Chapter XLI: The Château Pauloff

When Jack next opened his eyes with consciousness upon the world he found he was lying on a soft bed in a sumptuously furnished apartment.

The room was dimly lighted by a handsome lamp, and the cheery flickering of a large fire cast fantastic shadows upon the massive polished furniture.

Jack was conscious of a curious inability to move, of a sense of languor not altogether unpleasant. He seemed to have been asleep a long time, and to have been troubled with dreams--dreams of the cholera camp at Varna, of the death-ride in the North Valley, of the struggle in the fog at Inkermann, of Linham and Will and Pearson, of his mother and sisters. Strange people seemed to flit about in his dreams: the count, a white-haired old gentleman, a stately lady, and a young girl who looked at him always with anxious eyes. The room, too, seemed familiar, though what it all meant Jack could not tell.

Presently he fancied he was still lying on the cold, wet ground at Old Fort, then in the caves of Inkermann; then he ceased to think, lamplight and firelight grew dimmer and dimmer, and at last vanished altogether.

Next it was broad daylight, with a wintry sun shining through the curtains, and Jack awoke to realise that he really was in bed in a strange place, and that he felt as weak as a baby. He tried to sit up and get out of bed; but, utterly unable to do so, he fell back with a deep groan. Then there sounded a rustle of garments, and a stout, kind-faced woman, dressed like a nun, wearing a crucifix on her bosom and beads round her waist, got up from a chair by the bedside, uttered kind, soothing words in a tongue Jack guessed was Russian, smoothed his pillows, and gently laid him back upon them.

Then Jack remembered more--he had been taken prisoner by Cossacks. Count Pauloff had found him and taken him to the prison at Sebastopol. Well, Russian prisons were splendid places thought Jack, looking round him, and their attendants were more than kind.

Then some warm milk, flavoured with something very nice, was given him; the good nun gently bathed his face and hands, and Jack wanted to talk. He tried his kind nurse with French and English; but she only smiled gently and shook her head. And so Jack lay quietly thinking until he happened to catch sight of his own hand and arm. Heavens! it was only skin and bone; in one day he seemed to have turned into a skeleton!

This gave him fresh food for thought, and his mystification was growing deeper when his nurse murmured something, among which Jack thought he caught the name Irma, when a soft footstep approached the bed and a young girl of exceeding beauty, gladness beaming from her eyes, took Jack’s hand, saying softly in French, ‘Good-morning, monsieur, welcome back to life! It has been a hard struggle, but you have conquered.’

The features of the young girl did not seem altogether strange, though Jack could not for the moment recollect where he had seen them before. Something of his uncertainty must have showed in his face, for the girl continued, ‘You are wondering where you are, how you got here, and who I am?’

‘I confess, mademoiselle, I am puzzled. At first I thought I was in the prison at Sebastopol; but’---- and Jack looked round him.

The girl laughed gaily. ‘You think more of where you are than of anything else,’ she said. ‘Well, you are in the house of Count Pauloff; he brought you here from Sebastopol.’

‘Ha! now I know who you are. You must be the count’s sister; you are so much alike, yet so much more handsome’---- Then Jack checked himself and blushed; but Irma, for such was her name, seemed by no means displeased.

‘I am the count’s sister,’ she said.

‘I saw you at the Alma.’

‘Ah that dreadful day, when poor Alexis was wounded and would have been slain but for you!’ and Irma covered her face with her hands as though to shut out some disagreeable vision.

‘The count told me yesterday’---- began Jack.

‘Yesterday?’ interrogated Irma with a smile.

‘I mean, as we rode into Sebastopol from the picket who captured me.’

Irma opened her eyes very wide; then they suddenly dimmed, as though with tears.

‘Alas! monsieur,’ she said, ‘that is two weeks ago to-morrow.’

Jack looked and felt horrified. ‘And I have been here all that time?’ he said.

Irma nodded her head.

Jack looked at his thin arms. ‘That accounts for these then,’ he said, and sank back wearily.

‘Monsieur,’ said Irma, ‘you have been very, very ill; we long despaired of saving your life. We have watched you day and night. You have been delirious all the time, and talking, oh, so much! till our hearts ached for you. We could not understand one word you said; but we thought you called always for mother--mother.’ She pronounced it ‘mauzher.’ ‘Tell me, who is “mauzher”?’

Jack smiled and explained that it must have been his mother he raved of.

Irma smiled, and said artlessly, ‘Ah, I am glad! After some days the doctor said you would live; but you had to be kept very quiet, and now here you are. The fever has left you, and all you have to do is to get strong again.’

