‘Lady Bessborough? How does she come into it.’
‘She’s been his very good friend for years. But I hope he comes; I’m sure he could do more in a week to persuade the Tsar to ally himself with us than Sir John has done in all his years of grovelling flattery. He’s a straight talker, and a very persuasive man, Granville.’
A letter from Canning later that summer, confirmed Granville Leveson Gower’s appointment and asked Glynde to put himself at the new Ambassador’s disposal. ‘He counts on you rather than Warren to point his way in Petersburg society.’
‘So you’ll stay?’ Jan was delighted. His father had decided that he should continue in Petersburg as his representative to explore the increasing possibilities of trade between the United States and Russia. ‘Then how about moving out of this hotel? George Richards knows of a good little house to let on the English Quay. What do you think? I’m sick to death of hotel life.’
‘We’d be robbed blind by our servants.’
‘No more so than we are here. And you’d not be everlastingly worrying about my free tongue.’
Glynde laughed. ‘Am I such a bore? I warn you, there will be a spy among our servants just as much there as here, but I agree with you. Some domestic life would be a pleasant change.’
The negotiations for the house took time, and they finally moved in just before it became necessary to put up the double windows and hermetically seal themselves in for the winter. Granville Leveson Gower reached Petersburg shortly afterwards and was soon very much at home in the snug little house on the English Quay, describing the palace in which he was staying until Sir John and Lady Warren left as an intolerable barracks of a place. He was also soon allowing himself the relief of telling them what he thought of Sir John himself. The previous Ambassador had not been pleased at being recalled, and relations between the two men were frigid throughout the necessary formalities of the handover.
‘Three bows for an Ambassador, two for a Chargé d’Affaires,’ Granville told Glynde and Jan. ‘And one should take one’s own yardstick, to get the depth just right, or risk precipitating a diplomatic incident! I begin to wonder if I was really cut out for the diplomatic service. I had to ride forty miles to her country palace the other day to pay my respects to the Empress Mother, and then translate my pretty speeches into diplomatic French, all in the third person. Now that I do really call work!’
‘But you know you are enjoying it,’ said Glynde.
‘Now the Warrens are gone, yes, I begin to. She was the proudest woman it’s been my misfortune to encounter for a long time.’
‘And so little to be proud about,’ said Glynde.
‘Well, birth, I suppose. You are laughing, Mr. Warrington?’
‘I was thinking how restful to be an American.’
‘Where you make no distinction between classes? I might call on you and confidently expect to sit next to a black gentleman at table?’
‘You have me there!’ Jan threw out a hand. ‘But we do not treat our slaves as badly as the Russians do their serfs!’
‘And yet the serfs seem devoted to their masters. Is that true of the Polish peasants, too?’
‘The Princess’s certainly were.’ Granville had learned that so far as Glynde and Jan were concerned, there was only one Polish Princess.
‘I long to meet your Princess Ovinska,’ he said now. ‘I’ve seen her husband often enough, and his belle amie the Princess Landowska. I rather think that if I were the Princess Ovinska, I would come to Petersburg and present my son to the Tsar. What news do you have from Rendomierz?’
‘None directly,’ said Jan. ‘But my friend Mrs. Richards corresponds with Miss Peverel, the Princess’s companion.’ A touch of defiance in his tone suggested that he had taken to heart the remarks about pride of birth and knew that a merchant’s wife would not seem a very elegant acquaintance to his two companions. How strange it was to find himself associating on these easy terms with an Ambassador, who was also a lord. He was afraid his father would be delighted.
‘A letter from Mrs. Richards in Petersburg?’ Princess Isobel was playing with her stalwart little black-haired son in the garden, and looked up smiling as Jenny joined her.
‘Yes. It’s taken for ever to get here.’ She bent to pick up the toy soldier Prince Casimir had dropped and hand it back to him.
‘Well, at least it got here! What news from Petersburg?’ She had had only a few brief letters from her husband in the two years since he had returned to Russia.
