When Mazeppa was chosen, therefore, as ambassador or secret envoy of the Hetman to the Turk in Constantinople, I was chosen by Mazeppa to accompany him. We bore letters from the Hetman, who wrote, at Ian Casimir’s request, suggesting a combined movement of Turk, Pole and Cossack against the Russian Tsar, who grew aggressive.
But it happened that we never reached Constantinople, for before we had been many days travelling we were fallen upon, at evening, by a body of Russian Cossacks, who held us prisoners until we should have been examined by their captain in the morning.
During the night, when our guards slept, Mazeppa nudged me.
‘Wake, Chelminsky,’ he said, ‘and eat this.’
‘I am not hungry,’ I replied wearily, ‘let me sleep.’
‘Eat, fool, and talk to-morrow,’ he said angrily, holding something out to me. I took it: it was several small scraps of paper.
‘What is this jest?’ I asked. ‘This is not the time for fooling, but for sleeping.’
‘It is no jest; this is part of the Hetman’s letter, which was concealed in my boot. I have eaten much of it and can swallow no more; eat your share: it must all go, and quickly.’
I swallowed a scrap or two of paper and choked. Mazeppa snatched the rest of the torn letter and thrust it into his long boot. Two soldiers awoke. Mazeppa clapped me upon the back.
‘He chokes for want of water!’ he said. ‘Give us a drink, friend, for the love of Heaven. We are all Cossacks, though we swear by different overlords!’
They gave us water, and Mazeppa drank also. Afterwards, when the fellows were asleep again, I tried to swallow more pieces of the letter, but made but a poor job of it. Mazeppa ate some of it, contriving to swallow better than I had done. I hid the rest in my boot, intending to finish it before daylight, and thought I had done so; but when we were carefully examined at morning for letters or despatches, one small scrap was found in my boot, and upon this scrap were treasonable words which betrayed our mission.
‘Oho!’ said the Captain; ‘so you are envoys to the Turk? We have made our capture, men! Come, you young gamecocks,’—to us—‘where is the rest of the letter?’
‘Down our throats, most of it,’ said Mazeppa, laughing; ‘washed down by the water which you kindly provided us withal.’
‘Come, reveal: what was in this letter?’ said the man. ‘You had better disclose, or, who knows? we may rip you up to find the pieces. Which of you swallowed the letter? This one, I’ll be sworn, since he is so silent, and seeing, too, that a scrap was found in his boot.’ The Captain nodded his head at me.
Mazeppa did not contradict. I have since thought that if it had come to ripping us open in order to secure the letter, I should have been the first and perhaps the only one to suffer. At that time I did not suspect that Mazeppa would have allowed me to be the victim; the suspicion came long afterwards, when I knew more of the man’s heart.
The fellows consulted, however, and determined to leave us to digest the letter, whatever it might be.
‘It seems a serious matter,’ said the Captain; ‘and you shall be taken to the Tsar’s Court at Moscow. They have ways there of getting men to reveal what it is desirable to know.’
‘Take us to the devil if you will,’ laughed Mazeppa. ‘The Tsar shall know just as much or just as little as we—who know nothing—can tell him. It is easier to eat a sealed letter than to read it.’
‘It is easiest of all to tell what was in it, when the knout is at the back!’ laughed the Captain. ‘We shall see what will happen, Mr. Boastful.’
And so we were actually carried to Moscow to the Court of the Tsar, and since we were not allowed to ride together, nor to speak a word to one another on the way, I did not know what Mazeppa intended to do, or whether he would reveal or conceal what he knew of the vanished letter, or the object of our mission.
As for me I hoped, and prayed also, that I should be found courageous in the time of trial, and that I should not be forced to betray our trust under the anguish of the knout, which tears the flesh like the claws of a bear.
But in this matter, as in every position of difficulty, Mazeppa, born diplomatist and leader of men, found a way to escape—though not the most honourable. Since this is an honest record, however, and not a story drawn up for my own glorification or Mazeppa’s, I must admit that I was so greatly relieved and delighted by our unhoped-for escape from the knout or other torture, that I thought less of the end attained than of the means employed to attain it!
We were confined separately in Moscow, and I was surprised one day when—together with the jailor—Mazeppa entered my chamber.
‘We are free, Chelminsky,’ he said. ‘Come forth—we are in the Tsar’s favour.’
‘But how—how and why—we who were his arch enemies, and caught in the act of working for his disadvantage!’ I cried, hastening out of my captivity, however, and following him quickly from the house as I spoke.
‘The Tsar Alexis is the strong man,’ said Mazeppa. ‘I was brought before him and spoke with him, and I have discerned that it is so. From this time we are no longer registered vassals of the Pole: we are Russians, my friend, and shall henceforward offer our allegiance to the Tsar.’
‘Oh, Mazeppa!’ I exclaimed; ‘have you turned traitor and betrayed our own kith?’
‘Bah! we are all Cossacks: those are not more our kith than these; your own father fought the Poles—why not you?’
‘That was for independence, not for the Tsar!’ I groaned.
‘Well,’ said Mazeppa, somewhat disdainfully, ‘then refuse to be the Tsar’s man. Go back and sit in your prison for a few years, if you prefer it, or in a worse place; taste the knout and die of weariness of your own society and the devil’s!’
CHAPTER V
Of course I took part in Mazeppa’s perfidy, and shared in its reward, freedom and the favour of the Tsar, and presently profitable employment under another Hetman.
We remained in Moscow a little while, and during that period I heard that the Hetman Doroshenko, our late master, had been attacked in his citadel by a large force of Tsar’s Cossacks; that he had been captured and sent into exile. In that exile he died.
That Mazeppa was guilty of contributing in any way to his capture I will not expressly declare. Let each man think as he will upon such matters.
The Tsar Alexis was greatly impressed by Mazeppa, treating him with marked favour and kindness. He took little notice of me, regarding me as a mere hanger-on or attendant of my companion, and Mazeppa’s manner, under the sun of the Tsar’s regard, grew different towards me. He spoke to me, from this time, with condescension and hauteur, rousing my resentment at times almost to quarrelling point, though we always ended in reconciliation.
And when I consider the surprising scheme, which at this time took root and began to grow in Mazeppa’s brain—a scheme of ambition and presumption indeed, even though he eventually brought one half of it to pass, I am not surprised that he walked head-in-air.
The Tsar Alexis was, as I say, most gracious towards his new Cossack convert. He saw in him, I doubt not, indications of certain qualities which might be turned to the advantage of the State. Mazeppa was a plant to be watered by Tsarish favour and counsel in order that it might one day grow so great and so strong that it should give support to those