dyed red like a globule of blood
in the sunset._

_The old man watched him for a moment, all the fealty of his many years
of service in his gaze and attitude._

_"I do not like the look of things, Highness. What does it matter how
good their hearts are if their brains are bad?"_

_"I must go and talk with them, Vasili," said the Grand Duke quietly._

_The old man took a step forward._

_"If I might make so free----"_

_"Speak----"_

_"Not to-night, Master----"_

_"Why not?"_

_"It will be dangerous. Last night their voices were raised even against
you."_

_"Me! Why? Have I not done everything I could to help them? I am their
friend--because I believe in their cause: and they will get their rights
too but not by burning and looting----"_

_"And murder, Master. Two of Prince Galitzin's foresters were killed."_

_The Grand Duke turned. "That's bad. Murder in Zukovo!" He flicked his
extinguished cigarette out of the window and made a gesture with his
hand._

_"Go, Vasili. I want to think. I will ring if I need you."_

_"You will not go to Zukovo to-night?"_

_"I don't know."_

_And with another gesture he waved the servant away._

_When Vasili had gone, the Grand Duke sat, his legs across the chair by
the window, his arms folded along its back while his dark eyes peered
out, beyond the hills and forests, beyond the reddened dome of the
village church into the past where his magnificent father Nicholas
Petrovitch held feudal sway over all the land within his vision and his
father's fathers from the time of his own great namesake held all Russia
in the hollow of their hands._

_The Grand Duke's eyes were hard and bright above the slightly prominent
cheek bones, the vestiges of his Oriental origin, but there was
something of his English mother too in the contours of his chin and
lips, which tempered the hardness of his expression. The lines at his
brows were not the savage marks of anger, or the vengefulness that had
characterized the pitiless blood which ran in his veins, but rather were
they lines of disappointment, of perplexity at the problem that
confronted him, and pity for his people who did not know where to turn
for guidance. He still believed them to be his people, a heritage from
his lordly parent, his children, who were responsible to him and to whom
he was responsible. It was a habit of thought, inalienable, the product
of the ages. But it was the calm philosophy of his English mother that