They were walking in the garden, and in the hope of forcing a decision he told her that, so desperate had she made him, unless she was prepared to take pity on him soon he would be driven to the conclusion that she was only playing with him, and, in an endeavour to tear her image from his heart, he would seriously consider leaving Sweden.
She softened at once, telling him that she liked him greatly, and had come to count upon his society, so she would seek to prove him no further. Then she nodded towards a window on the first-floor at the back of the house, and said: "That is my room; do you think you could climb up there?"
He gave one glance at the balcony below it, which was supported by the scrolled iron-work of the ground-floor verandah, and laughed. "Indeed I could. Let me do so this very night, my sweet, I beg."
"So be it," she smiled. "Come to me at midnight, but not a moment before. As to your entry to the grounds, you see that postern-door in the wall over there? I will give you the key of it before you leave."
On that side of the house the garden-wall ran within twelve feet of the building, and the door, although at right angles to her balcony, was almost beneath it. He saw that once through the door he would have only a dozen paces to take to reach the verandah. It was an admirable arrangement, as he could not possibly lose his way in the darkness, and the risk of running into anyone during so short a passage from the street to her room was infinitesimal. An hour later, on his way back to the inn with the key in his pocket, his senses almost reeled at the thought of the promised delights of the night to come.
It was not until he was considering what clothes he should wear for his expedition that it suddenly occurred to him that Natalia Andreovna had, after his long siege of her, surrendered at the last somewhat precipitously and only on his threatening to abandon his pursuit of her. Could it be that she did not really mean to receive him after all, but intended instead to play him some scurvy trick, like mounting him on the black horse? Perhaps she would rouse the house pretending to mistake him for a burglar, for the fun of seeing him chased and perhaps beaten by her servants.
On thinking matters over he decided that his suspicions of her were both unjust and unreasonable. She could be very sweet at times and recently had shown in a dozen small ways that she was fond of him. Moreover she had admitted to having had lovers and, just before he left her, had gone up to her room to fetch the key of the postern gate, suggesting pretty clearly that she had made use of it before for a similar purpose. If she had let others come to her that way in the night, why should she not let him?
Nevertheless his lingering distrust of her vicious sense of humour led him to take special precautions. He decided to wear loose, dark easy clothes, as they would not only render him as inconspicuous as possible and facilitate his climb up the verandah, but they would also give him a much better chance of getting away and disappearing in the darkness, if she was base enough to have him ambushed for her amusement. Moreover, a long sword being an awkward weapon to take to such a rendezvous, he would normally have gone unarmed; but on this occasion he decided to carry a hanger and, going out, bought himself a short, thick-bladed seaman's cutlass, which would not get in his way but prove a good, handy weapon if he were attacked.
As he buckled it on he was inclined to laugh at his fears, and his optimism recovered, waited with the greatest impatience for midnight. When it came he was outside the postern door with its key in his hand, yet he deliberately waited for another five minutes before inserting it in the lock. It turned easily and without a sound, showing that the mechanism was well-oiled. He smiled to himself, feeling certain now that others before him had trodden this road to a night of bliss in the young widow's arms, and he would have betted his valuable black mare against a tabby cat that Count Yagerhorn had been among them.
The night was warm and it was the dark phase of the moon. As he opened the door and slipped through it he was only a blacker patch in the shadow of the wall. Nothing stirred, and he found that the door closed behind him noiselessly, its hinges being as well-oiled as its lock. For a moment he paused with his back against it, looking cautiously round. There was just enough light to discern the outlines of the house and the trees in the garden. Reassured by the utter stillness he tiptoed forward.
The latticed iron-work of the verandah was, as he had expected, easy to climb. Barely a minute after leaving the ground he swung himself over the low balcony. In the faint light he could now see that one of the two French windows which gave onto it was standing ajar. Quickly pulling off the gloves he had used to keep his hands free from the dirt on the iron, he thrust them in one of his pockets, and gently pushed the window open.
"Natalia Andreovna," he whispered.
As no reply came he stepped inside. The room was almost pitch-dark. A faint light came from its far end outlining a curtained doorway, and this was sufficient to show him the position of a big four-poster bed. As his eyes grew accustomed to the darkness he could just make out her head upon the white pillow.
Tiptoeing forward he whispered her name again. She moved slightly, showing that she was awake, but still made no reply.
It struck him then that perhaps she was much shyer than he had thought her, or wished to make a pretence at the last moment that she was being taken against her will. Smiling to himself he swiftly slipped out of his loose clothes, stepped up to the bed and, stooping above it, kissed her.
Her lips responded warmly and her arms closed round his neck. Pulling the sheets back he slipped into bed beside her, and began to murmur little phrases of endearment.
Without a word she pulled him to her and kissed him again; but with her movement there suddenly came to him a wild, almost incredible notion. Something told him that the woman he was embracing was not Natalia Andreovna.
Her perfume was that which Natalia affected, and she seemed about the right height; but her breasts were larger and her waist thicker than he had imagined could possibly be the case with the lithe Russian.
Putting up one hand to caress her hair, he felt it. Natalia's ash-blonde tresses were as smooth and as fine-spun as the sheerest silk; this was much coarser and slightly crinkled.
Pushing the woman from him, he sat up with a jerk, exclaiming angrily: "What is the meaning of this trick? You are not Natalia Andreovna! Where is she?"
There came a low laugh from behind the curtain and it was pulled aside, allowing a dim light to seep into the room. Natalia stood framed in the doorway. She was wearing a satin night-robe and her long ash-blonde hair, now parted in the middle, fell like a smooth cascade of silver about her shoulders.
"Here I am, Rojé Christorovitch," she smiled. "Waiting to make you welcome. Had you had my maid you would never have had me. But you have passed my test for sensibility with as much honour as you did that for courage."
As Roger gaped at her she spoke in Russian to the woman beside him. He saw now that she was a dark-haired merry-eyed girl of about twenty. At her mistress's order she jumped out of bed, flashed her white teeth at him in a wide grin, and ran giggling past Natalia Andreovna into the next room, which, from what he could see, was a clothes-closet.
With an enigmatic smile on her thin lips, the uncrowned Queen of Sweden drew the curtain behind her, plunging the room again into near darkness. Then she ran forward with, outstretched arms and, as he caught her, buried her face in his neck.
In the hours that followed he had no reason for complaint. Having finally made up her mind to give herself the slim Russian did so in no half-hearted manner. All the promise of her strange exotic beauty and the slumberous fires of passion that he had sensed in her were fulfilled. When, as the first streaks of dawn came through the window, he at last rose to leave her, he knew that this was one of the nights of his life that he would always remember.