"And you revenged yourself?"
"I have bided my time, Baron; every knot comes to the comb, they say."
"Did they all come?"
"Sooner or later, all, to the very last; some of my enemies even rotted in the mines of Siberia——"
The Baron shivered, thinking of his father.
"Others——" The Countess, for a moment, seemed to be thinking of the past.
"Well?"
"But it is my own story I am telling you, not theirs. Count Yarnova and I reached Paris almost at the same time. On my arrival, I presented myself at the Russian Embassy. As the Ambassadress happened to be looking for a companion or reader, the place was offered to me; I accepted it most willingly. A few days afterwards, I was informed by the gipsy, that the Count was to call on the Ambassadress the next day. I remembered the prediction; I did my best to bring it about. The room was exactly like the one described by my friend the gipsy; the furniture was gilt, the walls were covered over with old damask; as the Ambassadress was fond of flowers, the room looked like a hot-house. I had put on the same white dress in which he had already seen me three times, and knowing the very moment the Count would come, I spoke of Russian peasant songs; I mentioned the one I was to sing, and being requested to sing it, I did so. Before I ended it, the door was opened and Count Yarnova was announced.
"I do not know whether his could be called love at first sight, but surely everybody in the room thought that his sudden passion for me had almost deprived him of his reason.
"The Count called on the morrow, and asked if I could receive him; I did so, and he at once confessed his love for me. He told me that although he was old enough to be my father, still, he felt sure I should in time be fond of him, for marriages being made in heaven, I was ordained to be his wife.