Flashman at the Charge

For a long moment we just stared at each other, and then we both found our voices in the same phrase: ".What on earth are you doing here?" And then we stopped, uncertainly, until I said:

"I was captured at Balaclava, three weeks back."

"They took me at Silistria, three months ago. I've been here five weeks and two days."

And then we stared at each other some more, and finally I said:

"Well, you certainly know how to make a fellow at home. Ain't you going to offer me a chair, even?"

He jumped up at that, colouring and apologizing—still the same raw Scud, I could see. He was taller and thinner than I remembered; his brown hair was receding, too, but he still had that quick, awkward nervousness I remembered.

"I'm so taken aback," he stuttered, pulling up a chair for me. "Why—why, I am glad to see you, Flashman! Here, give me your hand, old fellow! There! Well—well—my, what a mountainous size you've grown, to be sure! You always were a big … er, a tall chap, of course, but … I say, isn't this a queer fix, us meeting again like this … after so long! Let's see, it must be fourteen, no fifteen, years since … since … ah …"

"Since Arnold kicked me out for being pissy drunk?" He coloured again. "I was going to say, since we said goodbye."

"Aye. Well, ne'er mind. What's your rank, Scud? Major, eh? I'm a colonel."

"Yes," says he. "I see that." He gave me an odd, almost shy grin. "You've done well—everyone knows about you all the fellows from Rugby talk about you, when one meets 'em, you know … "

"Do they, though? Not with any great love, I'll be bound, eh, young Scud?"

"Oh, come!" cries he. "What d'you mean? Oh, stuff! We were all boys then, and boys never get on too well, 'specially when some are bigger and older and … why, that's all done with years ago! Why—everyone's proud of you, Flashman! Brooke and Green—and young Brooke—he's in the Navy, you know." He paused. "The Doctor would have been proudest of all, I'm sure."

Aye, he probably would, thinks I, the damned old hypocrite.

… everyone knows about Afghanistan, and India, and all that," he ran on. "I was out there myself, you know, in the Sikh campaign, when you were winning another set of laurels. All I got was a shot wound, a hole in my ribs, and a broken arm. "²³ He laughed ruefully. "Not much to show, I'm afraid—and then I bought out of the 101st, and—but heavens, how I'm rattling on! Oh, it is good to see you, old fellow! This is the best, most famous thing! Let me have a good look at you! By George, those are some whiskers, though!"

I couldn't be sure if he meant it, or not. God knows, Scud East had no cause to love me, and the sight of him had so taken me back to that last black day at Rugby that I'd momentarily forgotten we were men now, and things had changed—perhaps even his memories of me. For he did seem pleased to see me, now that he'd got over his surprise—of course, that could just be acting on his part, or making the best of a bad job, or just Christian decency. I found myself weighing him up; I'd knocked him about a good deal, in happier days, and it came as a satisfaction to realize that I could probably still do it now, if it came to the pinch; he was still smaller and thinner than I. At that, I'd never detested him as much as his manly-mealy little pal, Brown; he'd had more game in him than the others, had East, and now—well, if he was disposed to be civil, and let bygones be bygones … We were bound to be stuck together for some months at least.

All this in a second's consideration—and you may think, what a mean and calculating nature, or what a guilty conscience. Never you mind; I know my own nature hasn't changed in eighty years, so why should anyone else's? And I never forget an injury—I've done too many of 'em.

So I didn't quite enter into his joyous spirit of reunion, but was civil enough, and after he had got over his sham-ecstasies at meeting his dear old school-fellow again, I said:

"What about this place, then—and this fellow Pencherjevsky?"

He hesitated a moment, glanced towards the wall, got up, and as he walked over to it, said loudly: "Oh, it is as you see it—a splendid place. They've treated me well—very well indeed." And then he beckoned me to go over beside him, at the same time laying a finger on his lips. I went, wondering, and followed his pointing finger to a curious protuberance in the ornate carving of the panelling beside the stove. It looked as though a small funnel had been sunk into the carving, and covered with a fine metal grille, painted to match the surrounding wood.

"I say, old fellow," says East, "what d'you say to a walk? The Count has splendid gardens, and we are free of them, you know."

I took the hint, and we descended the stairs to the hall, and out on to the lawns. The lounging Cossack looked at us, but made no move to follow. As soon as we were at a safe distance, I asked:

"What on earth was it?"

"Speaking-tube, carefully concealed," says he. "I looked out for it as soon as I arrived—there's one in the next room, too, where you'll be. I fancy our Russian hosts like to be certain we're not up to mischief."

"Well, I'm damned! The deceitful brutes! Is that any way to treat gentlemen? And how the deuce did you know to look for it?"

"Oh, just caution," says he, offhand, but then he thought for a moment, and went on: "I know a little about such things, you see. When I was taken at Silistria, although I was officially with the Bashi-Bazouk people, I was more on the political side, really. I think the Russians know it, too. When they brought me up this way I was most carefully examined at first by some very shrewd gentlemen from their staff—I speak some Russian, you see. Oh, yes, my mother's family married in this direction, a few generations ago, and we had a sort of great-aunt who taught me enough to whet my interest. Anyway, on top of their suspicions of me, that accomplishment is enough to make 'em pay very close heed to H. East, Esq."

"It's an accomplishment you can pass on to me as fast as you like," says I. "But d'you mean they think you're a spy?"

"Oh, no, just worth watching—and listening to. They're the most suspicious folk in the world, you know; trust no one, not even each other. And for all they're supposed to be thick-headed barbarians, they have some clever jokers among em."

Something made me ask: "D'you know a chap called Ignatieff- Count Ignatieff?"

"Do I not!" says he. "He was one of the fellows who ran the rule over me when I came up here. That's Captain Swing with blue blood, that one—why, d'you know him?"

I told him what had happened earlier in the day, and he whistled. "He was there to have a look and a word with you, you may depend on it. We must watch what we say, Flashman—not that our consciences aren't clear, but we may have some information that would be useful to them." He glanced about. "And we won't feed their suspicions by talking too much where they can't hear us. Another five minutes, and we'd better get back to the room. If we want to be private there, at any time, we'll hang a coat over their confounded tube—you may believe me, that works. But before we go in, I'll tell you, as quickly as I may, those things that are better said in the open air."

It struck me, he was a cool, assured hand, this East—of course, he had been all that as a boy, too.

"Count Pencherjevsky—an ogre, loud-mouthed, brutal, and a tyrant. He's a Cossack, who rose to command a hussar regiment in the army, won the Tsar's special favour, and retired here, away from his own tribal land. He rules his estate like a despot, treats his serfs abominably, and will surely have his throat cut one day. I can't abide him, and keep out of his way, although I sometimes dine with the family, for appearance's sake. But he's been decent enough, I'll admit; gives me the run of the place, a horse to ride, that sort of thing."

"Ain't they worried you might ride for it?" says I.

"Where to? We're two hundred miles north of the Crimea here, with nothing but naked country in between. Besides, the Count has a dozen or so of his old Cossacks in his service—they're all the guard anyone needs. Kubans, who could ride down anything on four legs. I saw them bring back four serfs who ran away, soon after I got here—they'd succeeded in travelling twenty miles before the Cossacks caught them. Those devils brought them back tied by the ankles and dragged behind their ponies—the whole way!" He shuddered. "They were flayed to death in the first few miles!"

I felt my stomach give one of its little heaves. "But, anyway, those were serfs," says I. "They wouldn't do that sort of thing to -"

"Wouldn't they, though?" says he. "Well, perhaps not. But this ain't England, you know, or France, or even India. This is Russia—and these land-owners are no more accountable than … than a baron in the Middle Ages. Oh, I dare say he'd think twice about mishandling us—still, I'd think twice about getting on his wrong side. But, I say, I think we'd best go back, and treat 'em to some harmless conversation—if anyone's bothering to listen."

As we strolled back, I asked him a question which had been exercising me somewhat. "Who's the fair beauty I saw when I arrived?"

He went red as a poppy, and I thought, o-ho, what have we here, eh? Young Scud with lecherous notions—or pure Christian passion, I wonder which?

"That would be Valentina," says he, "the Count's daughter. She and her Aunt Sara—and an old deaf woman who is a cousin of sorts—are his only family. He is a widower." He cleared his throat nervously. "One sees very little of them, though—as I said, I seldom dine with the family. Valentina … ah … is married."

I found this vastly amusing—it was my guess that young Scud had gone wild about the little bundle—small blame to him—and like the holy little humbug he was, preferred to avoid her rather than court temptation. One of Arnold's shining young knights, he was. Well, lusty old Sir Lancelot Flashy had galloped into the lists now—too bad she had a husband, of course, but at least she'd be saddle-broken. At that, I'd have to see what her father was like, and how the land lay generally. One has to be careful about these things.

I met the family at dinner that afternoon, and a most fascinating occasion it turned out to be. Pencherjevsky was worth travelling a long way to see in himself—the first sight of him, standing at his table head, justified East's description of ogre, and made me think of Jack and the Beanstalk, and smelling the blood of Englishmen, which was an unhappy notion, when you considered it.

He must have been well over six and a half feet tall, and even so, he was broad enough to appear squat. His head and face were just a mass of brown hair, trained to his shoulders and in a splendid beard that rippled down his chest. His eyes were fine, under huge shaggy brows, and the voice that came out of his beard was one of your thunderous Russian basses. He spoke French well, by the way, and you would never have guessed from the glossy colour of his hair, and the ease with which he moved his huge bulk, that he was over sixty. An enormous man, in every sense, not least in his welcome.

"The Colonel Flashman," he boomed. "Be happy in this house. As an enemy, I say, forget the quarrel for a season; as a soldier, I say, welcome, brother." He shook my hand in what was probably only the top joints of his enormous fingers, and crushed it till it cracked. "Aye—you look like a soldier, sir. I am told you fought in the disgraceful affair at Balaclava, where our cavalry were chased like the rabble they are. I salute you, and every good sabre who rode with you. Chased like rabbits, those tuts*(*Renegades.) and moujiks on horseback. Aye, you would not have chased my Kubans so—or Vigenstein's Hussars²⁴ when I had command of them—no, by the Great God!" He glowered down at me, rumbling, as though he would break into "Fee-fi-fo-fum" at any moment, and then released my hand and waved towards the two women seated at the table.

"My daughter Valla, my sister-in-law, Madam Sara." I bowed, and they inclined their heads and looked at me with that bold, appraising stare which Russian women use—they're not bashful or missish, those ladies. Valentina, or Valla, as her father called her, smiled and tossed her silver-blonde head—she was a plumply pert little piece, sure enough, but I spared a glance for Aunt Sara as well. She'd be a few years older than I, about thirty-five, perhaps, with dark, close-bound hair and one of those strong, masterful, chiselled faces—handsome, but not beautiful. She'd have a moustache in a few years, but she was well-built and tall, carrying her bounties before her.

For all that Pencherjevsky looked like Goliath, he had good taste—or whoever ordered his table and domestic arrangements had. The big dining-room, like all the apartments in the house, had a beautiful wood-tiled floor, there was a chandelier, and any amount of brocade and flowered silk about the furnishings. (Pencherjevsky himself, by the way, was dressed in silk: most Russian gentlemen wear formal clothes as we do, more or less, but he affected a magnificent shimmering green tunic, clasped at the waist by a silver-buckled belt, and silk trousers of the same colour tucked into soft leather boots—a most striking costume, and comfortable too, I should imagine.)

The food was good, to my relief—a fine soup being followed by fried fish, a ragout of beef, and side-dishes of poultry and game of every variety, with little sweet cakes and excellent coffee. The wine was indifferent, but drinkable. Between the vittles, the four fine bosoms displayed across the table, and Pencherjevsky's conversation, it was a most enjoyable meal.

He questioned me about Balaclava, most minutely, and when I had satisfied his curiosity, astonished me by rapidly sketching how the Russian cavalry should have been handled, with the aid of cutlery, which he clashed about on the table to demonstrate. He knew his business, no doubt of it, but he was full of admiration for our behaviour, and Scarlett's particularly.

"Great God, there is an English Cossack!" says he. "Uphill, eh? I like him! I like him! Let him be captured, dear Lord, and sent to Starotorsk, so that I can keep him forever, and talk, and fight old battles, and shout at each other like good companions!"

"And get drunk nightly, and be carried to bed!" says Miss Valla, pertly—they enter into talk with the men, you know, these Russian ladies, with a freedom that would horrify our own polite society. And they drink, too—I noticed that both of them went glass for glass with us, without becoming more than a trifle merry.

"That, too, golubashka," says Pencherjevsky. "Can he drink, then, this Scarlett? Of course, of course he must! All good horse-soldiers can, eh, colonel? Not like your Sasha, though," says he to Valla, with a great wink at me. "Can you imagine, colonel, I have a son-in-law who cannot drink? He fell down at his wedding, on this very floor—yes, over there, by God!—after what? A glass or two of vodka! Saint Nicholas! Aye, me—how I must have offended the Father God, to have a son-in-law who cannot drink, and does not get me grandchildren."

At this Valla gave a most unladylike snort, and tossed her head, and Aunt Sara, who said very little as a rule, I discovered, set down her glass and observed tartly that Sasha could hardly get children while he was away fighting in the Crimea.

"Fighting?" cries Pencherjevsky, boisterously. "Fighting—in the horse artillery? Whoever saw one of them coming home on a stretcher? I would have had him in the Bug Lancers, or even the Moscow Dragoons, but—body of St Sofia!—he doesn't ride well! A fine son-in-law for a Zaporozhiyan hetman,* (*Leader.) that!"

"Well, dear father!" snaps Valla. "If he had ridden well, and been in the lancers or the dragoons, it is odds the English cavalry would have cut him into little pieces—since you were not there to direct operations!"

"Small loss that would have been," grumbles he, and then leaned over, laughing, and rumpled her blonde hair. "There, little one, he is your man—such as he is. God send him safe home."

I tell you all this to give you some notion of a Russian country gentleman at home, with his family—although I'll own that a Cossack may not be typical. No doubt he wasn't to East's delicate stomach—and I gather he didn't care for East too much, either—but I found myself liking Pencherjevsky. He was gross, loud, boisterous—boorish, if you like, but he was worth ten of your proper gentlemen, to me at any rate. I got roaring drunk with him, that evening, after the ladies had retired—they were fairly tipsy themselves, and arguing at the tops of their voices about dresses as they withdrew to their drawing-room—and he sang Russian hunting songs in that glorious organ voice, and laughed himself sick trying to learn the words of "The British Grenadiers". I flatter myself he took to me enormously—folk often do, of course, particularly the coarser spirits—for he swore I was a credit to my regiment and my country, and God should send the Tsar a few like me.

"Then we should sweep you English bastards into the sea!" he roared. "A few of your Scarletts and Flashmans and Carragans—that is the name, no?—that is all we need!"

But drunk as he was, when he finally rose from the table he was careful to turn in the direction of the church and cross himself devoutly, before stumbling to guide me up the stairs.

