t and passed
many of them on the avenues and streets in the full light of the day.
Even your fiance who loved you better than she did her life, saw you
and passed you by unheeded. She saw your wistful glance, and looked
upon you wonderingly; but she, like others, believed that you were
dead, and although she felt that her heart leaped to her throat and
that a spasm of sorrowful recollections convulsed her when she glanced
into your eyes, yet she did not know you. And you--you thanked God that
she did not, for you knew that she would have flown into your arms then
and there--would have risked Siberia with all its horrors for one more
word of love from you. So you passed each other on the street so nearly
that her furs brushed against you, and she never knew--never
knew--until long after you were dead, when those friends who had helped
you when all others failed, went to her and told her."

"You were an invalid when you returned to St. Petersburg, and you
waited for health and strength before completing your work. You had
learned patience during those weary months of searching and waiting in
Siberia. Then, too, that same Russian officer whom you had sworn to
kill, was absent, and you wished him to return. Your friends told you
that he had been restored to favor with the czar, that he had been sent
to a post in Siberia; but when you arrived he was expected back within
the month. He was to take the very place and assume the same official
rank that you had once filled in the palace, next to the sacred person
of the czar. Ah! If you could only find them together, and destroy them
at the same time! Such a climax would be sweet indeed. It was for that
that you waited and hoped. But he did not come; you waited, and he did
not come.

"During all this time you were like a child in the hands of your
friends. You did precisely what they told you to do, no more, no less.
You were absorbed by the one idea. You could not see nor reason beyond
that. You even forgot your fiance and your love for her, save on that
one day when the sight of her on the street brought her vividly before
your mind; but the following morning even that recollection was gone.
At last your madness changed to a type more morose and sullen. The
delay fretted you, and one day without consulting your friends, you
resolved to act. You had reason enough left to know that your mind was
growing weaker and you feared that it would be altogether shattered;
that you would