“Peter’s dead?”
Dunyasha’s eyebrows arched in surprise. “Really, you Europeans, you care too much about the peasants. They are there to serve, nothing more. There is no need to mourn.”
“How dare you!” Isobel slammed the tankard down, and the table shook. “Peter is not just a peasant. How can you treat people like that? You say he’s dead—murdered more like, and you think that’s normal?”
“Of course,” Dunyasha chuckled. “There are many of them. One dies, another takes their place. They are happy to serve. After all, what else is there for them? They work, they die, they are content. That is the Russian way.”
“It is an honour,” Konstantin agreed. “Do not think they are sad.”
Isobel leapt up and spat at Dunyasha. “Murderers!”
Dunyasha’s cool gaze remained unruffled. “Witness the perils of free speech, Konstantin. You see how a backward nation becomes impossible when everyone is allowed to have an opinion, especially the women.”
Isobel swung the tankard at her head, but Konstantin grabbed her shoulders and pulled her back.
“You can’t do this,” she screamed. “Let me go.” But she couldn’t escape from his grip.
Dunyasha dabbed her face with a lace handkerchief. “It is hard for you to understand. I am sorry about James, but there is nothing that we can do. We cannot draw attention to ourselves. The Russian White causes much bewilderment and bloodshed. Be happy that you have helped bring an end to all of that. Living in Russia is a small price to pay for that peace of mind.”
Isobel stamped on Konstantin’s foot, twisted, and broke free. She whirled round, and smashed the tankard into his face. He reeled, stunned by the blow.
Terrington leapt up and snatched the cloth bag out of Dunyasha’s hands. Dunyasha screamed, and Isobel dived round the table and pushed her into the wall, where she crumpled and fell.
Terrington reached the door first and flung it open, but Russian men blocked his way. Isobel flung her tankard at the nearest, but missed. She darted between them, but there were too many. They circled her, caught her. She bit and kicked, and they pulled her hands behind her back, and bound them.
Terrington dropped his tankard and the bag. And when they ordered him to sit, he obeyed.
Dunyasha staggered to her feet. “Take them to the Embassy.”
Winded by Isobel’s blow, she gulped for breath, and though in pain, she didn’t think she was seriously injured. Konstantin handed her back the cloth bag with the Russian White secure in its velvet pouch. He guided her to the chair and she sat down.
“Fetch Gregor,” she instructed. “And Marsha too.”
Chapter Twenty Seven
“Message from the Russian Ambassador.”
Lord Aberdeen’s secretary placed a sealed envelope on the Prime Minister’s desk and left the room.
The Chief finished reading the last paragraph of the Foreign Office report. Bad news, and his brow furrowed as he took in its contents.
Many men risked freezing to death if the campaign in the Holy Lands continued throughout the winter. Inappropriate clothing would reduce morale which would, in turn, lessen the effectiveness of the army, which might result in the capitulation of territories already secured. Extra funds were needed from the Treasury to better equip the men, who were standing firm in the name of Empire, and protecting the rights and freedoms of Queen and Country.
The Chief laid the report down. It needed discussing with the Chancellor at the next Cabinet Meeting.
He picked up the envelope his secretary had just delivered, and sliced it open with his silver letter opener. It contained a single piece of paper embossed with the monogram of the Imperial Russian Eagle. Its few lines were written in dark green ink, and a large flowing script.
Prime Minister
The Honourable Yakov Ilyinichna wishes to report an unexpected occurrence that will have important and possibly far reaching consequences relating to the recent crises in the Holy Lands. The Russian Ambassador will expect your Lordship at the Russian Embassy at nine o clock this evening, when this matter will be discussed.
Your obedient servant etc… etc…
The Chief re-read the note. Then he read it again. He ground his teeth as the message’s meaning became clear. The Russians had the diamond. Blast and dam that Terrington! The wretched man had failed. Any bargaining the British Government implemented or demanded would come out in the Russians’ favour, because control of the Russian White bolstered their arguments towards a favourable outcome. He should never have trusted that nasty weasel-faced man.
He stared at the paper, until the green letters blurred one into another, and he could no longer read the words.
He laid it down on top of the report from the Foreign Office, and picked up his pen. He scribbled two notes, one to Hood and one to Buffrey and, once sealed, sent his secretary out to deliver them.
He folded the Russian Ambassador’s note in half, and threw it on the fire. The paper ignited and burned to grey ash; only the Eagle lingered, as the seal bubbled and steamed, until it too melted into the heat with a slow hiss.
Satisfied that it was destroyed, he pulled his armchair round to the window and gazed out over his gardens and the London rooftops.
A cold clear day, and smoke from hundreds of chimneys rose in the air in long slow columns that clouded the blue sky with a thin yellow fog. Across the City, the church clocks struck four, and the chiming bells drowned out the noise of passing crowds, and the rumble of carts as they banged across the cobbles.
From this window, he could see the Thames and its brown water flowing downstream towards the sea, and as he stared at its steady journey, his body relaxed into the soft contours of his armchair, and his mind switched off from the days’ events. He indulged in the pleasure that he always felt at these times, when he contemplated the extraordinary achievement of being Prime Minister of the greatest Empire on earth.
His position was absolute, second only to Queen Victoria. It made him invulnerable; perhaps even immortal.
The Country stood behind him, and supported his determination to stand firm in the face of Russia’s hostile actions in the Holy Lands. But—and doubt shaded his omnipotent pleasure, for how much longer?
Everyone remembered Wellington’s victory at Waterloo and the subsequent banishment of the Emperor Napoleon into exile. If the British could beat Napoleon, then the Russians didn’t stand a chance. But that was nearly forty years ago, and the army had grown flabby in the intervening years.
The Generals who fought at Waterloo were old men now, befuddled by advancing years and out of touch with the tactics of modern warfare. Their appearance, as they paraded through London on their way to the docks, and then onwards to Turkey, stirred up patriotic fervour; adoring crowds cheered them as all conquering heroes, but initial reports coming back to London suggested indecisive command and confusion.
The first mutterings of dissent were being heard in Westminster. He sensed the whispered conversations in dark corners, the finger pointing and the general feeling of disappointment. If this spread to the Country, the people might turn against him, and isolate him to a futile existence of position without power. He shuddered at the thought.
Perhaps he should step down, for who could foretell the outcome of hostilities? Especially now that the Russians had the diamond.
He feared failure too, and stepping down suggested cowardice in the face of approaching crises. He imagined the ignominy of nursing his wounded pride after a fall from grace, and worst of all, of conceding the possibility that his successor might eclipse his name and dam him to little more than a footnote in the history of the world.