Curse Not the King by Evelyn Anthony Read Free Book Online Page A

intimacy with the other deepened in proportion. Rasumovsky became less reckless as the weeks went by, sobered by the enjoyment of his prize.
    It was necessary to keep up appearances, he told his mistress a little anxiously. It would be unwise to underestimate the Czarevitch; fool though he was, there was still a limit it was dangerous to overstep. She must coat the pill with sugar, and pretend to some wifely feeling for him. He was stupid enough to be content with very little, André argued. A few words, a little praise, a sentimental sop to set his mind at ease, and any amount of lies to keep him out of their way.
    It was easy enough to dupe Paul, less easy to keep him out of her bed, but with a ruthlessness born of her love for the equerry, Natalie almost managed to do both while the Court stayed at Tsarskoë Selo. With alternate coquetry and excuses, she deceived and avoided him, until even Rasumovsky marvelled at the depths of duplicity and passion which dwelt in the gentlest of women.
    He marvelled and became even more enslaved. Other mistresses had tired him, wearied him by their caresses and their words, but the Grand Duchess in her teens did neither. Their love was mutual, and it fed fiercely on itself until he who had counselled her to caution with regard to Paul, became a prey to savage jealousy once more.
    Often they discussed the Court’s return to Petersburg, talked of it with mingled anger and despair, aware that freedom would be much restricted for them both.
    A thousand difficulties stood in the way of their meeting in the confines of the palace in the capital, where Paul and his household were subject to rigid discipline by the Empress. Never would the danger of discovery be so great as when they both became involved in the routine of life under the eyes of waiting-women with nothing to do but watch their mistress, and the duties of equerry to the detested Czarevitch would occupy most of Rasumovsky’s time.
    With that prospect before her, Natalie clung to him and cried, and the sight of her distress drove him to frenzy.
    â€œWe’ll meet, my beloved,” he promised her. “Nothing shall deprive us of our happiness together. I swear to you; we’ll find a way as others have before us.”
    â€œWe will, André, my love. We must.…”
    So they resolved, desperate in their need of one another, and in happy ignorance that their intrigue had been discovered long before.

3
    Nikita Panin sat at his desk, supporting one pendulous cheek with his left hand while he turned the pages of a thin dossier with the other. He knew the contents off by heart, and it made very curious reading. Six months of careful observation lay between the covers of that report, the work of the Minister’s spies who had been lurking in the shadows whenever the Grand Duchess Natalie walked or spoke to members of her suite, whether she rode with her husband in the park at Tsarskoë Selo, or sat sewing with her ladies.
    Sandwiched in between accounts of her most harmless activities, they reported the astounding fact that the virtuous bride of seventeen was committing adultery with a royal equerry within a few months of her marriage.
    Nikita, whose hopes of discovering the Czarevitch engaged in treason were still frustrated, swallowed his astonishment and for the time being kept the information to himself. His opinion of feminine virtue could sink no lower for the revelation: he only marvelled at the stupidity of the girl who plunged into a love affair before a legitimate heir was born.
    For six months he had waited, collecting the reports of stolen meetings; but at the end of that time, when the Grand Duchess was still childless, though possessed by a husband and an extremely virile lover, Panin decided at last that there was no more time to waste. If there had been a child, even if fathered by Rasumovsky, then a secured succession would have set many uneasy minds at rest, and opened the door of a cell