Poor Chance! He sneaked into the hall and lay down on a mat, with his head between his paws and a cowed look in his brown eyes. Katy, Jack and I all stooped to caress him, as we came from the drawing room, for we left soon after Michel’s departure, and madame did not urge us to stay, or ask us to come again. She had done her duty to her son’s plebeian friends, and I had no doubt that, as the carriage which was to take us to the hotel rolled from the door, she said, or thought, “Thank Heaven, that is over!” just as we did.
CHAPTER XII.
ON THE NEVA.
The next day Jack went out alone, hoping to meet Chance. On his return, he told us he had missed the dog, but had called on Sophie, who was suffering from a cold, and had not left the house since we had taken supper with her.
“She seemed awfully nervous,” he added. “I guess it was the search for Ivan that has upset her, though she didn’t speak of it. Her mother was sick in bed, and the house blue generally.”
He had asked Sophie to go with us that evening to the Neva. It was to be a kind of gala night, with fireworks and more bands of music than usual, and it was rumored that some of the court dignitaries were to be present, and Jack was very anxious to go. Sophie had hesitated at first, he said, saying she was tired of everything, and was going back to Paris as soon as her mother was better. At last, however, she was persuaded, and agreed to join us at a certain hour and place she named. Jack was in high spirits, but Katy was very quiet, just as she had been since the evening at Madame Scholaskie’s. She would like to see the fine sight, she said, but she was sorry Jack had persuaded Sophie, against her will, to join us. Two or three times she seemed on the point of telling me something, or asking something.
Twice she got as far as to begin: “Say, auntie——” and when I answered, “Yes. What is it?” she replied: “Oh, nothing. I only had a queer thought.”
What the thought was she did not tell me then, and by the time we were ready for the expedition she was as bright as usual, and had never looked lovelier. There was an eagerness in her manner which I had seldom seen. She could scarcely wait for us to start, and was more impatient than Jack, who had been counting the hours. Outside the hotel we found Chance, shaking his head, with a note in his mouth for me.
“Don’t go to the Neva to-night,” it read; “it is too cold. Wait till some other time!”
I was perplexed and mystified, and wondered how M. Seguin knew we were going upon the river.
“I know,” Jack said. “I met that girl Zaidee, who stood behind madame’s chair during the dinner. She can speak some English, and I talked with her, and asked if she was ever on the river at night. She nearly turned a somersault in the street trying to express her delight.”