‘George Richards and Jan Warrington seem to be thick as thieves. I am so pleased. Mr. Warrington is to stay another year at least at Petersburg, and so, she thinks, will Mr. Rendel. He’s an old friend of the new British Ambassador. They went to school together.’
‘Those very important English school-friendships. Then I have no doubt Mr. Rendel will stay.’
‘Yes. He and Jan Warrington have taken a house together. On the English Quay, wherever that is.’
‘On the River Neva, and very pleasant, I should think. What’s the matter, Jenny? Something is troubling you?’
‘Not precisely. It’s something Mary Richards says. It almost reads like a message.’
‘A message?’
‘For you. Jan told her, she says, that the new Ambassador, this Lord Granville Leveson Gower … what a name!’
‘I believe you pronounce it Lewson Gore,’ said the Princess.
‘Well, however you pronounce it, Mary says he was talking about you, and –’ she blushed crimson ‘– about the Prince.’
‘And also, no doubt, about the Princess Irene Landowska? Don’t look so wretched, Jenny, I’ve friends in Petersburg too. What else did he say?’
‘Well … He asked Mr. Warrington if he was in touch with us here, and went on to say that if he were you – forgive me, Princess – he thought he would take Prince Casimir to Petersburg and present him to the Tsar.’
‘Did he so?’ said the Princess thoughtfully. ‘Now I wonder just what he intended by that? And whether it was good advice?’
Jenny wondered, too. She had had very similar instructions from the Brotherhood only the other day. They had left her in peace for a long while after Glynde and Jan had gone, then, at Christmas, she had had a message by way of Olga. ‘They want to know all about the little Prince; how he goes on; what he is like.’
Her hand had gone automatically to the scar that still lifted the corner of her mouth. ‘Prince Casimir? Do they so?’ But in fact it confirmed what she had always thought about those sinister, hooded figures. Their methods might be savage, but their aim was one with which she could only sympathise: freedom for Poland. She was glad that she had never thought of trying to betray them, despite the brutal, unnecessary attack on her. And it was a pleasure to let them know what a bright, promising child Prince Casimir was. An expert aunt, she could report him as advanced in every stage of his development, a great hope for the future. She had done so, and had had, just the other day, further instructions through Olga. ‘You are to urge the Princess to send for her husband, no matter what the pretext.’
Ever since the Brotherhood’s messages had begun again, Jenny had felt she ought to tell the Princess the whole story. Shameful to be afraid to. But now, she knew, the time had come. She waited until the Princess was changing for dinner. ‘Princess.’ She was in the big closet, selecting a white dress.
‘Yes?’ The Princess was at the glass, brushing her long hair.
‘There’s something I ought to tell you. Should have long ago.’
‘Oh?’ The Princess’s eyes met Jenny’s anxious ones in the glass. She stood up, finger on lips, moved forward, took Jenny’s hand and led her through to the boudoir, all in silence. Then, ‘Close the door, Jenny, would you? I’m tired; I feel the draught.’
‘It’s been a long day.’ There was no draught, but Jenny moved obediently to close the door into the dressing-room, and saw the Princess move to the other door into the corridor, open, look out, and close it.
�
��No one,’ she said. ‘What is it, Jenny?’
It was most absolutely terrifying to have her own fears thus confirmed by the Princess’s caution. ‘You think that even here?’ The Princess had seated herself on a chaise longue in the centre of the room and motioned her to join her.
‘Everywhere.’ Quietly. ‘I am glad you are going to tell me at last, Jenny.’
‘You knew?’
‘I’m not always stupid. What happened to you, Jenny?’
‘It was before I even got here.’ She poured out the story of her first meeting with the Brotherhood and ended by telling of their new order, so oddly like Mary Richards’ message.
‘So!’ The Princess thought about it for a moment. Then, ‘You’re a brave girl, Jenny. I’m glad you are here. And have told me. What do you think it means?’
Here was a question. What use beating about the bush? There had never been any secret about the dynastic reason for the Princess’s marriage. ‘Don’t you think, maybe, that they want to make double sure? Time for you and the Prince to meet. Two little Princes better than one? Two hopes for the future? What’s the matter?’
