“Come in – no, hang it all – khadee-tyeh!”
I grinned at the friendly familiar sound, and strode in, saying: “Hollo, yourself, whoever you are,” and putting out my hand. A man of about my own age, who had been reading on the bed, looked up in surprise, swung his legs to the ground, stood up, and then sank back on the bed again, gaping as though I were a ghost. He shook his head, stuttering, and then got out:
“Flashman! Good heavens!”
I stopped short. The face was familiar, somehow, but I didn’t know from where. And then the years rolled away, and I saw a boy’s face under a tile hat, and heard a boy’s voice saying: “I’m sorry, Flashman.” Yes, it was him all right – Scud East of Rugby.
For a long moment we just stared at each other, and then we both found our voices in the same phrase: “What on earth are you doing here?” And then we stopped, uncertainly, until I said:
“I was captured at Balaclava, three weeks back.”
“They took me at Silistria, three months ago. I’ve been here five weeks and two days.”
And then we stared at each other some more, and finally I said:
“Well, you certainly know how to make a fellow at home. Ain’t you going to offer me a chair, even?”
He jumped up at that, colouring and apologizing – still the same raw Scud, I could see. He was taller and thinner than I remembered; his brown hair was receding, too, but he still had that quick, awkward nervousness I remembered.
“I’m so taken aback,” he stuttered, pulling up a chair for me. “Why – why, I am glad to see you, Flashman! Here, give me your hand, old fellow! There! Well – well – my, what a mountainous size you’ve grown, to be sure! You always were a big … er, a tall chap, of course, but … I say, isn’t this a queer fix, us meeting again like this … after so long! Let’s see, it must be fourteen, no fifteen, years since … since … ah …”
“Since Arnold kicked me out for being pissy drunk?”
He coloured again. “I was going to say, since we said goodbye.”
“Aye. Well, ne’er mind. What’s your rank, Scud? Major, eh? I’m a colonel.”
“Yes,” says he. “I see that.” He gave me an odd, almost shy grin. “You’ve done well – everyone knows about you – all the fellows from Rugby talk about you, when one meets ’em, you know …”
“Do they, though? Not with any great love, I’ll be bound, eh, young Scud?”
“Oh, come!” cries he. “What d’you mean? Oh, stuff! We were all boys then, and boys never get on too well, ’specially when some are bigger and older and … why, that’s all done with years ago! Why – everyone’s proud of you, Flashman! Brooke and Green – and young Brooke – he’s in the Navy, you know.” He paused. “The Doctor would have been proudest of all, I’m sure.”
Aye, he probably would, thinks I, the damned old hypocrite.
“… everyone knows about Afghanistan, and India, and all that,” he ran on. “I was out there myself, you know, in the Sikh campaign, when you were winning another set of laurels. All I got was a shot wound, a hole in my ribs, and a broken arm.”23 He laughed ruefully. “Not much to show, I’m afraid – and then I bought out of the 101st, and – but heavens, how I’m rattling on! Oh, it is good to see you, old fellow! This is the best, most famous thing! Let me have a good look at you! By George, those are some whiskers, though!”
I couldn’t be sure if he meant it, or not. God knows, Scud East had no cause to love me, and the sight of him had so taken me back to that last black day at Rugby that I’d momentarily forgotten we were men now, and things had changed – perhaps even his memories of me. For he did seem pleased to see me, now that he’d got over his surprise – of course, that could just be acting on his part, or making the best of a bad job, or just Christian decency. I found myself weighing him up; I’d knocked him about a good deal, in happier days, and it came as a satisfaction to realize that I could probably still do it now, if it came to the pinch; he was still smaller and thinner than I. At that, I’d never detested him as much as his manly-mealy little pal, Brown; he’d had more game in him than the others, had East, and now – well, if he was disposed to be civil, and let bygones be bygones … We were bound to be stuck together for some months at least.
All this in a second’s consideration – and you may think, what a mean and calculating nature, or what a guilty conscience. Never you mind; I know my own nature hasn’t changed in eighty years, so why should anyone else’s? And I never forget an injury – I’ve done too many of ’em.
