Excerpt:
What Tack had told me naturally increased my apprehension. I informed the two agents of Russian police who in turn guarded the house in Brunswick Square.
A whole month went by, bright, delightful autumn days beside the sea, when I often strolled with my charming little companion across the Lawns at Hove, or sat upon the pier at Brighton listening to the band.
Sometimes I would dine with her and Miss West, or at others they would take tea with me in that overheated winter garden of the “Métropole”—where half of the Hebrew portion of the City of London assembles on Sunday afternoons—or they would dine with me in the big restaurant. So frequently was she in and out of the hotel that “Miss Gottorp” soon became known to all the servants, and by sight to most of the visitors on account of the neatness of her mourning and the attractiveness of her pale beauty.
Tack had returned to Petersburg to resume his agency business, and Hartwig’s whereabouts was unknown.
The last-named had been in Brighton three weeks before, but as he had nothing to report he had disappeared as suddenly as he had come. He was ubiquitous—a man of a hundred disguises, and as many subterfuges. He never seemed to sleep, and his journeys backwards and forwards across the face of Europe were amazingly swift and ever-constant.
I was seated at tea with Her Highness and Miss West in the winter garden—that place of palms and bird-cages at the back of the “Métropole”—when a waiter handed me a telegram which I found was from the secretary of the Russian Embassy, at Chesham House, in London, asking me to call there at the earliest possible moment.
What, I wondered, had occurred?
I said nothing to Natalia, but, recollecting that there was an express just after six o’clock which would land me at Victoria at half-past seven, I cut short her visit and duly arrived in London, unaware of the reason why I was so suddenly summoned.
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What Tack had told me naturally increased my apprehension. I informed the two agents of Russian police who in turn guarded the house in Brunswick Square.
A whole month went by, bright, delightful autumn days beside the sea, when I often strolled with my charming little companion across the Lawns at Hove, or sat upon the pier at Brighton listening to the band.
Sometimes I would dine with her and Miss West, or at others they would take tea with me in that overheated winter garden of the “Métropole”—where half of the Hebrew portion of the City of London assembles on Sunday afternoons—or they would dine with me in the big restaurant. So frequently was she in and out of the hotel that “Miss Gottorp” soon became known to all the servants, and by sight to most of the visitors on account of the neatness of her mourning and the attractiveness of her pale beauty.
Tack had returned to Petersburg to resume his agency business, and Hartwig’s whereabouts was unknown.
The last-named had been in Brighton three weeks before, but as he had nothing to report he had disappeared as suddenly as he had come. He was ubiquitous—a man of a hundred disguises, and as many subterfuges. He never seemed to sleep, and his journeys backwards and forwards across the face of Europe were amazingly swift and ever-constant.
I was seated at tea with Her Highness and Miss West in the winter garden—that place of palms and bird-cages at the back of the “Métropole”—when a waiter handed me a telegram which I found was from the secretary of the Russian Embassy, at Chesham House, in London, asking me to call there at the earliest possible moment.
What, I wondered, had occurred?
I said nothing to Natalia, but, recollecting that there was an express just after six o’clock which would land me at Victoria at half-past seven, I cut short her visit and duly arrived in London, unaware of the reason why I was so suddenly summoned.
The Price of Power: Being Chapters from the Secret History of the Imperial Court of Russia
Excerpt:
What Tack had told me naturally increased my apprehension. I informed the two agents of Russian police who in turn guarded the house in Brunswick Square.
A whole month went by, bright, delightful autumn days beside the sea, when I often strolled with my charming little companion across the Lawns at Hove, or sat upon the pier at Brighton listening to the band.
Sometimes I would dine with her and Miss West, or at others they would take tea with me in that overheated winter garden of the “Métropole”—where half of the Hebrew portion of the City of London assembles on Sunday afternoons—or they would dine with me in the big restaurant. So frequently was she in and out of the hotel that “Miss Gottorp” soon became known to all the servants, and by sight to most of the visitors on account of the neatness of her mourning and the attractiveness of her pale beauty.
Tack had returned to Petersburg to resume his agency business, and Hartwig’s whereabouts was unknown.
The last-named had been in Brighton three weeks before, but as he had nothing to report he had disappeared as suddenly as he had come. He was ubiquitous—a man of a hundred disguises, and as many subterfuges. He never seemed to sleep, and his journeys backwards and forwards across the face of Europe were amazingly swift and ever-constant.
I was seated at tea with Her Highness and Miss West in the winter garden—that place of palms and bird-cages at the back of the “Métropole”—when a waiter handed me a telegram which I found was from the secretary of the Russian Embassy, at Chesham House, in London, asking me to call there at the earliest possible moment.
What, I wondered, had occurred?
I said nothing to Natalia, but, recollecting that there was an express just after six o’clock which would land me at Victoria at half-past seven, I cut short her visit and duly arrived in London, unaware of the reason why I was so suddenly summoned.
What Tack had told me naturally increased my apprehension. I informed the two agents of Russian police who in turn guarded the house in Brunswick Square.
A whole month went by, bright, delightful autumn days beside the sea, when I often strolled with my charming little companion across the Lawns at Hove, or sat upon the pier at Brighton listening to the band.
Sometimes I would dine with her and Miss West, or at others they would take tea with me in that overheated winter garden of the “Métropole”—where half of the Hebrew portion of the City of London assembles on Sunday afternoons—or they would dine with me in the big restaurant. So frequently was she in and out of the hotel that “Miss Gottorp” soon became known to all the servants, and by sight to most of the visitors on account of the neatness of her mourning and the attractiveness of her pale beauty.
Tack had returned to Petersburg to resume his agency business, and Hartwig’s whereabouts was unknown.
The last-named had been in Brighton three weeks before, but as he had nothing to report he had disappeared as suddenly as he had come. He was ubiquitous—a man of a hundred disguises, and as many subterfuges. He never seemed to sleep, and his journeys backwards and forwards across the face of Europe were amazingly swift and ever-constant.
I was seated at tea with Her Highness and Miss West in the winter garden—that place of palms and bird-cages at the back of the “Métropole”—when a waiter handed me a telegram which I found was from the secretary of the Russian Embassy, at Chesham House, in London, asking me to call there at the earliest possible moment.
What, I wondered, had occurred?
I said nothing to Natalia, but, recollecting that there was an express just after six o’clock which would land me at Victoria at half-past seven, I cut short her visit and duly arrived in London, unaware of the reason why I was so suddenly summoned.
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The Price of Power: Being Chapters from the Secret History of the Imperial Court of Russia
The Price of Power: Being Chapters from the Secret History of the Imperial Court of Russia
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Product Details
| BN ID: | 2940015508871 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Unforgotten Classics |
| Publication date: | 10/21/2012 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| File size: | 322 KB |
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