CHAPTER XXI
IT DIDN'T TAKE US LONG TO FIND THE LETTER. THERE WERE NOT many places where it could be hidden in such a rudimentary structure. Maks had slipped it between one of the beams supporting the roof and the wooden roof itself. One had to be looking for it to find it.
It was addressed to me – dated the twenty-seventh, the same as his scratched message. There were about half a dozen sheets, covered on both sides with Maksim's small, precise handwriting. I read it aloud.
'My dear Aleksei, 'If you are reading this letter, then I must apologize for not having waited longer for you to arrive. As you will understand once you have read this, I am very much in fear for my life and perhaps for even more. In communicating the circumstances specifically to you, Aleksei, and (I hope soon) in committing myself to your custody I intend at least to ensure that I die with some vestige of my reputation intact and also to die by a method whereby my soul might be saved. I can see your expression of surprise to learn that either of these should be of concern to me, but let me assure you that the former always has been. The future of my soul is a question that I have only recently begun to realize is worth asking.
'I shall remain here for four days. I have told Dominique where I am and she will, I hope, tell you and only you. If you have not arrived within that time, then I shall be forced to move on. The possibility that either Dmitry or the remaining Oprichniki should find me here is too dreadful to risk. I shall head south to Tula and on then to my mother's. You know where she lives. I shall not write here where that is in the hope that my omission may protect me from any others who might read this. Once I have seen her and, with luck, my sisters, then I shall attempt to leave the country for ever. I shall not be happy to make my home in France. It has become less and less the country I thought it to be.
'You are, I know, well aware of my interest in the republics of both the United States and France. We have happily discussed the matter often and I know that, at least on general principles, your views and mine have often coincided. Where I am certain that you will find no sympathy with me is that as a result of these principles I decided some years ago to make an active effort to support republican France. It was when I was captured at Austerlitz that I first began to work for France. I see the cynical curl of your lip, knowing that you would tell me that at that time the republic was no longer a republic since by then it had an emperor. Though Napoleon had indeed become emperor, though Austerlitz was fought on the anniversary of his coronation, I still believed that he and those around him did what they did for the sake of enlightened, republican ideals. Even today I still believe it.
'After my capture I was persuaded – willingly persuaded – by, in particular, a French colonel (whose name is best kept secret), who convinced me that by helping them, I could ultimately be helping Russia itself to become a republic as great and as powerful as France or America ever could be. I was returned to Russia as though I were a freed prisoner-of-war. In reality it was an act not of liberation, but of infiltration.
'So you see, Aleksei, for almost the whole time that I have known you, I have been a French spy, but believe me, that is the only matter on which I have deceived you. You may regard that as small consolation, if consolation at all, but in everything I have ever said to you, in every matter of opinion, of strategy and of friendship there has been no veil of pretence between us, nor between me and Vadim or Dmitry. The Maksim you have known has been the true Maksim in all aspects except this one tiny issue of allegiance. Men of different political colours and even of different nationalities do not have to be at war with each other, and even when they are they become enemies not out of choice but out of circumstance. Their friendship can be rekindled once the smoke of battle has cleared. If I had been born French then, although we might not have become the friends we once were – that I hope we still are – I would at least have retained your respect. That is not to say that I am blaming my treason on an accident of birth. I would not choose to have been born French rather than Russian. My affiliation has always been to ideas rather than to states. My hope was to take an idea born in France and see it flourish in Russia.
'Whether I have in practice been of very much use to France, I have to doubt. The only work of significance that I have undertaken has been alongside you, Vadim and Dmitry. I count my allegiance to you three higher than any and so I could never have handed over any information that would have directly put you in jeopardy. As to the more general picture of the state of our armies which I have conveyed, I doubt whether any of it has been of much assistance.
'I write this not in any attempt to exonerate myself or to make some plea for clemency that may help me avoid my execution as a traitor. I will attempt to avoid death by flight, but not by denial of what I truly believe. I write it simply in the hope that, though you may rightly condemn me in your own heart to death, you will at least regret that it had to be so.
'However, I would have no scruple that urged me to tell you the truth about myself had it not been for the fact that you most certainly already know the entire truth. It is of the circumstances of how this truth came to be revealed that I must give you every detail I can recall, in the hope that what I tell you may help in some way to defeat these despicable creatures whose war on humanity casts into unmistakable relief the petty squabbles of petty nations.'
