I've ever thought was that you were infinitely
more decent than the rest of us."

A faint flush crept over Ivan's face; but he waived the speech gravely,
and renewed the question. "I do want to know, Vladimir; because I have a
suspicion as to her identity. And--and if it should be the one I
fear,--by Heaven--I've a plan that may help us! Tell me her name!"

"Zedarovsky says that it was--Irina Petrovna, the singer."

Ivan's face paled slightly as he said, in a low voice: "I had a
presentiment it was she.--Well, Vladimir, wish me success! I'm going,
to-morrow evening, when I've arranged matters a little, to Brodsky's
tent to protest, in the name of the regiment, about his behavior."

"Ivan! Good God! He'll have you court-martialled and dismissed from the
regiment!"

"He will do nothing of the sort. And if he does--better that, than have
the old Second go to utter ruin."

"But--but--if you will be foolhardy, at least wait till you've given
some one of the others an opportunity. One of the majors, or the
Adjutant, might do it with less danger. Give them a chance, Ivan!"

"If all things were equal, Vladimir, I'd never dream of arrogating the
interview to myself. But I have a certain power--at least, my father
has, that may, perhaps, properly used, influence Brodsky.--At least, if
it does not, nothing else in the world will!"

After this, though de Windt's curiosity was roused and he was eager to
learn the unsuspected means the use of which had been so long delayed,
he could get nothing but monosyllables out of Ivan, who soon showed
plainly that he would say nothing more concerning it. And, indeed, when
a young and honorable officer has come to the determination to use
blackmail upon his Colonel, be the purpose never so laudable, it is not
a matter that he is likely to talk of, even with his best friend.

Amazing though it may seem, and contrary to every rule of novelistic
heroism, Ivan was determined to do a thing that he had been
contemplating for a week: to bring the terrible, unknown, but accurately
estimated power of his father's map of men to bear upon Colonel Brodsky
of the Grenadier Guards; to return a sobered and battered leader to a
regiment in want; and to rescue--for so Ivan put it to himself--a damsel
in distress from the power of a brutal man, for whom she could not
possibly have any real affection.

In the officers' mess of the Second Grenadiers, the head of the table
was habitually occupied by the