[Marianne 3] - Marianne and the Privateer

by Juliette Benzoni

  She went with the crowd, automatically, back into the ballroom where the violins were once again in full swing. She had some idea in her head of going straight out to find her carriage, of going home to the quiet of her own house and her own room. She found herself hating this embassy and all the people in it. Even Napoleon, seated on the red and gold throne which had been prepared for him and for Marie-Louise at the far end of the room, no longer had any power over her. She wanted only to go home. But then she saw, coming straight towards her, a group of ladies which included Dorothée and Countess Kielmansegg and a sound of annoyance broke from her at the sight. Now she would have to stand and chatter inanely when all she wanted was peace and quiet to listen to the odd, unhappy murmurings of her heart and try to understand… No, she could not, it was too much…

  Almost in the same instant, she caught sight of Chernychev, standing close by in his dark green uniform and watching her. Scarcely thinking what she did, she turned to him:

  'You asked for a dance, Count. This one is yours if you will have it'

  'Oh cruel! Does one ask the humble votary if he would approach the divinity?'

  Cold, green eyes stared into the Russian's. 'I did not invite you to make love to me, merely to dance this waltz,' she said concisely.

  This time, his only answer was a bow and a smile which showed a glint of white teeth. As they stepped on to the floor, Marianne let fall her broken fan and, catching up her long train, abandoned her waist to her partner's encircling arm. He swooped on it like a bird of prey and bore her off into the midst of the dancers with such enthusiasm that she could not help a small, sad smile.

  She did not love this man but he desired her, unashamedly, and in her present confused state Marianne was ready to find comfort in any kind of positive feeling, even that. He was a perfect dancer with an amazing sense of time and to Marianne, whirling in his arms, it seemed as if she were floating on air. The waltz seemed to free her from the weight of her body. If only her mind could be freed of its burdens as easily!

  As she danced, she saw the Emperor seated on his throne, the Empress at his side, speaking quietly, but her eyes did not linger, and already Chernychev had swept her on, his gloved hand firmly clasping her waist. Next she saw Jason, dancing with his wife. Their eyes met briefly but Marianne looked away hurriedly and moved by some feminine impulse of coquetry, by the need which lurks deep in every woman to deal blow for blow and give back hurt for hurt, she favoured the Russian with her most dazzling smile.

  'You are very quiet, my dear Count,' she said, loudly enough to be overheard by the American couple. 'Has joy robbed you of your tongue?'

  'You forbade me to make love to you, Princess, and since I cannot think of anything else…'

  'Do you know so little of women that you always take them so literally? Surely you know we sometimes like to be disobeyed, if it is done gracefully enough?'

  The Russian's green eyes darkened very nearly to black. His arm tightened in a way that left no doubt of his delight at this unexpected softening. Marianne's sudden cordiality appeared to stir him to such transports of joy that any moment she expected him to burst into some savage yell of triumph. He restrained himself, however, and merely leaned a little closer, until his cheek was pressed against her forehead and his hot breath was on her neck. Held tight against him, conscious of the hardness of his muscles, Marianne had the momentary fancy that she was dancing with some well-regulated machine.

  'Take care how you drive me to disobey you,' he murmured passionately into her ear. 'I might want more than you are ready to grant, and when I want something, I do not give up until I have it.'

  'But – surely you have got what you wanted? We are dancing together, and I think I even smiled at you.'

  'That's just it! With such a woman, how can a man help wanting more and more?'

  'Oh, indeed?' Her smile challenged him.

  But she was not fated to learn how far Chernychev's desires might have carried him that night, for suddenly, without warning, he uttered an inarticulate cry, startling the couples closest to them out of their abandonment to the music. Marianne found herself released, so abruptly that she kept her feet only by a miracle. Before she could find her voice to protest, or ask him what he meant by it, she saw the Russian officer thrust his way unceremoniously between the pairs of dancers on the floor and spring for the ballroom wall, both arms outstretched to snatch at one of the flimsy garlands of artificial roses which had caught fire from a sagging candle in one the gilded holders and was blazing merrily. Heedless of burned bands, Chernychev tore down the garland but already it was too late. The flames had seized on the silvery gauzes draping the canvas walls and were spreading rapidly. Within seconds, the whole wall was ablaze.

