or's name. Barker had inquired of Mr. Bellingham whether he knew
anything of his friend's movements, to which Uncle Horace had replied,
with a grim laugh, that he had quite enough to do with taking care of
distinguished foreigners when they were in New York, without looking
after them when they had gone elsewhere.

One evening before dinner Vladimir brought Margaret a telegram. She was
seated by the fire as usual and Miss Skeat, who had been reading aloud
until it grew too dark, was by her side warming her thin hands, which
always looked cold, and bending forward towards the fire as she listened
to Margaret's somewhat random remarks about the book in hand. Margaret
had long since talked with Miss Skeat about her disturbed affairs, and
concerning the prospect that was before her of being comparatively poor.
And Miss Skeat, in her high-bred old-fashioned way, had laid her hand
gently on the Countess's arm in token of sympathy.

"Dear Countess," she had said, "please remember that it will not make
any difference to me, and that I will never leave you. Poverty is not a
new thing to me, my dear." The tears came into Margaret's eyes as she
pressed the elder lady's hand in silence. These passages of feeling were
rare between them, but they understood each other, for all that. And now
Margaret was speaking despondently of the future. A few days before she
had made up her mind at last to write the necessary letters to Russia,
and she had now despatched them on their errand. Not that she had any
real hope of bettering things, but a visit from Nicholas had roused her
to the fact that it was a duty she owed to him as well as to herself to
endeavour to recover what was possible of her jointure.

At last she opened the telegram and uttered an exclamation of surprise.

"What in the world does it mean?" she cried, and gave it to Miss Skeat,
who held it close to the firelight.

The message was from Lord Fitzdoggin, Her British Majesty's Ambassador
at St. Petersburg, and was an informal statement to the effect that his
Excellency was happy to communicate to the Countess Margaret the
intelligence that, by the untiring efforts and great skill of a personal
friend, the full payment of her jointure was now secured to her in
perpetuity. It stated, moreover, that she would shortly receive official
information of the fact through the usual channels.

Miss Skeat beamed with pleasure; for though she had been willing to make
any sacrifice for