Russka - Edward Rutherfurd [372]
She was standing by the bath house. She saw the two men come from the lane and pause at the bottom of the slope. She watched intently. Then they parted, Sergei remaining by the water’s edge while the Cossack started up the slope to the house.
The girl smiled. It couldn’t have been better. The one she loved – alone.
It was a few minutes later that Sergei looked up to see the girl walking quietly along the bank towards him. The first rays of the sun were catching her hair. It did not take long for him to understand what she wanted. And a little while afterwards, in a pleasant clearing in the woods above the house, though the girl was not Olga, he managed, almost, to pretend to himself that she was.
Old Arina was furious. She had seen them, in the early morning, sneaking down from the woods towards the house. She had not even needed to question her niece to guess at once.
Now it was noon and the old woman was alone with Sergei on the verandah. She might be a serf, but she had also been his nanny. She was not afraid of him. And she was giving him a piece of her mind.
‘You are shameless. You write pretty poems, but you’re a selfish monster. And God will punish you, Sergei Alexandrevich, I swear He will.’ She positively glowered at him. ‘And so He should!’
‘I’m sorry, my duck,’ he said with a lame smile. ‘I dare say nothing will come of it.’
‘I shall marry her to someone in the village, straight away, just in case,’ old Arina said. ‘I’ll get your mother’s permission and you’ll be lucky if I don’t tell your brother Alexis. I just hope we can find a young man. They’re not so keen to be father to your brats, you know …’ And she went on for some time before she noticed that Sergei’s attention was riveted elsewhere.
‘Look,’ he said softly. And she turned.
The large carriage swept up the track to the house. It pulled up not by the main door, but in front of the stables to one side; Sergei and the old woman could see its occupants getting out. First came his brother Alexis, a look of grim triumph on his face. Then a stern-looking soldier.
And now. Sergei went completely white.
For from the back of the carriage, his hands in chains, they were pulling down a grim, bearded figure who, when he finally straightened up, towered over them all.
They had captured Savva Suvorin.
And Sergei knew it was his fault.
That single moment of carelessness in a Moscow street.
He had been so surprised to see the tall figure of Savva Suvorin that without even thinking he had called out his name. And when it seemed that Savva had not heard him Sergei had foolishly run across to him and taken him by the arm. Only as he did so and felt Suvorin stiffen did he remember – of course, the tall serf was still a runaway.
Sergei had always been appalled by the way the Suvorins had been treated. ‘Don’t worry, I won’t give you away,’ he quickly said.
But Savva was taking no chances. ‘A mistake,’ he muttered. ‘My name is not Savva.’ And he turned and disappeared through a doorway.
Sergei did not go after him. He stood there for a moment or two, looking up and down the street. It was as he did so that he suddenly realized they were only a few yards from the walled compound of the Theodosian sect. ‘The Theodosians,’ he muttered. ‘Of course, that must be it.’
He had heard how these Old Believers took people in and sometimes gave them false names and papers. No doubt this was the case with Savva Suvorin. Well, good luck to him. He turned away.
And it was only then that he realized that his manservant was standing beside him; and remembered that he was one of the serfs from the Russka estate. How much had the fellow heard? It was then that he had threatened him with a thrashing if he repeated anything.
Evidently, it had not worked.
There was a round-faced