Annie Vivanti

“ Not the terror-haunted hours of madness and crime, not the anguish-stricken nights passed at the bedside of those I loved, not my own life-struggles with the monsters of disease and dementia, tearing at the very roots of my life—no, the darkest hour of my life was that glorious summer morning in Venice, when I was brought from the prison of La Giudecca to attend my trial at the Criminal Court. The sun flung a sparkling net of diamonds athwart the blue waters of the lagoon, and the gondola bore me with peaceful splash of oar over the dancing waters. ”

“ How keenly have I envied some women I have known—women who were not beautiful, not brilliant and not young, but by whose sick-bed in their hour of pain a husband watched in tenderness and pity, faithful throughout the years, throughout the changes that time brings, faithful to the sad and pallid woman who had the right to lay her faded cheek upon his breast.
None, none of those who vowed they loved me, would have loved me thus! Not Vassili, not Bozevsky, not Stahl, not Kamarowsky. Prilukoff perhaps? Who knows? ”

“ Elise is crying again.
But perfect peace has descended into my soul. Paul is not dead. He lives! he lives! Nothing else matters but this—he lives.
The train still rushes along, beating rhythmic time to many tunes that are in my head; I gaze out of the window, at the whirling landscape that swings past like a giant chess-board, at the telegraph [292] wires that dip, and then ascend slowly and dip again. Hours pass or days pass.... And the train stops.
Elise is hurriedly collecting cloaks and satchels.
“Where are we, Elise? Are we in Venice?”
“Not yet; not yet. We are in Vienna.” ”

“ Our rooms at the hotel in Florence were bright with sunshine and with the frivolous gaiety of a graceful trio of Russian ladies—the Princess Dubinskaja, her sister Vera Vojatschek, and the fair-haired Olga Kralberg, who came to see us every day. But I felt lost and lonely, as if astray in the world. My mother had returned to Russia, and my vacant and aching heart invoked Vassili, who, alas! was never by my side.
“You must win him back,” said Olga Kralberg to me one day—she, whose fate it was on a not distant day to commit suicide for his sake. ”

“ The love that varies not from day to day,
A tranquil love, unruffled and serene—
was not the love I knew. My storm-tossed heart did not recognize it. Neither on that day nor ever could I bring myself to believe that Paul Kamarowsky really loved me.
During those few moments that we were alone together on the terrace, we arranged that I should start with Tioka and Elise that very evening, during the dinner hour, leaving all our trunks behind us for my betrothed to see to after we had left. ”

“ You who in such dark hours can shelter your sufferings in the protecting shadow of your home, you who can seek refuge in a husband's tenderness and hide your stricken brow upon a faithful breast, can you not summon one throb of sorrow to your womanly hearts, one gleam of pity to your gentle eyes, when you think of the tortures I dragged from hotel to hotel, seeking to conceal my martyrdom from the inquisitive or indifferent gaze of strangers, not daring to confide in the man who loved me but who yet was almost a stranger?... ”

“ I invent all manner of falsehoods; I repeat the tale of insults and outrages that I have endured at the hands of Kamarowsky; I accuse him of violence and brutality ... and even as I tell these mad stories they seem to myself to be true. I am thrilled by my own words; I tremble, I weep convulsively; and Naumoff, ever more pale, ever more bewildered, does not know what to believe.
Continually, a dozen times a day, blind to all caution, reckless of all consequences, I send telegrams to Prilukoff—the telegrams that afterwards were found, and led to our arrest—“Berta refuses.” ”

“ The strange Russian woman whose hand slew no man, but whose beauty drove those who loved her to commit murder for her sake, will soon have ended her eight years' captivity and will come forth into the world once more.
I have not sought in any way to minimize her guilt, or attenuate her responsibility for the sin and death that followed in her train. Though she must be held blameless for the boy Peter Tarnowsky's tragic fate and even for Dr. Stahl's suicide, yet Bozevsky's death, Naumoff's downfall and the murder of Count Kamarowsky will forever be laid at her door. ”

“ I made a grimace at those hateful boots and hurried away to shut myself in my room and await Elise.
She would come in, pale and tidy in her red woolen dressing-gown, with a little cap on her head. She sat down quietly by my bedside and held my hand. Sometimes she read aloud to me; sometimes she repeated Swiss poems and ballads that she remembered from her schooldays; and I soon grew calm again as I listened to her quiet voice and felt the clasp of her small roughened hand on mine.
Gradually a sort of frenzied fear of Kamarowsky took possession of me. ”

“ She who has pursued me since my birth! She who has caught us and crushed us all in her torturing grip, splintering us like frail glass bubbles in her hand! Now she had entered the sick room of Paul Kamarowsky, had brooded over his bedside, and in fiendish pleasantry had scourged the old surgeon's brain with madness, whipping it to frenzy as a child whips a top, guiding his hand to tear the injured body and reopen the fast-healing wounds. ”

“ He was the first, the last, the only lover of my devastated youth, and by his side the brief springtime of my happiness flowered and died. When the fearful death that was so soon to lay him low came upon him, when I saw him fall at my feet shot by Vassili—my reason gave way. The rest of my life lies behind me like a somber nightmare landscape, through which I wander, groping in the dark, stumbling forward on my way to perdition.... ”

