Bedlam: The Further Secret Adventures of Charlotte Bronte

8

The secret adventures of John Slade.

1849 March. Winter gradually released its frosty grip on Moscow. Snow fouled by ashes and manure gradually thawed. People filled the city streets, basking in the weak sunlight. They savored the warming air and dreamed of the long-awaited spring.

In the Presnya quarter, wagons laden with coal rattled past factories whose machinery clanged, pounded, and roared incessantly. Smoke and steam issued from a bathhouse near the workers’ barracks. John Slade entered, stripped off his clothes in the changing room, then lay on a marble table in a bath chamber. An attendant sprinkled him with boiling water, lathered him with soap, and scrubbed him down. Slade endured a vigorous massage, then a whipping with a broom made of twigs, to stimulate blood circulation. He rinsed himself in a pool of ice-cold water, then went to the steam room. He sat on a bench, one towel draped over his lap, another over his head and shoulders to protect him from hot clouds of steam, and he waited.

The three Russian intellectuals joined him, one at a time. These days they were careful not to be seen together in public. They met at different places where nobody knew them. When they were all seated, Peter the poet said, “Bad news, comrades. There was a raid on a meeting last night. Sasha, Ilya, and Boris were arrested.”

Fyodor the journalist cursed. Alexander the professor shook his head. Arrests were ever more frequent; the Third Section had intensified surveillance on the dissidents. Slade himself had had a policeman following him around since January, when he’d published an article in a magazine that advocated revolution. He had easily spotted his shadow, and he easily managed to shake it off when he wanted. The rest of the time he led the policeman around town, pretending not to know he was there, keeping him on the string for future use.

“I had a visit from the Third Section last week,” Fyodor said, pale despite the heat. “Three of them came to my rooms. They offered me a job writing propaganda for the Tsar. They said that if I refuse, I’ll be sent to Siberia.”

Banishment to that cold, remote wasteland was a common punishment for opposing the Tsar’s regime. Wagons full of exiles departed from Moscow daily.

“I have bad news, too,” Alexander said. “Today I lost my post at the university. The Third Section convinced the administration that I am a bad influence on my students.”

He removed his spectacles and wiped sweat, or tears, from his eyes. Peter said, “They’re eliminating us one after another! We have to do something!”

“We’ll call a special meeting,” Fyodor said. “We’ll talk about the problem.”

Peter jeered. “Talk has gotten us nowhere.”

“He’s right.” Slade hid his reluctance to speak behind the fiery passion for revolt that was part of his disguise. “It’s time to take action.”

Peter eagerly took the bait. “Yes! We must strike back!” He pounded his fist into his palm. “We must fight fire with fire!”

“But we swore that we would never resort to violence,” Fyodor said. “To do so would make us no better than our enemies.” But Slade could see that he was ready to be persuaded.

“They’ve given us no choice!” Peter persisted.

“This is war,” Slade said. “In war, no holds are barred.”

Even as Fyodor nodded, Alexander said, “How can we fight a war against the Tsar’s regime? It is too strong. We are so few, so weak, and so unorganized. Besides, we don’t have enough guns.”

Here it was, the opportunity for which Slade had been laying the groundwork ever since he’d met Peter, Fyodor, and Alexander. Here the Russians were, at the point toward which Slade had been covertly, carefully urging them. Triumph excited him at the same time he felt ashamed of how easy it had been. Manipulation was one of his best talents as a spy, one reason he’d drawn this assignment. But never had he been so loath to use it on trusting, unsuspecting subjects.

Slade spoke quickly before his companions, or he himself, could lose heart. “There are acts of war that can be carried out by a few men. And I own a gun. All we need is one.”

Understanding dawned on the Russians’ faces. “You mean assassination,” Fyodor said.

Slade held up his empty palms: What else is left?

“I’m all for it,” Peter declared.

Shocked by the turn the conversation had taken, Alexander said, “If you’re thinking of assassinating the Tsar, that’s impossible. We can’t get to him in the Kremlin.”

“Not the Tsar,” Slade said. “Someone who is not so well guarded but just as much our enemy. Someone whose murder would strike terror into the heart of the regime and inspire the intellectuals, the workers, and the peasants to unite and rise up against the Tsar.”

“Prince Alexis Orlov,” Fyodor suggested. “The Chief of the Third Section.”

Orlov was widely feared and hated. He was exactly the target Slade had in mind.

Fyodor and Peter, excited by their own audacity, set out to convince Alexander that they must assassinate the prince. After much argument, he gave in. “But how should we go about it? We are inexperienced in these matters.”

The three Russians looked to Slade. He felt his heart sink under a guilt as heavy and cold as the snow that had buried Moscow all winter. He reminded himself that his loyalty was not to his Russian friends; his duty lay elsewhere.

“I have a plan,” Slade said. “Listen.”