“It is the face of an angel,” replied Wilfrid as he returned the miniature. “What is her name?” he added.
“You do not recognise her?”
“No.”
“I thought perhaps you might have recognised the face. Her name? Pardon me, I will give it if you are prepared to undertake the rôle of lover—if not, ’twere best, in the lady’s interests, to keep it secret.”
Wilfrid reflected. A lady of political consequence, Baranoff had called her, threatened by the State with death if she listened to love-vows! Wilfrid was sufficiently versed in Russian history to know that the reigning dynasty was a younger branch of the House of Romanoff, and that a return to the rights of primogeniture would deprive the present Czar of his crown. Was the lady with the angel-face a descendant of the elder line, and thus so nearly related to the throne that, in the Court of the gloomy and suspicious Paul the First, it would be perilous for any man, even the highest among Russia’s nobility, to aspire to her hand? Imbued with this idea Wilfrid began to weave a whole political romance around the person of the beautiful unknown. Was she, though nominally at liberty, a virtual prisoner at the Czar’s Court, watched by a hundred suspicious eyes—pining for affection, yet forbidden to marry?
To try to set her free from such gloomy environment was no more than his duty.
And Wilfrid, if Baranoff had spoken truly, was certain of gaining her love! To woo and carry off a fair princess from the power of a jealous Czar was just the sort of enterprise that appealed to his knightly and romantic character. He could no longer hesitate.
“Do you assent?”
“Assent!” echoed Wilfrid. “Is it possible to dissent? You say that provided I succeed in marrying this lady you will add to the pleasure by paying me the sum of three hundred thousand roubles! Really, your proposal is so extraordinary, so captivating, that I am almost inclined to think that you are trifling with me. And,” he added in a graver tone, “it is not wise, sir, to trifle with a Courtenay.”
“No trifling is intended. But, pardon me, I have not, it seems, made my meaning quite clear. You are labouring under a slight misapprehension. I spoke of love: I did not speak of marriage.”