‘Yes. I am travelling for my pleasure. When our mutual friend Trepoff was good enough to ask you to extend your courtesy to me, and sent me an invitation to your ball, I accepted it with pleasure, and was glad to leave the loneliness of my hotel; but it grieves me sorely to think that I so forgot myself.’
‘Pray, Count, do not let the matter give you any concern,’ said the charming widow, as she sat up and again extended her soft hand to him to kiss. ‘Are you likely to remain in St. Petersburg long?’
‘My stay will be regulated by the amount of pleasure I experience here. But a hotel is not the most comfortable place in the winter, and I confess I feel dull and lonely.’
The lady fixed her keen eyes upon him as she remarked:
‘Indeed, I can well understand that, Count. Now, if I might venture to ask you to make my poor abode your residence during your stay in the city, it would afford me great pleasure to play the hostess. Will you accept of my hospitality?’
‘Really, Madame St. Joseph, I, I——’
‘Pray, no thanks or excuses, Count; the pleasure is mine, and I will endeavour at least to prevent your suffering from ennui.’
The Count rose, and warmly pressing her hand, said he was overwhelmed by her goodness, and no less enchanted with her beauty. He accepted her invitation in the spirit, in which it was given, and without losing any time would hasten to his hotel, pay his bill, and remove his things at once to madame’s house. An hour later he drove up in a drosky with his luggage, and was conducted to the handsomest of the guest-chambers. That night he dined tête-à-tête with madame, and in the course of the dinner he told her that the previous night he managed to lose, or had been relieved of, in some way, a large sum of money. When she uttered exclamations of regret, and expressed her sympathy with him, he laughed carelessly, made light of his loss, and said that, large though the sum was, it gave him no real concern, and he would regard it as a fine he had paid for his rudeness.
The widow sighed and told him he was a fortunate man in being able to bear such a loss without feeling it.
A fortnight passed, and the Count found himself in comfortable quarters. As if desirous of monopolizing his company, the widow invited nobody to the house, and those who paid the ordinary courtesy calls she speedily dismissed; while gentlemen who had been in the habit of dropping in of an evening to play cards and sup with pretty Julie were told by Roko that she was suffering so much from the fatigues of the ball that she could see no one. One caller, Peter Trepoff, who came specially to inquire about the Count, was told that though he had been there he had departed, without saying where he was going to. All that fortnight she remained very secluded. She would not accompany the Count when he invited her to go out, and she so strongly persuaded him not to go that he yielded and remained indoors. Every fascination, every talent she possessed, she put forth and exerted to amuse and entertain him, until he was as pliable as clay in her hands. One night he had retired to rest, and had been in his room about an hour, when he heard the handle of his door move. The door was not locked; indeed, there was no key wherewith to lock it, and he had not concerned himself about it in any way. Very gently, and almost without a sound, the latch was raised and the door pushed open. Presently Roko entered on his hands and knees. He paused and listened. Certain nasal sounds seemed to indicate that the Count was sleeping very soundly. Roko carried a tiny little lantern, and he flashed a ray across the sleeper’s face. Having satisfied himself that the Count was asleep, he drew from his pocket a phial containing a colourless liquid, and, approaching a night-table, on which stood a jug of barley-tea, which the Count had in his room every night, as he said it had been his custom for years always to drink barley-tea in the night-time, the Creole poured the contents of the phial into the jug, and having done that, he withdrew as stealthily as he had entered. Soon afterwards the Count rose, procured a light, and took from his portmanteau a large flask, into which he emptied the barley-tea. Then he addressed himself to sleep again, and slept the sleep of the just.