I was to see a different side to Pencherjevsky—and to all of them for that matter—in the winter that followed but for the first few weeks of my sojourn at Starotorsk I thoroughly enjoyed myself, and felt absolutely at home. It was so much better than I had expected, the Count was so amiable in his bear-like, thundering way, his ladies were civil (for I'd decided to go warily before attempting a more intimate acquaintance with Valla) and easy with me, and East and I were allowed such freedom, that it was like month of week-ends at an English country-house, without any of the stuffiness. You could come and go as you pleased, treat the place as your own, attend at mealtimes or feed in your chamber, whichever suited—it was Liberty Hall, no error. I divided my days between working really-hard at my Russian, going for walks or rides with Valla and Sara or East, prosing with the Count in the evenings playing cards with the family they have a form of whist called "biritsch" which has caught on in England this last few years, and we played that most evenings—and generally taking life easy. My interest in Russian they found especially flattering, for they are immensely proud and sensitive about their country, and I made even better progress than usual. I soon spoke and understood it better than East—"He has a Cossack somewhere in his family!" Pencherjevsky would bawl. "Let him add a beard to those foolish English whiskers and he can ride with the Kubans—eh, colonel?"

All mighty pleasant—until you discovered that the civility and good nature were no deeper than a May frost, the thin covering on totally alien beings. For all their apparent civilization, and even good taste, the barbarian was just under the surface, and liable to come raging out. It was easy to forget this, until some word or incident reminded you—that this pleasant house and estate were like a medieval castle, under feudal law; that this jovial, hospitable giant, who talked so knowledgeably of cavalry tactics and the hunting field, and played chess like a master, was also as dangerous and cruel as a cannibal chief; that his ladies, chattering cheerfully about French dressmaking or flower arrangement, were in some respects rather less feminine than Dahomey Amazons.

One such incident I'll never forget. There was an evening when the four of us were in the salon, Pencherjevsky and I playing chess—he had handicapped himself by starting without queen or castle, to make a game of it—and the women at some two-handed game of cards across the room. Aunt Sara was quiet, as usual, and Valla prattling gaily, and squeaking with vexation when she lost. I wasn't paying much attention, for I was happy with the Count's brandy, and looked like beating him for once, too, but when I heard them talking about settling the wager I glanced across, and almost fell from my chair.

Valla's maid and the housekeeper had come into the room. The maid—a serf girl—was kneeling by the card table, and the housekeeper was carefully shearing off her long red hair with a pair of scissors. Aunt Sara was watching idly; Valla wasn't even noticing until the housekeeper handed her the tresses."Ah, how pretty!" says she, and shrugged, and tossed them over to Aunt Sara, who stroked them, and said:

"Shall I keep them for a wig, or sell them? Thirty roubles in Moscow or St Petersburg_ " And she held them up in the light, considering.

"More than Vera is worth now, at any rate," says Valla, carelessly. Then she jumped up, ran across to Pencherjevsky, and put her arms round his shaggy neck from behind, blowing in his ear. "Father, may I have fifty roubles for a new maid?"

"What's that?" says he, deep in the game. "Wait, child, wait; I have this English rascal trapped, If only … "

"Just fifty roubles, father. See, I cannot keep Vera now."

He looked up, saw the maid, who was still kneeling, cropped like a convict, and guffawed. "She doesn't need hair to hang up your dresses and fetch your shoes, does she? Learn to count your aces, you silly girl."

"Oh, father! You know she will not do now! Only fifty roubles—please—from my kind little batiushka!"* (*Father.)

"Ah, plague take you, can a man not have peace? Fifty roubles, then, to be let alone. And next time, bet something that I will not have to replace out of my purse." He pinched her cheek. "Check, colonel."

I've a strong stomach, as you know, but I'll admit that turned it—not the disfigurement of a pretty girl, you understand, although I didn't hold with that, much, but the cheerful unconcern with which they did it—those two cultured ladies, in that elegant room, as though they had been gaming for sweets or counters . And now Valla was leaning on her father's shoulder, gaily urging him on to victory, and Sara was running the hair idly through her hands, while the kneeling girl bowed her pathetically shorn head to the floor and then followed the housekeeper from the room. Well, thinks I, they'd be a rage in London society, these two. You may have noticed , by the way, that the cost of a maid was fifty roubles, of which her hair was worth thirty.

Of course, they didn't think of her as human. I've told you something of the serfs already, and most of that I learned first-hand on the Pencherjevsky estate, where they were treated as something worse than cattle. The more fortunate of them lived in the outbuildings and were employed about the house, but most of them were down in the village, a filthy, straggling place of log huts, called isbas, with entrances so low you had to stoop to go in. They were foul, verminous hovels, consisting of just one room, with a huge bed bearing many pillows, a big stove, and a "holy corner" in which there were poor, garish pictures of their saints.

Their food was truly fearful—rye bread for the most part, and cabbage soup with a lump of fat in it, salt cabbage, garlic stew, coarse porridge, and for delicacies, sometimes a little cucumber or beetroot. And those were the well-fed ones. Their drink was as bad—bread fermented in alcohol which they call gvass ("it's black, it's thick, and it makes you drunk," as they said), and on special occasions vodka, which is just poison. They'll sell their souls for brandy, but seldom get it.

Such conditions of squalor, half the year in stifling heat, half in unimaginable cold, and all spent in back-breaking labour, are probably enough to explain why they were such an oppressed, dirty, brutish, useless people—just like the Irish, really, but without the gaiety. Even the Mississippi niggers were happier—there was never a smile on the face of your serf, just patient, morose misery.

And yet that wasn't the half of their trouble. I remember the court that Pencherjevsky used to hold in a barn at the back of the house, and those cringing creatures crawling on their bellies along the floor to kiss the edge of his coat, while he pronounced sentence on them for their offences. You may not believe them, but they're true, and I noted them at the time.

There was the local dog-killer—every Russian village is plagued in winter by packs of wild dogs, who are a real danger to life, and this fellow had to chase and club them to death—he got a few kopecks for each pelt. But he had been shirking his job, it seemed.

"Forty strokes of the cudgel," says Pencherjevskey. And then he added: "Siberia," at which a great wail went up from the crowd trembling at the far end of the barn. One of the Cossacks just lashed at them with his nagaika*(* Cossack whip.) and the wail died.

There was an iron collar for a woman whose son had run off, and floggings, either with the cudgel or the whip, for several who had neglected their labouring in Pencherjevsky's fields. There was Siberia for a youth employed to clean windows at the house, who had started work too early and disturbed Valla, and for one of the maids who had dropped a dish. You will say, "Ah, here Flashy pulling the long bow", but I'm not, and if you don't believe me, ask any professor of Russian history.²⁵

But here's the point—if you'd suggested to Pencherjevsky or his ladies, or even to the serfs, that such punishments were cruel, they'd have thought you were mad. It seemed the most natural thing in the world to them.—why, I've seen a man cudgelled by the Cossacks in Pencherjevsky's courtyard—tied to a post half-naked in the freezing weather, and smashed with heavy rods until he was a moaning lump of bruised and broken flesh, with half his ribs cracked—and through it all Valla was standing not ten yards away, never even glancing in his direction, but discussing a new sledge-harness with one of the grooms.

Pencherjevsky absolutely believed that his moujiks were well off. "Have I not given them a stone church, with a blue dome and gilt stars? How many villages can show the like, eh?" And when those he had condemned to years of exile in Siberia were driven off in a little coffle under the nagaikas of the Cossacks—they would be taken to the nearest town, to join other unfortunates, and they would all walk the whole way—he was there to give them his blessing, and they would embrace his knees, crying: "Izvenete, batiushka, veno vat,"* (*Pardon, father, I am guilty.) and he would nod and say "Horrosho,"*(*Very well.) while the housekeeper gave them bundles of dainties from the "Sudarinia*(*Lady.) Valla". God knows what they were—cucumber rinds, probably.

"From me they have strict justice, under the law," says this amazing gorilla. "And they love me for it. Has anyone ever seen the knout, or the butuks,* (*Press for crushing feet.) used on my estate? No, and never shall. If I correct them, it is because without correction they will become idle and shiftless, and ruin me—and themselves. For without me, where are they? These poor souls, they believe the world rests on three whales swimming in the Eternal Sea! What are you to do with such folk? I will meet with the best; the wisest of them, the spokesman of their gromada,* (*Village assembly.) driving his droshky.*(*Gig.). 'Ha, Ivan,' I will say, 'your axles squeal; why do you not grease them?' And he ponders, and replies, 'Only a thief is afraid to make a noise, batiushka.' So the axles remain ungreased—unless I cudgel his foolish head, or have the Cossacks whip and salt his back for him. And he respects me"—he would thump his great fist on his thigh as he said it "because he knows I am a bread and salt man, and go with my neck open, as he does.²⁶ And I am just—to the inch."

And you may say he was: when he flogged his dvornik*(*Porter.) for insolence, and the fellow collapsed before the prescribed punishment was finished, they sent him to the local quack—and when he was better, gave him the remaining strokes. "Who would trust me again, if I excused him a single blow?" says Pencherjevsky.

Now, I don't recite all these barbarities to shock or excite your pity, or to pose as one of those holy hypocrites who pretend to be in a great sweat about man's inhumanity to man. I've seen too much of it, and know it happens wherever strong folk have absolute power over spiritless creatures. I merely tell you truly what I saw—as for my own view, well, I'm all for keeping the peasants in order, and if hammering 'em does good, and makes life better for the rest of us, you won't find me leaping between the tyrant and his victim crying "Stay, cruel despot!" But I would observe that much of the cruelty I saw in Russia was pure senseless brutishness—I doubt if they even enjoyed it much. They just knew no better.

I wondered sometimes why the serfs, dull, ignorant, superstitious clods though they were, endured it. The truth, as I learned it from Pencherjevsky, was that they didn't, always. In the thirty years just ending when I was in Russia, there had been peasant revolts once every fortnight, in one part of the country or another, and as often as not it had taken the military to put them down. Or rather, it had taken the Cossacks, for the Russian army was a useless thing, as we'd seen in the Crimea. You can't make soldiers out of slaves. But the Cossacks were free, independent tribesmen; they had land, and paid little tax, had their own tribal laws, drank themselves stupid, and served the Tsar from boyhood till they were fifty because they loved to ride and fight and loot—and they liked nothing better than to use their nagaikas on the serfs, which was just nuts to them.

Pencherjevsky wasn't worried about revolution among his own moujiks because, as I say, he regarded himself as a good master. Also he had Cossacks of his own to strike terror into any malcontents. "And I never commit the great folly," says he. "I never touch a serf-woman—or allow one to be used or sold as a concubine." (Whether he said it for my benefit or not, it was bad news, for I hadn't had a female in ages, and some of the peasants—like Valla's maid—were not half bad-looking once they were washed.) "These uprisings on other estates—look into them, and I'll wager every time the master has ravished some serf wench, or stolen a moujik's wife, or sent a young fellow into the army so that he can enjoy his sweetheart. They don't like it, I tell you—and I don't blame them! If a lord wants a woman, let him marry one, or buy one from far afield—but let him slake his lust on one of his own serf-women, and he'll wake up one fine morning with a split head and his roof on fire. And serve him right!"

I gathered he was unusual in this view: most landlords just used the serf-wenches the way American owners used their nigger girls, and pupped 'em all over the place. But Pencherjevsky had his own code, and believed his moujiks thought the better of him for it, and were content. I wondered if he wasn't gammoning himself.

Because I paid attention, toady-like, to his proses, and was eager in studying his language, he assumed I was interested in his appalling country and its ways, and was at pains to educate me, as he saw it. From him I learned of the peculiar laws governing the serfs—how they might be free if they could run away for ten years, how some of them were allowed to leave the estates and work in the towns, provided they sent a proportion of earnings to their master; how some of these serfs became vastly rich—richer than their masters, sometimes, and worth millions—but still could not buy their freedom unless he wished. Some serfs even owned serfs. It was an idiotic system, of course, but the landowners were all for it, and even the humanitarian ones believed that if it were changed, and political reforms allowed, the country would dissolve in anarchy. I daresay they were right, but myself I believe it will happen anyway; it was starting even then, as Pencherjevsky admitted.

"The agitators are never idle," says he. "You have heard of the pernicious German Jew, Marx?" (I didn't like to tell him Marx had been at my wedding, as an uninvited guest.*(*See Royal Flash)) "He vomits his venom over Europe—aye, he and other vile rascals like him would spread their poison even to our country if they could.²⁷ Praise God the moujiks are unlettered folk—but they can hear, and our cities crawl with revolutionary criminals of the lowest stamp. What do they understand of Russia, these filth? What do they seek to do but ruin her? And yet countries like your own give harbour to such creatures, to brew their potions of hate against us! Aye, and against you, too, if you could only see it! You think to encourage them, for the downfall of your enemies, but you will reap the wild wind also, Colonel Flashman!"

"Well, you know, Count," says I, "we let chaps say what they like, pretty well, always have done. We don't have any kabala,*(*Slavery.) like you—don't seem to need it, for some reason. Probably because we have factories, and so on, and everyone's kept busy, don't you know? I don't doubt all you say is true—but it suits us, you see. And our moujiks are, well, different from yours." I wondered, even as I said it, if they were; remembering that hospital at Yalta, I doubted it. But I couldn't help adding: "Would your moujiks have ridden into the battery at Balaclava?"

At this he roared with laughter, and called me an evil English rascal, and clapped me on the back. We were mighty close, he and I, really, when I look back—but of course, he never really knew me.

So you see what kind of man he was, and what kind of a place it was. Most of the time, I liked it—it was a fine easy life until, as I say, you got an unpleasant reminder of what an alien, brooding hostile land it was. It was frightening, then, and I had to struggle to make myself remember that England and London and Elspeth still existed, that far away to the south Cardigan was still croaking "Haw-haw" and Raglan was fussing in the mud at Sevastopol. I would look out of my window sometimes, at the snow-frosted garden, and beyond it the vast, white, endless plain, streaked only by the dark field-borders, and it seemed the old world was just a dream. It was easy then, to get the Russian melancholy, which sinks into the bones, and is born of a knowledge of helplessness far from home.

The thing that bored me most, needless to say, was being without a woman. I tried my hand with Valla, when we got to know each other and I had decided she wasn't liable to run squealing to her father. By George, she didn't need to. I gave her bottom a squeeze, and she laughed at me and told me she was a respectable married woman; taking this as an invitation I embraced her, at which she wriggled and giggled, puss-like, and then hit me an atrocious clout in the groin with her clenched fist, and ran off, laughing. I walked with a crouch for days, and decided that these Russian ladies must be treated with respect.

