“But is this anything special?” she urged. “Lord Southbourne is not sending you abroad again,—to Russia?”
“No fear of that, little woman; and if he did they would stop me at the frontier, so don’t worry. Harding mentioned the States in his note.”
“Oh, that would be lovely!” she assented, quite reassured. I was thankful that she and Jim were settled down in this out-of-the-way place for the next few weeks, any way. It would be easy to keep them in ignorance of my movements, and, once away, they wouldn’t expect to hear much of me. In my private capacity I was a proverbially remiss correspondent.
They both came with me the seven-mile drive to the station; and even Jim, to my relief, didn’t seem to have the least suspicion that my hurried departure was occasioned by any other reason than that I had given.
Anne’s name had never been mentioned between him and myself since my release. Perhaps he imagined I was forgetting her, though Mary knew better.
I sent a wire from Exeter to “M. Pavloff,” and when I arrived at Waterloo, about half-past ten at night, I drove straight to the Charing Cross Hotel, secured a room there, and asked for Herr Pavloff.
I was taken up to a private sitting-room, and there, right enough, was Mishka himself. In his way he was as remarkable a man as his master; as imperturbable, and as much at home in a London hotel, as in the café near the Ismailskaia Prospekt in Petersburg.
He greeted me with a warmth that I felt to be flattering from one of his temperament. In many ways he was a typical Russian, almost servile, in his surly fashion, towards those whom he conceived to be immeasurably his superiors in rank; more or less truculent towards every one else; and, as a rule, suspicious of every one, high or low, with whom he came in contact, save his master, and, I really believe, myself.
At an early stage in our acquaintanceship he had abandoned the air of sulky deference which he had shown when we first met on the car returning to Dunaburg after the accident, and had treated me more or less en camarade, though in a kind of paternal manner; and yet I doubt if he was my senior in years. He was a man of considerable education, too, though he was usually careful to conceal the fact. To this day I do not know the exact position he held in his master’s service. It may perhaps be described as that of confidential henchman,—a mediæval definition, but in Russia one is continually taken back to the Middle Ages. One thing, at least, was indubitable,—his utter devotion to his master.
“So, the little man kept his word, and sent for you. That is well. And you have come promptly; that also is well. It is what you would do,” he said, eying me quite affectionately. “We did not expect to meet again,—and in England, hein?”