Princess Isobel was laughing, quietly, desperately. ‘Do you think there is a branch of the Brotherhood in Petersburg too? That they are urging the Prince to come to Poland?’
‘I expect so,’ said Jenny. ‘Don’t you?’
‘Yes. But he won’t come. Not for their asking. So – not at all. I don’t know him well, my husband, but I know him well enough for that. Besides, there is Princess Irene – and his other ladies.’
‘And the Tsar,’ said Jenny. ‘Who values his advice, it seems.’
‘His and Czartoryski’s. Do you think I should take Casimir to St. Petersburg, Jenny?’
‘I just don’t know.’ Jenny had noticed that the little Prince was never without a male attendant when he was out in the palace grounds.
‘It’s difficult, isn’t it? On all kinds of counts. First and foremost,’ she blushed, painfully, ‘my husband has not suggested that I go. He has – other occupations. And then, as to Casimir. You know what my hopes are for him. I think he should grow up pure Pole, not half Russian like Czartoryski.’
‘Well, yes, but one visit? Mary Richards writes in glowing terms of the Tsar. Suppose he were to see Casirmir –’ They were both convinced that to see their little Prince was to love him. ‘Might not that affect his thinking about Poland’s future?’
‘I suppose it might. He’d make Casimir King, as the Empress Catherine did Stanislas Augustus? But Poland needs her own leader, not someone thrust upon her by even the most benevolent of foreigners. I don’t think I’ll go to Russia,’ she decided. ‘And I most certainly will not invite the Prince to come here. But tell the Brotherhood that I will bear in mind what they say.’
‘I can’t do that,’ Jenny protested. ‘I’m not supposed to have told you.’
‘Of course. Stupid of me. I sometimes think I am hopelessly stupid, Jenny. Well, tell them you have done your best to persuade me! More than that you can hardly do. And – I know! – Ask them what their views are of my taking Casimir to Petersburg.’
‘Clever,’ said Jenny.
She put the question in carefully general terms in her next report to the Brotherhood and received an answer with disconcerting speed, confirming the Princess’s instinct that their presence loomed very near indeed. ‘They say he should stay here. Whatever that means.’ Olga, acting as mouthpiece for the Brotherhood, did not necessarily understand the verbal messages she carried, and, as she could not read, was equally unaware of what Jenny said in the written reports she transmitted to them. It had been tacitly agreed between them that the less either of them knew about the other’s activities, the better for both. But Jenny sometimes worried about Olga, who had grown proud in the comfort of Rendomierz and made no attempt to hide how much she disliked waiting on a foreigner. It was just as well that she was also deadly afraid of the Brotherhood.
The hot summer of 1804 drew into autumn, with the Prince still at Petersburg, the Princess at Rendomierz. Jenny had a rare letter from her oldest sister, describing invasion panic on the south coast of England and telling her how lucky she was to be living safe and in luxury in the centre of Europe where Bonaparte’s long arm could not reach. ‘Emperor Napoleon indeed!’ Araminta concluded. ‘That’s what he wants to be called, but never by us!’ Her husband was vicar of a seaside parish in Sussex, and she gave a vivid description of the preparations for swift evacuation if the enemy should land. ‘Only our gallant navy and Lord Nelson stand between us and the monster. That little business of Lady Hamilton is quite forgot, and Nelson is all the cry now.’ She went on to complain about the high cost of living. Taxes were up again, to pay for the war, tithes were hard to collect, and their sister Bella’s husband had decided he could no longer afford to have Mrs. Peverel stay with them for the six months in the year that had been agreed upon when her husband died. ‘So the burden falls entirely upon us, Jenny. What a mercy that you, at least, are settled in the lap of luxury. And so far from danger, too. With no one to care for but yourself. I cannot begin to tell you how I envy you. Remember us in your prayers.’
Chapter 10
‘It’s signed at last.’ Granville Leveson Gower had dropped in as he so often did to the little house on the English Quay between dining at home and starting on his evening round of diplomatic engagements.