  With one great gasp of horror, the dancers pressed back to the other side of the room, towards the throne. Carried along with the rest, Marianne found herself standing close to Napoleon as Prince Eugene, who had been chatting to the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Champagny, at a little distance, forced his way urgently to the Emperor's side. She saw the young viceroy say something quietly to the Emperor who turned at once and took Marie-Louise by the arm.

  'Come,' he said. The room is on fire. We must go.'

  But the young Empress remained seated, her eyes riveted on the blazing wall, apparently fascinated by the flames.

  'Come, Louise!' the Emperor commanded. Almost dragging her from her chair, he hurried her swiftly in the direction of the passage to the house. Marianne tried to follow them but a movement of panic in the crowd lifted her like a straw and bore her helplessly towards the opening leading into the grounds. Nothing, now, could have halted the terror-stricken throng. In another instant, the oiled canvas roof was alight. The fire ran along the other walls with terrifying speed. One by one, the gilded chandeliers with their loads of lighted candles fell from the ceiling on to the milling crowd below, felling some and setting fire to the clothes of others. A girl's dress of blue tulle became a sheet of flame. Screaming in agony, she hurled herself like a living torch blindly into the crowd which, far from offering her any assistance, only tried frantically to avoid her. One officer did rip off his jacket and throw it round her in an effort to smother the flames but both were soon swallowed up in the hysterical stampede.

  Very soon, the exits, the tall windows in the canvas walls and the passageway by which the Emperor had left, were blocked by the fire. The gallery itself was blazing, carrying the fire straight into the embassy drawing-rooms. Now the only passable way out was by the lofty doorway opening into the gardens and towards this the crowd surged with all the violence of water bursting through a dam. A thick, suffocating black smoke was filling the blazing ballroom, stinging the eyes and lungs.

  To escape it, men and women fought their way towards the single exit with a savage fury, thrusting with fists and elbows, trampling one another down, battling for life with no thought for anything beyond the naked, primitive instinct of self-preservation.

  The women were the first to fall, trodden down by the more powerful males, by the very man perhaps who, only a moment before, had been bowing with exquisite grace over the very fingers he now crushed beneath his heel, or murmuring sweet nothings into ears he would have torn off ruthlessly if it would help him to escape more quickly and win through into the blessed, breathable fresh air outside.

  Carried away in the midst of this desperate scramble for life, bruised, half-stifled with smoke and by the pressure of so many human bodies, the train ripped from her dress, Marianne had a horrified vision of glaring eyes and screaming mouths, of faces contorted with terror. The heat was unbearable and the drifts of smoke that filled the room with a thick, grey fog made her feel as if her lungs would burst. Among the press of heads around her, she caught sight of Savary's, bobbing like some absurd ship on an angry sea. The Minister of Police was looking very nearly as green as his braided uniform but, shrieking incomprehensibly, he was making a vain attempt to bring some order into the panic-stricken crowd.
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  The opening leading into the garden was not far away now but the hangings with which it was draped were already beginning to burn and the pressure of the crowd was growing ever more frantic as each person fought to get across the threshold before the way was barred by the flames. Such was the press of bodies with everyone trying to escape at once that the crowd became jammed tight in the doorway, like the cork of a bottle. It was impossible to move, either forward or backwards. People struggled wildly. Marianne was hit in the chest by a senator's flailing elbow and felt hands grasping her hair. Fortunately for her, there was, not far behind her in the crowd, a giant of a man, a great, bearded, bear-like creature whose massive shoulders were clad in the brilliant uniform of the Russian guard. This man was fighting like a fury, pushing at the crowd in front of him with his great hands. Sparks from a falling chandelier set light to his hair and, uttering an inhuman cry, he gave such a violent thrust that the human stopper burst out into the open amid billows of smoke. Marianne found herself, horribly bruised about the chest but safe, outside the ballroom, on the steps leading to the gardens. But she had hardly drawn a breath of slightly cooler air into her lungs before an anguished cry broke from her. A woman beside her groaned piteously, then another gave a shriek that ended on a choking sob. The lamps which had twinkled so gaily on the outside of the ballroom were tipping over, spilling hot oil on to the bare shoulders and uncovered breasts below, causing fearful injuries. Marianne stumbled forward towards an ornamental pool whose waters glowed redly. Servants were hurrying towards it with buckets and basins: none too soon, for by now the ballroom doorway was ablaze.

