change in her
demeanour. On questioning Victoria, I found that Krak's softness did not
extend beyond the limits of my sickroom; she had indeed ceased the
knuckle-rapping, but in its place she curtailed Victoria's liberty and
kept her nose to the grindstone pitilessly. Why should caresses be
confined to the sick, and kindness be bought only at the price of
threatened death? I was inclined to refuse to kiss Krak, but my mother
made such a point of compliance that I yielded reluctantly. In days of
health Krak had exacted, morning and evening, a formal and perfunctory
peck; if I gave her no more now she looked aggrieved, and my mother
distressed. Had Krak been possessed by a real penitence, I would have
opened my arms to her, but I was fully aware that her mood was not this;
she merely wanted to know that I bore no malice for just discipline, and
it went to my heart even apparently to concede this position. There
seemed to me something a little unfair in her proceedings; they were
attempts to obtain from me admissions that I should have repudiated
scornfully in hours of health. I knew that concessions now would
prejudice my future liberty. In days to come (supposing I recovered) my
hostility to Krak would be met by "Remember how kind she was to you when
you were ill," or "Oh, Augustin, you didn't say that of the Baroness
when she brought you grapes in your illness." I had plenty of grapes.
There are few things which human nature resents more than a theft of its
grievances. I was polite to Krak, but I lodged a protest with my mother
and confided a passionate repudiation of any treaty to Victoria's
sympathetic ear. Victoria was all for me; my mother was stern for a
moment, and then, smiling faintly, told me to try to sleep.

After several months I took a decided and rapid turn toward recovery.
This, I think, was the moment in which I realized most keenly the
fictitious importance which my position imparted to me. The fashion of
everybody's face was changed; mother, doctors, nurses, servants, all
wore an air of victory. When I was carried out on to the terrace at
Artenberg, rows of smiling people clapped their hands. I felt that I had
done something very meritorious in getting better, and I hoped secretly
that they would give me just as fine a procession as though I had died.
Victoria got hold of a newspaper and, before she was detected and
silenced, read me a sentence:

"By the favourable news of the King's health a great w