Schein, is it? Or Troyekurov?’

‘No, neither the one nor the other.’

‘No, they are not to my taste either: flighty, they are, and too much infected with the German spirit. Well, is it Miloslavsky?’

‘No, not he.’

‘And a good thing, too: he is rich and stupid. Who is it then? Yeletsky? Lvov? Surely not Raguzinsky? No, I give it up. For whom, then, does the Tsar want Natasha?’

‘For the negro Ibrahim.’

The old lady cried out, clasping her hands. Prince Lykov raised his head from the pillow and repeated in amazement:

‘For the negro Ibrahim?’

‘My dear brother!’ said the old lady in a tearful voice. ‘Do not be the ruin of your own dear child – do not deliver poor little Natasha into the clutches of that black devil!’

‘But how am I to refuse the Emperor,’ objected Gavril Afanassyevich, ‘when he promises us his favour, me and all our family?’

‘What!’ cried the old prince, who was wide awake now. ‘Marry Natasha, my granddaughter, to a bought negro slave?’

‘He is not a commoner,’ said Gavril Afanassyevich. ‘He is the son of a negro sultan. The Turks captured him and sold him in Constantinople, and our ambassador rescued him and presented him to the Tsar. Ibrahim’s elder brother came to Russia with a considerable ransom and…’

‘My dear Gavril Afanassyevich!’ his sister interrupted him. ‘We have heard the fairy-tale about Prince. Bova and Yeruslan Lazarevich! You had better tell us what answer you gave to the Emperor.’

‘I said that he was our master, and that it was his servants’ duty to obey him in all things.’

At that moment there was a noise behind the door. Gavril Afanassyevich went to open it but felt something in the way. He gave a hard push – the door opened and they saw Natasha lying unconscious on the blood-stained floor.

Her heart had swooned away when the Emperor shut himself up with her father; some presentiment whispered to her that the matter concerned her, and when Gavril Afanassyevich sent her away, saying that he must speak to her aunt and grandfather, she had not been able to resist the feminine instinct of curiosity and, stealing quietly through the inner rooms to the bedroom door, had not missed a single word of the whole awful conversation. When she heard her father’s last sentence the poor girl fainted and in falling struck her head against one of the iron corners of the chest in which her dowry was kept.

Servants came running in haste; they picked Natasha up, carried her to her room and placed her on the bed. In a little while she regained consciousness and opened her eyes but did not recognize her father or her aunt. She broke out into a high fever; in her delirium she kept raving about the Tsar’s negro and the wedding, and then suddenly cried out in a pitiful, piercing voice:

‘Valerian, dear Valerian, my life! Save me: here they come, here they come….’

Tatiana Afanassyevna glanced uneasily at her brother, who turned pale, bit his lip and silently left the room. He joined the old prince, who, unable to mount the stairs, had remained below.

‘How is Natasha?’ he asked.

‘Very bad,’ replied the distressed father. ‘Worse than I thought: she is delirious and raves about Valerian.’

‘Who is this Valerian?’ asked the old man, alarmed. ‘Can it be that orphan, that boy belonging to the Strelitz1 man, who was brought up in your house?’

‘The very same, woe is me!’ replied Gavril Afanassyevich. ‘His father saved my life during the mutiny of the Strelitz, and the devil put it into my head to take the accursed young wolf-cub into my home. When he was enrolled into the Service two years ago, at his own request, Natasha burst into tears as she said good-bye to him, while he stood as though turned to stone. It struck me as suspicious, and I spoke to my sister about it. But since that time Natasha has not mentioned him, and nothing further was heard of Valerian. I thought she had forgotten him, but it seems she hasn’t…. But it is settled: she shall marry the negro.’

Prince Lykov did not gainsay him: that would have been useless; he went home. Tatiana Afanassyevna remained by Natasha’s bedside; after sending for the doctor Gavril Afanassyevich locked himself in his room, and all was still and mournful in the house.

*

The unexpected offer to make a match for him surprised Ibrahim quite as much as it did Gavril Afanassyevich, if not more. This was how it happened. They were engaged on a piece of work together when Peter said to Ibrahim:

‘I perceive, my friend, that you are low-spirited. Tell me frankly, what is wrong?’

Ibrahim assured the Tsar that he was content with his lot and wished for nothing better.

‘Good!’ said the Tsar.