tary importance to us. What can it
matter? The fortune of France is invincible.'

"'Well then...' she uttered, meaningly, and rose from the couch. The
French officer stood up, too. Tomassov hastened to follow their example.
He was pained by his state of utter mental darkness. While he was
raising the lady's white hand to his lips he heard the French officer
say with marked emphasis:

"'If he has the soul of a warrior (at that time, you know, people really
talked in that way), if he has the soul of a warrior he ought to fall at
your feet in gratitude.'

"Tomassov felt himself plunged into even denser darkness than before. He
followed the French officer out of the room and out of the house; for he
had a notion that this was expected of him.

"It was getting dusk, the weather was very bad, and the street was quite
deserted. The Frenchman lingered in it strangely. And Tomassov lingered,
too, without impatience. He was never in a hurry to get away from the
house in which she lived. And besides, something wonderful had happened
to him. The hand he had reverently raised by the tips of its fingers had
been pressed against his lips. He had received a secret favour! He was
almost frightened. The world had reeled--and it had hardly steadied
itself yet. De Castel stopped short at the corner of the quiet street.

"'I don't care to be seen too much with you in the lighted
thoroughfares, M. Tomassov,' he said in a strangely grim tone.

"'Why?' asked the young man, too startled to be offended.

"'From prudence,' answered the other curtly. 'So we will have to part
here; but before we part I'll disclose to you something of which you
will see at once the importance.'

"This, please note, was an evening in late March of the year 1812. For
a long time already there had been talk of a growing coolness between
Russia and France. The word war was being whispered in drawing rooms
louder and louder, and at last was heard in official circles. Thereupon
the Parisian police discovered that our military envoy had corrupted
some clerks at the Ministry of War and had obtained from them some very
important confidential documents. The wretched men (there were two
of them) had confessed their crime and were to be shot that night.
To-morrow all the town would be talking of the affair. But the worst was
that the Emperor Napoleon was furiously angry at the discovery, and had
made up his mind to have the Russian envoy arrested.

"Such was De Castel