"And what would be the consequences?"
"Surely you know what it means for a Nihilist to disobey orders? It is death." She was white now and agitated. "I am so ashamed at not having told you before you took the first step."
"It would have made no difference in my decision," I replied promptly. I thought more of clearing her clouded face than of any possible consequences to me. "But tell me, are you also mixed up with them in any way?"
"I am putting my liberty and perhaps my life into your hands," she said, in the same very earnest tone and manner. "My brother has drawn me in with him to a certain extent. You know they like to have many women in the ranks."
"I am sorry for you. I have rarely known a Nihilist who was capable of getting much pleasure out of life." A cold touch of fear seemed to contract her features, as she glanced at me and shrank a little from me.
"You! What—how come you to know anything of this? You said you were—an Englishman?"
"I am an Englishman: but I lived the first sixteen years of my life in Russia: the last six of them in Moscow here; and I know much of Russian life. I have made only one visit to Russia since I left; and this time I arrived only last night, and intended to go on to St Petersburg as I told you to-day. It will save time in this matter if you can make up your mind to believe absolutely in my good faith."
I looked into her face as I said this, and I held out my hand. She laid hers in it, and we clasped hands in a strong firm grip as a token of mutual faith and friendship. I believed in the little soul, and meant to stand by her.
"I will trust you now," she said, simply, after a pause.
"As for what you have told me, it can make no difference to me," I declared. "If I go out and meet this fellow Devinsky to-morrow, and he beats me, it will be all the same to me whether I am a Nihilist or an Englishman. There is only one soul in all the world who will care; and I shall give you a letter to be posted to him—if things go wrong."