'So he did know about them,' I said, half to myself, half to Dmitry, though I had been convinced of it almost from the start.
Dmitry did not respond. He sat with his back to the wall, almost mirroring the posture of Maks' lingering remains. The two sat at opposite corners of the same wall, like naughty schoolboys who have been told to sit apart. Neither, for very different reasons, could raise his eyes to look at me as I continued to read.
'When we returned to Moscow from Smolensk, I had had no opportunity for several months to make any report back to my superiors in the French camp. (By the by, when you see Vadim, tell him that in the French army I also carry the title of major, so he can no longer pull rank on me. To be honest, I think they bump up the ranks of agents just to flatter them. I hope that, despite what I have done to him, Vadim will be able to smile at this. I know I have no right to be flippant, but I cannot tell you how much I long for just five more minutes of the times when we used to sit beside the Moskva and drink vodka and tease one another – but mostly tease Vadim.)
'Our return out west with the Oprichniki gave me a fine opportunity to get back behind French lines and report what I knew. I looked for every chance to separate myself from Andrei, Simon and Iakov Alfeyinich, but it transpired that they were even more keen to be rid of me than I was of them. The very same night that we set out from Gzatsk – the last time, in fact, that I saw you – first one, then two, then all three of them had made some excuse to separate from the rest of the party and scout around on their own.
'I took full advantage of the solitude and headed straight off for the French encampments to the west of the town. I told them all I knew – again, I must assure you, nothing of our personal work, nor even of the Oprichniki, although on that latter point I wish I had – and after a couple of hours of debriefing I was treated to the wine, food and good company that is bestowed on any patriot who has been so long away from his confederates. It meant little to me. I seek little more from food than nourishment and the company was not as good as I have known.
'It was after sunset on the evening of the next day, as I was preparing to leave, that suddenly the camp that I was in came under a ferocious attack. Screams came from all around us in the darkness. I looked out of the tent, in which I had been talking with three other officers, to see two figures that I recognized as Andrei and Iakov Alfeyinich creeping towards the sentry who stood guard outside. I could only see the sentry's back. He could see the two Oprichniki that approached him and his head turned from one to the other in disbelief. Eventually, he fired his musket at Andrei and without doubt the musket ball passed through his chest, but hindered him no more than would a brief gust of wind. Iakov Alfeyinich dived for the soldier's legs. The soldier responded by stabbing his bayonet hard down into Iakov Alfeyinich's back. It was as ineffective as the musket ball had been.
'Iakov Alfeyinich's attack brought the sentry to the ground and in the same instant that he fell, Andrei launched himself upon his throat. What I saw then is beyond any comprehension of a civilized man. My upbringing never allowed any of the myth and folklore that is the staple for so many of my contemporaries. From what little I heard in the schoolyard of vampires and werewolves and other such abominations, I was glad to have been spared such nonsense. Even those who did hear those stories as children do not grow up to believe them. But any man must believe the evidence of his own eyes.
'Andrei sunk his teeth deep into the man's throat and tore off a sliver of flesh. The soldier was still alive and struggling for freedom beneath Andrei's firm grasp as Iakov Alfeyinich fell upon him and took a similar bite from the other side of his neck. Then the two lay there beside him, their mouths to his neck, lapping away at the blood that seeped out of him. It was only when the sentry had ceased to breathe that the two Oprichniki raised their heads from his throat and exchanged between themselves a glance of pride and self-satisfaction.
'Before they could rise, three more soldiers were upon them. Again, the damage inflicted by shot and by blade had little impact. They killed by the same method – with their teeth – but now they did not linger to drink the blood of their victims. Time had become too pressing for them to enjoy the aftermath of the kill.
'I turned back to speak to the other officers in the tent with me and was horrified by what I saw. Two of them lay dead upon the floor. The third remained upright, showing on his contorted face a look of agony that was matched only by the terror revealed in his staring eyes. Over his shoulder I saw the face of Simon, looking down to where his teeth were sunk into the man's neck. Behind his teeth, Simon's tongue flicked back and forth between the man's sinews, to taste every drop of blood he could find, much as a dog's tongue probes every crevice of his bone in search of the last tasty morsel of marrow.
'Behind them, I saw the rip in the side of the tent through which Simon had entered. Before Simon could look up and see that I had observed him, I felt a heavy blow to my head from behind and I collapsed into unconsciousness.
