"I guess I am!" said Fred. "I'm glad to know that some of you will own me! My uncle Mikail had me arrested when I went to see him in Petersburg!"
And then while they learned about one another, the two of them forgot the war and the danger in which they stood.
CHAPTER IV
COUSINS
"So you have seen Mikail Suvaroff!" said Boris. He shook his head. "We have seen little of him in the last few years. He and my father do not agree. Mikail is on the side of the men about the Czar who want no changes, who want to see the people crushed and kept down. My father wants a new Russia, with all the people happier and stronger."
"Then I should think they wouldn't agree," said Fred, heartily. "Mikail is like the Russians one reads about, dark and mysterious, and always sending people to Siberia and that sort of thing."
"It isn't as bad as that, of course," said Boris, with a laugh. "Russia isn't like other countries, but we're not such barbarians as some people try to make out. Still, of course, there are a lot of things that ought to be changed. Russia has been apart from the rest of the world because she's so big and independent. That's why there are two parties, the conservatives and the liberals. My father is all for the Czar, but he wants the Czar to govern through the men the people elect to the Duma. After this war—well, we shall see! There will be many changes, I think. You see, this time it is all Russia that fights. Against Japan we were not united. It is the Russian people who have made this war."
"I only knew there was danger of war the night it began," said Fred. "I suppose it is on account of Servia, though?"