East felt the boredom of captivity in that white wilderness more than I, and spent long hours in his room, writing. One day when he was out I had a turn through his papers, and discovered he was writing his impressions, in the form of an endless letter to his odious friend Brown, who was apparently farming in New Zealand. There was some stuff about me in it, which I read with interest:

"… I don't know what to think of Flashman. He is very well liked by all in the house, the Count especially, and I fear that little Valla admires him, too—it would be hard not to, I suppose, for he is such a big, handsome fellow. (Good for you, Scud; carry on.) I say I fear—because sometimes I see him looking at her, with such an ardent expression, and I remember the kind of brute he was at Rugby, and my heart sinks for her fair innocence. Oh, I trust I am wrong! I tell myself that he has changed—how else did the mean, cowardly, spiteful, bullying toady (steady, now, young East) become the truly brave and valiant soldier that he now undoubtedly is? But I do fear, just the same; I know he does not pray, and that he swears, and has evil thoughts, and that the cruel side of his nature is still there. Oh, my poor little Valla—but there, old fellow, I mustn't let my dark suspicions run away with me. I must think well of him, and trust that my prayers will help to keep him true, and that he will prove, despite my doubts, to be an upright, Christian gentleman at last."

You know, the advantage to being a wicked bastard is that everyone pesters the Lord on your behalf; if volume of prayers from my saintly enemies means anything, I'll be saved when the Archbishop of Canterbury is damned. It's a comforting thought.

So time passed, and Christmas came and went, and I was slipping into a long, bored tranquil snooze as the months went by. And I was getting soft, and thoroughly off guard, and all the time hell was preparing to break loose.

It was shortly before "the old wives' winter", as the Russians call February, that Valla's husband came home for a week's furlough. He was an amiable, studious little chap, who got on well with East, but the Count plainly didn't like him, and once he had given us the news from Sevastopol—which was that the siege was still going on, and getting nowhere, which didn't surprise me—old Pencherjevsky just ignored him, and retired moodily to his study and took to drink. He had me in to help him, too, and I caught him giving me odd, thoughtful looks, which was disconcerting, and growling to himself before topping up another bumper of brandy, and drinking sneering toasts to "the blessed happy couple", as he called them.

Then, exactly a week after Valla's husband had gone back—with no very fond leave-taking from his little spouse, it seemed to me—I was sitting yawning in the salon over a Russian novel, when Aunt Sara came in, and asked if I was bored. I was mildly surprised, for she seldom said much, or addressed one directly. She looked me up and down, with no expression on that fine horse face, and then said abruptly:

"What you need is a Russian steam-bath. It is the sovereign remedy against our long winters. I have told the servants to make it ready. Come."

I was idle enough to be game for anything, so I put on my tulup,*(*Sheepskin coat.) and followed her to one of the farthest outbuildings, beyond the house enclosure; it was snowing like hell, but a party of the servants had a great fire going under a huge grille out in the snow, and Aunt Sara took me inside to show me how the thing worked. It was a big log structure, divided down the middle by a high partition, and in the half where we stood was a raised wooden slab, like a butcher's block, surrounded by a trench in the floor. Presently the serfs came in, carrying on metal stretchers great glowing stones which they laid in the trench; the heat was terrific, and Aunt Sara explained to me that you lay on the slab, naked, while the minions outside poured cold water through openings at the base of the wall, which exploded into steam when it touched the stones.

"This side is for men-folk," says she. "Women are through there"—and she pointed to a gap in the partition. "Your clothes go in the sealed closet on the wall, and when you are ready you lie motionless on the slab, and allow the steam to envelop you." She gave me her bored stare. "The door is bolted from within." And off she went, to the other side of the partition.

Well, it was something new, so I undressed. and lay on the slab, Aunt Sara called out presently from beyond the partition, and the water came in like Niagara. It hissed and splashed on the stones, and in a twinkling the place was like London fog, choking, scalding, and blotting you in, and you lay there gasping while it sweated into you, turning you scarlet. It was hellish hot and clammy, but not unpleasant, and I lay soaking in it; by and by they pumped in more water, the steam gushed up again, and I was turning over drowsily on my face when Aunt Sara's voice spoke unexpectedly at my elbow.

"Lie still," says she, and peering -through the mist, I saw that she was wrapped in a clinging sheet, with her long, dark hair hanging in wet strands on either side of that strong, impassive face. I suddenly choked with what East would have called dark thoughts; she was carrying a bunch of long birch twigs, and as she laid a hot, wet hand on my shoulder she muttered huskily: "This is the true benefit of the baths; do not move."

And then, in that steam-heat, she began to birch me, very lightly at first, up the backs of my legs and to my shoulders, and then back again, harder and harder all the time, until I began to yelp. More steam came belching up, and she turned me over and began work on my chest and stomach. I was fairly interested by now, for mildly painful though it was, it was distinctly stimulating.

"Now, for me," says she, and motioned me to get up and take the birches. "Russian ladies often use nettles," says she, and for once her voice was unsteady. "I prefer the birch—it is stronger." And in a twinkling she was out of her sheet and face down on the slab. I was having a good gloat down at that long, strong, naked body, when the damned serfs blotted everything out with steam again, so I lashed away through the murk, belabouring her vigorously; she began to moan and gasp, and I went at it like a man possessed, laying on so that the twigs snapped, and as the steam cleared again she rolled over on her back, mouth open and eyes staring, and reached out to seize hold of me, pumping away at me and gasping:

"Now! Now! For me! Pajalsta! I must have! Now! Pajalsta!"

Now, I can recognize a saucy little flirt when I see one, so I gave her a few last thrashes and leaped aboard, nearly bursting. God, it must have been months—so in my perversity, I had to tease her, until she dragged me down, sobbing and scratching at my back, and we whaled away on that wet slab, with the steam thundering round us, and she writhed and grappled fit to dislocate herself, until I began to fear we would slither off on to the hot stones. And when I lay there, utterly done, she slipped away and doused me with a bucket of cold water—what with one thing and another, I wonder I survived that bath.

Mind you, I felt better for it; barbarians they may be, but the Russians have some excellent institutions, and I remain grateful to Sara—undoubtedly my favourite aunt.

I supposed, in my vanity, that she had just proposed our steam-bath romp to help pass the winter, but there was another reason, as I discovered the following day. It was a bizarre, unbelievable thing, really, to people like you and me, but in feudal Russia—well, I shall tell you.

It was after the noon meal that Pencherjevsky invited me to go riding with him. This wasn't unusual, but his manner was; he was curt and silent as we rode—if it had been anyone but this hulking tyrant, I'd have said he was nervous. We rode some distance from the house, and were pacing our beasts through the silent snow-fields, when he suddenly began to talk—about the Cossacks, of all things. He rambled most oddly at first, about how they rode with bent knees, like jockeys ( which I'd noticed anyway), and how you could tell a Ural Cossack from the Black Sea variety because one wore a sheepskin cap and the other the long string-haired bonnet. And how the flower of the flock were his own people, the Zaporozhiyan Cossacks, or Kubans, who had been moved east to new lands near Azov by the Empress generations ago, but he, Pencherjevsky, had come back to the old stamping-ground, and here he would stay, by God, and his family after him forever.

"The old days are gone," says he, and I see him so clearly still, that huge bulk in his sheepskin tulup, hunched in his saddle, glowerin with moody, unseeing eyes across the white wilderness, with the blood-red disc of the winter sun behind him. "The day of the great Cossack, when we thumbed our noses at T'sar and Sultan alike, and carried our lives and liberty on our lance-points. We owed loyalty to none but our comrades and the hetman we elected to lead us—I was such a one. Now it is a new Russia, and instead of the hetman we have rulers from Moscow to govern the tribe. So be it. I make my place here, in my forefathers' land, I have my good estate, my moujiks, my land—the inheritance for the son I never sired." He looked at me. "I would have had one- Like you, a tall lancer fit to ride at the head of his own sotnia* (*Company, band.) You have a son, eh? A sturdy fellow? Good. I could it were not so—that you had no wife in England, no son, nothing to bind you or call you home. I would say to you then: 'Stay with us here. Be as a son to me. Be a Husband to my daughter, and get yourself a son, and me and a grandson, who will follow after us, and hold our land here, in this new Russia, this empire born of storm, where only a man who is a man can hope to plant himself and his seed and endure.' That is what I would say."

Well, it was flattering, no question, although I might have pointed out to him that Valla had a husband already, and even if I'd been free and willing ..-. but it occurred to me that he probably Wasn't the man to let a little thing like that stand in the way. Morrison may not have been much of a father-in-law , but this chap would have been less comfortable still.

"As it is," he growled on, "I have a son-in-law—you saw what kind of a thing he is. God knows how any daughter of mine could … but there. I have doted on her, and indulged her, for her dear mother's sake—aye, and because I loves her. And if he was the last man I would have chosen for her—well, she cared for him, and I thought, their sons will have my blood, they may be Cossacks, horse-and-lance men, grandchildren to be proud of. But I have no grandsons—he gets me none!"

And he growled and spat and then swung round to face me. For a moment he wrestled with his tongue, and couldn't speak, and then it came out in a torrent.

"There must be a man to follow me here! I am too old now, there are no children left in me, or I would marry again. Valla, my lovely child, is my one hope—but she is tied to this … this empty thing, and I see her going childless to her grave. Unless …" He was gnawing at his lip, and his face was terrific. "Unless … she can bear me a grandson. It is all I have to live for! To see a Pencherjevsky who will take up this inheritance when I am gone—be his father who he will, so long as he is a man! It cannot be her husband, so . . If it is an offence against God, against the Church, against the law—I am a Cossack, and we were here before God or the Church or the law! I do not care! I will see a male grandchild of mine to carry my line, my name, my land—and if I burn in hell for it, I shall count it worth the cost! At least a Pencherjevsky shall rule here—what I have built will not be squandered piecemeal among the rabble of that fellow's knock-kneed relatives! A man shall get my Valla a son!"

I'm not slow on the uptake, even with a bearded baboon nearly seven feet tall roaring at my face from a few inches away, and what I understood from this extraordinary outburst simply took my breath away. I'm all for family, you understand, but I doubt if I have the dynastic instinct as strong as all that.

"You are such a man," says he, and suddenly he edged his horse even closer, and crushed my arm in his enormous paw. "You can get sons—you have done so," he croaked, his livid face beside mine. "You have a child in England—and Sara has proved you also. When the war is over, you will leave here, and go to England, far away. No one will ever know—but you and I!"

I found my voice, and said something about Valla.

"She is my daughter," says he, and his voice rasped like an iron file. "She knows what this means to the house of Pencherjevsky. She obeys." And for the first time he smiled, a dreadful, crooked grin through his beard. "From what Sara tells me, she may be happy to obey. As for you, it will be no hardship. And"—he took me by the shoulder, rocking me in the saddle—"it may be worth much or little, but hereafter you may call Pencherjevsky from the other side of hell, and he will come to your side!"

If it was an extraordinary proposition, I won't pretend it was unwelcome. Spooky, of course, but immensely flattering, after all. And you only had to imagine, for a split second, what Pencherjevsky's reaction would have been to a polite refusal—I say no more.

"It will be a boy," says he, "I know it. And if by chance it is a girl—then she shall have a man for a husband, if I have to rake the world for him!"

An impetuous fellow, this Count—it never occurred to him that it might be his little Valla who was barren, and not her husband. However, that was not for me to say, so I kept mum, and left all the arrangements to papa.

He did it perfectly, no doubt with the connivance of that lustful slut Sara—there was a lady who took pleasure in her experimental work, all right. I sallied forth at midnight, and feeling not unlike a prize bull at the agricultural show—"'ere 'e is, ladies'n' gennelmen, Flashman Buttercup the Twenty-first of Horny Bottom Farm"—tip-toed out of the corridor where my room and East's lay, and set off on the long promenade to the other wing. It was ghostly in that creaky old house, with not a soul about, but true love spurred me on, and sure enough Valla's door was ajar, with a little sliver of light lancing across the passage floor.

I popped in—and she was kneeling beside the bed, praying! I didn't know whether it was for forgiveness for the sin of adultery, or for the sin to be committed successfully, and I didn't stop to ask. There's no point in talking, or hanging back shuffling on these occasions, and saying: "Ah … well, shall we …?" On the other hand, one doesn't go roaring and ramping at respectable married women, so I stooped and kissed her very gently, drew off her nightdress, and eased her on to the bed. I felt her plump little body trembling under my hands, so I kissed her long and carefully, fondling her and murmuring nonsense in her ear, and then her arms went round my neck.

Frankly, I think the Count had underestimated her horse artillery husband, for she had learned a great deal from somewhere. I'd been prepared for her to be reluctant, or to need some jollying along, but she entered into the spirit of the thing like a tipsy widow, and it was from no sense of duty or giving the house of Pencherjevsky its money's worth that I stayed until past four o'clock. I do love a bouncy blonde with a hearty appetite, and when I finally crawled back to my own chilly bed it was with the sense of an honest night's work well done.

But if a job is worth doing, it's worth doing well, and since there seemed to be an unspoken understanding that the treatment should be continued, I made frequent forays to Valla's room in the ensuing nights. And so far as I'm a judge, the little baggage revelled in being a dutiful daughter—they're a damned randy lot, these Russians. Something to do with the cold weather; I dare say. A curious thing was, I soon began to feel as though we were truly married, and no doubt this had something to do with the purpose behind our night games; yet during the day we remained on the same easy terms as before, and if Sara grudged her niece the pleasuring she was getting, she never let on. Pencherjevsky said nothing, but from time to time I would catch him eyeing us with sly satisfaction, fingering his beard at the table head.

East suspected something, I'm certain. His manner to me became nervous, and he avoided the family's society even more than before, but he didn't dare say anything. Too scared of finding his suspicions well grounded, I suppose.

The only fly in the ointment that I could see was the possibility that during the months ahead it might become apparent that I was labouring in vain; however, I was ready to face Pencherjevsky's disappointment when and if it came. Valla's yawns at breakfast were proof that I was doing my share manfully. And then something happened which made the whole speculation pointless.

From time to time in the first winter months there had been other guests at the big house of Starotorsk: military ones. The nearest township—where I'd encountered Ignatieff—was an important army headquarters, a sort of staging post for the Crimea, but as there was no decent accommodation in the place, the more important wayfarers were in the habit of putting up with Pencherjevsky. On these occasions East and I were politely kept in our rooms, with a Cossack posted in the corridor, and our meals sent up on trays, but we saw some of the comings and goings from our windows—Liprandi, for example, and a grandee with a large military staff whom East said was Prince Worontzoff. After one such visit it was obvious to both of us that some sort of military conference had been held in the Count's library—you could smell it the next morning, and there was a big map easel leaned up in a corner that hadn't been there before.

"We should keep our eyes and ears open," says East to me later. "Do you know—if we could have got out of our rooms when that confabulation was going on, we might have crept into the old gallery up yonder, and heard all kinds of useful intelligence."

This was a sort of screened minstrel's gallery that overlooked the library; you got into it by a little door off the main landing. But it was no welcome suggestion to me, as you can guess, who am all for lying low.

"Rot!" says I. "We ain't spies—and if we were, and the whole Russian general staff were to blab their plans within earshot, what could we do with the knowledge?"

"Who knows-" says he, looking keen. "That Cossack they put to watch our doors sleeps half the night—did you know? Reeking of brandy. We could get out, I daresay—I tell you what, Flashman, if another high ranker comes this way,, I think we're bound to try and overhear him, if we can. It's our duty."

