t is. This morning already reports to that effect were
current in the town, and your father himself told me that if Russia
insisted on payment, he was lost irretrievably. Judge, then, of my
horror, when I have just received from a friend in St. Petersburg the
certain intelligence that the empress has already sent a special envoy
to settle this business with the most stringent measures. This half
a million must be of great importance to the empress, when, for the
purpose of collecting it, she sends her well-known favorite, Prince
Stratimojeff!"

Elise started from her seat in horror, and stared at Bertram. "Whom
did she send?"

"Her favorite, Stratimojeff," repeated Bertram, calmly.

Elise shuddered; her eyes flashed fire, and her cheeks burned. "Who
has given you the right to insult the Prince Stratimojeff, that you
call him the favorite of the adulterous empress?"

Bertram looked at her in astonishment. "What is Prince Stratimojeff
to you?" said he. "The whole world knows that he is the favorite
of Catharine. Read, then, what my correspondent writes me on the
subject." He drew forth a letter, and let Elise read those passages
which alluded especially to the mission of the imperial favorite.

Elise uttered a scream, and fell back fainting on the sofa; every
thing swam before her; her blood rushed to her heart; and she muttered
faintly, "I am dying--oh, I am dying!" But this momentary swoon soon
passed over, and Elise awoke to full consciousness and a perception of
her situation. She understood every thing--she knew every thing. With
a feeling of bitter contempt she surveyed all the circumstances--her
entire, pitiable, sorrowful misfortune. "Therefore, then," said she to
herself, almost laughing in scorn, "therefore this hasty wedding, this
written consent of the empress--I was to be the cloak of this criminal
intercourse. Coming from her arms, he was anxious to present me to the
world. 'Look! you calumniate me! this is my wife, and the empress is
as pure as an angel!'" She sprang up, and paced the room with
hasty steps and rapid breathing. Her whole being was in a state of
excitement and agitation. She shuddered at the depth of pitiable
meanness she had discovered in this man, who not only wished to cheat
and delude her, but was about, as if in mockery of all human feeling,
to make herself the scapegoat of her imperial rival.

She did not notice that Bertram was looking at her in all
astonishment, and in vain see