St Petersburg Tryst (1843)
In 1842, a letter arrived for Balzac informing him that Hanski had died. The debt-ridden novelist, now approaching the height of his fame, was ecstatic! He wrote to Eve anticipating their living together, but she had heard of his womanizing in France and “set him free.” Her family, who had never liked or accepted the plebeian and vulgar Frenchman, contested the will to keep the estate from him.
The court in Kyiv agreed, and the widow now had to go to St Petersburg to appeal the verdict. But Balzac continued to write passionate letters to her, and by the middle of the next year his tone had changed, and she invited him to join her and Anna in the Russian capital.Balzac immediately went to the Russian embassy in Paris to apply for a visa. There the young diplomat Victor Balabin already seemed to know something of him. Within the embassy plans were immediately laid to make use of this popular, monarchist writer to counteract the scathing criticism of Russia in the new book La Russie en 1839 (Russia in 1839) by the Marquis de Custine, whose father had been executed during the French Revolution and should, the Russians assumed, have looked favourably on their monarchy. Balabin disapproved of Balzac's appearance and manners but still recommended using him to counter de Custine's book.13
By the summer of 1843, Balzac was in St Petersburg with Eve. They had not seen each other in many years, and pursuit by creditors and terrible overwork had visibly aged him. But she was just as attractive to him as ever, and they got on well together. Largely at his urging, they planned marriage sometime in the future. The Russian government, however, stood in the way. Even if Eve won her lawsuit, she would not be allowed to marry a foreigner, as this would give him certain rights to the inheritance. Balzac had offered to become a Russian subject and go to the tsar to ask permission for their marriage, but the tsar would not see him, despite his fame and potential to do much for the Russian image abroad. Nevertheless, the couple spent two glorious months together in the Russian capital. They strolled the streets together, saw the sights, and made love. In the autumn, he returned to Paris, still hoping to one day marry Eve and see Verkhivnia.
Events then moved rapidly: news arrived that Eve was pregnant. Balzac was ecstatic and was sure it was a boy, whom he immediately named Victor. But she lost the child and won her lawsuit, so her daughter, Anna, could receive inheritance rights. Anna meanwhile had agreed to marry Count Jerzy Mniszech, owner of a large estate in Podolia, near Austrian Galicia. They travelled west for the ceremony and wed in Dresden. Balzac was a witness. By this time as well, Eve had begun sending Balzac money to pay off his ever-recurring debts, although she could never quite keep up with his free-spending habits.