What did need serious thinking—as the catastrophe had by some extraordinary stroke of good luck so far been averted—was how to ward it off successfully.
In the first place, it was quite evident that so far the papers were safe.
The Cardinal and Madame Demidoff had seen nothing; either his Eminence forgot or forbore to show the lady the secret spring, or, having done so, he happened to have used the candlestick that did not contain the secret papers. But women are naturally curious, fond of toying with trifles, and any moment—— Volenski’s thoughts refused to travel further; the consequences were too appalling. And then again, should he warn his comrades at once of the catastrophe? own to them that the trust they had placed in him he had even the first day betrayed? Would that serve any purpose? What could they do, even if they knew the worst, but calmly await events? For wherever they went, however they hid, it would be impossible to escape the far-reaching arm of the Russian police. No; far better let them remain in blissful ignorance for a time; if the blow was to fall they would know their fate soon enough.
Hour after hour the young Pole sat, his head buried in his hands, trying to think of some plan, some means of intercepting those candlesticks, of robbing Madame Demidoff; but how?—how?
All night he paced up and down his room; it was broad daylight before he fell into a troubled sleep, and in his dream chains were on his wrists, he and most of his comrades were tramping through a dreary desert of snow towards the distant mines of Eastern Siberia, where death awaits the exile—certain, creeping death, a lingering torture that sometimes lasts three entire years.
CHAPTER VIII.
Whoever has travelled in a first-class carriage of an Austrian State railway has learnt to know the acme of comfort and luxury that can be conveyed on wheels. True, that whilst the traveller gains in the matter of softly cushioned seats he loses in that of speed; but what would you? This is Eastern Europe, and the oriental looks upon hurry as one of the seven deadly sins; so the railways he constructs never exceed forty miles an hour, but the springs of the carriages are balanced to a nicety, and everything is done to render the passenger’s prolonged stay in the coupé a pleasant and luxurious one.
But oh! there is one great, one very great drawback to travelling in those Eastern countries! Who has not known the annoyance, the worry, the bustle attendant on the necessary custom-house examinations at the frontier? Both at Passau, at one end of the Empire, and at Oderberg on the other, the weary traveller is usually landed an hour or so before sunrise. The imperious rules of the Austrian custom-house demand that every article of luggage pass under the inspection of its officials, and that under no circumstances a passenger be allowed to remain in his or her carriage, probably lest he or she may thereby succeed in keeping concealed the very articles of contraband, most strictly taxed by the Austrian Government.
“I don’t think we need get out, Róza,” said Madame Demidoff in a sleepy voice from the corner of her coupé, as the express drew up at Oderberg, the frontier station. “You saw the luggage registered through to Petersburg, and leaded, did you not?”
“Oui, madame!” replied the maid, looking out of the carriage window, “they are opening all the doors and making everybody get out, but they did tell me in Vienna that, if we have the luggage registered, it can go through without examination.”