At times there would trot past little bands of Cossacks, who, carrying immensely long lances and mounted on shaggy ponies, sought to quicken the pace of the people by crying, “To the Winter Palace! To the Winter Palace!”
“Now, I wonder what all this excitement is about?” said Wilfrid, re-entering the Embassy.
“You do? Well, then, let us go to the Winter Palace, and discover the reason,” answered Pauline, who had returned, looking more charming than ever in her handsome furs.
As for Wilfrid, having no choice in the matter of attire, he was wearing the same Austrian uniform as on the previous day. Pauline, studiously critical, noticed that he was without the ornament of a sword, and thinking it a pity that he should go forth without his full equipment, procured a handsome weapon from her father’s collection, and even went so far as to help him in girding it on.
Having assisted Pauline into the carriage, Wilfrid was about to take his place by her side, when she cried, with a little gesture of impatience—
“There! I have left my vinaigrette in the hall.”
While Wilfrid went back to fetch it a troop of guards came riding by. At their head was Prince Ouvaroff, looking, so Pauline thought, pale, ill, and melancholy.
“Now what is troubling him?” she murmured.
No sooner did Ouvaroff catch sight of Pauline than his melancholy seemed to vanish. There came upon his face a smile, never seen there except when she was in view.