'I wish I had never left you, though I did think it, and at the mercy of those curs. If only I had died by you!'

'You know well enough our rule is that none should be sacrificed without reason. Why should you have given those hounds two lives instead of one?'

'I wish I had died that night under the orange trees at Monte Carlo. You did yourself a bad turn when you saved my life. I have done no good with it. I have only weighted myself with unpardonable sins.'

'As far as I am concerned,' Petrovitch said, 'if there is anything to forgive, it is freely forgiven—freely and fully; and now let us shake hands after your English fashion, and of forgiveness let us talk no more. We are friends, and between such it is no question of pardon. And there are many other things we must speak of.'

He held his hand out, and the younger man grasped it. There was a moment's pause. Then,—

'Let me give you some fresh tea—that is cold,' said Petrovitch cheerfully, pouring out another cup; 'don't you want to hear what happened to me after I was killed?'

'I can hardly realise yet that you are not killed.'

'Well, I'll tell you about it. The officer of that troop added medicine to his other accomplishments, besides which he was a distant relation of my mother's, and he insisted on seeing whether I could not be conjured back to life. I believe I gave them a good deal of trouble, but I seem to be a die-hard. My capture was kept very quiet, thanks to my family name, for the Government didn't care about having it known that the head of the Litvinoffs had tried to atone for the crimes of his family by taking the side of the people. My wound was a bad one, and even now troubles me sometimes. I used sometimes almost to wish it had settled me. Fancy being in prison, and a Russian prison, with a wound like that.'

'But how did you get away?'

For answer Petrovitch told him the story of his escape as he had told it to Hirsch and to his other friends, intentionally making the recital a long one, so that his companion might have time to get used to the new situation before they began to talk of the future.