"Duty?" says I, alarmed. "Duty to eavesdrop? What kind of company have you been keeping lately? I can't see Raglan, or any other honourable man, thinking much of that sort of conduct." The high moral line, you see; deuced handy sometimes. "Why, we're as good as guests in this place."

"We're prisoners," says he, "and we haven't given any parole. Any information we can come by is a legitimate prize of war—and if we heard anything big enough it might even be worth trying a run for it. We're not that far from the Crimea."

This was appalling. Wherever you go, however snug you may have made yourself, there is always one of these duty-bound, energetic bastards trying to make trouble. The thought of spying on the Russians, and then lighting out in the snow some dark night, with Pencherjevsky's Cossacks after us—my imagination was in full flight in a trice, while Scud stood chewing his lip, muttering his thoughtful lunacies. I didn't argue—it would have looked bad, as though I weren't as eager to strike a blow for Britannia as he was. And it wasn't even worth talking about—we weren't going to get the chance to spy, or escape, or do anything foolish. I'd have given a thousand to one on that—which, as it turned out, would have been very unwise odds to offer.

However, after that small discussion the weeks had slipped by without any other important Russians visiting the place, and then came my diversion with Valla, and East's ridiculous daydream went clean out of my mind. And then, about ten days after I had started galloping her, a couple of Ruski staff captains jingled into the courtyard one morning, to be followed by a large horse-sled, and shortly afterwards comes the Count's major-domo to East and me, presenting his apologies, and chivvying us off to our rooms.

We took the precaution of muffling the hidden speaking-tube, and kept a good watch from East's window that day. We saw more sleds arrive, and from the distant hum of voices in the house and the sound of tramping on the stairs we realized there must be a fair-sized party in the place. East was all excited, but what really stirred him was when a sled arrived late in the afternoon, and Pencherjevsky himself was in the yard to meet it—attired as we'd never seen him before, in full dress uniform.

"This is important," says East, his eyes alight. "Depend upon it, that's some really big wig. Gad! I'd give a year's pay to hear what passes below tonight." He was white with excitement. "Flashman, I'm going to have a shot at it!"

"You're crazy," says I. "With a Cossack mooching about the passage all night? You say he sleeps—he can wake up, too, can't he?"

"I'll chance that," says he, and for all I could try—appeals to his common sense, to his position as a guest, to his honour as an officer (I think I even invoked Arnold and religion) he remained set.

"Well, don't count on me," I told him. "It ain't worth it—they won't be saying anything worth a damn—it ain't safe, and by thunder, it's downright ungentlemanly. So now!"

To my surprise, he patted my arm. "I respect what you say, old fellow," says he. "But—I can't help it. I may be wrong, but I see my duty differently, don't you understand? I know it's St Paul's to a pub it'll be a fool's errand, but—well, you never know. And I'm not like you—I haven't done much for Queen and country. I'd like to try."

Well, there was nothing for it but to get my head under the bed-clothes that night and snore like hell, to let the world know that Flashy wasn't up to mischief. Neither, it transpired, was the bold East: he reported next day that the Cossack had stayed awake all night, so his expedition had to be called off. But the sleds stayed there all day, and the next, and they kept us cooped up all the time, and the Cossack remained vigilant, to East's mounting frenzy.

"Three days!" says he. "Who can it be, down there? I tell you, it must be some important meeting! I know it! And we have to sit here, like mice in a cage, when if we could only get out for an hour, we might find out something that would—oh, I don't know, but it might be vital to the war! It's enough to drive a chap out of his wits!"

"It already has," says I. "You haven't been shut up like this before, have you? Well, I've been a prisoner more times than I care to think of, and I can tell you, after a while you don't reason straight any longer. That's what's wrong with you. Also, you're tired out; get to sleep tonight, and forget this nonsense."

He fretted away, though, and I was almost out of patience with him by dinner-time, when who should come up with the servants bearing dinner, but Valla. She had just dropped in to see us, she said,- and was very bright, and played a three-handed card game with us, which was a trying one for East, I could see. He was jumpy as a cat with her at the best of times, blushing and falling over his feet, and now in addition he was fighting to keep from asking her what was afoot downstairs, and who the visitors were. She prattled on, till about nine, and then took her leave, and as I held the door for her she gave me a glance and a turn of her pretty blonde head that said, as plain as words: "It's been three nights now. Well?" I went back to my room next door, full of wicked notions, and leaving East yawning and brooding.

If I hadn't been such a lustful brute, no doubt prudence would have kept me abed that night. But at midnight I was peeping out, and there was the Cossack, slumped on… his stool, head back and mouth open, reeking like Davis's cellar. Valla's work, thinks I, the charming little wretch. I slipped past him, and he never even stirred, and I padded out of the pool of lamplight round him and reached the big landing.

All was still up here, but there was a dim light down in the hall, and through the banisters I could see two whitetunicked and helmeted sentries on the big double doors of the library, with their sabres drawn, and an orderly officer pacing idly about smoking a cigarette. It struck me that it wasn't safe to be gallivanting about this house in the dark—they might think I was on the East tack, spying—so I flitted on, and two minutes later was stallioning away like billy-o with my modest flower of the steppes—by jingo, she was in a fine state of passion, I remember. We had one violent bout, and then some warm wine from her little spirit lamp, and talked softly and dozed and played, and then went to it again, very slowly and wonderfully, and I can see that lovely white shape in the flickering light even now, and smell the perfume of that silver hair, and—dear me, how we old soldiers do run on.

"You must not linger too long, sweetheart," says she, at last. "Even drunk Cossacks don't sleep forever," and giggled, nibbling at my chin. So I kissed her a long goodnight, with endearments, resumed my nightshirt, squeezed her bouncers again for luck, and toddled out into the cold, along her corridor, down the little stairs to the landing—and froze in icy shock against the wall on the second step, my heart going like a hammer.

There was someone on the landing. I could hear him, and then see him by the dim light from the far corridor where my Count's room lay. He was crouched by the archway, listening, a man in a nightshirt, like myself. With a wrenching inward sigh, I realized that it could only be East.

The fool had stayed awake, seen the Cossack asleep, and was now bent on his crack-brained patriotic mischief. I hissed very gently, had the satisfaction of seeing him try to leap through the wall, and then was at his side, shushing him for all I was worth. He seized me, gurgling. "You! Flashman!" He let out a shuddering breath. "What -? You've been … why didn't you tell me?" I wondered what the blazes he meant, until he whispered fiercely: "Good man! Have you heard anything? Are they still there?"

The madman seemed to think I'd been on his eaves-dropping lay. Well, at least I'd be spared recriminations for fornicating with his adored object. I shook my head, he bit his lip, and then the maniac breathed in my ear: "Come, then, quickly! Into the gallery—they're still down there!" And while I was peeping, terrified, into the dimness through the banisters, where the white sentries were still on guard, he suddenly flitted from my side across the landing. I daren't even try a loud whisper to call him back; he was fumbling with the catch of the little door in the far shadows, and I was just hesitating before bolting for bed and safety, when from our corridor sounded a cavernous yawn. Panicking, I shot across like a whippet, clutching vainly at East as he slipped through the low aperture into the gallery. Come back, come back, you mad bastard, my lips were saying, but no sound emerged, which was just as well, for with the opening of the little gallery door the clear tones of someone in the library echoed up to us. And light was filtering up through the fine screen which concealed the gallery from the floor below. If our Cossack guard was waking, and took a turn to the landing, he'd see the dim glow from the open gallery door. Gibbering silently to myself, half-way inside the little opening, I crept forward, edging the door delicately shut behind me.

East was flat on the dusty gallery floor, his feet towards me; it stank like a church in the confined space between the carved wooden screen on the one hand and the wall on the other. My head was no more than a foot from the screen; thank God it was a nearly solid affair, with only occasional carved apertures. I lay panting and terrified, hearing the voice down in the library saying in Russian:

.. so there would be no need to vary the orders at present. The establishment is large enough, and would not be affected."

I remember those words because they were the first I heard, but for the next few moments I was too occupied with scrabbling at East's feet, and indicating to him in dumb show that the sooner we were out of this the better, to pay any heed to what they were talking about. But damn him, he wouldn't budge, but kept gesturing me to lie still and listen. So I did, and some first-rate military intelligence we overheard, too—about the appointment of a commissary-general for the Omsk region, and whether the fellow who commanded Orianburg oughtn't to be retired. Horse Guards would give their buttocks to know this, thinks I furiously, and I had just determined to slide out and leave East alone to his dangerous and useless foolery, when I became conscious of a rather tired, hoarse, but well-bred voice speaking in the library, and one word that he used froze me where I lay, ears straining:

"So that is the conclusion of our agenda? Good. We are grateful to you, gentlemen. You have laboured well, and we are well pleased with the reports you have laid before us. There is Item Seven, of course," and the voice paused. "Late as it is, perhaps Count Ignatieff would favour us with a resume of the essential points again."

Ignatieff. My icy bully of the registrar's office. For no reason I felt my pulse begin to run even harder. Cautiously I turned my head, and put an eye to the nearest aperture.

Down beneath us, Pencherjevsky's fine long table was agleam with candles and littered with papers. There were five men round it. At the far end, facing us, Ignatieff was standing, very spruce and masterful in his white uniform; behind him there was the huge easel, covered with maps. On the side to his left was a stout, white-whiskered fellow in a blue uniform coat frosted with decorations—a marshal if ever I saw one. Opposite him, on Ignatieff's right, was a tall, bald, beak-nosed civilian, with his chin resting on his folded hands. At the end nearest us was a high-backed chair whose wings concealed the occupant, but I guessed he was the last speaker, for an aide seated at his side was saying:

"Is it necessary, majesty? It is approved, after all, and I fear your majesty is over-tired already. Perhaps tomorrow… "

"Let it be tonight," says the hidden chap, and his voice was dog-weary. "I am not as certain of my tomorrows as I once was. And the matter is of the first urgency. Pray proceed, Count."

As the aide bowed I was aware of East craning to squint back at me. His face was a study and his lips silently framed the words: "Tsar? The Tsar?"

Well, who else would they call majesty?²⁸ I didn't know, but I was all ears and eyes now as Ignatieff bowed, and half-turned to the map behind him. That soft, metallic voice rang upwards from the library panelling.

"Item Seven, the plan known as the expedition of the Indus. By your majesty's leave."

I thought I must have misheard. Indus—that was in Northern India! What the devil did they have to do with that?

"Clause the first," says Ignatieff. "That with the attention of the allied Powers, notably Great Britain, occupied in their invasion of your majesty's Crimean province, the opportunity arises to further the policy of eastward pacification and civilization in those unsettled countries beyond our eastern and southern borders. Clause the second, that the surest way of fulfilling this policy, and at the same time striking a vital blow at the enemy, is to destroy, by native rebellion aided by armed force, the British position on the Indian continent. Clause the third, that the time for armed invasion by your majesty's imperial forces is now ripe, and will be undertaken forthwith. Hence, the Indus expedition."

I think I had stopped breathing; I couldn't believe what I was hearing.

"Clause the fourth," says Ignatieff. "The invasion is to be made by an imperial force of thirty thousand men, of whom ten thousand will be Cossack cavalry. General Duhamel," and he bowed towards the bald chap, "your majesty's agent in Teheran, believes that it would be assisted if Persia could be provoked into war against Britain's ally, Turkey. Clause the fifth -"

"Never mind the clauses," says Duhamel. "That advice has been withdrawn. Persia will remain neutral, but hostile to British interest—as she always has been."

Ignatieff bowed again. "With your majesty's leave. It is so agreed, and likewise approved that the Afghan and Sikh powers should be enlisted against the British, in our invasion. They will understand—as will the natives of India—that our expedition is not one of conquest, but to overthrow the English and liberate India." He paused. "We shall thus be liberating the people who are the source of Britain's wealth. "

He picked up a pointer and tapped the map, which was of Central Asia and Northern India. "We have considered five possible routes which the invasion might take. First, the three desert routes—Ust-Yurt-Khiva-Herat, or Raim-Bokhara, or Raim-Syr Daria-Tashkent. These, although preferred by General Khruleff'—at this the stout, whiskered fellow stirred in his seat—"have been abandoned because they run through the unsettled areas where we are still engaged in pacifying the Tajiks, Uzbeks and Khokandians, under the brigand leaders Yakub Beg and Izzat Kutebar. Although stinging reverses have been administered to these lawless bandits, and their stronghold of Ak Mechet occupied, they may still be strong enough to hinder the expedition's advance. The less fighting there is to do before we cross the Indian frontier the better."

Ignatieff lowered his pointer on the map. "So the southern routes, beneath the Caspian, are preferred—either through Tabriz and Teheran, or by Herat. An immediate choice is not necessary. The point is that infantry and artillery may be moved with ease across the South Caspian to Herat, while the cavalry move through Persia. Once we are in Persia, the British will have warning of our attempt, but by then it will be too late – far too late. We shall proceed through Kandahar and Kabul, assisted by the hatred which the Afghans owe the British, and so – to India.

"There are, by reliable report, twenty-five thousand British troops in India, and three hundred thousand native soldiers. These latter present no problem – once a successful invasion is launched, the majority of them will desert, or join in the rebellion which our presence will inspire. It is doubtful if, six months after we cross the Khyber, a single British soldier, civilian, or settlement will remain on the continent. It will have been liberated, and restored to its people. They will require our assistance, and armed presence, for an indefinite period, to guard against counter-invasion."

At this I heard East mutter, "I'll bet they will." I could feel him quivering with excitement; myself, I was trying to digest the immensity of the thing. Of course, it had been a fear in India since I could remember – the Great Bear coming over the passes, but no one truly believed they'd ever have the nerve or the ability to try it. But now, here it was – simple, direct, and certain. Not the least of the coincidences of our remarkable eavesdrop was that I, who knew as much about Afghan affairs from first hand, and our weakness on the north Indian frontier, as any man living, should be one of the listeners. As I took it in, I could see it happening; yes, they could do it all right.

"That, your majesty," Ignatieff was saying, "is an essential sketch of our purpose. We have all studied the plans in detail, as has your highness, and unless some new points have arisen from my resume, your majesty will no doubt wish to confirm the royal assent already given." He said it with deference, trying to hide his eagerness – your promoter anxious to get the official seal.

"Thank you, Count." It was the weak voice again. "We have it clear. Gentlemen?" There was a pause. "It is a weighty matter. No such attempt has ever been made before. But we are confident—are we not?"

Khruleff nodded slowly. "It has always been possible. Now it is a certainty. In a stroke, we clear the British from India, and extend your majesty's imperial … influence from the North Cape to the isle of Ceylon. No Tsar in history has achieved such an advance for our country. The troops are ample, the planning exact, the conditions ideal. The pick of Britain's army, and of her navy, are diverted in the Crimea, and it is certain that no assistance could be rendered in India within a year. By then—we shall have supplanted England in southern Asia. "²⁹

"And it can begin without delay?" says the Tsar's voice.

"Immediately, majesty. By the southern route, we can be at the Khyber, with every man, gun, and item of equipment, seven months from this night." Ignatieff was almost striking an attitude, his tawny head thrown back, one hand on the table. They waited, silently, and I heard the Tsar sigh.

