but I saw that it was all hundred ruble bills."

"The prisoner saw hundred ruble bills. I have no other questions."

"Well, did you bring back the money?" asked the justiciary, looking at
the clock.

"I did."

"Well, what then?"

"Then he again took me with him," said Maslova.

"And how did you give him the powder in the wine?" asked the
justiciary.

"How? Poured it into the wine and gave it to him."

"Why did you give it to him?"

Without answering, she sighed deeply. After a short silence she said:

"He would not let me go. He exhausted me. I went into the corridor and
said to Simon Michaelovich: 'If he would only let me go; I am so
tired.' And Simon Michaelovich said: 'We are also tired of him. We
intend to give him sleeping powders. When he is asleep you can go.'
'All right,' I said. I thought that it was a harmless powder. He gave
me a package. I entered. He lay behind the partition, and ordered me
to bring him some brandy. I took from the table a bottle of
feen-champagne, poured into two glasses--for myself and him--threw the
powder into his glass and handed it to him. I would not have given it
to him if I had known it."

"And how did you come by the ring?" asked the justiciary.

"He presented it to me."

"When did he present it to you?"

"When we reached his room. I wished to depart. Then he struck me on
the head and broke my comb. I was angered, and wished to go. Then he
took the ring from his finger and gave it to me, asking me to stay,"
she said.

Here the assistant prosecutor again rose, and with a dissimulating
naiveness asked permission to ask a few more questions, which was
granted, and leaning his head on his gold-embroidered collar, he
asked:

"I would like to know how long was the prisoner in the room with
Smelkoff?"

Maslova was again terror-stricken, and with her frightened eyes
wandering from the prosecutor to the justiciary, she answered,
hurriedly:

"I do not remember how long."

"And does the prisoner remember entering another part of the hotel
after she had left Smelkoff?"

Maslova was thinking.

"Into the next room--an empty one," she said.

"Why did you enter that room?" said the assistant prosecutor,
impulsively.

"To wait for a cabriolet."

"Was not Kartinkin in the room with the prisoner?"

"He also came in."

"Why did he come in?"

"There was the merchant's feen-champagne left, and we drank it
together."

"Oh, drank together. Very well."

"And di