So I didn’t quite enter into his joyous spirit of reunion, but was civil enough, and after he had got over his sham-ecstasies at meeting his dear old school-fellow again, I said:
“What about this place, then – and this fellow Pencherjevsky?”
He hesitated a moment, glanced towards the wall, got up, and as he walked over to it, said loudly: “Oh, it is as you see it – a splendid place. They’ve treated me well – very well indeed.” And then he beckoned me to go over beside him, at the same time laying a finger on his lips. I went, wondering, and followed his pointing finger to a curious protuberance in the ornate carving of the panelling beside the stove. It looked as though a small funnel had been sunk into the carving, and covered with a fine metal grille, painted to match the surrounding wood.
“I say, old fellow,” says East, “what d’you say to a walk? The Count has splendid gardens, and we are free of them, you know.”
I took the hint, and we descended the stairs to the hall, and out on to the lawns. The lounging Cossack looked at us, but made no move to follow. As soon as we were at a safe distance, I asked:
“What on earth was it?”
“Speaking-tube, carefully concealed,” says he. “I looked out for it as soon as I arrived – there’s one in the next room, too, where you’ll be. I fancy our Russian hosts like to be certain we’re not up to mischief.”
“Well, I’m damned! The deceitful brutes! Is that any way to treat gentlemen? And how the deuce did you know to look for it?”
“Oh, just caution,” says he, offhand, but then he thought for a moment, and went on: “I know a little about such things, you see. When I was taken at Silistria, although I was officially with the Bashi-Bazouk people, I was more on the political side, really. I think the Russians know it, too. When they brought me up this way I was most carefully examined at first by some very shrewd gentlemen from their staff – I speak some Russian, you see. Oh, yes, my mother’s family married in this direction, a few generations ago, and we had a sort of great-aunt who taught me enough to whet my interest. Anyway, on top of their suspicions of me, that accomplishment is enough to make ’em pay very close heed to H. East, Esq.”
“It’s an accomplishment you can pass on to me as fast as you like,” says I. “But d’you mean they think you’re a spy?”
“Oh, no, just worth watching – and listening to. They’re the most suspicious folk in the world, you know; trust no one, not even each other. And for all they’re supposed to be thick-headed barbarians, they have some clever jokers among ’em.”
Something made me ask: “D’you know a chap called Ignatieff – Count Ignatieff?”
“Do I not!” says he. “He was one of the fellows who ran the rule over me when I came up here. That’s Captain Swing with blue blood, that one – why, d’you know him?”
I told him what had happened earlier in the day, and he whistled. “He was there to have a look and a word with you, you may depend on it. We must watch what we say, Flashman – not that our consciences aren’t clear, but we may have some information that would be useful to them.” He glanced about. “And we won’t feed their suspicions by talking too much where they can’t hear us. Another five minutes, and we’d better get back to the room. If we want to be private there, at any time, we’ll hang a coat over their confounded tube – you may believe me, that works. But before we go in, I’ll tell you, as quickly as I may, those things that are better said in the open air.”
It
struck me, he was a cool, assured hand, this East – of course, he had been all that as a boy, too.
“Count Pencherjevsky – an ogre, loud-mouthed, brutal, and a tyrant. He’s a Cossack, who rose to command a hussar regiment in the army, won the Tsar’s special favour, and retired here, away from his own tribal land. He rules his estate like a despot, treats his serfs abominably, and will surely have his throat cut one day. I can’t abide him, and keep out of his way, although I sometimes dine with the family, for appearance’s sake. But he’s been decent enough, I’ll admit; gives me the run of the place, a horse to ride, that sort of thing.”
“Ain’t they worried you might ride for it?” says I.