Jack thought for some time, then he said, ‘How did I get here?’

‘You fainted right away in the hospital in Sebastopol, and then grew delirious. The doctors there said you must die; but Alexis had you wrapped in blankets, and, borrowing a carriage, drove you here, and--we have nursed you.’

‘How can I ever repay you?’

‘Hush, do we not owe to you the life of Alexis?’

The nurse then came forward and spoke gently to Irma, who smilingly said to Jack, ‘Sister Katrin says I must not talk to you any more now; but I shall come back presently. I sit some hours by your bedside every day.’

And later on she came back with her mother, the countess, a tall, stately, white-haired lady. In the evening came the young Count Alexis, who was overjoyed that Jack was at last on the highroad to recovery.

‘Where are we now?’ asked Jack presently.

‘In my house,’ smiled the count.

‘But where is that?’

‘Near Teberti, on the Katcha, fifteen miles from Sebastopol.’

Having once turned the corner, Jack began rapidly to improve, and in a week was able to sit up for an hour or two, wrapped in a costly dressing-gown and wearing slippers of the count’s.

What on earth he was going to do for clothes puzzled him, for it would be impossible for him to wear the mud-and-blood-stained rags he had been captured in.

‘Perhaps they will send me off to Sebastopol,’ he thought; ‘then it will not matter.’

But Count Pauloff had no idea of sending Jack to Sebastopol; and a day or two later he settled the clothes question in a very simple manner.

‘I’ve got my uniform as a cadet at the Military College,’ he said; ‘it will just about fit you.’ And he went away, presently returning with a handsome dark-green uniform trimmed with silver lace, with cap, boots, belts, all complete; and when Jack was dressed he looked a handsome figure in the Russian uniform.

‘If I only had my hair cut!’ he said with a laugh.

‘That we will soon settle;’ and, touching the bell, the count bade the servant request his valet to attend.

That obsequious gentleman was a Frenchman, and on his appearance the count bade him cut Jack’s hair.

He insisted then on taking Jack to the drawing-room, where he was received by the countess and Irma with the utmost cordiality and quite on terms of equality.

That evening was the beginning of several happy weeks for Jack, who felt himself growing daily stronger.

Waited on hand, foot, and finger, treated as a dear friend or relative by the count’s family, and living on the choicest fare, who could fail to be happy, especially after the experiences Jack had passed through during the last twelve months?

It became apparent at once to Jack that the countess idolised her daughter, and that all the servants did the same. Irma was a self-willed and imperious young lady, and governed everybody except the count, who, however, seldom thwarted any wish of hers, for brother and sister were devotedly attached to one another.

Now Irma and Jack spent the greater part of every day in each other’s society, and it would have been evident to any one less modest than was Jack that the young Russian lady had a warm regard for the English soldier.

As they wandered about the summer mansion of the Pauloffs, where the family stayed on so as to be near Alexis, by adroit questioning Irma got from Jack the whole of his history; not that Jack wanted much coaxing, as it proved a convenient topic on which to talk.

The mansion had very extensive grounds, which were surrounded by a high wall in which were several gates, one opening out into the forest, which on one side came right down to the walls. In this forest, Irma and Jack had many a gallop on horseback, an exercise in which, on one or two occasions when he was able to snatch a day’s leave, they were joined by the count. Always, however, whether he accompanied them or not, a sort of retainer of the family, a head servant named Sergius, rode behind them.

Sergius was devoted to his young master and to Irma. For Jack he seemed to have a genuine regard; but, like the true Russian domestic, he never betrayed his feelings either one way or the other. It was a noticeable fact, though, that whenever he rode abroad with Jack he carried both sword and pistols, not that Jack, despite his longing to be again with his comrades in the field, ever thought of repaying the kindness he had received from the Pauloffs by trying to escape from their custody.

In the evenings they had cards or music, and Jack, being a very fair performer on the pianoforte, played duets with Irma or sang some of the songs which had been popular in England before the war. Then there were lessons from Irma in Russian and lessons from Jack in English, so that time passed like a dream.

But Jack knew the life of idleness and luxury he was leading would unfit him for those duties which he would have to perform when he got back to the regiment; and, spite of the terrible sufferings which he heard the others were undergoing, he wished he were back again among them, sharing the danger and the glory. Once or twice he had led up to this subject with Count Pauloff; but the latter had always adroitly turned the conversation.

