that he is married.'

'Alas, Mademoiselle Barbara, no wife; no fiancee. I have never had one or the other. I lead the wrong kind of life. There have been a few affairs, of course -1 tell you that quite openly, because you are a modern woman free of foolish affectation.' (Varya smiled, flattered.) 'As for a family . . . only a father, whom I love dearly and miss greatly. He is in France at present. Some day I will tell you about him. After the war, perhaps? C'est toute une histoire.'

So it had turned out that he was not indifferent, but did not wish to set himself up as a rival to Sobolev. Out of pride, no doubt.

This circumstance, however, had not prevented the Frenchman from remaining on friendly terms with Michel. Most of the time when Paladin disappeared he was with the White General's unit, since Michel was always in the very vanguard of the advancing army, where there were good pickings for the correspondents.

At midday on the 8th of January Sobolev sent a captured carriage and a Cossack escort for Varya - he had invited her to visit the newly conquered city of Adrianople. There was an armful of hothouse roses lying on the soft leather seat. Mitya Gridnev became very upset, because he tore his brand-new gloves as he was gathering the flowers into a bouquet. Varya tried to console him as they rode along and mischievously promised to give him her own gloves (the ensign had small hands, almost like a girl's). Mitya frowned, knitting his white eyebrows, sniffed in offence and sulked for about half an hour, fluttering his long, fine eyelashes. Those eyelashes were perhaps the only point of his appearance in which nature had been kind to him, thought Varya. Just like Erast Petrovich's, only lighter. Her thoughts moved on in a perfectly natural manner to Fandorin and she wondered where his wanderings had taken him. If only he would come back soon! When he was there things were . . . Calmer? More interesting? She couldn't quite put her finger on the right word, but she definitely felt better when he was there.

It was already getting dark when they arrived. The town was quiet, with not a soul out on the streets, only the echoing clip-clop of horses' hooves as mounted patrols rode by, and the rumbling of artillery being moved up along the highway.

The temporary headquarters was located in the railway-station building. Varya heard the bravura strains of music from a distance: a brass band playing the anthem 'Rejoice'. All the windows in the new, European-style station building were lit up, and in the square in front of it there were bonfires burning and field-kitchens with their chimneys smoking efficiently. What surprised Varya most of all was the perfectly ordinary passenger train standing at the platform: neat little carriages and a gently panting locomotive - as if there were no war going on at all.

In the waiting room they were celebrating, of course.

A number of tables of various sizes had been hastily pushed together and the officers were sitting round them, banqueting on simple fare augmented by a substantial number of bottles. Just as Varya and Gridnev entered, they all roared out 'Hurrah', raised their tankards and turned towards the table at which their commander was sitting. The general's famous white tunic contrasted sharply with the black army and grey Cossack uniforms. Sitting with Sobolev at the table of honour were the senior officers (the only one Varya recognised was Perepyolkin) and Paladin. They all had red, jolly faces - they must have been celebrating for some time already.

'Varvara Andreevna,' Achilles shouted, jumping to his feet. 'I am so glad that you decided to come! "Hurrah", gentlemen, in honour of our only lady!'

Everybody stood up and roared so deafeningly that Varya was frightened. She had never been greeted in such an energetic manner before. Perhaps she ought not to have accepted the invitation after all? She recalled the good advice given by Baroness Vreiskaya, the head of the field infirmary (with whose employees Varya was quartered), to her female wards: 'Mesdames, keep well away from men when they are excited by battle or, even worse, by victory. It rouses an atavistic savagery in them, and any man, even an alumnus of the Corps of Pages, is temporarily transformed into a barbarian. Leave them in their male company to cool off, and afterwards they will return to civilised manners and become manageable once again.'

In fact, apart from the exaggerated gallantry and excessively loud voices, Varya noticed nothing particularly wild about her neighbours at table. They seated her in the place of honour, on Sobolev's right. Paladin was on his left.

After she had drunk some champagne and calmed down a little, she asked: 'Tell me, Michel, what is that train doing here? I can't remember the last time I saw a locomotive standing on the tracks and not lying at the bottom of an embankment.'

