"Then," she said, "your friends will come to look for you, will they not?"
I told her that it was not impossible.
"But, mademoiselle," said I, "they will not imagine that I have become a bird."
She liked the humour of it and smiled very sweetly.
"Oh," she said, closing her eyes and shuddering, "what a day it has been! Prince Boris left yesterday to rejoin the army. My brother and I were to have followed him to Nishni this afternoon. Then the steward said that he could not be left alone, for the convicts were out and were robbing the houses. The governor released them at noon to-day. They have been pillaging all Moscow, and your friends will find little when they come."
I was greatly interested in this, for some such story had reached us even before we entered the city.
The desperate resolve to deliver Moscow to the evil element in its population had been taken by its rulers some days previously to the arrival of the army, but neither the Emperor nor his staff had been greatly moved by it. The cavalry would soon make short work of these fellows in the open, while we trusted to the predatory instincts of the rank and file to deal with such scum in the houses.
I was about to tell her as much when a movement of the window behind us caused me to turn round, and to discover a shaggy head protruding therefrom. Without a thought, I fired my pistol point blank at it, and I shall always say that this was as unlucky a stroke as ever I made. The flash and the report on that high tower drew the attention of the passers-by in the street without, and presently some infantry who were passing began to fire on the tower, and the bullets rained thick around us. There was nothing for it but to plump down beneath the balustrade and so wait until their humour was done. And so we sat, the girl wide-eyed and silent, myself with drawn sword to thrust at any face which should be shown at the window above us.
"Janil," said I to myself, "this will be a pretty tale for the regiment to-morrow." Had you pressed me, I would have confessed a doubt that that to-morrow would ever be.
An hour passed, I suppose, and still found us in the same position. There were no longer any bullets from the street, and anon, when I stood up and looked again over the great gate of the palace, whom should I see but my own nephew Léon riding up and down upon his famous white horse and evidently searching for his old uncle who had played so scurvy a trick upon him.