"Really a queen! A true queen! A reigning queen—an absolute monarch! We all are her slaves; you, I, even Alexis Maximovitch. A queen who is not to be driven out of her kingdom by means of cannon, but with this!" and she held out to her companion the whistle of her shattered riding-whip.
"What! an actress?"
"Of course. What else should she be?"
"Ha, ha, ha! To whom the whistle means a revolution; whose throne is upset by hisses! Ah, Maria Alexievna, present me with this whistle. With it I will fight for you, as a knight sans peur et sans reproche."
The lady resigned the fatal weapon, so efficacious in the downfall of stage potentates, to her cavalier, as the latter lifted her out of her saddle in the portico of the Ghedimin Palace.
He then kissed her hand. She kissed him on the cheek, and, taking the young girl by the hand, she passed through a treble glass door and ascended the broad frescoed staircase within.
Here the hunting-party broke up, making rendezvous at the opera that evening.
Now the silent, bestarred gentleman, who had hitherto not mixed in the conversation, slapping the clean-shorn one on the back with the flat of his hand, said:
"Nicholas Sergievitch, a word with you. Come along with me."
"At your service, Alexis Maximovitch."