ysical
suffering, the thought of the relentless approach of that blank
nothingness of death gripped him till his brow grew cold, and his limbs
trembled.

Up to the Christmas of that year he had kept the appearance of a man in
his fifties. Then, quite suddenly, his failure began. He was himself
aware of it in December. By the end of January it was the great topic of
the kitchen. In mid-lent the Governor remarked upon it to the
Governor-General;--and hope began to stir in a hundred hearts: hope of a
long despaired-of release from the terrors of an invincible blackmail.

Up to the middle of March he managed to get about alone. But as the
breath of spring began to make itself perceptible in the icy air,
Michael was forced secretly to realize that will and body were on the
verge of divorce. On the afternoon of March 13th, his sleigh was
announced, ready to drive him across the city to a council with his
colleagues of the police. His furs--cap and coat--were up-stairs in his
bedroom. Piotr delayed answering his ring. At the end of five minutes
the Prince, raging like a school-boy, left the house coatless, wearing
only a common felt hat, and in that guise drove for more than two miles
in the open _troika_. It was a performance not unique; but it was
destined to be his last.

Prince Michael was carried home from the council and put to bed, burning
with fever. Two days later the whole city sat awaiting the six-hour
bulletins that recounted the state of the mysterious official, whose
attack of double pneumonia was as serious as it was sudden. The notice
of the morning of April 3d read thus:

"His Excellency has passed a critical night, and this morning it is
feared that there is slight hope of recovery."

By noon of that day Ivan was speeding across the city in his father's
sleigh, with Piotr, who had been sent for him, at his side.

During the drive, Ivan did not speak. By this time he had somewhat
recovered from the shock of the news of three days before. But Piotr's
word that his father was actually dying, brought up those thoughts
which, hitherto, he had resolutely refused to consider. And, as his mind
wavered through innumerable irrelevant subjects, he was subconsciously
wondering why, in all the years of his banishment, the possibility of
reinstatement and the inheritance of that enormous fortune, had never
once entered his head. That his casting-off had been final, he had not
doubted. Who had known Michael