'So you haven't heard!' exclaimed a young colonel sitting at the side of the table. 'The war's over! The truce envoys arrived from Constantinople today! By railway, just like in peacetime!'

'And just how many of these envoys are there?' Varya asked in surprise. 'A whole trainload?'

'No, Varya,' Sobolev explained. 'There are only two envoys; but after the fall of Adrianople the Turks were afraid to waste any more time, so they simply hitched their staff carriage on to an ordinary train. Only without any passengers, of course.'

'Then where are the envoys now?'

'I sent them off to the grand duke in carriages. There's a break in the track further up.'

'Oh, it's ages since I had a ride in a train,' she sighed dreamily. 'Lie back on your soft seat, open a book, drink some hot tea . . . The telegraph posts flicking past the window, the wheels hammering . . .'

'I would take you for a ride,' said Sobolev, 'but unfortunately the route is rather limited. The only place you can go to from here is Constantinople.'

'Gentlemen, gentlemen!' exclaimed Paladin in his French accent. 'An excellent idea! La guerre est en fait finie, the Turks are not shooting any more! And anyway, the train is flying the Turkish flag! Why don't we take a ride to San Stefano and back? Aller et retour, eh Michel?' He changed completely into French as his enthusiasm mounted ever higher. 'Madamoiselle Barbara will ride in a first-class carriage, I shall write a splendid article about it, and someone from headquarters staff will ride along with us and take a look at the Turks' rear lines. My God, Michel, it will all go off without a hitch! They'll never suspect a thing! And even if they do, they won't dare fire a single shot -you've got their envoys! And then, Michel, from San Stefano it's only a stone's throw to the bright lights of Constantinople! The Turkish viziers have their country villas at San Stefano! Ah, what an opportunity!'

'Irresponsible adventurism,' snapped Lieutenant-Colonel Perepyolkin. 'I trust, Mikhail Dmitrievich, that you will have the good sense not to be tempted.'

Eremei Perepyolkin was so annoying, such a dry stick. In fact, during the last few months Varya had developed quite an active dislike for the man, even though she accepted on trust the superlative administrative abilities of Sobolev's head of staff. If only he wouldn't be so zealous about everything! It was less than six months since he had leapfrogged from captain to lieutenant-colonel, and picked up a George Medal, not to mention a Sword of St Anne for being wounded in action - all thanks to Michel. And still he glared at Varya as if he thought she'd stolen something that was his by right. But she could understand him: he was simply jealous,- he wanted Achilles to belong to him and nobody else. Perhaps Eremei Ionovich was tainted with Kazanzaki's old sin? One day she had even tried hinting at it when she was talking to Sobolev, but the idea had made him laugh so hard that he almost choked.

This time, however, the repugnant Perepyolkin was absolutely right. Varya thought Charles's 'excellent idea' was absolute lunacy. But the carousing officers were all fully in favour of the project: one Cossack colonel even slapped the Frenchman on the back and called him a 'crazy fool'. Sobolev smiled, but he didn't say anything.

'Let me go, Mikhail Dmitrievich,' a dashing cavalry general suggested (Varya seemed to remember that his name was Strukov). 'I'll fill up the carriages with my Cossack lads and we'll ride down the line like the wind. Who knows, we might even capture ourselves another pasha or two. We still have the right, don't we? We haven't received any orders to cease military operations yet.'

Sobolev glanced at Varya and she noticed an unusual glint in his eyes.

'Oh no, Strukov. Adrianople was enough for you.' Achilles smiled rapaciously and raised his voice. 'Gentlemen, listen to my orders!' The room fell silent immediately. 'I am transferring my field headquarters to San Stefano. The third battalion of chasseurs is to board the train. I want every last one of them in those carriages, even if they have to squeeze in like sardines. I will travel in the staff carriage. The train will then immediately return to Adrianople for reinforcements and go backwards and forwards continuously. By midday tomorrow I shall have an entire regiment. You, Strukov, are to arrive with your cavalry no later than tomorrow evening. In the meantime one battalion will be all I need. According to reconnaissance reports, there are no battleworthy Turkish forces ahead of us - only the sultan's guards in Constantinople itself, and they are busy guarding Abdul-Hamid.'