'When I came to, it was still dark. I saw Andrei's face looming close to mine, and I feared that it was now time for me too to become a meal for these creatures. Instead, Andrei displayed concern. I feigned amnesia until I had heard enough from them to understand what they thought had happened. It turned out that they were under the impression that I had been captured by the French. They had attacked the camp by chance, but when they recognized me, they transformed their attack into a rescue mission. I played along with them, and also managed to convince them that I remembered nothing of my liberation – that the blow to my head had wiped away all images of what I had seen of their methods of killing. Their concern was so much concentrated on finding out whether I knew their true nature that they showed no inquisitiveness whatsoever into my true nature. The fact that I had been captured by the French was universally accepted and the possibility that I had voluntarily walked into the French camp was never even mooted.
'They suggested that I should rest and recover from the head wound that – it turned out – Andrei had inflicted upon me, while they would continue to harry the French as best they could. The plan was that we meet again in Goryachkino in four days. I agreed, happy that this would give me plenty of time to engineer their downfall.
'Once it was daylight, I returned to the camp where the previous night's events had taken place. Not a soul remained alive. The Oprichniki had made some effort to cover their tracks. Many of the corpses had bullet wounds or bayonet wounds which, it was clear to my eye, had been inflicted after death. A number of fires had been started, but these too only superficially hid the stomach- churning throat wounds which I found on every carcass.
'The Oprichniki had not killed the horses at the camp, but had released them from their pens so as to add to the general impression of chaos. I got hold of one, and so my journey to Goryachkino was rapid. For a few days I attended the meeting place – the farm building – that we had arranged there, but neither you, nor Vadim, nor Dmitry, nor any of the Oprichniki showed up. By the twenty-fourth of August – the night when I had arranged to meet my three Oprichniki – the French were almost upon the village and were preparing for the great battle at Borodino. I left a brief message for you, simply saying that I had been there, and then went back out to the French lines to prepare the trap that I had planned for the Oprichniki.
'I told the guards at the camp that I would be sending three enemy spies to them that night. I described what they would look like, what direction they would come from and even the incorrect password which they would use when challenged by a sentry. I instructed the guards simply to capture them, bind them hand and foot and then hold them until my return. I told them to make sure that the captives were not held in a tent, but outside next to the fire. You may be surprised, Aleksei, at how easy it was for me to issue orders, but once my bona fides had been proved, the men in the camp were all too eager to help capture the Russian infiltrators.
'I went back to Goryachkino and waited. Soon after dusk, Andrei, Iakov Alfeyinich and Simon arrived. With them, they had brought Faddei, whom they had met somewhere along the way. My enthusiasm at seeing the opportunity to destroy four of these creatures, rather than the three that I had originally planned, was, I suppose, my undoing. I told them that I had found an isolated French camp that was perfect for them to attack. I told them the weakest points in the perimeter and even what the day's password was (which, incidentally, I said you had supplied for me, Aleksei).
'Faddei was not keen to join the raiding party. He felt he should get back to Vadim and the other Oprichniki under his command. I persuaded him that the French camp was a sitting duck, and that he would be a fool not to go. The description I gave of all those young, innocent, healthy soldiers must, I think, have whetted his appetite. They departed and I lay back and waited until dawn.
'Soon after the sun rose, I returned to the French camp into which I had sent the four Oprichniki. My instructions that they should be tied up and left in the open air had been a test of them and a test of my own credulity – something akin to the trials of witches in the Middle Ages. Despite my blinkered education, I had gathered some slight knowledge of the legends of the voordalaki. It seemed preposterous to me that mere sunlight could have such a devastating effect on their physical being, but no more preposterous than what I had already discovered to be irrefutably true. If the legends proved correct, then I would enter the camp to find four dead vampires, otherwise I would find four live ones, tied up and ready for death by firing squad. Either way, the twelve Oprichniki would be reduced to eight. A third of the battle would be won.
'Already, before my arrival, there was much commotion in the camp. A lieutenant, who recognized me from my visit the night before, dashed over to me and took me to the remains of the Oprichniki – three scorched patches of grass. They had been sitting, I was told, on wooden stools, of which only a few charred lumps remained. Some scraps of shoe leather and fragments of material were all else that was left to see. I asked what had happened to the fourth. He had escaped, I was told. They had been expecting only three and so the fourth had been able to get away almost before anyone saw him. As someone who has been lying throughout my adult life, Aleksei, I have long become used to disguising the fear of discovery, but there was little I could do to suppress the fear I felt then that one of the Oprichniki was out there, somewhere, aware of the trap into which I had sent them. I managed outwardly to retain my composure, but inside me every voice shouted that I should flee. I have been fleeing almost ever since.
