“Greetings, ladies and gentlemen!” Peter said with a cheerful look. They all bowed deeply. The tsar’s quick glance sought out the host’s young daughter in the crowd; he called her to him. Natalya Gavrilovna approached quite boldly, but blushing not only to the ears, but down to the shoulders. “You get prettier by the hour,” the sovereign said to her and, as was his custom, kissed her on the head; then, turning to the guests: “Well, so? I’ve disturbed you. You were having dinner. I beg you to sit down again, and you, Gavrila Afanasyevich, give me some anise vodka.”
The host rushed to the majestic butler, snatched the tray out of his hands, filled a little gold goblet himself, and offered it to the sovereign with a bow. Peter, having drunk it, took a bite from a pretzel, and again invited the guests to go on with dinner. They all took their former places, except for the dwarf and the housekeeper, who did not dare to remain at a table honored by the tsar’s presence. Peter sat down beside the host and asked for cabbage soup. His orderly served him a wooden spoon set with ivory, and a knife and fork with green bone handles, for Peter never used any utensils but his own. The dinner, noisily animated a moment before with merriment and garrulity, went on in silence and constraint. The host, out of deference and joy, ate nothing; the guests also became decorous and listened with reverence as the sovereign talked with the captive Swede about the campaign of 1701. The fool Ekimovna, whom the sovereign questioned a few times, answered with a sort of timid coldness, which (I note in passing) by no means proved her innate stupidity.
Finally the dinner came to an end. The sovereign stood up, and all the guests after him. “Gavrila Afanasyevich,” he said to the host, “I must talk with you alone.” And taking him by the arm, he led him to the drawing room and shut the door behind them. The guests remained in the dining room, exchanging whispers about this unexpected visit, and, for fear of being indelicate, soon departed one by one, without thanking the host for his hospitality. His father-in-law, daughter, and sister quietly saw them to the porch and remained in the dining room, waiting for the sovereign to come out.
CHAPTER FIVE
I shall find a wife for thee,
Or a miller I’ll ne’er be.
ABLESIMOV, FROM THE OPERA The Miller24
Half an hour later the door opened and Peter came out. Gravely inclining his head in response to the threefold bow of Prince Lykov, Tatyana Afanasyevna, and Natasha, he walked straight to the front hall. The host held his red fleece-lined coat for him, saw him to the sledge, and on the porch thanked him again for the honor bestowed on him. Peter drove off.
Returning to the dining room, Gavrila Afanasyevich seemed very preoccupied. He angrily ordered the servants to clear the table at once, sent Natasha to her room, and, announcing to his sister and father-in-law that he had to talk to them, led them to his bedroom, where he usually rested after dinner. The old prince lay down on the oak bed; Tatyana Afanasyevna sat in an old-fashioned damask armchair, moving a footstool closer; Gavrila Afanasyevich shut all the doors, sat on the bed at Prince Lykov’s feet, and in a low voice began the following conversation:
“It was not for nothing that the sovereign visited me today. Can you guess what he was pleased to talk with me about?”
“How can we know, brother dear?” said Tatyana Afanasyevna.
“Can the tsar have appointed you governor-general somewhere?” asked the father-in-law. “It’s none too soon. Or has he offered you an ambassadorship? Why not? Noblemen, and not just scribes, are sent to foreign rulers.”
“No,” his son-in-law replied, frowning. “I’m a man of the old stamp, our services are no longer required, though an Orthodox Russian nobleman may well be worth all these present-day upstarts, pancake makers, and heathens25—but that’s another subject.”
“What was it, then, that he was pleased to talk with you about for so long?” asked Tatyana Afanasyevna. “You’re not in some sort of trouble, are you? Lord, save us and have mercy on us!”
“Trouble or no trouble, I must confess it set me thinking.”
“What is it, brother? What’s the matter?”
“It’s a matter of Natasha: the tsar came to make a match for her.”
“Thank God,” Tatyana Afanasyevna said, crossing herself. “The girl’s of marriageable age, and like matchmaker, like suitor—God grant them love and harmony. It’s a great honor. For whom is the tsar asking her hand?”
“Hm,” grunted Gavrila Afanasyevich. “For whom? That’s just it—for whom.”
“For whom, then?” Prince Lykov, who was already beginning to doze off, repeated.
“Guess,” said Gavrila Afanasyevich.
“Brother dear,” the old woman replied “how can we guess? There are lots of suitors at court: any one of them would be glad to take your Natasha. Is it Dolgoruky?”
“No, not Dolgoruky.”
“Well, God help him: he’s awfully arrogant. Schein? Troekurov?”
“No, neither of them.”
“They’re not to my liking either: featherbrains, too full of the German spirit. Well, then, Miloslavsky?”
“No, not him.”
“And God help him, too: he’s rich but stupid. Who, then? Eletsky? Lvov? No? Can it be Raguzinsky? I give up. Who is the tsar choosing for Natasha?”
“The Moor Ibrahim.”
The old woman cried out and clasped her hands. Prince Lykov raised his head from the pillows and repeated in amazement: “The Moor Ibrahim!”
“Brother dear,” the old woman said in a tearful voice, “don’t ruin your own child, don’t deliver Natashenka into the clutches of that black devil.”
“But how can I refuse the sovereign,” Gavrila Afanasyevich protested, “who promises his favor in return, to me and all our family?”
“What?!” exclaimed the old prince, whom sleep had totally deserted. “To have Natasha, my granddaughter, marry a bought blackamoor?!”
“He’s not of common stock,” said Gavrila Afanasyevich. “He’s the son of a Moorish sultan. Some heathens took him captive and sold him in Constantinople, and our ambassador redeemed him and presented him to the tsar. The Moor’s elder brother came to Russia with a rich ransom and—”
“My dearest Gavrila Afanasyevich,” the old woman interrupted, “we’ve all heard the tales of Prince Bova and Eruslan Lazarevich.26 You’d better tell us how you replied to the sovereign’s matchmaking.”
“I told him that the power was with him, and our bounden duty was to obey him in all things.”
Just then a noise came from behind the door. Gavrila Afanasyevich went to open it, but, feeling some resistance, he pushed hard on it, the door opened—and they saw Natasha lying unconscious on the bloodied floor.
Her heart had sunk when the sovereign shut himself in with her father. Some presentiment had whispered to her that it had to do with her, and when Gavrila Afanasyevich sent her away, announcing that he had to speak with her aunt and grandfather, feminine curiosity got the better of her, she tiptoed quietly through the inner rooms to the door of the bedroom, and did not miss a single word of the whole terrible conversation. When she heard her father’s last words, the poor girl fainted and, falling, struck her head against the iron-bound chest in which her dowry was kept.
Servants came running; Natasha was picked up, carried to her room, and placed on the bed. After some time she came to, opened her eyes, but recognized neither her father nor her aunt. She broke into a high fever, raved about the tsar’s Moor, the wedding—and suddenly cried out in a pitiful and piercing voice: “Valerian, dear Valerian, my life! Save me: they’re coming, they’re coming!…” Tatyana Afanasyevna glanced anxiously at her brother, who turned pale, bit his lips, and silently left the room. He went back to the old prince, who, unable to climb the stairs, had remained below.