mountain and, turning in under the gate, I hastened my pace. Suddenly it
seemed to me that somebody was following my steps. I stopped and looked
round. It was impossible to make out anything in the darkness. However,
out of caution, I walked round the house, as if taking a stroll. Passing
Princess Mary's windows, I again heard steps behind me; a man wrapped in
a cloak ran by me. That rendered me uneasy, but I crept up to the flight
of steps, and hastily mounted the dark staircase. A door opened, and a
little hand seized mine...

"Nobody has seen you?" said Vera in a whisper, clinging to me.

"Nobody."

"Now do you believe that I love you? Oh! I have long hesitated, long
tortured myself... But you can do anything you like with me."

Her heart was beating violently, her hands were cold as ice. She broke
out into complaints and jealous reproaches. She demanded that I should
confess everything to her, saying that she would bear my faithlessness
with submission, because her sole desire was that I should be happy. I
did not quite believe that, but I calmed her with oaths, promises and so
on.

"So you will not marry Mary? You do not love her?... But she thinks...
Do you know, she is madly in love with you, poor girl!"...

*****

About two o'clock in the morning I opened the window and, tying two
shawls together, I let myself down from the upper balcony to the lower,
holding on by the pillar. A light was still burning in Princess Mary's
room. Something drew me towards that window. The curtain was not quite
drawn, and I was able to cast a curious glance into the interior of the
room. Mary was sitting on her bed, her hands crossed upon her knees;
her thick hair was gathered up under a lace-frilled nightcap; her white
shoulders were covered by a large crimson kerchief, and her little feet
were hidden in a pair of many-coloured Persian slippers. She was sitting
quite still, her head sunk upon her breast; on a little table in front
of her was an open book; but her eyes, fixed and full of inexpressible
grief, seemed for the hundredth time to be skimming the same page whilst
her thoughts were far away.

At that moment somebody stirred behind a shrub. I leaped from the
balcony on to the sward. An invisible hand seized me by the shoulder.

"Aha!" said a rough voice: "caught!... I'll teach you to be entering
princesses' rooms at night!"

"Hold him fast!" exclaimed another, springing out from a corner.

It was Grushnitski a