'The lieutenant told me that they had followed my orders. They had done better than tie the three spies up, they had put them in irons, from which there would be no escape. As dawn had approached, the three had become more and more agitated, had pleaded to be released and had even tried to run – to any extent that they could – for freedom. At around dawn there had been three terrific explosions, so close together that they sounded as one. Two of the sentries guarding the prisoners had been slightly burnt, and all that remained of the three was the ash that I now saw.
'All the soldiers who had witnessed the events were keen to discover what had caused the explosions. A Russian in the same circumstances might, I suspect, have made some connection between the violent and unusual deaths of these men and their first contact with the sun's rays. The French are, however, not as superstitious as we foolish Russians. The most popular theory was that the men had come into the camp with gunpowder hidden in their clothes, hoping to get close to Napoleon himself and ignite the powder, but it had accidentally gone off too early. Some doubted that this could be so, that no Christian – not even a Russian – could commit the sin of suicide, however much he believed in his cause. I glibly assured them that, while the Catholic Church was strong on the point, the Orthodox had no such qualms about sending young men to their deaths. And so this was the version of events that became accepted.
'I departed as quickly as possible and set out eastwards, back to Moscow. I was in unprecedented fear for my life and so I stayed away from the main roads; thus my progress was slower than it would have been if I had taken the direct route. That night I made camp in a clearing in the woods. I had slept for a few hours when I was awakened by the sound of voices. I opened my eyes to see in front of me one Oprichnik and one man – Andrei and Dmitry.
'It was Andrei, clearly, who had escaped the raid on the French. He had obviously worked out that I had betrayed them. I could make no attempt to deny it. Instead, I told Dmitry what I had seen, what the Oprichniki had done, that they were vampires, but his only reaction was that he was well aware of it. I asked him how he could live with that knowledge, and he said that he would use any means he could find to defeat the French. Andrei was after my blood, but Dmitry – to his credit – held him back. He asked me to swear that I would take no more action against the Oprichniki. He seemed to think that now I understood what they were, I would let them get on with their work in the way that they did it best. I refused to go along with him.
'I believe at that stage, Dmitry only thought I had betrayed the Oprichniki because they were vampires; he had not perceived that I was working for the French. Perhaps, even if Andrei had told him, he hadn't believed it. But it was sometime during our conversation there that the realization came to him that I could not have set up the trap without being able to walk freely across the French lines. It was pointless for me to deny it. He took it like a physical wound – a shock to him far greater than had been the shock to me that the Oprichniki were vampires. He muttered that he did not relish the prospect of telling you and Vadim, and then he left me with Andrei.
'I tried to talk with Andrei, but he was as uncommunicative as the rest of the Oprichniki. His only intent was my death. Both he and Dmitry had an enormous faith in his abilities, since they had made no effort even to disarm me of my sword. When attacking by stealth, the Oprichniki were successful assailants, but Andrei's chances were less good here in an evenly matched contest. I drew my sword and he showed no fear of it. It did not seem right to use it on an unarmed man, so I told him to keep back, but he kept advancing. When he was just over the sword's length away from me he leapt towards me. I had no option but to bring the blade between us, and I felt the pressure on my hand as my sword met and overcame the resistance of his body. His face was up close to mine and I could smell his foul breath, but although the wound from my blade did not seem to hurt him, the physical impediment of the guard of my sword itself prevented him from getting close to me. After persisting for a little while, he stepped back and I heard and felt my sword slide smoothly out from under his ribs. There was a slight stain of blood on his coat, but little other damage seemed to have been done.