  From the steps, Marianne saw a piece of burning timber crash down on old Prince Kurakin. The massive, gouty Russian ambassador collapsed with a grunt like a wounded bear, but a man in the tattered uniform of a French general sprang forward instantly to rescue him.

  Leaning her bare back gratefully against the cold stone of one of the statues, Marianne stared, wide-eyed with horror, at the spectacle of desolation and death which, all round her in the gardens, had replaced the magical beauty of so short a time before. She was still gasping for breath and her chest hurt her, and her shoulder where the skin was blistered and cracked from her burns. Even here, the air was almost too thick to breathe. The ballroom was now a blazing inferno, shooting roaring flames up into the dark sky, as if in search of something more to feed on. Vague shapes could still be seen emerging from the furnace within, their garments blazing, and rolling themselves screaming on the ground in their efforts to put out the stinging flames.

  The injured and dying were everywhere. People were rushing hither and thither in panic, not knowing what they were doing. Marianne saw Prince Metternich run towards the flames, a bucket of water in his hands. She saw another man, also running, carrying a woman in a silver dress and she recognized Jason, oblivious of everything but the need to bear his wife, Pilar, safely out of danger.

  I no longer exist for him, Marianne thought bewilderedly. He is thinking only of her. He has not tried to find out if I am even alive…

  She felt suddenly very weak, and very much alone. Among all these people, there was not one who was her friend, not one whose thoughts were only for her. She felt so desolate that she put her arms round the statue, a little figure of Ceres in white marble, and started to cry bitterly, clinging to the stone which was already growing warm from the fire.

  'Antonia! Antonia!'

  The piercing shriek close beside her roused Marianne from her agony of self-pity. Looking up, she saw a woman clearly far advanced in pregnancy running desperately towards the blaze. Her tangled hair fell about her shoulders, over the shreds of a white muslin gown, and her arms were stretched out before her. To her horror, Marianne recognized the ambassador's sister-in-law, Princess Schwarzenburg, and darted swiftly in pursuit:

  'Madame! Madame!… Where are you going? For pity's sake—'

  The eyes the young woman turned on her were so dilated with horror and anguish that it was doubtful if they even saw her.

  'My daughter!' she said. 'Antonia! She is in there!'

  With a sudden movement, she wrenched herself free from Marianne's grasp, leaving her holding nothing but a few strips of tattered muslin, and resumed her blind race. Still shrieking and calling, she had reached the fire when, with a mighty crash, the floor of the ballroom collapsed into the empty pool above which it was built and Marianne saw the wretched woman vanish into the fiery pit below.

  Sick with horror, her stomach heaving, Marianne could only double up and vomit. Her head was hammering and she was sweating heavily. When she lifted her eyes it was to see with disgust that the musicians, who had escaped with the rest into the gardens, were busy among the injured, robbing them of their jewels. And they, unhappily, were not the only ones. The people who had swarmed up on to the walls of the embassy garden to watch the fireworks with shouts of delight, had come in for their share of the spoils. Groups of ill-favoured rascals were slipping over the walls into the gardens, eyes gleaming like a pack of hungry wolves, and were going silently about their grisly work.

  The efforts of the embassy staff to keep the evil tide at bay were worse than useless. A few men attempted to defend the women victims, but they were too few to offer any effective resistance.

  But, Marianne thought, with mounting horror, the firemen should be here, soldiers… Where is the Emperor's escort?

  But the Emperor had gone and his escort with him. How long would it be before a regiment of troops could be brought in to restore order and drive off the looters? A hand fell on her suddenly, snatching the tiara from her head, and a handful of hair with it, then tugging at the emerald necklace, trying to break the clasp. Marianne screamed in terror:

  'Help! Thieves!'

