pallor for an instant upon the countenance of
the princess? Was there a quick but imperceptible intaking of her
breath? Was there a deepening in the expression of her matchless eyes,
and an imperceptible widening of them, as they dwelt upon her
companion? Was there a stiffening of her figure in its attitude of
quiet repose, and did her muscles attain a sudden rigidity, induced by
that startling announcement? Saberevski could not have answered any one
of these questions. So perfectly were the features and the facial
expression of Princess Zara under her control that she outwardly
betrayed no sign of the effect of the announcement. And yet it might
well have affected her most deeply; might have startled her even into a
cry of terror; should have filled her with instant fear, because this
man who made it was one, who in his former official capacity could have
condemned almost any person in Russia to exile by a gesture, or a word.
And Zara did not doubt that his official capacity still obtained. She
knew him to be an expatriate as she had announced. She understood that
for some reason, not apparent, he had become a voluntary exile from his
native country and city, and might never again return to the scenes he
loved best. But she also knew that he was no less closely in the
confidence of the Russian emperor, and could never be any the less
inimical to the enemies of the czar. A statement such as he had made,
coming from him, charging her with complicity in revolutionary acts
which had for their object the assassination of the Russian ruler and
his possible successors, contained an implied threat more terrible in
its consequences than any other one which could have been made; more
terrible to her, personally, than to any other person against whom it
might have been made, because she knew by the experiences of one of her
girl friends, to what extremities of mental and moral torture a
Siberian exile may be condemned.

She made no reply. She remained perfectly motionless and silent,
waiting for him to continue.

"You need not deny me, Zara, for I know," he went on presently. "How
the knowledge came to me does not matter, and has no connection with
this interview. But I know. That knowledge has created the duty which I
have come to you to-day to perform. I want you to abandon your present
pursuits. Whatever the purpose of your visit to America may be, I beg
that you will forego it. I do not seek any confession, or even a
statem