“ At this very hour of dawn the train has reached Venice. Nicolas Naumoff is hastening from the Riva degli Schiavoni, across the empty piazza and the deserted streets. He hails a gondola. “Campo Santa Maria del Giglio!”
And the gondola, with soft plash of oar, glides slowly towards the doomed sleeper.
[290] What dreams may the angel of rest have sent to him for the last time? Perhaps the tender vision of little Grania has gladdened him, while silent and inexorable in the closed gondola the youth with the golden eyes steals towards him through the mazes of the clear canals. ”

“ Yet sometimes I dream that it is all not true, that he still lives, that one day the door of my cell will open, and the lover of my youth appear to me again. I shall see him standing on the threshold, a halo of sunshine lighting his fair hair, like some young martyr-saint come to deliver me from my bondage. The hand I wounded will be filled with roses, and his clear voice will call me by my name.
Then rising from this gloomy prison bench I [84] shall move to meet him. Shame and crime and captivity will fall away from me like a dark and worn-out cloak. ”

“ Light as air I swung round in Bozevsky's arm. I could have wished to dance thus forever—dance, dance to the very brink of life and, still dancing, to plunge over into the abyss of death.
As we whirled round I perceived that Vassili was watching us. He was drinking champagne with vodka in it and was laughing loudly while he spoke to Stahl; but his eyes never left me as I swept round the ballroom with Bozevsky. His gaze alarmed me. I was dizzy and out of breath, [92] but I did not dare to stop dancing for fear of Vassili. I danced and danced, breathless and distraught ”

“ Let us thank Him, Donat, for not permitting us to do harm to any one. Let us begin life all over again—a new, honorable life.”
“Ah, no,” groaned Prilukoff. “I am a criminal. I have stolen!”
“Never mind, never mind. You will give it all back. I will help you to give it all back. We must be prepared to face suffering and humiliation, but we shall atone; we shall take up our lives again, and retrieve and redeem the past.”
Even while I spoke I resolved that I would confess everything to Kamarowsky, and this thought filled me with joy. ”

“ I think of my mother, of little Peter, and of Bozevsky; I remember a pink dress I once wore here in Vienna, at a reception of the Russian Embassy.... I think of little Tioka and his days for saying “No.” ... How far, how far away it all is! What a gulf of guilt and sorrow have my tottering footsteps traversed since then.... But now—now I will climb tremblingly, devoutly, the steep road that leads back to safety; humbled to my knees I will pour out my thanks. For Paul Kamarowsky is saved; he lives and will recover!
The man at my side is dragging me roughly forward. ”

“ I thought of Otrada, my home. But how could my unhappy father protect me against the loving persistence of Kamarowsky, against Naumoff's passionate daring, or Prilukoff's diabolic designs?
In the rare moments when I was alone with Elise, we talked it over. In trembling whispers, glancing constantly round lest the Scorpion should be on the watch, we concerted the manner of our flight.
We made a thousand different plans, all equally extravagant and impracticable. In our luxurious hotel rooms we were imprisoned like mice in a trap. ”

“ With a bitter smile I recalled the story of the English hunters in India who succeeded in capturing that most precious and sacred among all animals: a white elephant. And having captured it they knew not what to do with it. They trailed it after them across land and sea—ponderous, slow, magnificent; and nobody wanted it, and nobody knew what to do with it nor how to get rid of it. Prilukoff's stolen money was indeed a white elephant for us.
Kamarowsky with his little son had joined us in Vienna, bringing all our luggage with him. ”

“ The switchback plunges downward in its mad race to the abyss—the end is near.
At Kieff, as arranged, I meet Naumoff.
I sob out my despair to him. Paul Kamarowsky must die. I give no reason, I explain nothing; I repeat unceasingly the three words: “He must die,” until there seem to be no other words in the world—until the universe seems to ring with those three words: “He must die!” ”

“ Naumoff believed it all. His astonishment and indignation knew no bounds. What? Kamarowsky, whom he had always thought the most chivalrous and considerate of men, was a despicable, worthless coward? Well, Naumoff would challenge him; he would fight a duel to the death with him who had been his best friend.
But not that, not that was what I wanted.
[262] Tioka recovered. Taller, thinner and paler, he came out once more into the sunshine, leaning on my arm, enraptured at everything, greeting every ray of light and every winged or flowering thing as if it were a new acquaintance. ”

“ At last, having compelled me to repeat the abominable vow, having forced me to invoke once more the seraphic image of little Tioka as tutelar genius of a monstrous crime, he went away, passing through my dressing-room to an outer passage at the back of the hotel.
Elise dressed me and placed me in an armchair near the window, where I reclined, trembling and weak. Then I sent word to Count Kamarowsky that I would see him.
He came in full of emotion and joy. “At last, at last you are better,” he cried, his kind eyes alight with pleasure. “But how pale you are, how dreadfully pale.” ”