  A second hand, rough and evil-smelling, stopped her mouth. Instinctively, she struggled with her attacker, seeing a long, pallid face and cruel eyes, a man dressed in dirty overalls, reeking of sweat. Biting and scratching, she managed to wriggle from his grasp and started to run, her hands gripping her necklace, but he was before her, hurling himself forward to jerk her back. She felt a steel blade pricking her throat.

  'Give me those!' said a hoarse voice, 'or I'll cut yer throat!'

  He pressed lightly, so that the blade nicked the soft flesh. Petrified with fear, Marianne put up trembling hands to unfasten the necklace and saw the man slip it into his sleeve. Then she took the sparkling drops from her ears. The knife was removed and Marianne thought that now he would let her go, but he did not. Instead, he bent over her, chuckling evilly. She felt his breath on her face, foul with the reek of cheap wine, and gave a choking scream; but moist, cold lips were clamped hard on hers, stifling the cry with a kiss that made her retch. At the same time, the man holding her was thrusting her roughly in the direction of a bed of huge peonies guarding the entrance to a shrubbery.

  'This way, my beauty! It's not every day I gets me 'ands on a swell mort like you!'

  Marianne was no sooner released from the stinking embrace than she began to scream and struggle again, thin, piercing screams uttered on a high note of hysteria. Failing to muffle them, the man drew back his arm and struck her with such force that she fell to the ground. But even as he bent to drag her in among the bushes, a man's figure sprang from the shadows and grappled with him, flinging him down a yard or two from Marianne. The ruddy glow of the fire enabled her to recognize Chernychev. He was bleeding from a cut across his temple and his uniform was badly charred, but he seemed otherwise unhurt.

  'Run!' he snarled. 'By St Vladimir, I mean to gut this moujik like a herring!'

  He did not look at Marianne. In the unnatural, flickering half-light, she could see his green eyes shining with savage joy at the prospect of a fight. He stood with his hands held low and open, ready to grip, his body tense and perfectly controlled, unarmed and wholly forgetful of his recently-healed wound, confronting the villain with the butcher's knife.

  'He stole my jewels,' Marianne whispered, holding her hand t
o her bruised throat and feeling the raw wound on her neck where the necklace had bitten into it as the man pulled.

  'That is all? He did not rape you?'

  'He had no time, he—'

  'Get yourself to safety. I will recover your jewels. As for this gallows-bird, he may thank Our Lady of Kazan he was not born in Russia! There he would have died under the knout for daring to so much as touch you.'

  The man gave a crack of laughter and spat out some vile oath, settling the knife more comfortably in his grimy paw.

  'But he is armed!' Marianne wailed. 'He will kill you.'

  Now it was the Cossack's turn to laugh, his slanting eyes narrowed to gleaming slits as he surveyed his adversary:

  'He? His knife will not save him. I have slain bears and tamed wild horses with these bare hands. I shall have throttled him in two minutes, knife or no!'

  Then, with a powerful thrust of steely muscles, Chernychev sprang. Caught off-balance, the other man fell heavily, with a choking gasp, striving to tear away the hands that clutched ferociously at his throat, half-throttling him before he could use his weapon. The knife had fallen from his hand and Marianne bent quickly to seize it, but the man was strong for all his gaunt frame and already he had wrenched his neck free and was making a recovery. Both men rolled over and over on the ground, as closely intertwined as a pair of fighting snakes engaged in a savage struggle on the damp grass of a smoothly-shaven lawn.

  The Russian was a skilful wrestler and Marianne was not greatly alarmed for him. She was confident that he would emerge victorious. Then, suddenly, she realized to her horror that two more men in working clothes and three-decker caps were creeping up silently on the struggling pair. She guessed that they were associates of the first bully coming to the rescue and knew that it would be no longer a fair fight. It came to her in a flash that Chernychev would need help and she looked round wildly, in time to see a company of soldiers entering the grounds by way of the walls, carrying stretchers and other rescue apparatus. Gathering up the rags of her dress, she ran towards them and seeing a group of men in green uniforms bending over the injured seized one of them by the arm.