With disdain on his face Wilfrid rose.
“When next you take to pamphleteering let the theme be, ‘Is it possible for a Russian to be a gentleman?’ My present address is the Hôtel du Nord. If by to-morrow evening at six of the clock you have neither left Berlin nor sent me your second, you may prepare for humiliation. I take my leave. Adieu, or Au revoir, whichever you please.”
And so saying Wilfrid withdrew to the quietude of his room in the hotel to think over matters.
It was a fascinating thought that during a brief stay in Saxony he had been seen by a girlish and beautiful princess, upon whose imagination he had made an impression so powerful that after the lapse of eight years she still retained him in mind. True, Baranoff was a person upon whose statements little reliance could be placed, but in the present instance Wilfrid was convinced that he had not spoken falsely.
“The lady has a real existence,” he muttered. “Now how ought I to act in this affair?”
It was hard that a princess who cherished his memory with affection should meet with no return. Yet, on the other hand, it would be embarrassing for both if he should be unable to requite her love.
If he went it was doubtful whether he would find her, so slight were the clues he held.
Would his friend Ouvaroff be able to identify her? The thought had no sooner entered Wilfrid’s mind than he recalled the Prince’s strange saying in connection with his own love suit. “There is deadly peril in aspiring to her hand.” This could scarcely be a coincidence—Ouvaroff’s lady must be Baranoff’s princess.
“Humph! if Serge were first in the field,” thought Wilfrid, “it seems unfair to cut him out. But, if the princess won’t have him——”
Early on the following morning he called at Ouvaroff’s quarters. To his extreme disappointment he found that the Prince had taken his departure, leaving a note to the effect that he had been hastily summoned to St. Petersburg by command of the Czarovitch. “Pardon my running off without a farewell,” he wrote, “but Alexander’s service brooks no delay.”