“The one thing you can do is to put yourself in the hands of the police.”
“The police?”
“You say your friends will help you in any explanation.”
“I don’t follow you yet.”
“The police have tracked you here from Bratinsk. They were in the village yesterday evening. They are coming to me again this afternoon. It happens that my housekeeper’s niece was to have come here to-day—in a village like this all private matters are public, you know. She is not coming, but Volna can take her place for the time without any suspicion being aroused. What you have to do is to cause the police to believe that Volna has crossed the frontier with you and that you have returned alone.”
“How cause them to believe this?”
“Go and get your horse and ride through the village this afternoon and call here.”
“Here!” I cried in astonishment.
“Yes. I shall then send for the police agents and hand you over to them, as the man who told me the falsehoods yesterday. This will clear this house of the danger of any suspicion.”
I could not restrain a smile, remembering how he had emphasized the heinousness of falsehoods. “It will at least be in a good cause,” I said.