"So be it, then. Forgive us, gentlemen, for desiring to hear it in summary again, but it is a matter for second, and third thoughts, even after the resolve has been given." He coughed, wearily. "All is approved, then—and the other items, with the exception of—yes, Item Ten. It can be referred to Omsk for further study. You have our leave, gentlemen."

At this there was a scrape of chairs, and East was kicking at me, and jabbing a finger at the door behind us. I'd been so spellbound by our enormous discovery, I'd almost forgotten where we were but, by gad, it was time we were no longer here. I edged back to the door, East crowding behind me, and then we heard Ignatieff s voice again.

"Majesty, with permission. In connection with Item Seven—the Indian expedition—mention was made of possible diversionary schemes, to prevent by all means any premature discovery of our intentions. I mentioned, but did not elaborate, a plan for possibly deluding the enemy with a false scent."

At this we stopped, crouched by the door. He went on:

"Plans have been prepared, but in no considerable detail, for a spurious expedition through your Alaskan province, aimed at the British North American possessions. It was thought that if these could be brought to the attention of the British Government, in a suitably accidental manner, they would divert the enemy's attention from the eastern theatre entirely."

"I don't like it," says Khruleff's voice. "I have seen the plan, majesty; it is over-elaborate and unnecessary."

"There are," says Ignatieff, quite unabashed, "two British officers, at present confined in this house—prisoners from the Crimea whom I had brought here expressly for the purpose. It should not be beyond our wits to ensure that they discovered the false North American plan; thereafter they would obviously attempt to escape, to warn their government of it."

"And then?" says Duhamel.

"They would succeed, of course. It is no distance to the Crimea—it would be arranged without their suspecting they were mere tools of our purpose. And their government would at least be distracted."

"Too clever," says Khruleff. "Playing at spies."

"With submission, majesty," says Ignatieff, "there would be no difficulty. I have selected these two men with care—they are ideal for our purpose. One is an agent of intelligence, taken at Silistria—a clever, dangerous fellow. Show him the hint of a design against his country, and he would fasten on it like a hawk. The other is a very different sort—a great, coarse bully of a man, all brawn and little brain; he has spent his time here lechering after every female he could find." I felt East stiffen beside me, as we listened to this infernal impudence. "But he would be necessary—for even if we permitted, and assisted their escape here, and saw that they reached the Crimea in safety they would still have to rejoin their army at Sevastopol, and we could hardly issue orders to our forces in Crimea to let them pass through. This second fellow is the kind of resourceful villain who would find a way."

There was a silence, and then Duhamel says: "I must agree with Khruleff, majesty. It is not necessary, and might even be dangerous. The British are not fools; they smell a rat as soon as anyone. These false plans, these clever stratagems – they can excite suspicion and recoil on the plotter. Our Indus scheme is soundly based; it needs no pretty folly of this kind."

"So." The Tsar's voice was a hoarse murmur. "The opinion is against you, Count. Let your British officers sleep undisturbed. But we thank you for your zeal in the matter, even so. And now, gentlemen, we have worked long enough –"

East was bundling me on to the dark landing before the voice had finished speaking. We closed the door gently, and tip-toed across towards our passage even as we heard the library doors opening down in the hall. I peeped round the corner; the Cossack was snoring away again, and we scuttled silently past him and into East's room. I sank down, shaking, on to his bed, while he fumbled at the candle, muttering furiously till he got it lit. His face was as white as a sheet – but he remembered to muffle the mouth of the hidden speaking-tube with his pillow.

"My God, Flashman," says he, when he had got his wind back. We were staring helplessly at each other. "What are we to do?"

"What can we do?" says I.

"We did hear aright – didn't we?" says he. "They're going for India – while our back's turned? A Russian army over the Khyber – a rebellion! Good God – is the thing possible?"

I thought of '42, and the Afghans – and what they could do with a Russian army to help them. "Aye," says I. "It's possible all right."

"I knew we were right to watch and listen!" cries he. "I knew it! But I never dreamed—this is the most appalling thing!" He slapped his hands and paced about. "Look—we've got to do something! We've got to get away—somehow! They must have news of this at Sevastopol. Raglan's there; he's the commander—if we could get this to him, and London, there'd be time—to try to prepare, at least. Send troops out—increase the north-west garrisons—perhaps even an expedition into Persia, or Afghanistan -"

"There isn't time," says I. "You heard them—seven months from tonight they'll be on the edge of the Punjab with thirty thousand men, and God knows how many Afghans ready to join in for a slap at us and the loot of India. It would take a month to get word to England, twice as long again to assemble an army—if that's possible, which I doubt—and then it's four months to India -"

"But that's in time just in time!" cries he. "If only we can get away—at once!"

"Well, we can't," says I. "The thing's not possible."

"We've got to make it possible!" says he, feverishly. "Look—look at this, will you?" And he snatched a book from his bureau: it was some kind of geography or guide, in Russian script—that hideous lettering that always made me think of black magic recipes for conjuring the Devil. "See here; this map. Now, I've pieced this together over the past few months, just by listening and using my wits, and I've a fair notion where we are, although Starotorsk ain't shown on this map; too small. But I reckon we're about here, in this empty space—perhaps fifty miles from Ekaterinoslav, and thirty from Alexandrovsk, see? It startled me, I tell you; I'd thought we were miles farther inland."

"So did I," says I. "You're sure you're right?—they must have brought me a hell of a long way round, then."

"Of course—that's their way! They'll never do anything straight, I tell you. Confuse, disturb, upset—that's their book of common prayer! But don't you see—we're not much above a hundred miles from the north end of the Crimea—maybe only a couple of hundred from Raglan at Sevastopol!"

"With a couple of Russian armies in between," I pointed out. "Anyway, how could we get away from here?"

"Steal a sled at night—horses. If we went fast enough, we could get changes at the post stations on the way, as long as we kept ahead of pursuit. Don't you see, man—it must be possible!" His eyes were shining fiercely. "Ignatieff was planning for us to do this very thing! My God, why did they turn him down! Think of it—if he had had his way, they'd be helping us to escape with their bogus information, never dreaming we had the real plans! Of all the cursed luck!"

"Well, they did turn him down," says I. "And it's no go. You talk of stealing a sled—how far d'you think we'd get, with Pencherjevsky's Cossacks on our tail? You can't hide sleigh-tracks, you know—not on land as flat as your hat. Even if you could, they know exactly where we'd go—there's only one route"—and I pointed at his map—"through the neck of the Crimean peninsula at—what's it called? Armyansk. They'd overhaul us long before we got there."

"No, they wouldn't," says he, grinning—the same sly, fag grin of fifteen years ago. "Because we won't go that way. There's another road to the Crimea—I got it from this book, but they'd never dream we knew of it. Look, now, old Flashy friend, and learn the advantages of studying geography. See how the Crimean peninsula is joined to mainland Russia—just a narrow isthmus, eh? Now look east a little way along the coast—what d'ye see?"

"A town called Yenitchi, " says I. "But if you're thinking of pinching a boat, you're mad -"

"Boat nothing," says he. "What d'ye see in the sea, south of Yenitchi?"

"A streak of fly-dung," says I, impatiently. "Now, Scud -"

"That's what it looks like," says he triumphantly. "But it ain't. That, my boy, is the Arrow of Arabat—a causeway, not more than half a mile across, without even a road on it, that runs from Yenitchi a clear sixty miles through the sea of Azov to Arabat in the Crimea—and from there it's a bare hundred miles across to Sevastopol! Don't you see, man? No one ever uses it, according to this book, except a few dromedary caravans in summer. Why, the Russians hardly know it exists, even! All we need is one night of snow, here, to cover our traces, and while they're chasing us towards the isthmus, we're tearing down to Yenitchi, along the causeway to Arabat, and then westward ho to Sevastopol -"

"Through the bloody Russian army!" cries I.

"Through whoever you please! Can't you see—no one will be looking for us there! They've no telegraph, anyway, in this benighted country—we both speak enough Russian to pass! Heavens, we speak it better than most moujiks, I'll swear. It's the way, Flashman—the only way!"

I didn't like this one bit. Don't misunderstand me—I'm as true-blue a Briton as the next man, and I'm not unwilling to serve the old place in return for my pay, provided it don't entail too much discomfort or expense. But I draw the line where my hide is concerned—among the many things I'm not prepared to do for my country is die, especially at the end of a rope trailing from a Cossack's saddle, or with his lance up my innards. The thought of abandoning this snug retreat, where I was feeding full, drinking well, and rogering my captivity happily away, and going careering off through the snow-fast Russian wilderness, with those devils howling after me—and all so that we could report this crazy scheme to Raglan! It was mad. Anyway, what did I care for India? I'd sooner we had it than the Russians, of course, and if the intelligence could have been conveyed safely to Raglan (who'd have promptly forgotten it, or sent an army to Greenland by mistake, like as not) I'd have done it like a shot. But I draw the line at risks that aren't necessary to my own well-being. That's why I'm eighty years old today, while Scud East has been mouldering underground at Cawnpore this forty-odd years.

But I couldn't say this to him, of course. So I looked profound, and anxious, and shook my head. "Can't be done, Scud. Look now; you don't know much about this Arrow causeway, except what's in that book. Who's to say it's open in winter—or that it's still there? Might have been washed away. Who knows what guards they may have at either end? How do we get through the Crimea to Sevastopol? I've done a bit of travelling in disguise, you know, in Afghanistan and Germany … and, oh, lots of places, and it's a sight harder than you'd think. And in Russia—where everyone has to show his damned ticket every few miles—we'd never manage it. But"—I stilled his protest with a stern finger—"I'd chance that, of course, if it wasn't an absolute certainty that we'd be nabbed before we'd got halfway to this Yenitchi place. Even if we got clear away from here—which would be next to impossible—they would ride us down in few hours. It's hopeless, you see."

"I know that!" he cried. "I can count, too! But I tell you we've got to try! It's a chance in a million that we've found out this infernal piece of Russian treachery! We must try to use it, to warn Raglan and the people at home! What have we got to lose, except our lives?"

D'you know, when a man talks like that to me, I feel downright insulted. Why other, unnamed lives, or the East India Company's dividend, or the credit of Lord Aberdeen, or the honour of British arms, should be held by me to be of greater consequence than my own shrinking skin, I've always been at a loss to understand.

"You're missing the point," I told him. "Of course, one doesn't think twice about one's neck when it's a question of duty"—I don't, anyway—"but one has to be sure where one's duty lies. Maybe I've seen more rough work than you have, Scud, and I've learned there's no point in suicide—not when one can wait and watch and think. If we sit tight, who knows what chance may arise that ain't apparent now? But if we go off half-cock, and get killed or something—well, that won't get the news to Raglan. Here's something: now that Ignatieff don't need us any more, they may even exchange us. Then the laugh would be on them, eh?"

At this he cried out that time was vital, and we daren't wait. I replied that we daren't go until we saw a reasonable chance (if I knew anything, we'd wait a long time for one), and so we bandied it to and fro and got no forrarder, and finally went to bed, played out.

When I thought the thing over, alone (and got into a fine sweat at the recollection of the fearful risk we'd run, crouching in that musty gallery) I could see East's point. Here we were, by an amazing fluke, in possession of information which any decent soldier would have gone through hell to get to his chiefs. And Scud East was a decent soldier, by anyone's lights but mine. My task, plainly, was to prevent his doing anything rash—in other words, anything at all—and yet appear to be in as big a sweat as he was himself. Not too difficult, for one of my talents.

In the next few days we mulled over a dozen notions for escaping, each more lunatic than the last. It was quite interesting, really, to see at what point in some particular idiocy poor Scud would start to boggle; I remember the look of respectful horror which crept into his eyes when I regretted absently that we hadn't dropped from the gallery that night and cut all their throats, the Tsar's included—"too late, now, of course, since they've all gone," says I. "Pity, though; if we'd finished 'em off, that would have scotched their little scheme. And I haven't had a decent set-to since Balaclava. Aye, well."

Scud began to worry me, though; he was working himself up into a fever of anxiety and impatience where he might do something foolish. "We must try!" he kept insisting. "If we can think of no alternative soon, we're bound to make a run for it some night! I'll go mad if we don't, I tell you! How can you just sit there?—oh, no, I'm sorry, Flashman; I know this must be torturing you too! Forgive me, old fellow. I haven't got your steady nerve."

He hadn't got Valla to refresh him, either, which might have had a calming effect. I thought of suggesting that he take a steam-bath with Aunt Sara, to settle his nerves, but he might have enjoyed it too much, and then gone mad repenting. So I tried to look anxious and frustrated, while he chewed his nails and fretted horribly, and a week passed, in which he must have lost a stone. Worrying about India, stab me. And then the worst happened: we got our opportunity, and in circumstances which even I couldn't refuse.

It came after a day in which Pencherjevsky lost his temper, a rare thing, and most memorable. I was in, the salon when I heard him bawling at the front door, and came out to find him standing in the hallway, fulminating at two fellows outside on the steps. One looked like a clergyman; the other was a lean, ugly little fellow dressed like a clerk.

"… effrontery, to seek to thrust yourself between me and my people!" Pencherjevsky was roaring. "Merciful God, how do I keep my hands from you? Have you no souls to cure, you priest fellow, and you, Blank, no pen-pushing or pimping to occupy you? Ah, but no—you have your agitating, have you not, you seditious scum! Well, agitate elsewhere, before I have my Cossacks take their whips to you! Get out of my sight and off my land—both of you!"

He was grotesque in his rage, towering like some bearded old-world god—I'd have been in the next county before him, but these two stood their ground, jeopardizing their health.

"We are no serfs of yours!" cries the fellow Blank. "You do not order us," and Pencherjevsky gave a strangled roar and started forward, but the priest came between.

"Lord Count! A moment!" He was game, that one.

"Hear me, I implore. You are a just man, and surely it is little enough to ask. The woman is old, and if she cannot pay the soul-tax on her grandsons, you know what will happen. The officials will block her stove, and she will be driven out—to what? To die in the cold, or to starve, and the little ones with her. It is a matter of only one hundred and seventy silver kopecks—I do not ask you to pay for her, but let me find the money, and my friend here. We will be glad to pay! Surely you will let us—be merciful!"

"Look you," says Pencherjevsky, holding himself in. "Do I care for a handful of kopecks? No! Not if it was a hundred and seventy thousand roubles, either! But you come to me with a pitiful tale of this old crone, who cannot pay the tax on her brats—do I not know her son—worthless bastard!—is a koulak*(*A peasant with money, a usurer.) in Odessa, and could pay it for her, fifty times over! Well, let him! But if he will not, then it is for the government to enforce the law—no man hindering! No, not even me! Suppose I pay, or permit you to pay, on her behalf, what would happen then? I shall tell you. Next year, and every year thereafter, you would have all the moujiks from here to Rostov bawling at my door: 'We cannot pay the soul-tax,³⁰ batiushka; pay for us, as you paid for so-and-so.' And where does that end?"

