“I have seen their courage,” said Bertram.
“Many of my friends have starved to death,” said the Princess. “It is Nadia and Alexis who have saved us. My daughter is a medical student. They still get rations, and she brings home most of them to us. Without that we should not be alive. . . . Come again, dear sir!”
“But not in the daylight,” said the old man, with a hint of fear. “My name is still a cause of suspicion and dislike.”
Out into the snow again Bertram walked with Nadia. Once she stumbled over a snow-drift in the courtyard, and Bertram said, “Take my arm, won’t you? It’s safer.”
She laid her hand on his arm, and said, “You are very kind.”
“I marvel at your courage,” he said, presently.
She answered with a kind of surprise.
“Without courage, what is life? I am young. It is only the old who are afraid of new adventures.”
She told him about her medical studies at the University of Moscow. All the classes were at night, because the students worked during the day to supplement their rations.
“You take yours home,” he said. “How do you manage to get enough to eat?”