Bedlam: The Further Secret Adventures of Charlotte Bronte

17

The secret adventures of John Slade

1849 June. Summer in Moscow flares briefly, like a fever before the chills of winter return. In the alleys around Trubnaya Square, northeast of the Kremlin, red lights burned above the doors of squalid brothels. Cheap prostitutes in tawdry finery called invitations to men who passed. Some of the men stopped to banter, bargain, and take their pleasure. But Peter, Fyodor, Alexander, and Slade ignored the women. Furtive and solemn, they hurried along. The Russians sweated in the coats they wore despite the hot night. Peter the poet carried Slade’s pistol hidden under his coat. He had volunteered to do the shooting. Although Peter had been eager and confident when they’d planned the assassination, Slade could see his bravado wane. By the time they reached Tsvetnoy Boulevard, Peter was trembling with nerves.

“Don’t worry,” Fyodor said. “It will be over soon. Then we can go have a drink.”

Peter responded with a sickly smile. Slade felt no less ill: he knew the Russians would never drink together again.

Elegant mansions inhabited by expensive courtesans lined the boulevard. Inside, chandeliers sparkled behind velvet drapes. Piano music and laughter tinkled from open windows, but the street was empty. Slade and his friends slipped through the gate of one small, exclusive establishment and hid in the shrubbery in the garden. The air was heavy with the odors of garbage and flowers, perfume and latrines. They waited for Prince Orlov. Their spying had produced the information that he spent every Wednesday night in this brothel, with his favorite courtesan.

The revelry ended. Silence engulfed the street as the women entertained clients in their boudoirs. Hours passed. The street slumbered. Slade watched the Russians grow more nervous by the moment. Near two o’clock, they tensed and became alert. The Prince always left the brothel at that hour. Slade and the other men riveted their gazes on the door. Peter drew the pistol in his shaking hand and took aim.

A carriage rumbled up the street. Plekhanov and six other policemen from the Third Section jumped out of the vehicle and charged into the garden. They assailed Slade and the Russians in a welter of punches, kicks, and shouts. The Russians screamed and struggled as the police wrested the gun away from Peter and pinned them on the ground. Slade fought valiantly. The police singled him out for a particularly rough beating before they finally overcame him. They put iron shackles on him and his friends.

“You’re under arrest for conspiracy to commit assassination,” Plekhanov said.

“How did they know we were here?” Peter asked as the police dragged him and the others to the carriage.

“Someone must have talked.” Fyodor regarded Slade and his friends with suspicion. “Have we a traitor among us?”

“It’s not me,” Peter and Alexander hastened to say.

“Nor me.” Slade’s nose was bleeding, his mouth swollen. “We weren’t careful enough. We must have been overheard by a spy.”

“That’s enough babbling,” Plekhanov said.

As he and his men pushed the prisoners into the carriage, Slade looked toward the mansion. In the doorway stood Prince Orlov. His body was thick with fat and muscle. His bald head resembled a bullet, hard and shiny as steel, rising from a thick neck to a rounded point at the top. He studied his four would-be assassins through the monocle that glinted in his right eye. His unsmiling gaze lingered on Slade.

A hot, sultry morning suffocated Moscow. Slade stood in Prince Orlov’s office inside the Kremlin. His shirt was stained with blood; bruises marked his face. Orlov studied Slade from behind a carved mahogany desk the size of Red Square.

“I owe you my thanks.” Contempt inflected his rough voice. He didn’t like rats, even though he employed hundreds of them. But his contempt was nothing compared to that which Slade felt for himself. He had just sent three hapless men to their death.

The Prince looked over Slade’s injuries. “I am sorry about your face.” He didn’t sound sorry. “It was necessary, you understand.”

Slade nodded. The police hadn’t wanted to favor him and expose him as the man who’d betrayed Peter, Alexander, and Fyodor. The three Russians would “disappear,” but Slade would be freed to continue working for the Third Section. The bruises and scars from a beating by the police would give him extra cachet with the other secret societies that he’d already infiltrated. Now he tasted his own blood; he welcomed the pain. A beating was far less punishment than he deserved.

“You have proved to be worth ten other informants,” Orlov said with grudging respect. “I can use a man of your skills. From now on, you work directly for me.”

Slade felt no triumph, even though he’d achieved his goal of penetrating the Tsar’s inner court. He was as happy as a man can be when he stands before the gates of hell and watches them open.