said, after a few moments' silence.

"Oh, it was about the general," began the prince, waking abruptly from
the fit of musing which he too had indulged in "and-and about the theft
you told me of."

"That is--er--about--what theft?"

"Oh come! just as if you didn't understand, Lukian Timofeyovitch! What
are you up to? I can't make you out! The money, the money, sir! The four
hundred roubles that you lost that day. You came and told me about
it one morning, and then went off to Petersburg. There, NOW do you
understand?"

"Oh--h--h! You mean the four hundred roubles!" said Lebedeff, dragging
the words out, just as though it had only just dawned upon him what
the prince was talking about. "Thanks very much, prince, for your kind
interest--you do me too much honour. I found the money, long ago!"

"You found it? Thank God for that!"

"Your exclamation proves the generous sympathy of your nature, prince;
for four hundred roubles--to a struggling family man like myself--is no
small matter!"

"I didn't mean that; at least, of course, I'm glad for your sake, too,"
added the prince, correcting himself, "but--how did you find it?"

"Very simply indeed! I found it under the chair upon which my coat had
hung; so that it is clear the purse simply fell out of the pocket and on
to the floor!"

"Under the chair? Impossible! Why, you told me yourself that you had
searched every corner of the room? How could you not have looked in the
most likely place of all?"

"Of course I looked there,--of course I did! Very much so! I looked and
scrambled about, and felt for it, and wouldn't believe it was not there,
and looked again and again. It is always so in such cases. One longs and
expects to find a lost article; one sees it is not there, and the place
is as bare as one's palm; and yet one returns and looks again and again,
fifteen or twenty times, likely enough!"

"Oh, quite so, of course. But how was it in your case?--I don't quite
understand," said the bewildered prince. "You say it wasn't there at
first, and that you searched the place thoroughly, and yet it turned up
on that very spot!"

"Yes, sir--on that very spot." The prince gazed strangely at Lebedeff.
"And the general?" he asked, abruptly.

"The--the general? How do you mean, the general?" said Lebedeff,
dubiously, as though he had not taken in the drift of the prince's
remark.

"Oh, good heavens! I mean, what did the general say when the purse
turned up under the