This was true, and I wished it were the next day, so anxious was I to escape from the mysteries and masquerades and plots of which I seemed a part, and of which I should be a part, if I tried to smuggle Ivan across the frontier as my maid. I couldn’t do it, I said, when next Ivan came to my room. But he was so hopeful and anxious for freedom—and here was his chance—that I began to consider the matter, aided and abetted by Zaidee, who, as she knew everything, knew of Ivan’s plan, and was eager to have it carried out.
“I’d go, too,” she said, “as your friend’s maid, if I wasn’t going to Siberia to see Carl, and see if it will do. I don’t much believe it will, and, in that case, I shall find my way to America. A lot of us want to go, Ivan has said so much of it in his speeches.”
I listened in dismay to this prospect of a colony of nihilists swooping down upon quiet Ridgefield some day, and began to wish I had never seen Russia.
“How did M. Seguin know of your meetings?” I asked; and she replied: “You see, Ivan took off his shoes, and the rags twisted round them for corns. He has no more corns than I have. His feet are beautiful. He had to get in a chair to be heard, there was such a jam, and his socks must have been damp, for there are the prints of two feet plain as day on the cushion. I tried to get them off, but couldn’t, and monsieur went for me so fierce I had to tell him. Wasn’t he mad, though? His eyes actually opened wide. He tried to make me tell where Ivan was, but I wouldn’t. I told him it was Alex who stood in the chair, scolding us for having a meeting there. ‘Good for her!’ he said, and, when I told him you were at Mrs. Browne’s, he quieted down like a lamb. He is going to Paris soon, to see about his eyes. I believe he will go on the same train with you, and I shall be off for Siberia. I must go now. I hear the dragon coming. She hates me.”
My brain was in such a whirl that I cannot narrate correctly all that occurred that week, my last in St. Petersburg.
What with sight-seeing and Alex and Zaidee and Mrs. Browne, I had a hard time. At first madame was furious at the thought of losing Alex. What did I want of that old woman, and what would my friends say when they saw her? She didn’t think much of people who would coax one’s servants away; no, she didn’t; and her face wore a most vinegary expression, until Alex broke two dishes and spilled a pail of milk over the floor, and took twice the usual time to do my room and Mrs. Whitney’s.
After that the popularity of Alex waned a little. She was old and careless and slow, and grew worse all the time, and I was welcome to her, Mrs. Browne said, and that made matters easier.
Quite to my surprise, Monsieur Seguin approved of the plan, and seemed quite elated over the prospect. He came but once to see me, and was then in a hurry. He was going to Paris, he said, to see a famous oculist with regard to his eyes, and he was planning to leave on the same train with myself. I was afraid my delight showed in my eyes, and, to cover it, I said: “What of Nicol? Can I see him before I go?”
“Perhaps,” he answered. “Leave it to me. I will tell you everything in time.”
I did not see him again till I met him at the station. Zaidee came to say good-by, bringing Chance with her. I felt it was my final farewell to him, for I should never visit St. Petersburg again, and I was weak enough to cry as I put my arms around him and held him close for a moment. Mrs. Browne had allowed him to come into my room, and I made the most of my time, and petted and caressed him and talked to him until it was time for him to go. Then I said good-by to him and Zaidee, the girl promising to write from Siberia, and tell me if it would or would not “do.”