If Vashka did not return, Peter resolved that he would go out and try his hand again with Rimsky. The old cigarette-seller might be induced to tell something which would afford a clew of the whereabouts of Kirsakoff. And it might be wise to loaf in the restaurant of the old post-house, and strike up an acquaintance with anybody who would talk. There was no time to be lost, if Peter was to find Kirsakoff and get about the business which had brought him back to the Valley of Despair.
When noon came, he rang for a samovar. Before long he heard some one moving in the hall, and after a short interval, there came a gentle tapping at his door.
“Come!” he called, and turned his head. “Vashka” entered with the samovar, pushing the door open before her with the forward end of the metal tray.
“Oh, I am sorry,” he said, rising from his chair. “I did not expect to see you—I thought the other girl would come.”
She smiled at him, quite gay and playful now, with a trace of coyness in her manner. She seemed amused at him because he had not expected her to return.
“Would you feel sad if I never came back? Would you miss me so much?”
“Of course I would miss you,” he replied, not sure what else would be safe to say. He would have preferred some light pleasantry which would answer her more in keeping with her mood, but he was afraid that she might resent gayety on his part, even though she affected it herself.
“Then I may presume to say that I am the favorite samovar girl of the American.”
“And it would not be presumption at all,” he said.
He moved and closed the door after her, while she busied herself at the table with the samovar. He had a mind for an instant to lock the door and to demand that she give an explanation of herself and her reason for coming to him in the guise of a servant. But he smiled at his own Russianism—his impulse to do the dramatic thing. He decided to draw her out in a more careful manner. One thing he was determined upon—to settle, as far as possible, her motives in playing servant.