“Where to? We’re two hundred miles north of the Crimea here, with nothing but naked country in between. Besides, the Count has a dozen or so of his old Cossacks in his service – they’re all the guard anyone needs. Kubans, who could ride down anything on four legs. I saw them bring back four serfs who ran away, soon after I got here – they’d succeeded in travelling twenty miles before the Cossacks caught them. Those devils brought them back tied by the ankles and dragged behind their ponies – the whole way!” He shuddered. “They were flayed to death in the first few miles!”
I felt my stomach give one of its little heaves. “But, anyway, those were serfs,” says I. “They wouldn’t do that sort of thing to –”
“Wouldn’t they, though?” says he. “Well, perhaps not. But this ain’t England, you know, or France, or even India. This is Russia – and these land-owners are no more accountable than … than a baron in the Middle Ages. Oh, I dare say he’d think twice about mishandling us – still, I’d think twice about getting on his wrong side. But, I say, I think we’d best go back, and treat ’em to some harmless conversation – if anyone’s bothering to listen.”
As we strolled back, I asked him a question which had been exercising me somewhat. “Who’s the fair beauty I saw when I arrived?”
He went red as a poppy, and I thought, o-ho, what have we here, eh? Young Scud with lecherous notions – or pure Christian passion, I wonder which?
“That would be Valentina,” says he, “the Count’s daughter. She and her Aunt Sara – and an old deaf woman who is a cousin of sorts – are his only family. He is a widower.” He cleared his throat nervously. “One sees very little of them, though – as I said, I seldom dine with the family. Valentina … ah … is married.”
I found this vastly amusing – it was my guess that young Scud had gone wild about the little bundle – small blame to him – and like the holy little humbug he was, preferred to avoid her rather than court temptation. One of Arnold’s shining young knights, he was. Well, lusty old Sir Lancelot Flashy had galloped into the lists now – too bad she had a husband, of course, but at least she’d be saddle-broken. At that, I’d have to see what her father was like, and how the land lay generally. One has to be careful about these things.
I met the family at dinner that afternoon, and a most fascinating occasion it turned out to be. Pencherjevsky was worth travelling a long way to see in himself – the first sight of him, standing at his table head, justified East’s description of ogre, and made me think of Jack and the Beanstalk, and smelling the blood of Englishmen, which was an unhappy notion, when you considered it.
He must have been well over six and a half feet tall, and even so, he was broad enough to appear squat. His head and face were just a mass of brown hair, trained to his shoulders and in a splendid beard that rippled down his chest. His eyes were fine, under huge shaggy brows, and the voice that came out of his beard was one of your thunderous Russian basses. He spoke French well, by the way, and you would never have guessed from the glossy colour of his hair, and the ease with which he moved his huge bulk, that he was over sixty. An enormous man, in every sense, not least in his welcome.
“The Colonel Flashman,” he boomed. “Be happy in this house. As an enemy, I say, forget the quarrel for a season; as a soldier, I say, welcome, brother.” He shook my hand in what was probably only the top joints of his enormous fingers, and crushed it till it cracked. “Aye – you look like a soldier, sir. I am told you fought in the disgraceful affair at Balaclava, where our cavalry were chased like the rabble they are. I salute you, and every good sabre who rode with you. Chased like rabbits, those tutsb and moujiks on horseback. Aye, you would not have chased my Kubans so – or Vigenstein’s Hussars24 when I had command of them – no, by the Great God!” He glowered down at me, rumbling, as though he would break into “Fee-fi-fo-fum” at any moment, and then released my hand and waved towards the two women seated at the table.
“My daughter Valla, my sister-in-law, Madam Sara.” I bowed, and they inclined their heads and looked at me with that bold, appraising stare which Russian women use – they’re not bashful or missish, those ladies. Valentina, or Valla, as her father called her, smiled and tossed her silver-blonde head – she was a plumply pert little piece, sure enough, but I spared a glance for Aunt Sara as well. She’d be a few years older than I, about thirty-five, perhaps, with dark, close-bound hair and one of those strong, masterful, chiselled faces – handsome, but not beautiful. She’d have a moustache in a few years, but she was well-built and tall, carrying her bounties before her.
