"Hear me, Natalie! when they bind me upon the wheel, weep not. Be
resolute, my wife, and pray that their torments may not render me weak,
and that no cry may escape my lips!"
"I will pray, Ivan."
In half an hour all was over. The noble and virtuous Count Ivan
Dolgorucki had been broken upon the wheel, and three of his brothers
beheaded, and for what?--Because Count Munnich, fearing that the noble
and respected brothers Dolgorucki might dispossess him of his usurped
power, had persuaded the Czarina Anna that they were plotting her
overthrow for the purpose of raising Katharina Ivanovna to the imperial
throne. No proof or conviction was required; Munnich had said it, and
that sufficed; the Dolgoruckis were annihilated!
But Natalie Dolgorucki still lived, and from the bloody scene of her
husband's execution she repaired to Kiew. There would she live in the
cloister of the Penitents, preserving the memory of the being she loved,
and imploring the vengeance of Heaven upon his murderers!
It was in the twilight of a clear summer night when Natalie reached the
cloister in which she was on the next day to take the vows and exchange
her ordinary dress for the robe of hair-cloth and the nun's veil.
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