The Princess glanced at me with a strange smile.
“To save my life! I see you do not yet know our Holy Russia. Shall I tell you what my sentence was?”
“Was it not death, then?”
“Yes, death—by the knout!”
“My God!”
I gazed at her stupified. Her whole beauty seemed to be focussed in one passionate protest. Knouted to death! I saw the form before me stripped, and lashed to the triangles, while the knotted thong, wielded by the hangman’s hands, buried itself in the soft flesh.
I no longer disbelieved. I no longer even doubted. The very horror of the story had the strength of truth.
For some time neither of us spoke.
“But now, surely, you have made up your mind to break lose from this thraldom?” I demanded. “And, if so, and you will trust me, I will undertake to save you.”
“You forget, do you not, that you yourself are not free? You surely do not mean that you would lay aside your work for my sake?”