A few days after his last attempt, a dinner-party was given at the château, and the young count brought several officers from Sebastopol. Among others was a Hussar in a magnificent crimson uniform, having a dark-green pelisse richly laced with gold. The count, in introducing Jack, alluded to him as ‘My cousin, Colonel Vladimir Sominoff.’

Jack immediately recognised him as the Hussar who had been with Kirchoff on the night he had been captured; but Sominoff, hardly giving Jack a glance, just nodded slightly and passed him by. Jack was relieved to think he had not been recognised; but presently he heard Count Pauloff relating how Jack had saved his life at the Alma, how later he had been captured by Kirchoff, and how the count had rescued him.

Then Colonel Sominoff favoured Jack with a long, cold stare.

During the evening Sominoff paid Irma very great attention. She, however, received his advances with great coolness. The handsome Hussar stroked his moustache and pretended not to notice this treatment; but there was a look in his eye that Jack did not like, and later on in the evening, when Irma seated herself on a divan in one corner of the room with him, and told him who all the people were, he glanced up to see Colonel Sominoff regarding him with a look that quite made him start.

Seeing Colonel Sominoff glaring at Jack, Irma said, ‘Oh, that’s my cousin Vladimir; he pesters me to death with his odious attentions, but I hate him. Alexis says he is careful to keep as far from danger as he can, which means he is a coward, and I am sure he is a bully as well, in spite of his cat-like manners.’

After that Colonel Vladimir Sominoff was a frequent visitor at the château, and he kept by Irma’s side all the while he was in the house. Jack he simply ignored, never addressing a word to him, and treating him as if he did not exist. Sometimes the count came with the colonel, but more often the latter came alone.

On one occasion the colonel and the count came to spend a few days at the mansion, and Jack determined to keep in the apartments which he occupied. This, however, Irma did not let him do.

‘Why do you shut yourself up here?’ she cried with a little stamp of her foot, while her dark eyes shone angrily.

‘I--I do not wish to intrude,’ said Jack rather lamely.

‘Intrude, intrude! who has dared say you intrude?’ she cried fiercely. ‘If any of the servants’---- and her eyes blazed ominously.

‘No one has said a word,’ interrupted Jack hastily; ‘but your brother and your cousin are here. You are quite a little family circle, and--and’----

‘And what? Have we neglected you? Have we slighted you?’

‘No, a thousand times no,’ said Jack; ‘but can you not understand? You are of the aristocracy. I am a plain English soldier; I cannot mix on an equality with you, and it is better that I should not. This life is unfitting me for my career. I shall never forget your kindness; but the longer I remain here the harder I shall find it when I go. At any moment I may be taken off to prison’----

‘You won’t,’ cried Irma. ‘Alexis has promised me that you shall not be taken from here if he can help it; and he can help it--he shall. He is a friend of Prince Mentschikoff.’

‘Then I must return to my duty, and before long I hope.’

At this point Irma burst into a flood of tears. ‘You are unkind; you are ungrateful!’ she sobbed. ‘We have done all we could for you, and you repay us by saying you hope you will soon go.’

Irma’s tears were more than Jack could bear. He felt he was making a muddle of things. Ungrateful! Why, if he lived a hundred years he would never forget their kindness!

He stepped to the angry girl and laid one hand on her arm.

‘Countess,’[7] he said, ‘you do not understand. It is duty calls me, not inclination. I am a soldier and’----

The door was suddenly flung violently open, and Vladimir Sominoff rushed in. ‘So, dog, scum!’ he hissed, ‘you dare to lay finger on a daughter of the house of Pauloff;’ and he struck at Jack.

Irma, however, threw herself in front of him. ‘Touch him if you dare!’ she cried, her eyes blazing like those of a tigress.

Sominoff choked back his rage and gave vent to a mocking laugh. ‘Stand aside,’ he said, seizing her by the wrist, ‘the countess shall talk to you. I will settle with this clod.’

‘Coward, you hurt me!’ she cried in cutting tones; ‘but it is only what one might expect from a man who would leave a helpless prisoner to be frozen to death on a winter’s night.’

This allusion to Jack maddened Sominoff. He must have squeezed her wrist, for she screamed out. Next moment, however, the gaudily uniformed Hussar was sprawling on the floor, dashed there by a blow from Jack’s fist.

With a hoarse cry he leapt to his feet, and tearing his sword from the scabbard rushed on Jack. The latter snatched up a chair and stood facing the infuriated Russian.

‘Leave us, countess,’ Jack said; ‘I think I can give this feather-bed dandy a lesson in swordsmanship that will lower his pride.’