“How do you know whether there is risk or not?” Laurence exclaimed, violently drawing her skirts around her. “Send for twenty doctors, if you like. What do I care! I am going. I’ll leave here to-day. Give orders for instant departure. Prince Piotr and his household can come away, too. But go, go at once, and see to it!”
She was clutching distractedly at the back of a chair, and her fingers fidgeted restlessly upon it. Garrassime was gazing at her in absolute consternation. What was he to do in so unexpected a dilemma—so unheard-of a situation! And this was his beloved master’s wife—the Princess—the mother of the Boy-Heir of his—Garrassime’s—adoration!
“Your Highness does not know,” he said, without moving from his place, “that the doctor is far away. He has twenty thousand souls to look after, and will not move without peremptory orders from the Zèmtsvo, or from Your Highness, since his Excellency our Prince is not here.”
“And if it gets worse?” Laurence asked, shivering like a leaf. “If there is more of that plague coming? If—”
“Bòg dâl y Bòg vzial,” Garrassime gravely replied (God gave and God took!). “That is all we will say then, Highness. It is for you, Illustrious, however, to prevent its happening—if it can yet be done!”
“The land-steward and the intendant must look to it all!” Laurence cried, tripping over her words. “You are here to take care of me—of Prince Piotr. You must not have anything to do with this ghastly affair!”
Garrassime, hiding his indignation, advanced nearer to her unreproved; she was too frightened now to notice it. “The people,” he pronounced, with slow respect, “would long since have starved, or died of many sicknesses, had our lords not taken care of them. The taxes are heavy, Your Highness. We of the villages were happier a thousand times as serfs—before the Little White Father of other days—peace be to his soul—gave them their liberty.” Here Garrassime bowed three times, crossing himself devoutly, and Laurence, held by something she could not have explained, stood still, watching him. “There is nothing left,” the gray-haired servitor ventured on, “but to help them in every way, and that is what the Prince, Your Highness’s Illustrious Consort, has always done, as his noble father did before him. By their holy forethought cholera has already been almost frightened away, and the people no longer starve. But there are other evils, Highness—and we—that is, they thought—that in the absence of our beloved master, Your Highness might consider—the welfare of—his—people, Highness—that you might wish to do for them what he does.”
She gave a short toss of the head. There was an expression of extreme disgust in her whole attitude that did not escape him, and perhaps emboldened him to go yet further.
“Your Highness cannot leave them now,” he said, almost sternly. “Not while His Excellency is away, while they are so hard pressed already. His Excellency’s forefathers through many, many generations have aided and saved the forefathers of these in pain and trouble. Remember that, Highness.”
“Cannot leave!” cried Laurence. “Cannot leave! Is there somebody here or anywhere with enough effrontery to call me to order?”