"But -" the priest was beginning, but Pencherjevsky cut him short.

"You would tell me that you will pay for them all? Aye, Master Blank there would pay—with the filthy money sent by his Communist friends in Germany! So that he could creep among my moujiks, sowing sedition, preaching revolution! I know him! So get him hence, priest, out of my sight, before I forget myself!"

"And the old woman, then? Have a little pity, Count!"

"I have explained!" roars Pencherjevsky. "By God, as though I owe you that much! Get out, both of you!"

He advanced, hands clenched, and the two of them went scuttling down the steps. But the fellow Blank³¹ had to have a last word:

"You filthy tyrant! You dig your own grave! You and your kind think you can live forever, by oppression and torture and theft—you sow dragon's teeth with your cruelty, and they will grow to tear you! You will see, you fiend!"

Pencherjevsky went mad. He flung his cap on the ground, foaming, and then ran bawling for his whip, his Cossacks, his sabre, while the two malcontents scampered off for their lives, Blank screaming threats and abuse over his shoulder. I listened with interest as the Count raved and stormed:

"After them! I'll have that filthy creature knouted, God help me! Run him down, and don't leave an inch of hide on his carcase!"

Within a few moments a group of his Cossacks were in the saddle and thundering out of the gate, while he stormed about the hall, raging still:

"The dog! The insolent garbage! To beard me, at my own door! The priest's a meddling fool—but that Blank! Anarchist swine! He'll be less impudent when my fellows have cut the buttocks off him!"

He stalked away, finally, still cursing, and about an hour later the Cossacks came back, and their leader stumped up the steps to report. Pencherjevsky had simmered down a good deal by this time; he had ordered a brew of punch, and invited East and myself to join him, and we were sipping at the scalding stuff by the hall fire when the Cossack came in, an old, stout, white-whiskered scoundrel with his belt at the last hole.³²He was grinning, and had his nagaika in his hand.

"Well?" growled Pencherjevsky. "Did you catch that brute and teach him manners?"

"Aye, batiushka," says the Cossack, well pleased. "He's dead. Thirty cuts—and, pouf? He was a weakling, though."

"Dead, you say?" Pencherjevsky set down his cup abruptly, frowning. Then he shrugged: "Well, good riddance! No one'll mourn his loss. One anarchist more or less will not trouble the prefect."

"The fellow Blank escaped," continued the Cossack. "I'm sorry, batiushka -"

"Blank escaped!" Pencherjevsky's voice came out in a hoarse scream, his eyes dilating. "You mean—it was the priest you killed! The holy man!" He stared in disbelief, crossing himself. "Slava Bogu!*(*Glory to God!) The priest!"

"Priest? Do I know?" says the Cossack. "Was it wrong, batiushka?"

"Wrong, animal? A priest! And you … you flogged him to death!" The Count looked as though he would have a seizure. He gulped, and clawed at his beard, and then he blundered past the Cossack, up the stairs, and we heard his door crash behind him.

"My God!" says East. The Cossack looked at us in wonder, and then shrugged, as his kind will, and stalked off. We just stood, looking at each other.

"What will this mean?" says East.

"Search me," I said. "They butcher each other so easily in this place—I don't know. I'd think flogging a priest to death is a trifle over the score, though—even for Russia. Old man Pencherjevsky'll have some explaining to do, I'd say—shouldn't wonder if they kick him out of the Moscow Carlton Club."

"My God, Flashman!" says East again. "What a country!"

We didn't see the Count at dinner, nor Valla, and Aunt Sara was uncommunicative. But you could see in her face, and the servants', and feel in the very air of the house, that Starotorsk was a place appalled. For once East forgot to talk about escaping, and we went to bed early, saying good-night in whispers.

I didn't rest too easy, though. My stove was leaking, and making the room stuffy, and the general depression must have infected me, for when I dozed I dreamed badly. I got my old nightmare of drowning in the pipe at Jotunberg, probably with the stove fumes,³³ and then it changed to that underground cell in Afghanistan, where my old flame, Narreeman, was trying to qualify me for the Harem Handicap, and then someone started shooting outside the cell, and shrieking, and suddenly I was awake, lathered with sweat, and the shooting was real, and from beneath me in the house there was an appalling crash and the roar of Pencherjevsky's voice, and a pattering of feet, and by that time I was out of bed and into my breeches, struggling with my boots as I threw open the door.

East was in the passage, half-dressed like myself, running for the landing. I reached it on his very heels, crying: "What's happening? What the devil is it?", when there was a terrible shriek from Valla's passage, and Pencherjevsky was bounding up the stairs, bawling over his shoulder to the Cossacks whom I could see in the hall below:

"Hold them there! Hold the door! My child, Valentina! Where are you?"

"Here, father!" And she came hurrying in her night-gown, hair all disordered, eyes starting with terror. "Father, they are everywhere—in the garden! I saw them—oh!"

There was a crash of musket-fire from beyond the front door, splinters flew in the hall, and one of the Cossacks sang out and staggered, clutching his leg. The others were at the hall windows, there was a smashing of glass, and the sound of baying, screaming voices from outside. Pencherjevsky swore, clasped Valla to him with one enormous arm, saw us, and bawled above the shooting:

"That damned priest! They have risen—the serfs have risen! They're attacking the house!"

I've been in a good few sieges in my time, from full-dress affairs like Cawnpore, Lucknow, and the Pekin nonsense a few years ago, to more domestic squabbles such as the Kabul residency in '41. But I can't think of one worse managed than the moujiks' attack on Starotorsk. I gathered afterwards that several thousand of them, whipped on by Blank's fiery oratory, had just up and marched on the house to avenge their priest's death, seizing what weapons were handiest, and making no attempt at concealment or concerted attack to take the place on all sides at once. They just stamped up the road, roaring, the Cossacks in their little barrack saw them, knocked a few over with rifle fire, and then retired to the main house just as the mob surged into the drive and threw themselves at the front door. And there it was, touch and go, with the moujiks beating on the panels, smashing in the downstairs windows on that side to clamber in, waving their trowels and torches and yelling for Pencherjevsky's blood.³⁴

As he stood there, clasping Valla and glaring round like a mad thing, I doubt if he fully understood it himself- that his beloved slaves were out to string him from the nearest limb, with his family on either side of him. It was like the sun falling out of the sky for him. But he knew deadly danger when he saw it, and his one thought was for his daughter. He seized me by the arm.

"The back way—to the stables! Quickly! Get her away, both of you! We shall hold them here—the fools, the ingrate clods!" He practically flung her into my arms. "Take a sled and horses, and drive like the wind to the Arianski house—on the Alexandrovsk road! There she will be safe. But hasten, in God's name!"

I'd have been off at the run, but East, the posturing ass, had to thrust in:

"One of us will stay, sir! Or let a Cossack escort your daughter—it is not fitting that British officers should -"

"You numskull!" bawled Pencherjevsky, seizing him and thrusting him violently towards the back corridor. "Go! They will be in, or round the house, while you stand prating! This is no affair of yours—and I command here!" There was a tearing crash from the front door, several pistol shots amid the clamour of the mob and the shouting of the Cossacks, and over the banisters I saw the door cave in, and a torrent of ragged figures pouring in, driving the Cossacks back towards the foot of the stairs. The smoky glare of their torches turned the place suddenly into a struggling hell, as the Cossacks swung their sabres and nagaikas to force them back.

"Get her away!" Pencherjevsky encircled both me and Valla for an instant in his bear-like hug, his great, bearded face within an inch of my own, and there were tears in his glaring eyes. "You know what is to do, my son! See to her—and to that other life! God be with you!"

And he bundled us into the corridor, and then rushed to the head of the stairs. I had a glimpse of his towering bulk, with the smoky glare beneath him, and then the chorus of yells and screams from the hall redoubled, there was a rushing of feet, a splintering of timber—and East and I were doubling down the back-stairs at speed, Valla sobbing against my chest as I swept her along.

We tore through the kitchen, East pausing to grab some loaves and bottles, while I hurried out into the yard. It was dead still in the moonlight; nothing but the soft stamp of the beasts in their stalls, and the distant tumult muffled on the other side of the house. I was into the coach-building in a flash, bundled Valla into the biggest sled, and was leading round the first of the horses when East joined me, his arms full.

I don't know the record for harnessing a three-horse sled, but I'll swear we broke it; I wrenched home the last buckle while East scuttled across the snow to unbar the gate. I jumped into the driver's seat and tugged the reins, the horses whinnied and reared and then danced forward, any old how—it's deuced difficult, tooling a sled—and with me swearing at the beasts and East swinging up as we slid past, we scraped through the gateway on to the open road beyond.

There was a bang to our left, and a shot whistled overhead, causing me to duck and the horses to swerve alarmingly. They were rounding the house wall, a bare thirty yards away, a confused, roaring rabble, torches waving, running to head us off. East seized the whip from its mount and lashed at the beasts, and with a bound that nearly overturned us they tore away, down the road, with the mob cursing at our tail, waving their fists, and one last shot singing wide as we distanced them.

We didn't let up for a mile, though, by which time I had the beasts under control, and we were able to pull up on a gentle rise and look back. It was like a Christmas scene, a great white blanket glittering in the full moon, and the dark house rising up from it, with the red dots of torch-light dancing among the outbuildings, and the thin sound of voices echoing through the frosty air, and the stars twinkling in the purple sky. Very bonny, I suppose—and then East clutched my arm.

"My God! Look yonder!"

There was a dull glow at one corner of the house; it grew into an orange flame, licking upwards with a shower of sparks; the torches seemed to dance more madly than ever, and from the sled behind there was a sudden shrieking sob, and Valla was trying to struggle out—my God, she still had nothing on but her night-dress, and as she half fell out it ripped and sent her tumbling into the snow.

I threw the reins to East, jumped down, and bundled her quickly back into the sled. There were furs there, any amount of them, and I swaddled her in them before the cold could get at her. "Father! Father!" she was moaning, and then she fainted dead away, and I laid her down on the back seat and went forward to East, handing him up one of the furs—for we had nothing but our shirts and breeches and boots, and the cold was crippling.

"Let's get on," says I, wrapping up myself, with my teeth chattering. "The sooner we're out of here, the better. Come on, man, what ails you?"

He was sitting staring ahead, his mouth open, and when he swung round to me, he was positively laughing.

"Flashman!" he cried. "This is our chance! Heaven-sent! The sled—the horses—and a clear start! We're away, old fellow—and no one to stop us!"

It shows you what a hectic scramble it had been, with not a moment's pause to collect one's wits from the shock of waking until now, but for a second I didn't see what he was driving at.. And then it struck me—escape. We could light out for Yenitchi, and East's causeway, and not a living soul would know we had gone. One couldn't be sure, of course, but I doubted whether any civilized being would survive what was happening at Starotorsk; it might be days before the police or the army came on the scene and realized that there were three persons not accounted for. And by then we could be in Sevastopol—always assuming we got through the Russian army. I didn't like it, but I didn't much care for the Alexandrovsk road, either, wherever that was—God knew how far the insurrection would spread, and to be caught up in it, with Pencherjevsky's daughter in tow, would be asking to be torn limb from limb.

Even as the thoughts rushed through my mind, I was glancing at the stars, picking out the Plough and judging our line south. That way, even if we hit the coast fifty versts either side of Yenitchi, we at least stood a decent chance of finding our road to it in the end, for we had time on our side.

"Right," says I. "Let's be off. We're sure to hit some farm or station where we can change horses. We'll drive in turns, and -"

"We must take Valla with us," cries he, and even in that ghostly light I'll swear he was blushing. "We cannot abandon her—God knows what kind of villages these will be we shall pass through—we could not leave her, not knowing what … I mean, if we can reach the camp at Sevastopol, she will be truly safe … and … and …"

And he would be able to press his suit, no doubt, the poor skirt-smitten ninny, if he ever plucked up courage enough. I wonder what he'd have thought if he'd known I had been pupping his little Ukrainian angel for weeks. And there she was, in the sled, with not a stitch to her name.

"You're right!" I cried. "We must take her. You are a noble fellow, Scud! Off we go, then, and I'll take the ribbons as soon as you're tired."

I jumped in the back, and off we swept, over the snowy plain, and far behind us the red glow mounted to the night sky. I peered back at it, wondering if Pencherjevsky was dead yet, and what had happened to Aunt Sara. Whatever it was, I found myself hoping that for her, at least, it had been quick. And then I busied myself putting the sled in some order.

They are splendid things, these three-horse sleighs, less like a coach than a little room on runners. They are completely enclosed with a great hood, lashed down all round, with flaps which can be secured on all the window spaces, so that when they are down the whole thing is quite snug, and if you have furs enough, and a bottle or two, you can be as warm as toast. I made sure everything was secure, set out the bread, and a leg of ham, which East had thoughtfully picked up, on the front seat, and counted the bottles—three of brandy, one of white wine. Valla seemed to be still unconscious; she was wrapped in a mountain of furs between the seats, and when I opened the rear window-flap for light to examine her, sure enough, she was in that uneasy shocked sleep that folk sometimes go into when they've been terribly scared. The shaft of moonlight shone on her silvery hair, and on one white tit peeping out saucily from the furs—I had to make sure her heart was beating, of course, but beyond that I didn't disturb her—for the moment. Fine sledges these: the driver is quite walled off.

So there we were; I huddled in my fur, took a pull at the brandy, and then crawled out under the side flap on to the mounting of the runner; the wind hit me like a knife, with the snow furrowing up round my legs from the runner-blades. We were fairly scudding along as I pulled myself up on to the driving seat beside East and gave him a swig at the brandy.

He was chattering with cold, even in his fur wrap, so I tied it more securely round him, and asked how we were going. He reckoned, if we could strike a village and get a good direction, we might make Yenitchi in five or six hours—always allowing for changes of horses on the way. But he was sure we wouldn't be able to stand the cold of driving for more than half an hour at a time. So I took the ribbons and he crept back perilously into the sled—one thing I was sure of: Valla would be safe with him.

If it hadn't been for the biting cold, I'd have enjoyed that moonlight drive. The snow was firm and flat, so that it didn't ball in the horses' hooves, and the runners hissed across the snow—it was strange, to be moving at that speed with so little noise. Ahead were the three tossing manes, with the vapour streaming back in the icy air, and beyond that—nothing. A white sheet to the black horizon, a magnificent silver moon, and that reassuring Pole star dead astern when I looked back.

I was about frozen, though, when I spotted lights to starboard after about twenty minutes, and swerved away to find a tumble-down little village, populated by the usual half-human peasants. After consultation with East, I decided to ask the distance and direction to Osipenke; East was carrying a rough table of places and directions in his head, out of the book he had studied, and from the peasants' scared answers—for they were in awe of any strangers—we were able to calculate our proper course, and swerve away south-west.

East had taken over the reins. Valla had come to while he was in the sled—I wondered if he'd been chancing his arm, but probably not—and had had mild hysterics, about her father, and Aunt Sara, who had been sitting up with a sick Cossack woman in the barracks, and had presumably been cut off there.

