“I know that you have highly distinguished yourself. Your name made a noise in the world after Chesma,” she continued; “and to crown all, you have suffered a long imprisonment.”
I was greatly agitated, and remained silent; she also paused. At last she began again, and even though so many years have elapsed, I seem to hear that low, charming contralto voice of hers,—
“Listen,”—said she. “I am a Russian princess, the daughter of your once beloved empress. It is true, is it not, that my mother, the daughter of Peter the Great, was much loved? I, both by blood and by her testament, am her only heiress.”
“Yes. But you know,” I at last ventured to say, “that there now reigns the no less beloved Empress Ekaterina the Great.”
“I know, I know,” interrupted the Princess, “how all powerful and idolized by her people the present empress is; and it is not for me—poor, weak, and abandoned by all, torn from the Imperial house, and from the land of my birth—to try to dispute the throne with her. I am the most devoted of her slaves.”
“Then what are you seeking? what are you expecting?” I asked with astonishment.
“Protection, and that my rights may be respected.”
“Excuse me,” I returned; “but you must first prove your birth and your rights.”
“I have the proofs here,” the Princess replied; and, hastily rising, she opened the drawer of a Buhl side-table, with silver incrustations. “Here is the testament of my grandfather, Peter I., and this one is my mother’s, Elizabeth’s.”
The Princess tendered me a French version of the papers mentioned. I looked them over hastily.