The reporter pricked up his ears. If Demidroff characterized a tale as amazing, it was worth listening to.
“Twenty years ago,” went on the Baron, “Count Lladislas Metrovitch, a Pole and a professor in the University here, was arrested for participation in a plot against the Czar. Whether he was guilty or not does not matter now. He was convicted and was imprisoned in a fortress. After three years it was reported that he was dead. The truth was that he had escaped.
“His first act was to look for his family. He learned that his wife had died shortly after his arrest, and that his daughter was being cared for by the Grand Duke Ivan, who had known him and his wife. By some means, he got into the Grand Duke’s palace. He saw there a child about four years old, which was the age of his own child, and from various circumstances concluded that she was his own child. He was deceived; she was not his own. She was the little Princess Yves Napraxine, daughter of the Grand Duke. But, unknowing, he stole her and escaped to America, where he took the name of Shishkin.”
The Baron paused and glanced around to note the effect of his story. He need not have feared; his listeners, one and all, were hanging breathlessly on his words. The thoughts of each differed from those of the rest, but there was not one to whom the recital did not come sharply home. Bristow and Olga, especially, were beginning to realize what this might mean. No one had yet thought of Florence.
“The Grand Duke,” went on the Baron, “died ten years ago. He left enormous wealth and no children except the missing princess. He had always refused to believe her dead, and in his will he left all his fortune to her and provided for keeping up the search for her. If she was not found in twenty years, the estates were to escheat to the crown.
“Count Strogoff was made trustee of these estates, and as time passed on, and the princess did not appear, he doubtless came to look upon them as his own. Undoubtedly he will demand the best of proof before giving them up. But slowly and surely I have traced the matter and riveted the proofs one by one until they are indisputable.
“I was about to send for Professor Shishkin—Count Lladislas—when he suddenly started for Russia on the Sea Spume, bringing with him this lady whom he supposed to be his daughter, but who was really the Princess Yves Napraxine.”
As the Baron spoke, he drew Florence forward. “I have the honor,” he declared, “to present to you the Princess Yves Napraxine.”
Florence faced them boldly. Her face was white. The desperation of a cornered rat shone in her eyes. Her swelling heart seemed about to suffocate her. Yet she faced them all, head high; she would take her medicine bravely when the time came; at least, they should not call her coward.
Olga, too, was pale. The revelation of her birth stunned her; the complications terrified her; the loss at one blow of him whom she had always called father and the substitution of fresh kindred and fresh life made her brain reel. Desperately she strove to reduce the confusion to order.