whatever his answer, must never know that I have consented to
your making this application to him; no one must know that you are
following my instructions; the world must remain ignorant of the
confession I have just made to you; and, lastly, you must not ask me,
whatever happens, to help you in any other way than with my good wishes."

"Whatever you please. I will do everything you wish me to do. Do you
not grant me a thousand times more than I dared hope, and if your father
refuses me, do I not know myself that you are sharing my grief?" cried
Foedor.

"Yes; but that will not happen, I hope," said Vaninka, holding out her
hand to the young officer, who kissed it passionately.

"Now be hopeful and take courage;" and Vaninka retired, leaving the young
man a hundred times more agitated and moved than she was herself, woman
though she was.

The same day Foedor asked for an interview with the general. The general
received his aide-de-camp as usual with a genial and smiling countenance,
but with the first words Foedor uttered his face darkened. However, when
he heard the young man's description of the love, so true, constant, and
passionate, that he felt for Vaninka, and when he heard that this passion
had been the motive power of those glorious deeds he had praised so
often, he held out his hand to Foedor, almost as moved as the young
soldier.

And then the general told him, that while he had been away, and ignorant
of his love for Vaninka, in whom he had observed no trace of its being
reciprocated, he had, at the emperor's desire, promised her hand to the
son of a privy councillor. The only stipulation that the general had
made was, that he should not be separated from his daughter until she had
attained the age of eighteen. Vaninka had only five months more to spend
under her father's roof. Nothing more could be said: in Russia the
emperor's wish is an order, and from the moment that it is expressed, no
subject would oppose it, even in thought. However, the refusal had
imprinted such despair on the young man's face, that the general, touched
by his silent and resigned sorrow, held out his arms to him. Foedor
flung himself into them with loud sobs.

Then the general questioned him about his daughter, and Foedor answered,
as he had promised, that Vaninka was ignorant of everything, and that the
proposal came from him alone, without her knowledge. This assurance
calmed the general: he had feared that he was