For all that Pencherjevsky looked like Goliath, he had good taste – or whoever ordered his table and domestic arrangements had. The big dining-room, like all the apartments in the house, had a beautiful wood-tiled floor, there was a chandelier, and any amount of brocade and flowered silk about the furnishings. (Pencherjevsky himself, by the way, was dressed in silk: most Russian gentlemen wear formal clothes as we do, more or less, but he affected a magnificent shimmering green tunic, clasped at the waist by a silver-buckled belt, and silk trousers of the same colour tucked into soft leather boots – a most striking costume, and comfortable too, I should imagine.)
The food was good, to my relief – a fine soup being followed by fried fish, a ragout of beef, and side-dishes of poultry and game of every variety, with little sweet cakes and excellent coffee. The wine was indifferent, but drinkable. Between the vittles, the four fine bosoms displayed across the table, and Pencherjevsky’s conversation, it was a most enjoyable meal.
He questioned me about Balaclava, most minutely, and when I had satisfied his curiosity, astonished me by rapidly sketching how the Russian cavalry should have been handled, with the aid of cutlery, which he clashed about on the table to demonstrate. He knew his business, no doubt of it, but he was full of admiration for our behaviour, and Scarlett’s particularly.
“Great God, there is an English Cossack!” says he. “Uphill, eh? I like him! I like him! Let him be captured, dear Lord, and sent to Starotorsk, so that I can keep him forever, and talk, and fight old battles, and shout at each other like good companions!”
“And get drunk nightly, and be carried to bed!” says Miss Valla, pertly – they enter into talk with the men, you know, these Russian ladies, with a freedom that would horrify our own polite society. And they drink, too – I noticed that both of them went glass for glass with us, without becoming more than a trifle merry.
“That, too, golubashka,” says Pencherjevsky. “Can he drink, then, this Scarlett? Of course, of course he must! All good horse-soldiers can, eh, colonel? Not like your Sasha, though,” says he to Valla, with a great wink at me. “Can you imagine, colonel, I have a son-in-law who cannot drink? He fell down at his wedding, on this very floor – yes, over there, by God! – after what? A glass or two of vodka! Saint Nicholas! Aye, me – how I must have offended the Father God, to have a son-in-law who cannot drink, and does not get me grandchildren.”
At this Valla gave a most unladylike snort, and tossed her head, and Aunt Sara, who said very little as a rule, I discovered, set down her glass and observed tartly that Sasha could hardly get children while he was away fighting in the Crimea.
“Fighting?” cries Pencherjevsky, boisterously. “Fighting – in the horse artillery? Whoever saw one of them coming home on
a stretcher? I would have had him in the Bug Lancers, or even the Moscow Dragoons, but – body of St Sofia! – he doesn’t ride well! A fine son-in-law for a Zaporozhiyan hetman,c that!”
“Well, dear father!” snaps Valla. “If he had ridden well, and been in the lancers or the dragoons, it is odds the English cavalry would have cut him into little pieces – since you were not there to direct operations!”
“Small loss that would have been,” grumbles he, and then leaned over, laughing, and rumpled her blonde hair. “There, little one, he is your man – such as he is. God send him safe home.”
I tell you all this to give you some notion of a Russian country gentleman at home, with his family – although I’ll own that a Cossack may not be typical. No doubt he wasn’t to East’s delicate stomach – and I gather he didn’t care for East too much, either – but I found myself liking Pencherjevsky. He was gross, loud, boisterous – boorish, if you like, but he was worth ten of your proper gentlemen, to me at any rate. I got roaring drunk with him, that evening, after the ladies had retired – they were fairly tipsy, themselves, and arguing at the tops of their voices about dresses as they withdrew to their drawing-room – and he sang Russian hunting songs in that glorious organ voice, and laughed himself sick trying to learn the words of “The British Grenadiers”. I flatter myself he took to me enormously – folk often do, of course, particularly the coarser spirits – for he swore I was a credit to my regiment and my country, and God should send the Tsar a few like me.
The Flashman Papers: The Complete 12-Book Collection Page 236