“Do I?” she asked, looking confidingly into Ivan’s face while she leaned on his arm. They were standing at a window in the old castle of Nicolofsky, watching the white flakes as they fell gently to the ground. It was night, but a full moon shed its soft, pure radiance, over the peaceful scene. “Our first night at home, Ivan,” she continued. “I shall love this place. I am so glad we came here at once.”
“And I am so glad to hear you say so. I have often felt, Clémence, that it was too generous, too unselfish of you and your mother to agree in counselling me to decline the Emperor’s offer of a post in the Army of Occupation, which would have kept us together in France, perhaps for years.”
“You know, Ivan, that you are needed here.”
“I know it. I must get rid of Dmitri at once; and my only way of doing so is by being my own steward. I fear he has used my poor friends here very hardly. Yet, according to his light, he has been faithful; and after Zoubof’s letter, pleading his cause so earnestly, I could not well set him aside for another. It is true I neither respect Zoubof nor like him,—though he has behaved very courteously to me, being evidently well satisfied with whatever arrangements the Emperor made with him about the estate.”
“If you are your own steward, Ivan, will you not have to remain here all the year?”
“Not quite, m’amie,” Ivan answered smiling. “That would be too great a sacrifice. For this winter, indeed, I purpose keeping my princess a captive in fetters of frost and snow; and perhaps next summer we may content ourselves with a visit to Moscow, our martyr city, of which it is indeed true that we think upon her stones. But, if God will, the following winter must be spent in St. Petersburg.”
“I should be well content to stay here and work amongst these poor, faithful-hearted people, who gave us such a loving welcome to-day. Some of them wept with joy to see you again, Ivan.”
“Yes, Clémence, I love them dearly; and they love me with the love they gave poor little Ivan Barrinka long ago. Still—the capital has attractions—”
Clémence smiled. “It was a sacrifice for you to abandon the army,” she said.
“How could I do otherwise? God gave me these people. Besides,” Ivan added, “my great temptation to remain in the service was the hope of one day becoming an imperial aide-de-camp. But for these posts there are far too many candidates already. It will now be necessary for the Czar to place his army upon a peace-footing, and a very difficult task that will be.—But, m’amie, you have not told me yet what you think of this old, tumble-down owl’s nest of a castle?”