He walked past her and leaned against the mantelpiece in the pose of easy familiarity which he had maintained during the first portion of their interview.

"Prove it, madame!" he said again.

"He died at Tver," she said; but there was no conviction in her voice.

With her title and position to hold to, she could face the world.

Without these, what was she?

"A local newspaper reports that the body of a man was discovered on the plains of Tver and duly buried in the pauper cemetery," said De Chauxville indifferently. "Your husband--Sydney Bamborough, I mean--was, for reasons which need not be gone into here, in the neighborhood of Tver at the time. A police officer, who has since been transferred to Odessa, was of the opinion that the dead man was a foreigner. There are about twelve thousand foreigners in Tver--operatives in the manufactories. Your husband--Sydney Bamborough, bien entendu--left Tver to proceed eastward and cross Siberia to China in order to avoid the emissaries of the Charity League, who were looking out for him at the western frontier. He will be due at one of the treaty ports in China in about a month. Upon the supposition that the body discovered on the plains of Tver was that of your husband, you took the opportunity of becoming a princess. It was enterprising. I admire your spirit. But it was dangerous. I, madame, can suppress Sydney Bamborough when he turns up. I have two arrows in my quiver for him; one is the Charity League, the other the Russian Government, who want him. Your husband--I beg your pardon, the prince--would perhaps take a different view of the case. It is a pretty story. I will tell it to him unless I have your implicit obedience."

Etta stood dry-lipped before him. She tried to speak, but no words came from her lips.

De Chauxville looked at her with a quiet smile of triumph, and she knew that he loved her. There is no defining love, nor telling when it merges into hatred.

"Thursday evening, before dinner," said De Chauxville.

And he left her standing on the hearth-rug, her lips moving and framing no words.

CHAPTER XXXIV

AN APPEAL

"Have you spoken to the princess?" asked Steinmetz, without taking the cigar from his lips.

They were driving home through the forest that surrounded Osterno as the sea surrounds an island. They were alone in the sleigh. That which they had been doing had required no servant. Paul was driving, and consequently the three horses were going as hard as they could. The snow flew past their faces like the foam over the gunwale of a boat that is thrashing into a ten-knot breeze. Yet it was not all snow. There were flecks of foam from the horses' mouths mingled with it.

"Yes," answered Paul. His face was set and hard, his eyes stern. This trouble with the peasants was affecting him more keenly than he suspected. It was changing the man's face--drawing lines about his lips, streaking his forehead with the marks of care. His position can hardly be realized by an Englishman unless it be compared to that of the captain of a great sinking ship full of human souls who have been placed under his care.

"And what did she say?" asked Steinmetz.

"That she would not leave unless we all went with her."

Steinmetz drew the furs closer up round him.

"Yes," he said, glancing at his companion's face, and seeing little but the eyes, by reason of the sable collar of his coat, which met the fur of his cap; "yes, and why not?"

"I cannot leave them," answered Paul. "I cannot go away now that there is trouble among them. What it is, goodness only knows! They would never have got like this by themselves. Somebody has been at them, and I don't think it is the Nihilists. It is worse than that. Some devil has been stirring them up, and they know no better. He is still at it. They are getting worse day by day, and I cannot catch him. If I do, by God!

Steinmetz, I'll twist his neck."

Steinmetz smiled grimly.

"Yes," he answered, "you are capable of it. For me, I am getting tired of the moujik. He is an inveterate, incurable fool. If he is going to be a dangerous fool as well, I should almost be inclined to let him go to the devil in his own way."

"I dare say; but you are not in my position."

"No; that is true, Pavlo. They were not my father's serfs. Generations of my ancestors have not saved generations of their ancestors from starvation. My fathers before me have not toiled and slaved and legislated for them. I have not learnt medicine that I might doctor them. I have not risked my health and life in their sties, where pigs would refuse to live. I have not given my whole heart and soul to their welfare, to receive no thanks, but only hatred. No, it is different for me. I owe them nothing, mein lieber; that is the difference."

"If I agree to make a bolt for Petersburg to-morrow will you come?"

retorted Paul.

"No," answered the stout man.

"I thought not. Your cynicism is only a matter of words, Steinmetz, and not of deeds. There is no question of either of us leaving Osterno. We must stay and fight it right out here."

"That is so," answered Steinmetz, with the Teutonic stolidity of manner which sometimes came over him. "But the ladies--what of them?"

Paul did not answer. They were passing over the rise of a heavy drift.

It was necessary to keep the horses up to their work, to prevent the runners of the sleigh sinking into the snow. With voice and whip Paul encouraged them. He was kind to animals, but never spared them--a strong man, who gave freely of his strength and expected an equal generosity.

"This is no place for Miss Delafield," added Steinmetz, looking straight in front of him.

"I know that!" answered Paul sharply. "I wish to God she was not here!"

he added in a lower tone, and the words were lost beneath the frozen mustache.

Steinmetz made no answer. They drove on through the gathering gloom. The sky was of a yellow gray, and the earth reflected the dismal hue of it.

Presently it began to snow, driving in a fine haze from the north. The two men lapsed into silence. Steinmetz, buried in his furs like a great, cumbrous bear, appeared to be half asleep. They had had a long and wearisome day. The horses had covered their forty miles and more from village to village, where the two men had only gathered discouragement and foreboding. Some of the starostas were sullen; others openly scared.

None of them were glad to see Steinmetz. Paul had never dared to betray his identity. With the gendarmes--the tchinovniks--they had not deemed it wise to hold communication.

"Stop!" cried Steinmetz suddenly, and Paul pulled the horses on to their haunches.

"I thought you were asleep," he said.

There was no one in sight. They were driving along the new road now, the high-way Paul had constructed from Osterno to Tver. The road itself was, of course, indistinguishable, but the telegraph posts marked its course.

Steinmetz tumbled heavily out of his furs and went toward the nearest telegraph post.

"Where is the wire?" he shouted.

Paul followed him in the sleigh. Together they peered up into the darkness and the falling snow. The posts were there, but the wire was gone. A whole length of it had been removed. They were cut off from civilization by one hundred and forty miles of untrodden snow.

Steinmetz clambered back into the sleigh and drew up the fur apron. He gave a strange little laugh that had a ring of boyish excitement in it.

This man had not always been stout and placid. He too had had his day, and those who knew him said that it had been a stirring one.

"That settles one question," he said.

"Which question?" asked Paul.

He was driving as hard as the horses could lay hoof to ground, taken with a sudden misgiving and a great desire to reach Osterno before dark.

"The question of the ladies," replied Steinmetz. "It is too late for them to go now."

The village, nestling beneath the grim protection of Osterno, was deserted and forlorn. All the doors were closed, the meagre curtains drawn. It was very cold. There was a sense of relief in this great frost; for when Nature puts forth her strength men are usually cowed thereby.

At the castle all seemed to be in order. The groom, in his great sheepskin coat, was waiting in the doorway. The servants threw open the vast doors, and stood respectfully in the warm, brilliantly lighted hall while their master passed in.

"Where is the princess?" Steinmetz asked his valet, while he was removing the evidences of a long day in the open air.