"The poor little lamb," says East, as he took the reins. "It tore my heart to see her grief, Flashman—so I have given her a little laudanum from a phial which … which I carry always with me. She should sleep for several hours; it will be best so."

I could have kicked him, for if there's one thing I'd fancy myself good at, it's comforting a bereaved and naked blonde under a fur rug. But he had put her to sleep, no error, and she was snoring like a walrus. So I had to amuse myself with bread and ham, and try to I snatch a nap myself.

We made good progress, and after a couple of hours found a way-station, by great good luck, on what must have been the Mariupol road. We got three new nags, and bowled away famously, but what with lack of sleep it was getting to be hard work now, and a couple of hours after sunrise we pulled up in the first wood we'd seen—a straggly little affair of stunted bushes, really—and decided to rest ourselves and the horses. Valla was still out to the wide, and East and I took a seat apiece and slept like the dead.

I woke first, and when I put my head out the sky was already dimming in the late afternoon. It was bleak and grey, and freezing starvation, and looking through the twisted branches at the pale, endless waste, I felt a shiver running through me that had nothing to do with cold. Not far away there were two or three of those funny little mounds called koorgans, which I believe are the barrows of long-forgotten barbarian peoples; they looked eerie and uncanny in the failing light, like monstrous snowmen. The stillness was awful; you could feel it, not even a breath of wind, but just the cold and the weight of emptiness hanging over the steppe. It was unnerving, and suddenly I could hear Kit Carson's strained quiet voice in the dread silence of the wagon road west of Leavenworth: "Nary a sight nor sound anywhere—not even a sniff o' danger. That's what frets me."

It fretted me, too, at this minute; I roused East, and then we made all fast, and I took the reins and off we slid silently south-west, past those lonely koorgans, into the icy wilderness. I had a bottle, and some bread, but nothing could warm me; I was scared, but didn't know of what—just the silence and the unknown, I suppose. And then from somewhere far off to my right I heard it—that thin, dismal sound that is the terror of the empty steppe, unmistakable and terrifying, drifting through the vast distance: the eldritch cry of the wolf.

The horses heard it too, and whinnied, bounding forward in fear with a stumble of hooves, until we were flying at our uttermost speed. My imagination was flying even faster; I remembered Pencherjevsky's story of the woman who had thrown her children out when those fearful monsters got on the track of her sled, and had been executed for it, and countless other tales of sleds run down by famished packs and their occupants literally eaten alive. I daren't look back for fear of what I might see loping over the snow behind me.

The cry was not repeated, and after a few more miles I breathed easier; there was a twinkle of light dead ahead, and when we reached it, we found it was a moujik's cabin, and the man himself at the door, axe in hand, glowering at us. We asked him the nearest town, and could have cried with relief when he said Yenitchi: it was only forty versts away—a couple of hours' driving, if the beasts held up and weren't pressed too hard. East took the reins, I climbed in behind—Valla was sleeping still, uneasily, and mumbling incoherently—and we set off on what I prayed was the last stage of our mainland journey.

For rather more than an hour nothing happened; we drove on through the silence, I took another turn, and then I halted not far from another clump of koorgans to let East climb into the driver's seat again. I had my foot on the runner, and he was just chuckling to the horses, when it came again—that bloodchilling wail, far closer this time, and off to the left. The horses shrieked, and the sled shot forward so fast that for a moment I was dragged along, clinging to the side by main strength, until I managed to drag myself inboard, tumbling on to the back seat. Valla was stirring, muttering sleepily, but I'd no time for her; I thrust out my head, staring fearfully across the snow, trying to pierce the dusk, but there was nothing to be seen. East was letting the horses go, and the sled was swaying with the speed—and then it came again, closer still, like the sound of a lost soul falling to hell. I heard East shouting to the horses, cracking his whip; I clutched the side, feeling the sweat pouring off me in spite of the cold.

Still nothing, as we fairly flew along; there was another cluster of koorgans just visible in the mirk a quarter of a mile or so to our left. As I watched them—was that something moving beyond them? My heart flew to my mouth—no, they stood bleak and lonely, and I found I was panting with fear as I dashed the sweat from my eyes and peered again. Silence, save for the muffled thump of the hooves and the hissing of the runners—and there was something flitting between the last two koorgans, a low, long dark shape rushing over the snow, and another behind it, and another, speeding out now into the open, and swerving towards us.

"Jesus!" I shrieked. "Wolves!"

East yelled something I couldn't hear, and the sled rocked horribly as he bore on his offside rein; then we righted, and as I gazed over the side, the hellish baying broke out almost directly behind us. There they were—five of them, gliding in our wake; I could see the leader toss up his hideous snout as he let go his evil wail, and then they put their heads down and came after us in dead silence.

I've seen horror in my time, human, animal, and natural, but I don't know much worse than that memory—those dim grey shapes bounding behind us, creeping inexorably closer, until I could make out the flat, wicked heads and the snow spurting up under their loping paws. I must have been petrified, for God knows how long I just stared at them—and then my wits came back, and I seized the nearest rug and flung it out to the side, as far as I could.

As one beast they swerved, and were on it in a twinkling, tearing it among them. Only for a second, and then they were after us again—probably all the fiercer for being fooled. I grabbed another rug and hurled it, and this time they never even broke stride, but shot past it, closing in on the sled until they were a bare twenty paces behind, and I could see their open jaws—I've never been able to look an Alsatian in the face since—and delude myself that I could even make out their glittering eyes. I'd have given my right arm, then, for the feel of my faithful old Adams in my grip—"You wouldn't run so fast with a forty-four bullet in you, damn you!" I yelled at them—and they came streaking up, while the horses screamed with fear and tore ahead, widening the gap for about ten blessed seconds. I was cursing and scrabbling in the back looking for something else to throw—a bottle, that was no use, but by George, if I smashed one at the bottom it might serve as a weapon when the last moment came and they were ravening over the tailboard—in desperation I seized a loaf (we'd finished the ham) and hurled it at the nearest of them, and I am here to tell you that wolves don't eat bread—they don't even bloody well look at it, for that matter. I heard East roaring something, and cracking his whip like a madman, and God help me, I could see the eyes behind us now, glaring in those viciously pointed heads, with their open jaws and gleaming teeth, and the vapour panting out between them. The leader was a bare five yards behind, bounding along like some hound of hell; I grabbed another rug, balled it, prayed, and flung it at him, and for one joyous moment it enveloped him; he stumbled, recovered, and came on again, and East sang out from the box to hold tight. The sled rocked, and we were shooting along between high snow banks on either side, with those five devils barely a leap from us—and suddenly they were falling back, slackening their lope, and I couldn't believe my eyes, and then a cabin flashed by on the right, and then another, with beautiful, wonderful light in its windows, and the five awful shapes were fading into the gloom, and we were gliding up a street, between rows of cottages on either side, and as East brought the sled slowly to a halt I collapsed, half-done, on the seat. Valla, I remember, muttered something and turned over in her rugs.

You would not think much of Yenitchi, I dare say, or its single mean street, but to me Piccadilly itself couldn't have looked better. It was five minutes before I crawled out, and East and I faced the curious stares of the folk coming out of the cabins; the horses were hanging in their traces, and we had no difficulty in convincing them that we needed a change. There was a post-station at the end of the street, beside a bridge, and a drunk postmaster who, after much swearing and cajoling, was induced to produce a couple of fairly flea-bitten brutes; East wondered if we should rest for a few hours, and go on with our own nags refreshed, but I said no—let's be off while the going's good. So when we had got some few items of bread and sausages and cheese from the postmaster's wife, and a couple of female garments for Valla to wear when she woke up, we put the new beasts to and prepared to take the road again.

It was a dismal prospect. Beyond the bridge, which spanned a frozen canal, we could see the Arrow of Arabat, a long, bleak tongue of snow-covered land running south like a huge railway embankment into the Azov bar Sea. The sea proper, which was frozen—at least as far out as we could see—lay to the left; on the right of the causeway lies a stinking inland lagoon, called the Sivache, which is many miles wide in places, but narrows down as you proceed along the Arrow, until it peters away altogether where the causeway reaches Arabat, on the eastern end of the Crimea. The lagoon seems to be too foul to freeze entirely, even in a Russian winter, and the stench from it would poison an elephant.

We were just preparing to set off, when Valla woke up, and after we had told her where she was, and reassured her that all was well, and she had wept a little, and I'd helped her out discreetly to answer a call of nature—well, she'd been asleep for the best of twenty-four hours—we decided after all to have a caulk before setting out again. East and I were both pretty done, but I wouldn't allow more than two hours' rest—having got this far, I'd no wish to linger. We had some food, and now Valla was beginning to come to properly, and wanted to know where we were taking her.

"We're going back to our own army," I told her. "We must take you with us—we can't leave you here, and you'll be well cared for. I believe your father is all right—we saw him and his Cossacks escaping as we drove away—and I know he would wish us to see you safe, and there's nowhere better than where we're going, d'you see?"

It served, after a deal of questioning and answering; whether she was still under the influence of the laudanum or not, I wasn't certain, but she seemed content enough, in a sleepy sort of way, so we plied her with nips of brandy to keep out the cold—she refused outright the clothes we had got, and stayed curled up in her rugs—and being a Russian girl, she was ready to drink all we offered her.

"If she's half-tight, so much the better," says I to East. "Distressing, of course, but she'll be less liable to give the game away if we run into trouble."

"It is terrible for her- to be subjected to this nightmare," says he. "But that was a noble lie you told, about her father—I wanted to shake your hand on that, old boy." And he wrung it then and there. "I still think I must be dreaming," says he. "This incredible country, and you and I—and this dear girl—fleeing for our lives! But we are nearly home, old fellow—a bare sixty miles to Arabat, and then eight hours at most will see us at Sevastopol, God willing. Will you pray with me, Flashman, for our deliverance?"

I wasn't crawling about in the snow, not for him or anyone, but I stood while he mumped away with his hands folded, beseeching the Lord that we might quit ourselves like men, or something equally useful, and then we climbed in and took our forty winks. Valla was dozing, and the brandy bottle was half-empty—if ever they start the Little White Ribboners in Russia, all the members will have to be boys, for they'll never get the women to take the pledge.

The rest did me little good. The scare we'd had from the wolves, and the perils ahead, had my nerves jangling like fiddle-strings, and after a bare hour of uneasy dozing I roused East and said we should be moving. The moon was up by now, so we should have light enough to ensure we didn't stray from the causeway; I took the driver's seat, and we slid away over the bridge and out on to the Arrow of Arabat.

For the first few miles it was quite wide, and as I kept to the eastern side there was a great expanse of hummocky snow to my right. But then the causeway gradually narrowed to perhaps half a mile, so that it was like driving along a very broad raised road, with the ground falling away sharply on either side to the snow-covered frozen waters of Azov and the Sivache lagoon; the salty charnel reek was awful, and even the horses didn't like it, tossing their heads and pulling awkwardly, so that I had to look sharp to manage them. We passed two empty post-stations, East and I exchanging at each one, and after about four hours he took the reins for what we hoped would be the last spell into Arabat.

I climbed into the back of the sled and made all the fastenings secure as we started off again, and was preparing to curl up on the back seat when Valla stirred sleepily in the darkness, murmuring "Harr-ee?" as she stretched restlessly in her pile of furs on the floor. I knelt down beside her and took her hand, but when I spoke to her she just mumbled and turned over; the laudanum and brandy still had her pretty well foxed, and there was no sense to be got out of her. It struck me she might be conscious enough to enjoy some company, though, so I slipped a hand beneath the furs and encountered warm, plump flesh; the touch of it sent the blood pumping in my head.

"Valla, my love," I whispered, just to be respectable; I could smell the sweet musky perfume of her skin, even over the brandy. I stroked her belly, and she moaned softly, and when I felt upwards and cupped her breast she turned towards me, her lips wet against my cheek. I was shaking as I put my mouth on hers, and then in a trice I was under the rugs, wallowing away like a sailor on shore leave, and half-drunk as she was she clung to me passionately. It was an astonishing business, for the furs were crackling with electricity, shocking me into unprecedented efforts—I thought I knew everything in the galloping line, but I'll swear there's no more alarming way of doing it than under a pile of skins in a sled skimming through the freezing Russian night; it's like performing on a bed of fire-crackers.

Engrossing as the novelty was, it was also exhausting, and I must have dozed off afterwards with Valla purring in her unconsciousness beside me. And then I became dimly conscious that the sled was slowing down, and gliding to a halt; I sat up, wondering what the blazes was wrong, buttoning myself hastily, and then I heard East jump down. I stuck my head out; he was standing by the sled, his head cocked, listening.

"Hush!" says he, sharply. "Do you hear anything?"

It crossed my mind that he'd overheard the heaving and crackling of my contortions with Valla, but his next words drove that idea out of my head, and implanted a new and disturbing one.

"Behind us," says he. "Listen!"

I scrambled out on to the snow, and we stood there, in the silent moonlight, straining our ears. At first there was nothing but the gentle sigh of the wind, the restless movement of the horses, and our own hearts thumping in the stillness—and then? Was there the tiniest murmur from somewhere back on the causeway, an indistinct but regular sound, softly up and down, up and down? I felt the hairs rise on my neck—it couldn't be wolves, not here, but what was it, then? We stared back along the causeway; it was very narrow now, only a couple of hundred yards across, but we had just come on to a stretch where it began to swerve gently towards the east, and it was difficult to make out anything in the gloom beyond the bend about a quarter of a mile behind us. Snow was falling gently, brushing our faces.

"I thought I heard …" Scud said slowly. "But perhaps I was wrong."

"Whatever it is, or isn't, there's no sense waiting here for it!" says I. "How far d'you reckon we are from Arabat?"

"Six miles, perhaps—surely not much more. Once there, we should be all right. According to that book of mine, there are little hills and gullies beyond the town, and we can lose ourselves in 'em if we want to, so … "

"The devil with dallying here, then!" cries I, in a fine stew. "Why the deuce are we wasting time, man? Let's be off from this blasted place, where there's nowhere to hide! Up on the box with you!"

"You're right, of course," says he. "I just … Hark, though! what's that?"

I listened, gulping—and there was a sound, a sound that I knew all too well. Very faintly, somewhere behind us, there was a gentle but now distinct drumming, and a tiny tinkling with it. There were horsemen on the causeway!

"Quick!" I shouted. "They're after us! Hurry, man—move those horses!"

He tumbled up on to the box, and as I swung myself on to the runner-mounting he cracked his whip and we slid forward across the snow. I clung to the side of the sled, peering back fearfully through the thin snowfall, trying to make out if anything was showing beyond the bend in the causeway. We increased speed, and with the hiss of the runners it was impossible to listen for that frightening tell-tale sound.

"It may be just other travellers some distance back!" cries Scud from the box. "No one could be pursuing us!"

"Travellers at this time of night?" says I. "For God's sake, man, hurry those beasts!"