‘The Anglo-Russian Treaty of Consort?’ Glynde poured wine for them all. ‘Then let us drink to it. We British provide the money, I take it, and Russia the troops?’
‘That’s it. If the Austrians and Prussians come in too, we shall see some action.’
‘Will they?’
‘I wish I was sure of that. Oh well,’ he rose. ‘I must be about my duties. Thank God, with this treaty signed at last, I can begin to hope for my recall.’
‘You wish to leave us?’
‘As soon as I decently can. It’s all very well for you two free men; I am strangling in protocol. Feel for me! I am off now to make my round of bows and scrapes.’
‘Ending up, as usual, tête à tête with the Princess Galitzin?’
‘The only place in Petersburg, except here, of course, where I have found the kind of talk I am used to.’
‘She’s a great beauty, they say.’
‘And a good friend.’
‘I do wonder what Lady Bessborough thinks about it all,’ said Glynde, when Granville had left them.
‘I shall never begin to understand you Europeans.’ Jan had been a silent listener. ‘Behave like this in the United States and you’d be run out of town on a rail. But here, so far as I can see, Prince Ovinski spends his time with Princess Landowska, while his wife lives at home with the little boy; the Emperor is devoted to Princess Narishkin while Adam Czartoryski –’
‘Is the Empress’s devoted friend,’ Glynde broke in. ‘Which goes far to explain why Adam has never made the kind of dynastic marriage one would have expected. There’s been talk of a very rich Princess of Courland, but she’s little more than a child, they say, and he’s not interested.’
‘Nothing but unhappy dynastic marriages,’ said Jan, ‘and scandalous liaisons as a result. I do feel we manage things better at home.’
‘Your father has never urged you to marry a rich neighbour’s daughter?’
‘Oh, well, fathers!’ Glynde could only agree with him. He would soon have been two years in Petersburg and his only word from his own father had been a message, sent by Granville Leveson Gower, urging him to stay.
As the days became longer and the weather more clement, with green showing here and there at last, everyone moved out of Petersburg to dachas in the surrounding countryside. The Tsar was mostly at his summer palace of Tsarske-Selo, though he came frequently to Petersburg to oversee the great mobilisation of the Russian army, which was going on apace now that Austria had joined Russia and England in their alliance against Napoleon. Taking after his father in this, Alexander was passionately interested i
n military matters, particularly in uniforms, and showed signs of meaning to lead his army himself.
‘I do hope wiser counsel prevails.’ Granville had invited Glynde and Jan to the country house he had taken on the banks of the Neva some way out of town, but they were all being eaten so horribly by mosquitoes that it seemed doubtful if they would repeat the visit. Besides, Granville’s dear friend, Princess Galitzin, had taken a house so close to his that the ensuing outburst of gossip had been too much, even for her. ‘Mind you,’ Granville went on now, ‘I do rather selfishly hope that the Tsar decides to go with the army when they move west. It will be a tremendous chance of seeing something more of Russia, and Poland, too, most likely.’
‘You would go too?’ asked Glynde.
‘The whole court would. A most appalling nuisance for the army. But one can understand the Tsar’s wanting to go. He does tend to imitate Napoleon, and the French government officials go with him on all his campaigns – inevitably, since he’s about as absolute a monarch as even the Tsar himself. But he’s also absolutely in control. Most unlike Alexander, who is as hamstrung by protocol as the rest of us. I can imagine him expecting his armies to wait for his permission, or the requisite number of bows given and acknowledged, before they can join battle.’ He slapped irritably at a mosquito. ‘I do sometimes wish that Peter the Great had not chosen to build his capital city in this wilderness!’ And then, as if to explain his unusual ill-temper, ‘I’ve been ordered to stay on here, much against my will.’
‘Good news for us,’ said Jan.
‘Thank you. Which brings me to the real reason why I asked you to risk marsh fever with me here. I’m hoping to persuade you two gentlemen to come with me if I do go west with the Russian army. I am sure you would find it enormously interesting.’
‘Why, yes,’ said Glynde doubtfully. ‘But you know we have no official position. We have not even been presented.’
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