Page:The Czar, A Tale of the Time of the First Napleon.djvu/92

82 armies, now face to face with the enemy, and retrace his steps to the centre of his dominions. But his generals had said to him, "Sire, your presence here paralyzes the army; it takes fifty thousand men to guard you;" and he was forced to acknowledge the justice of their remonstrances: a chance bullet—perhaps a bullet which was not a chance one; for Napoleon was no chivalrous antagonist—might at any moment leave Russia a prey to untold confusion. On the other hand, a new army was urgently needed, and none but the sovereign could raise it; men's hearts everywhere were failing them for fear, and none but the sovereign could inspire them with hope and confidence. So "the great heart" returned "to the midst of the great body." For the present.

On the morning after the arrival of the Czar in Moscow, Ivan was walking in a fashionable street called the Arbatskaya, not far from the Kremlin. Adrian Wertsch and two or three other young noblemen were with him. Like all the crowd amongst which they were moving, they had donned their richest and gayest dresses. Every one wore a festive air, and seemed to be making holiday in honour of the presence of the sovereign.

"Come, Adrian Nicoläitch," said young Kanikoff, the very person to whom Ivan had lost so many of Petrovitch's hard-earned roubles—"come, tell us how much of the show you saw last night."

"As much as you did," was the laughing answer; "or as our friend here, Ivan Ivanovitch."

"Oh, as for me," said Ivan, "I am born under an unlucky star. I am destined never to see his Imperial Majesty. During one of his visits to the city I was ill; during two I was absent; and last night, all I could contrive to see was the head of one of his horses."