Dennis Wheatley - The Shadow of Tyburn Tree

She was already on her feet and had kicked herself free of her trailing night-robe. Agile as a panther, she bounded across the room towards the heavy desk, wrenched open one of its upper drawers and grabbed a long, curved knife. Before he could get within two yards of her she had whipped round and flashed the glittering blade before his eyes.

Roger halted abruptly in his tracks. For a moment they both remained motionless, glaring at one another. Even in that moment of crisis he could not but catch his breath at the violent beauty of the figure she made. She had not a stitch of clothing on her slim, lissome body but her long, silvery-blonde hair hung like a cloak about her shoulders and half-way down her back. Her small breasts heaved violently with stress and emotion, and her green eyes blazed at him with the fury of a trapped animal.

He felt certain that she meant to kill him if she could, yet he dared not back down now. To have shown a trace of fear or attempted to temporise would have spelled certain disaster. Even if it meant an ugly wound he had got to get the knife from her; otherwise there could be no reconciliation, and within a week she would carry out her threat to have him knouted to death. She was not the woman to forget an injury. Immunity from her vengeance could be secured only by subduing her completely. He had gambled on being able to do that, and now he must go through with it or pay the forfeit.

Suddenly it came to him that, for these next few moments, he must forget that she was a woman, and deal with her as he would a drunken sailor who attempted to knife him in a brawl. So far he had merely slapped her; but now he must hit her in good earnest as the only means of preventing her from giving him an ugly wound.

As he clenched his fists and raised them her eyes widened with astonished dismay. His left shot out straight for her face and she flung herself back against the desk in an attempt to escape the blow. But it was only a feint and did not even touch her. Before she could recover her balance his right landed with a thud in the middle of her stomach.

Her mouth gaped open as the breath was driven from her body. A spasm of pain shot across her features, and dropping the knife, she clutched wildly at the place where his blow had landed, doubled up, then slid gasping to the floor.

Roger kicked the knife away well out of her reach, picked her up and threw her on the bed. For a minute he stood watching her as she writhed there, but he knew that he had only winded her and the moment she got her breath back she would be cursing and threatening him again; so he decided that now was the time to go through with the distasteful task he had set himself.

Striding across the room to a cloak-rack near the door he took frpm it the stoutest of Natalia Andreovna's three long parasols. By the time he got back to the bed her writhing had ceased; she was lying there panting heavily and staring up at him with a strange expression in her eyes. Ignoring her glance he grabbed the hair on the top-of her head with his left hand. Instantly she clawed at it with her long nails in an effort to free herself, but she could do no more than scratch him, and twisting her head round sideways he forced her over onto her face. Then he set about belabouring her bottom with the parasol in no half-hearted manner.

For a few moments she bore her beating stoically, alternatively gritting her teeth and snarling curses at him. Then she began to shout for help, but he forced her face down into the pillow, half-muffling her cries. Next she started to beg for mercy, but he ignored her pleas and continued to belabour her. At last she ceased to curse, struggle and plead, went suddenly limp beneath his grip and burst into a flood of tears.

Only then did he stop, and, throwing the parasol on the floor, stood back from her, panting as a result of his exertions.

She did not move but continued to lie there with her face buried in the pillows, sobbing as though her heart would break. When he had recovered his breath he slowly began to undress, intent now on completing his plan for her subjugation.

He hated the thought of taking her against her will, but not from any moral scruple. He had had her first, and many times since, with her eager consent; so this would have no semblance to a violation. But he disliked the thought of forcing a woman in any circumstances, and, moreover, believed that he had now come to far the most difficult part of the battle that he was waging; since, should she prove really stubborn, and refuse to respond to Ms passion by finally melting in his arms, all that had gone before would count for nothing. They would part still unreconciled and himself inevitably become the victim of her unappeasable hatred.

Yet in this his fears were groundless. Had he lived in Russia for years and been an expert on Russian character and customs he could not have dealt more effectively with her than he had already done. As he laid his hand upon her shoulder she turned over of her own accord, smiled up at him from tear-dimmed eyes and, choking back her sobs, murmured:

"Oh, Rojé Christorovitch, how deeply you must love me, to beat me so."

"Indeed I love you," he replied; and looking down on her thus he almost believed he meant it as he went on: "Surely you do not think that I would have left Sweden at a moment's notice for the sole purpose of paying you out by giving you a beating. You are a wicked child, and it seems that like a fond parent I needs must be stern with you for your own betterment. But I determined at once to sail in this ship because I could not bear to be parted from you."

"Yet you have found the way to my heart," she sighed contentedly. "All that you needed to-be a perfect lover was the violence of a Russian. You were too soft, too considerate, too woman-like before. You allowed me to bully you unmercifully without complaint, and that is wrong. No woman of my country ever believes that her man truly loves her unless he beats her now and then. Even the Empress Catherine has taken her beatings from the Orlofs' Potemkin and other favourites, and loved them for it all the more. Rojé Christorovitch, you are now my master and I your slave. Lie down here while I kneel at your feet and you, my lord, shall tell me how best I may pleasure you this night."

Roger knew then that he had achieved a victory beyond his wild­est dreams. Their reconciliation was in keeping with the violence of their previous feelings and when, at last, their emotions were spent Natalia Andreovna wept again; but this time from sheer joy, and in the small hours she sobbed herself happily to sleep in Roger's arms.

From then on everything about the four-day voyage went as merry as a marriage-bell. Roger came out into the open as Natalia's cavalier, and henceforth took his meals with her, the Captain, and two Secretaries of the Embassy, whom King Gustavus had compelled Count Razumof-sky to send home. One, Vladimir Paulovitch Lepekhin, was a tall, dark, amusing young man and the other, Dr. Drenke, was a fat, kindly, blue-eyed German of middle age, who had spent many years in the Russian service. Roger had, of course, already met both of them on numerous occasions, and together they formed a merry party.

The weather was excellent and the sea like a mill-pond. On the evening of Sunday, the 24th of Jiuie, they ploughed their way steadily up the Gulf of Finland, and late that night, dropped anchor in Crondstadt Bay. The following morning the Russian authorities came aboard and gave the Swedish frigate permission to proceed up the channel to St. Petersburg for greater convenience in landing Natalia Andreovna and her party. As a member of it Roger went ashore with the others, and by eleven o'clock, found himself at last in the Imperial city where lay the focus of his secret mission.

Natalia was in duty bound to take up her residence in the palace of her grandfather, Count Cyril Razumofsky. The Empress Elizabeth, whose lover he had been, had made him Herman of the Cossacks, and later he had played a leading part in the coup d'etat that had placed Catherine on the throne. But he was now old, crotchety and abhorred strangers; so, although it had at first been mooted that Roger should be her guest there, they decided that it would be wiser for him to take lodgings in the city.