The Russians looked at me intently. I was standing before them, my hat in my hand, and my cloak still thrown across my shoulders, armed and booted as I had ridden, and I was measuring them with a certain scorn of their ability to dupe me, yet curious too as to their own estimate of the situation, for I no longer doubted that they knew something of M. de Lambert.
“All honor to the King of France,” Dolgoruky replied suavely; “long may he live and learn to stand with Russia against the madman of Sweden and the Turk! Why should I desire to offend his Majesty?”
“Nevertheless, the king will be gravely offended, Prince Dolgoruky,” I said calmly, “if I cannot account for this young man who has served with conspicuous gallantry in the armies of France.”
“Am I his keeper, M. l’Ambassadeur?” exclaimed the prince, tartly. “Why do you demand a hot-headed boy at my hands?”
For a moment I did not reply. I wished my words to have additional weight, and I let a silence intervene and then spoke with deliberation.
“I asked him at your hands, prince,” I said, “because you have set a spy upon him for two months and more. It was your man, Tikhon, who dogged his steps before Apraxin joined the pursuit and attempted to assassinate him. I am responsible for his life, and am compelled to demand your aid in my search for him.”
Dolgoruky’s face flushed deeply at my words, and I saw that he was struggling with a passionate impulse to reply with violence, and his anger was reflected in the faces of his friends. But he had much at stake and was something of a diplomat; before I finished speaking, he had smoothed his brow and was looking at me with candid reproach.
“You do me foul injustice, M. le Vicomte,” he said plaintively; “how have I deserved such treatment at your hands? My assistance you shall have. Tikhon shall go with you into every corner of Moscow, to search for this young gentleman.”
He had assumed the only tone possible to evade my importunity, and I was astonished at the ease with which he played the injured party. I could not quarrel with so passive a foe, and was forced to accept Tikhon for what he was worth as a guide. I had no authority to search Dolgoruky’s house, and indeed doubted that he would attempt to detain M. de Lambert there.
So it was that, baffled in my intention of taunting him into an acknowledgment of his work, I left his house as quickly as possible to prosecute my search, accompanied by Tikhon, who rode along sullenly enough with Pierrot, for he probably still remembered the day when M. de Lambert had stretched him on the pavement of the Grand Square of the Kremlin. In truth, I scarcely knew what use to make of the silent Russian, who protested an ignorance as great as his master’s, but whom I suspected of considerable malevolence, for he was not the man to forget or forgive.