“ But Kamarowsky interrupted me.
“Hush, Marie, hush. I know that you have suffered [165] much and that you have been led astray. But let the dead past bury the past. All I ask of you is the pure white page of the future.”
“You are generous, you are kind,” I said, and tears burned in my eyes. “But let me tell you, let me tell you all—”
“Mura,” he said, calling me by the tender pet-name of my childhood, “do not raise impassable barriers between us. What I have no knowledge of does not exist so far as I am concerned. The unknown is but a shadow; and I am not afraid of shadows. ”

“ A wave of thankfulness came over me; repentance for all my past doubts and transgressions flooded my heart.
How could I ever have doubted Paul Kamarowsky's love? Was not the absolute faith he reposed in me—the blind unquestioning faith that in my folly I had often resented—was it not after all the highest homage that a noble heart could bestow? Henceforth the aim of my life should be to render myself worthy of his trust and love. ”

“ At that moment some one in the crowd—a woman—laughed. As if that sound had shattered the spell that held them mute, the mob broke into a tumult of noise, a storm of hisses and cries, shrieks and jeers, hootings and maledictions, while, rising above it and more cruel than all, was the laughter, the strident, mocking laughter that accompanied my every step and gesture.
And there, tall and motionless in the midst of the laughing, hissing, shrieking mob, stood my father, his white hair stirring in the breeze, his eyes—the proud blue O'Rourke eyes—fixed upon me. ”

“ Redeeming and triumphant there came to me at last the Angel of Maternity. With proud humility I bore the little human flower fluttering in my breast. [37] At every throb of life I felt myself swooning with joy—with the ineffable joy of my reconquered purity.
My mother was with me, and in the tender haven of her arms I found shelter for my meek and boundless ecstasy.
How is it possible, I asked myself, that there are women who dread this perfect happiness, who weep and suffer through these months fraught with rapturous two-fold life? ”

“ Whereas, coward that I had been, the fear of disgrace had vanquished me, and the threat of ignominy and death had dragged the inhuman vow from my lips.... And now Tioka was paying for it.
The fierce primitive instinct of maternity awoke [256] within me. Weakened by illness and wakefulness, my spirit lost itself again in the dark labyrinth of superstition. My frantic gaze passed from Tioka—lying wan and wasted on his pillows, gasping like a little dying bird—to Kamarowsky stretched out in an armchair, with his flaccid hands hanging at his sides and the corners of his mouth relaxed in sleep. ”

“ I am conscious of a dull pain in the nape of my neck. Then I see Vassili come in; he is carrying an enormous cage in his hand; and Olga follows him, laughing and radiant. “Here he is! here he is!” cries Vassili triumphantly, putting the cage down beside me; and in it, to my horror, I see a parrot, a huge gray and scarlet creature, twisting a hard black tongue round and round as he clambers about the cage. I cry out in terror: “Why—why do they bring me things that frighten me?” And I burst into tears. Every one gazes at me in amazement ”

“ Bozevsky liked to find me reading. He would arrive in the evening—usually after Vassili had gone out, alone or with friends—and enter [64] the drawing-room with bright and cheerful greeting. He always smiled when he found me with one of his books in my hand, sitting beside Aunt Sonia placidly knitting in her armchair.
“I like your thoughts to be far away from here,” he would say, kissing my hand. “I like to know that your soul is far from the frivolous society you live in, far from the petty preoccupations, the compliments and the flattery which surround you. ”

“ The train slackens speed, falters, shivers—stops. [8] I am at Trani; at the furthermost end of Italy; almost beyond civilization; almost out of the world.
Soon I shall see before me the woman I have come so far to seek: the woman who never gave the gift of love without the gift of death.
The high white walls of the penitentiary glared down in the blazing southern sun. The languid Adriatic trailed its blue silken waters past the barred windows. I raised the heavy knocker; it fell from my hand with a reverberating clang, and the massive prison-door opened slowly before me. ”

“ We closed the door, and found ourselves shut up with Prilukoff, ferocious and maniacal, who glowered at us with the eye of a tiger.
A thousand times in my weakness and despair I was on the point of throwing the door wide open and calling for help—calling Kamarowsky and Naumoff, and crying to them: “Look! a man is shut up in here. For days and days he has been torturing and threatening me. The man is a criminal and a thief, and he has been my lover. ”

“ As soon as we reached the frontier I telegraphed to Prilukoff. I wanted to send Elise back to Hyères with the money, but she refused to leave me.
“What if Mr. Prilukoff were to kill me,” she cried. “Then what would your ladyship and poor little Master Tioka do, all alone in the world?”
“But my good Elise, why on earth should Mr. Prilukoff kill you?”
“I don't know,” sighed Elise. “But he has become so strange of late—” and after a pause, she added, under her breath: “We have all become very strange.” ”

“ The least peculiar among us was Count Kamarowsky. Yet even he, I fancy, was not quite like other people. His was not a strong nature, like that of some men I had known. Perhaps the Slav blood is responsible for much that is abnormal and unconventional. Surely we are from the inmost depths of our nature strangely removed from the Teutonic, the Anglo-Saxon and even the Latin races, and our thoughts and actions must frequently appear to them singular and incomprehensible.
As for Paul Kamarowsky, his dread of suffering was so great that he preferred to know nothing that might cause him distress. ”