ear the Winter Palace,
where he inquired for Mrs. Borisoff. After a little delay, he was
conducted to a private sitting-room, where again he waited. On a table
lay two periodicals, at which he glanced, recognising with a smile
recent numbers of the _Nineteenth Century_ and the _Vyestnik Evropy_.

There entered a lady with a bright English face, a lady in the years
between youth and middle age, frank, gracious, her look of interest
speaking a compliment which Otway found more than agreeable.

"I have kept you waiting," she said, in a tone that dispensed with
formalities, "because I was on the point of going out when they brought
your card----"

"Oh, I am sorry----"

"But I am not. Instead of twaddle and boredom round somebody or other's
samovar, I am going to have honest talk under the chaperonage of an
English teapot--my own teapot, which I carry everywhere. But don't be
afraid; I shall not give you English tea. What a shame that I have been
here for two months without our meeting! I have talked about
you--wanted to know you. Look!"

She pointed to the periodicals which Piers had already noticed.

"No," she went on, checking him as he was about to sit down, "_that_ is
your chair. If you sat on the other, you would be polite and grave
and--like everybody else; I know the influence of chairs. That is the
chair my husband selects when he wishes to make me understand some
point of etiquette. Miss Derwent warned you, no doubt, of my
shortcomings in etiquette?"

"All she said to me," replied Piers, laughing, "was that you are very
much her friend."

"Well, that is true, I hope. Tell me, please; is the article in the
_Vyestnik_ your own Russian?"

"Not entirely. I have a friend named Korolevitch, who went through it
for me."

"Korolevitch? I seem to know that name. Is he, by chance, connected
with some religious movement, some heresy?"

"I was going to say I am sorry he is; yet I can't be sorry for what
honours the man. He has joined the Dukhobortsi; has sold his large
estate, and is devoting all the money to their cause. I'm afraid he'll
go to some new-world colony, and I shall see little of him henceforth.
A great loss to me."

Mrs. Borisoff kept her eyes upon him as he spoke, seeming to reflect
rather than to listen.

"I ought to tell you," she said, "that I don't know Russian.
Irene--Miss Derwent almost shamed me into working at it; but I am so
lazy--ah, so lazy! you are aware, of course, that Miss Derwen