We were gathering speed now, cracking along at a good clip, and I was just about to swing myself under the cover—but I paused for another look back along the causeway, and what I saw nearly made me loose my hold. Very dimly through the falling flakes, I could just make out the causeway bend, and there, moving out on to the straight on this side of it, was a dark, indistinct, mass—too big and irregular to be anything like a sled. And then the moonlight caught a score of twinkling slivers in the gloom, and I yelled at East in panic:

"It's cavalry—horsemen! They're after us, man!"

At the same time they must have seen us, for a muffled cry reached my ears, and now I could see the mass was indeed made up of separate pieces—a whole troop of them, coming on at a steady hand-gallop, and even as I watched they lengthened their stride, closing the distance. East was flogging at the horses, and the sled swayed and shuddered as we tore along—were they gaining on us? I clung there, trying to measure the distance, but I couldn't be sure; perhaps terror was colouring my judgment, making me see what I wanted to see, but so far as I could judge it looked as though we were holding our own for the moment.

"Faster!" I bawled to East. "Faster, man, or they'll have us!"

If only the bloody ass hadn't halted to listen—if only we hadn't wasted that precious hour dozing at Yenitchi! I couldn't begin to guess who these people were, or how they had got after us—but there they were, scudding along behind as fast as they could ride—four hundred yards, five hundred? Maybe five or more—I couldn't see whether they were hussars or dragoons or what, but I had a feeling they were heavies. Pray God they might be! I swung under the covers and threw myself on to the back seat, peering out through the window-flap. No, they weren't closing the distance—not yet. They were fanned out on the causeway as far as they could—good riding; that, for in column the rear files would have been ploughing into the churned snow of the men in front. Trust Russian cavalry to know about that.

But if they weren't gaining, they weren't dropping back, either. There was nothing in it—it's a queer thing, but where a horseman can easily overhaul a coach, or even a racing phaeton, a good sled on firm snow is another matter entirely. A horse with a load on his back makes heavy weather in snow, but unladen they can spank a sled along at nearly full gallop.

But how long could our beasts keep up their present pace? They were far from fresh—on the other hand, our pursuers didn't look too chipper, either. I watched them, my heart in my mouth, through the falling snow—was it getting thicker? By God, it was! If it really set in, and we could hold them as far as Arabat, we might be able to lose them—and even as the thought crossed my mind I felt the pace of the sled slacken just a little. I stared back at the distant horsemen, my throat dry, fixing on the centre man until my eyes ached and he seemed to be swimming mistily before me. He was just a vague blur—no, I could make out the shape of his head now—they were gaining, ever so little, but still gaining, creeping gradually up behind, yard by yard.

I couldn't stand it. I plunged to the side of the sled, stuck my head out, and bawled at East.

"They're closing, you fool! Faster! Can't you stir those bloody cattle!"

He shot a glance over his shoulder, cracked on the reins, and cried:

"It's no go … horses are almost played out! Can't … We're too heavy! Throw out some weight … the food … anything!"

I looked back; they were certainly gaining now, for the pale blobs of their faces were dimly visible even through the driving snow. They couldn't be much more than two hundred yards away, and one of 'em was shouting; I could just catch the voice, but not the words.

"Damn you!" I roared. "Russian bastards!" And fell back into the sled, scrabbling for our supplies, to hurl them out and lighten the sled. It was ridiculous—a few loaves and a couple of bottles—but out they went anyway, and not a scrap of difference did it make. The cover? If I let it go, would that help—it would cut down the wind resistance at least. I struggled with the buckles, stiff with the cold as they were, bruising my fingers and swearing feebly. There were eight of them, two to each side, and I just had the wit to undo the rear ones first, and the front ones last, whereupon the whole thing flew off, billowing away before it flopped on the snow. Perhaps it helped a trifle, but nothing like enough—they were still closing, almost imperceptibly, but closing nonetheless.

I groaned and cursed, while the freezing wind whipped at me, casting about for anything else to jettison. The furs? We'd freeze without them, and Valla didn't have a stitch—Valla! For an instant even I was appalled—but only for an instant. There was eight stone of her if there was an ounce—her loss would lighten us splendidly! And that wasn't all—they'd be bound to check, at least, if she came bouncing over the back. Gallant Russian gentlemen, after all, don't abandon naked girls in the snow. It would gain us seconds, anyway, and the loss of weight would surely do the rest.

I stooped over her, fighting to balance myself in the rocking sled. She was still unconscious, wrapped in her furs, looking truly lovely with her silver hair shining in the moonlight, murmuring a little in her half-drunken sleep. I heaved her upright, keeping the fur round her as best I could, and dragged her to the back seat. She nestled against me, and even in that moment of panic I found myself kissing her goodbye—well, it seemed the least I could do. Her lips were chill, with the snow driving past us in the wind; there'll be more than your lips cold in a moment, thinks I. At least her eyes were shut, and our pursuers would see to her before she froze.

"Good-bye, little one," says I. "Sleep tight," and I slipped my arm beneath her legs and bundled her over the back in one clean movement; there was a flash of white limbs as the furs fell away from her, and then she was sprawling on the snow behind us. The sled leaped forward as though a brake had been released, East yelled with alarm, and I could guess he was clinging to the reins for dear life; I gazed back at the receding dark blur where the fur lay beside Valla in the snow. She was invisible in the white confusion, but I saw the riders suddenly swerve out from the centre, a thin shout reached me, and then the leader and his immediate flankers were reining up, the riders on the wings were checking, too, but then they came on, rot them, while a little knot of the centre men halted and gathered, and I saw a couple of them swinging down from their saddles before they were lost in the snowy night.

And the dozen or so riders from the wings were losing ground, too! The lightened sled was fairly racing along. I yelled with delight, tossing my hands in the air, and scrambled forward, over the front of the sled, heaving myself up beside East on the box.

"On, Scud, on!" I shouted. "We're leaving 'em! We'll beat them yet!"

"What was it?" he cried. "What did you do? What did you throw out?"

"Useless baggage!" shouts I. "Never mind, man! Drive for your life!"

He shouted at the beasts, snapping the reins, and then cries:

"What baggage? We had none!" He glanced over his shoulder, at where the horsemen were dim shapes now in the distance, and his eyes fell on the sled. "Is Valla all -" and then he positively screamed. "Valla! Valla! My God!" He reeled in his seat, and I had to grab the reins as they slipped from his fingers. "You—you—no, you couldn't! Flashman, you …"

"Hold on, infernal fool!" I yelled. "It's too late now!" He made a grab at the reins, and I had to sweep him back by main force, as I clutched the ribbons in one hand. "Stop it, damn you, or you'll have us sunk as well!"

"Rein up!" he bawled, struggling with me. "Rein up—must go back! My God, Valla! You filthy, inhuman brute—oh, God!"

"You idiot!" I shouted, lunging with all my weight to keep him off. "It was her or all of us!" Divine inspiration seized me. "Have you forgotten what we're doing, curse you? We've got to get to Raglan, with our news! If we don't—what about Ignatieff and his cursed plans? By heaven, East, I don't forget my duty, even if you do, and I tell you I'd heave a thousand Russian sluts into the snow for my country's sake!" And ten thousand for my own, but that's no matter. "Don't you see—it was that or be captured? And we've got to get through—whatever the cost!"

It stopped him struggling for the reins, at any rate; I felt him go limp beside me, and then he was sobbing like a man in torment, feebly beating with his fist against his temple.

"Oh, my God! How could you—oh, little Valla! I'd have gone—gladly! Oh, she'll die—freezing in that horrible waste!"

"Stop that damned babbling!" says I, stern duty personified. "Do you think I wouldn't have gone myself? And if I had, and some accident had then happened to you, where would our mission have been? While we're both free we double our hope of success." I snapped the reins, blinking against the driving snow as we sped along, and then stole a glance behind—nothing but whirling snow over the empty causeway; our pursuers were lost in the distance, but they'd still be there; we daren't check for an instant.

East was clinging to the box as we rocked along, a man stricken. He kept repeating Valla's name over and over again, and groaning. "Oh, it's too much! Too high a price—God, have you no pity, Flashman? Are you made of stone?"

"Where my duty's concerned—aye!" cries I, in a fine patriotic fever. "You may thank God for it! If you'd had your way, we'd have died with Pencherjevsky, or be getting sabred to bits back yonder—and would that have served our country?" I decided a little manly rave would do no harm—not that I gave a damn what East thought, but it would keep him quiet, and stop him doing anything rash even now. "My God, East! Have you any notion what this night's work has cost me? D'you think it won't haunt me forever? D'you think I … I have no heart?" I dashed my knuckles across my eyes in a fine gesture. "Anyway, it's odds she'll be all right—they're her people, after all, and they'll wrap her up nice as ninepence."

He heaved a great shuddering breath. "Oh, I pray to God it may be so! But the horror of that moment—it's no good, Flashman—I'm not like you! I have not the iron will—I am not of your mettle!"

You're right there, boy, thinks I, turning again to look back. Still nothing, and then through the dimness ahead there was a faint glimmer of light, growing to a cluster, and the causeway was narrowing to nothing more than a dyke, so that I had to slow the sled for fear we should pitch down the banks to the frozen sea. There was a big square fort looming up on our right, and a straggle of buildings on the left, whence the lights came; between, the road ran clear on to broad snowfields.

I snapped the whip, calling to the horses, and, we drove through, never heeding a voice that called to us from the fort wall overhead. The horsemen might well have closed on us with our slowing down for the dyke, and there wasn't a second to spare. We scudded across the snowfield, casting anxious glances behind; the ground was becoming broken ahead, with little mounds and valleys, and stunted undergrowth—once into that, with the light snow still falling to blot out our tracks, we could twist away and lose them for certain.

"Bravo!" cries I, "we're almost there!" Behind us, Arabat and its fort were fading into the dark; the glimmer of the lights was diminishing as we breasted the first gentle slope and made for a broad gully in the rising ground. We sped silently into it, the sled rocking on the uneven surface; I reined in gently as we went down the reverse slope—and then the lead horse stumbled, whinnying, and came slithering down, the near-side beast swerved sharply, wrenching the reins from my hands, the sled slewed horribly, struck something with a fearful jar, East went flying over the side, and I was hurled headlong forward. I went somersaulting through the air, roaring, felt my back strike the rump of the near-side horse, and then I was plunging into the snow. I landed on my back, and there above me was the sled, hanging poised: I screamed and flung up my hands to save my head. The sled came lumbering over, slowly almost, on top of me, a fiery pain shot through my left side, a crushing weight was across my chest; I shrieked again, and then it settled, pinning me in the snow like a beetle on a card.

I beat at it with my fists, and tried to heave up, but its weight and the agony in my side stopped me—there was a rib gone for sure, if nothing worse. One of the horses was floundering about in the snow, neighing madly, and then I heard East's voice:

"Flashman! Flashman, are you all right?"

"I'm pinned!" I cried. "The sled—get the damned thing off me! Ah, God, my back's broken!"

He came blundering through the snow, and knelt beside me. He put his shoulder to the sled, heaving for all he was worth, but he might as well have tried to shift St Paul's. It didn't give so much as an inch.

"Get it off!" I groaned. "It's killing me—oh, Christ! Push, damn you—are you made of jelly?"

"I can't!" he whispered, straining away. "It won't … budge. Ah!" And he fell back, panting.

"Rot you, it's crushing my guts out!" I cried. "Oh, God—I know my spine's gone—I can feel it! I'm -"

"Silence!" he hissed, and I could see he was listening, staring back towards Arabat. "Oh, no! Flashman—they're coming! I can hear the horsemen on the snow!" He flung himself at the sled, pushing futilely. "Oh, give me strength, God, please! Please!" He strove, thrusting at the sled, and groaning: "I can't … I can't shift it! Oh, God, what shall I do?"

"Push, or dig, or anything, curse you!" I cried. "Get me loose, for God's sake! What are you doing, man? What is it?" For he was standing up now, staring back over the mouth of the gully towards Arabat; for half a minute he stood motionless, while I babbled and pawed at the wreck, and then he looked down at me, and his voice was steady.

"It's no go, old fellow. I know I can't move it. And they're coming. I can just see them, dimly—but they're heading this way." He dropped on one knee. "Flashman I'm sorry. I'll have to leave you. I can hide—get away reach Raglan. Oh, my dear comrade—if I could give my life, I would, but -"

"Rot you!" cries I. "My God, you can't leave me! Push the bloody thing—help me, man! I'm dying!"

"Oh, God!" he said. "This is agony! First Valla—now you! But I must get the news through—you know I must. You have shown me the way of duty, old chap—depend upon it, I shan't fail! And I'll tell them—when I get home! Tell them how you gave … But I must go!"

"Scud," says I, babbling, "for the love of-"

"Hush," says he, clapping a hand over my lips. "don't distress yourself- there's no time! I'll get there—one of the horses will serve, and if not—you remember the Big Side run by Brownsover, when we were boys? I finished, you know—I'll finish again, Flash, for your sake! They shan't catch me! Trust an old Rugby hare to distance a Russian pack—I will, and I'll hear you hallooing me on! I'll do it for you, and for Valla—for both your sacrifices!"

"Damn Valla and you, too!" I squealed feebly. "You can't go! You can't leave me! Anyway, she's a bloody Russian! I'm British, you swine! Help me, Scud!"

But I don't think he so much as heard me. He bent forward, and kissed me on the forehead, and I felt one of his manly bloody tears on my brow. "Good-bye, dear old fellow," says he. "God bless you!"

And then he was ploughing away over the snow, to where the near-side horse was standing; he pulled the traces free of its head, and hurried off, pulling it along into the underbrush, with me bleating after him.

"Scud! For pity's sake, don't desert me! You can't—not your old school-fellow, you callous son-of-a-bitch! Please, stop, come back! I'm dying, damn you! I order you—I'm your superior officer! Scud! Please! Help me!"

But he was gone, and I was pinned, weeping, beneath that appalling weight, with the snow falling on my face, and the cold striking into my vitals. I would die, freezing horribly—unless they found me—oh, God, how would I die then? I struggled feebly, the pain lancing at my side, and then I heard the soft thumping of hooves on the snow, and a shout, and those cursed Russian voices, muffled from the mouth of the gully.

"Paslusha-tyeh!*(*Ah there) Ah, tam*(*"Listen!)—skorah!"* (*quickly!)

The jingle of harness was close now, and the pad of hooves—a horse neighed on the other side of the sled, and I squeezed my eyes shut, moaning. At any moment I expected to feel the agony of a lance-point skewering into my chest; then there was the snorting of a horse almost directly over my face, and I shrieked and opened my eyes. Two horsemen were sitting looking down on me, fur-wrapped figures with those stringy Cossack caps pulled down over their brows; fierce moustached faces peering at me.

"Help!" I croaked. "Pamagityeh, pajalsta!"*(*"Help, please!)

One of them leaned forward. "On syer-yaznuh ranyin,"*(*He is badly hurt.) says he, and they both laughed, as at a good joke. Then, to my horror ,the speaker drew his nagaika from his saddle-bow, doubled it back, and leaned down over me.

"Nyeh zashta, "*(*Not at all.) says he, leering. His hand went up, I tried in vain to jerk my head aside, a searing pain seemed to cleave my skull, and then the dark sky rushed in on me.