She had dressed meticulously, painted her face, even powdered her hair like his beloved, but there was nothing beyond politeness in the way he looked at her. At present he did not even do that, standing before the window with his back to her, hair –his own, unpowdered– cascading down it. Kai had laughed at his vanity, his doctors. She could not drudge up the mirth, only scorn and shame; that her country should be ruled by such a man!
"I have protested to the ambassador," said he, his voice clear and impersonal, as though reciting, "but the Empress has written that they have been blackening her name and her intentions, which remain good and favourable towards this country."
Gerda did not let herself even smile, for she could feel, at the back of her throat, an odd lump. If she were to let herself, she could burst out laughing and perhaps never stop, or else break down and cry, and she could not let herself do either, for he also benefited from her loss. She exclaimed, "And for this she has had my husband abducted! How much harm could he possibly do her!"
"Indeed, it is more the bishop who may do so. But it is not –" he turned then, and Gerda saw to her abject surprise that there were tears in his eyes, "I regret very much that it is not in my power to help you." He walked to his desk, moved some papers, a book. There were shadows under his eyes, enhanced by the curl of his lashes, as though he too had lost sleep over this. She could not muster up any feelings of sympathy. He added, "It is an arrest."
"It is a crime, then? To protest foreign incursions into one's own beloved country?" She stressed the last few words, staring into his face for any sign of shame for his own treachery, but could detect none.
"The Empress feels her honour impugned," he said.
She had the mad urge to take him by the shoulders and shake him, remind him of his supposed title, but it would not help. Kai may have denied him that honour, the election may have been invalid, but there were guards outside the door. Nowadays they stood outside almost every door. It was worse than she had thought, worse than Kai had feared; it was all over.
Gerda lifted her head, and placing her hands on each of the armrests of her chair, so that he could see the flash of her wedding ring in the light, before lifting herself up. "I thank you for your time," she said, omitting the title like her husband would have done, and at his clear surprise, added, "It is my custom to speak the local language upon finding myself in a foreign country."
She had spoken in Russian; he flinched, but did not call her out on it, nor prevent her from leaving.
There were many people still outside, waiting for their own futile audiences with the king, and Gerda saw several look askance at her, wondering. For everybody now knew what had happened, and besides at the other end of the room, enveloped in his own throng of sycophants and traitors, stood the ambassador. He was talking, in a voice intended to carry, perhaps to the other room, " – shall order the arrest not of three, but of thirty."
Gerda felt herself freeze.
Next to her, a woman said, "No wonder he is so ignorant of the law, he cannot even count. Your husband makes it five," and then a hand touched her elbow and she jumped, flinching away instinctively, half-fearing that she would be next. But Repnin was still talking, unperturbed, and when she turned her head, she flushed red with embarrassed recognition.
Thankfully, Maria Amalia was not looking at her, but rather at the crowd and its speaker, with scorn on her face, and carried on, "You are coping remarkably well."
The night before, Gerda had cried until her tears had degenerated into dry sobbing. Then she had splashed cool water onto her face and gone downstairs to inform the servants. Today she felt cold from the inside, like a statue, and her movements felt slow and languid, as though the limbs belonged to somebody else. She could not speak.
Her companion had no such problem. She leaned in towards Gerda, so close that she could see that Maria Amalia's face was wan beneath the paint. But her eyes were bright as she said, "It was at our house that Bishop Sołtyk was arrested last night. And as it was being done," her voice dropped, "he asked my husband to save the nation. To continue, in short, the good work of my father," and she drew herself up as always upon his mention, her earrings catching the light.
"How nice."
Maria Amalia's father, for all her protestations, had once worked with them. Now they had taken Kai from her; perhaps he was already on the way to Siberia. There he would die, alone in the cold under the brutality of the Lady of Ice, another ruler he did not recognize.
It couldn't happen. They had had such plans, she and Kai. And now he would die.
Yet the king would do nothing. The country he so loved would not muster its strength to help, nor even accept his criticisms. He would not even die an honoured man. But that he should die, alone in the cold, was unbearable.
Something had to be done. For if God was with them, who could stand against; and if He had seemed somewhat preoccupied with other matters recently, it must surely be time for that to change.
Kai could not die. She would not let him.
Whenever she was with him, she had a feeling of being at once conscious of time and apart from it, and conscious too of wherever he touched her, that sense of here is his hand and here is mine; that this moment might last forever, oh, it would end too soon but time was frozen. Outside the birds seemed to sing for them.
He could not die.
There was something, surely, that Gerda could do. But what would a woman who exchanged lovers like handkerchiefs, who had had her own husband murdered, care for her plight? They must be enemies, this woman who was wrecking her country, and she, who would resist it; Kai, who would fight. But it was said that Catherine loved.
She bid Maria Amalia farewell, and hurried homeward, considering.
There was still mud on the outside steps, and inside in the hall, from the heavy army boots of the foreign serfs who thought themselves masters here now, and here and there a different shade of brown, for Kai had not gone quietly.
The silence chilled her. Normally music reverberated through the house, and the scratch of quills on parchment and a child's laughter could be heard. Today there was nothing.
It was dark in the nursery, and just as quiet, for unlike Kai, he never snored, rather slept so sweetly that it almost hurt to disturb him. But wake him she did as she petted his hair, soft to the touch, a little fluffed, his arm swinging out a little in response. Then he raised himself up on one arm, and Gerda saw him blink.
"Mama?" he said, a little hesitantly, and then, his eyes adjusting to the half-light, indignantly, "Papa didn't come to kiss me goodnight!"
"Courage, sweetheart," she said, tucking a wisp of his hair behind his ear. "I have to go away for a little while, to get your Papa back."
"Back? Is he lost? Was he careless?" his questions were joyful, but Gerda took a shaky breath and bit her lip. For he was right: Kai had been careless; he held strong opinions and voiced them, and now he was lost to them.
But the politics were too messy to explain to a child, and so she asked, "Darling, do you remember the story? About the girl who saved her friend from the Snow Queen?" and at his nod, she continued, "You see, bad men, in the service of a wicked queen who dwells in cold lands, have taken your father away, and Mama has to go rescue him."
He was quiet for a long moment, then he said, "But it will be all right? Since you already know the story?"
Gerda choked back a sob, turning her face away so that her little angel wouldn't see. "I hope so, darling." And collecting herself, she drew herself up to kiss him, and said, "Now, your great-grandmother will look after you while we are away, so be very, very good, and God willing, we shall be back soon." And she kissed him again and again, not quite able to tear herself away.
For this child was now all that she had left of Kai, and if it went terribly, terribly wrong, she would be separated from them both. But she could not think that, so she steeled herself, and kissed him again, for goodbye, then rose, and left the room, her skirt swishing around her, her hands clenched.
In actual fact the four arrested by Russian troops for opposing the Russian ambassador on 14 October 1767 were taken to Kaluga, not Siberia. They were Governor Rzewuski and his son Seweryn, and the Bishops Sołtyk and Załuski (the latter taken accidentally in place of Bishop Turski). Adam Krasiński, a would-be-prisoner, was warned and escaped in disguise to France.
Repnin did say "If there is any opposition, I shall finish as I have started. I warn you, if it comes to this, I shall order the arrest not only of three but of thirty" but it was to a treaty commission rather than in public.
There were more protests: at the next meeting of the Sejm, Michał Czartoryski, the king's uncle; and Stanisław Lubormirski threatened to resign, and chancellor Zamoyski actually did (was replaced by "a man well-suited to seal the downfall of the country".) Stanisław Rzewuski demanded the release of his family, Repnin threatened more arrests and confiscations.