She looked timidly at her brother.
“Even if it were a great deal of trouble...” answered Prince Andrew, as if guessing what it was about.
“Think what you please! I know you are just like Father. Think as you please, but do this for my sake! Please do! Father’s father, our grandfather, wore it in all his wars.” (She still did not take out what she was holding in her reticule.) “So you promise?”
“Of course. What is it?”
“Andrew, I bless you with this icon and you must promise me you will never take it off. Do you promise?”
“If it does not weigh a hundredweight and won’t break my neck... To please you...” said Prince Andrew. But immediately, noticing the pained expression his joke had brought to his sister’s face, he repented and added: “I am glad; really, dear, I am very glad.”
“Against your will He will save and have mercy on you and bring you to Himself, for in Him alone is truth and peace,” said she in a voice trembling with emotion, solemnly holding up in both hands before her brother a small, oval, antique, dark-faced icon of the Saviour in a gold setting, on a finely wrought silver chain.
She crossed herself, kissed the icon, and handed it to Andrew.
“Please, Andrew, for my sake!...”
Rays of gentle light shone from her large, timid eyes. Those eyes lit up the whole of her thin, sickly face and made it beautiful. Her brother would have taken the icon, but she stopped him. Andrew understood, crossed himself and kissed the icon. There was a look of tenderness, for he was touched, but also a gleam of irony on his face.