Russka - Edward Rutherfurd [184]
‘Call your abbot,’ his deep voice echoed around the icy yard. ‘Tell him his Tsar is here.’ And the monks trembled.
About five minutes passed before they were all assembled in the refectory. The old abbot stood at their head, some eighty monks behind him, including Daniel. The dozen Oprichniki with the Tsar were stationed by the door. Ivan had seated himself in a heavy oak chair, and was facing them gloomily. He had not removed his fur hat. His chin was sunk upon his chest, so that his long nose partly obscured his mouth. His eyes, glinting under his heavy brows, looked up at the monks, darting suspiciously from one to the other. His long staff rested beside him, leaning at a sharp angle over the back of the chair.
For a little time he said nothing.
‘My loyal servant, Boris Davidov Bobrov: where is he?’ he quietly enquired.
‘Up at Russka,’ someone said, and then shut his mouth as though he had not spoken.
Ivan looked neither to right nor left.
‘Fetch him,’ he intoned.
One of the Oprichniki vanished through the door. Several long moments of silence followed. Then the piercing eyes fell upon the abbot.
‘You were sent an oxhide. Where is it?’
If the old abbot looked terrified, his fear was no worse than that which now came over Daniel. Suddenly, in this new and awful light, face to face with the Tsar, the plan which once had seemed so daring now appeared pitiful. It was also impertinent. His legs suddenly felt cold. He wished he were hidden at the back of the room.
‘Brother Daniel was put in charge of it,’ he heard the abbot say. ‘He can explain to you what he has done.’
Now he felt the Tsar’s eyes upon him.
‘Where is my oxhide, Brother Daniel?’
There was nothing else for it.
‘As you said we might, Gosudar, we used it to mark out a patch of ground, which, if Your Majesty is so gracious, might be granted to your loyal monastery.’
Ivan stared at him.
‘You ask for no more?’
‘No, great lord, it is enough.’
The Tsar rose. He seemed to tower over them all.
‘Show me.’
The idea had been nothing if not ingenious. After all, the Tsar’s message had been quite explicit: they were to use the oxhide to enclose the land. Why not, then, cut it into strips? Better yet, why not subdivide the strips? Or even better still …
It had been at the end of the summer that Daniel had set the monks to work. Using sharpened combs and knives they had proceeded, day after day, to take the oxhide apart, making from it not just fine strips of leather but a thread. With care and ingenuity this thread, now wound carefully round a block of wood, could be unravelled to enclose no less than a hundred acres. The area had been staked out by Daniel on St Nicholas’s Day.
Now, with the spindle of thread in his hand, he trudged across the snow, followed by Ivan, the abbot and the Oprichniki, to the place where the stakes began. He had just begun to unwind the thread when he heard Ivan’s voice.
‘Enough. Come here.’
This was it then. Death, he supposed. He went and stood before the Tsar.
Ivan reached forward his long hand and took Daniel by the beard.
‘A cunning monk,’ he said softly. ‘Yes, a cunning monk.’ He looked bleakly at the abbot. ‘The Tsar keeps his word. You shall have your land.’
The two monks bowed low, both praying fervently.
‘I shall remain here tonight,’ Ivan went on. He nodded his head thoughtfully. ‘And before I depart, you shall learn to know me better.’
He turned; and now he smiled. For hurrying across the snow came a figure in black.
‘Ah,’ he cried, ‘here he comes, a loyal servant. Boris Davidov,’ he called, ‘you shall help these cunning monks to know me better.’ Then, gazing down at the abbot, he announced: ‘Come, it is almost time for Vespers.’
It was already dark outside when, amidst the bright glow from all the candles they could muster, the trembling monks sang the service of Vespers.
Facing them, having donned the golden robes used on the highest feast days, Tsar Ivan stood and, with a strange, grim smile, conducted them