'I suspect that at that point, most of Andrei's victims give up in the face of his invincibility, for he laughed and suggested that I surrender to the inevitable. He did not realize that there is more than one way in which a man is trained to use a sabre. On his next advance I chose not to stab but to cut. With every step he took, I slashed the blade across his torso. On a normal man, each blow would have broken several ribs. Whether they did on him, I do not know. He showed little sign of weakening, but the very force of the blows did begin to push him back, away from me. The energy I was expending in every blow would not have allowed me to continue for long, but as he stepped back, he stumbled over something and found himself prone and helpless on the ground. I lifted my sword to give what I hoped would be a debilitating blow to his head, and he raised his arm to defend himself. The blade made contact with his arm and drew blood. I brought my sword down again and again, knowing that my attack now was only on his arm. I made no attempt to inflict a fatal blow, for I knew that such an attack would be unsuccessful. I cannot tell you, Aleksei, and if I could I would be ashamed to, the feeling of elation I felt with every blow as it cut further and further into the bone. Eventually, even the supernatural matter of which Andrei was made up could not resist me and his arm became detached from his body, leaving a bloody stub just below the elbow.
'The wound was clearly not fatal, but at least seemed to have incapacitated Andrei enough that he was no longer an immediate threat. I had never paid enough attention to even the little I had heard of the legends to know the various ways in which a creature like this might be destroyed, and I did not want to remain there trying to find out, for fear that Dmitry or some of the other Oprichniki might return. It is my hope that I disabled him enough so that he was unable to find shelter and so perished in the first light of dawn.
'For my part, I once again took flight. I stopped briefly at Shalikovo, hoping I might meet with you there, but I was afraid to wait long, so I chalked a message for you and continued to Moscow. I felt certain that I was being followed, either by Andrei or by the other Oprichniki, but the days are still longer than the nights, so the advantage was with me. Once in Moscow, I could think of only one way to contact you and to be sure of Dmitry not finding out. I went to see Dominique at the brothel. I told both her and Margarita the briefest of details of where I would be, and that you and only you should meet me. In that you are reading this, I must assume that you have spoken to Dominique. She was very concerned for your safety, Aleksei, and interrogated me for information about you – anything and everything about you – much as she has done in the past.
'I headed straight out for Desna and arrived here today. I travelled through daylight, so I don't think that the Oprichniki could have followed me here, but still I fear that they will find me. I do not want to die, but if I must, I would prefer it to be with the relative honour of a Russian firing squad than at their hands. Perhaps it is for the better that I never listened to the stories I was told about vampires as a child, otherwise I might fear even more what is to become of me now.
'If you are reading this, Aleksei, then it must be that I could not wait long enough for you and have moved on. Perhaps I am already in France by now. My hope is to settle in Paris, although I have learned that fate has little inclination to consider what my hopes may be. Should you one day come to Paris, either at the head of a conquering army, or as a visitor in more pacific times, then perhaps you will try to come and find me.
'To anyone else who finds this letter (or to whom you, Aleksei, choose to show it) I must make a plea that no suspicion of treachery should fall upon any of Vadim Fyodorovich, Dmitry Fetyukovich or Aleksei Ivanovich. Just because I am a French spy, it in no way follows that they are. I am reminded of a discussion we once had, Aleksei, about the Bible. Just because some things in it are true does not make the whole of it true. And (you will see that I stick to my guns to the last) just because there are vampires doesn't mean there is a god. I may soon know for sure.
'Please convey my apologies and regards to Vadim and Dmitry, and also my warmest affection to Marfa Mihailovna and young Dmitry Alekseevich.
'I remain, I hope, your friend,
'Maksim Sergeivich Lukin.'
Though some were more explicit than others, Maks' letter contained many condemnations. Most obvious was Maks' condemnation of himself in his confession of treachery against his tsar and his country. What it told of Dmitry and of the Oprichniki was once shocking, but by now it was nothing new. To that, though, there was one exception – Andrei's arm. I was not surprised that the flesh and blood of a vampire was close enough to that of a human that it was possible to sever one of their limbs. I had myself already seen that I could sever Andrei's head. And that was just the point. When I had destroyed Andrei, both his arms had been intact. Somehow since his meeting with Maks, Andrei had . . . recovered.
But that was a minor distraction. The worst thing in Maksim's letter was its condemnation of me. When I had spoken to Maks in this very building, all those weeks before, I had given him no chance to explain what he had now told me so clearly in his letter. I had been so blinded by my rage at his betrayal of our country that I had never even paused to consider that there might be some issue of greater importance which he had to tell me. I could blame Maks himself for not forcing me to listen to him and I could blame the Oprichniki for arriving to cut short our conversation, but I was the true culprit. With the Oprichniki there I might not have been able to save him, but at least he could have died knowing what he wanted to know above all – that I was still his friend.