“And how is it with you?” he asked, speaking in German, as they always did together.
She shrugged her shoulders.
“Oh!” she answered indifferently, “I am well, of course. I always am. I have the strength of a horse. Of course I have been troubled about these poor people. It has been terrible. They are worse than children. I cannot quite understand why God afflicts them so. They have never done any harm. They are not like the Jews. It seems unjust. I have been very busy, in my small way. My mother, you know, does not take much interest in things that are not clean.”
“Madame the Countess reads French novels and the fictional productions of some modern English ladies,” suggested Steinmetz quietly.
“Yes; but she objects to honest dirt,” said Catrina coldly. “May I go in?”
Steinmetz did not move.
“I think not. This Moscow man is eccentric. He likes to do good sub rosa. He prefers to be alone.”
Catrina tried to look into the cottage; but Karl Steinmetz, as we know, was fat, and filled up the whole doorway.
“I should like to thank him for coming to us, or, at least, to offer him hospitality. I suppose one cannot pay him.”
“No; one cannot pay him,” answered Steinmetz gravely.
There was a little pause. From the interior of the cottage came the murmured gratitude of the peasants, broken at times by a wail of agony—the wail of a man. It is not a pleasant sound to hear. Catrina heard it, and it twisted her plain, strong face in a sudden spasm of sympathy.
Again she made an impatient little movement.
“Let me go in,” she urged. “I may be able to help.”
Steinmetz shook his head.
“Better not!” he said. “Besides, your life is too precious to these poor people to run unnecessary risks.”
She gave a strange, bitter laugh.
“And what about you?” she said. “And Paul?”
“You never hear of Paul going into any of the cottages,” snapped Steinmetz sharply. “For me it is different. You have never heard that of Paul.”
“No,” she answered slowly; “and it is quite right. His life—it is different for him. How—how is Paul?”
“He is well, thank you.”
Steinmetz glanced down at her. She was looking across the plains beyond the boundless pine forests that lay between Thors and the Volga.
“Quite well,” he went on, kindly enough. “He hopes to ride over and pay his respects to the countess tomorrow or the next day.”
And the keen, kind eyes saw what they expected in the flickering light of the lamp.
At this moment Steinmetz was pushed aside from within, and a hulking young man staggered out into the road, propelled from behind with considerable vigor. After him came a shower of clothes and bedding.
“Pah!” exclaimed Steinmetz, spluttering. “Himmel! What filth! Be careful, Catrina!”
But Catrina had slipped past him. In an instant he had caught her by the wrist.
“Come back!” he cried. “You must not go in there!”
She was just over the threshold.
“You have some reason for keeping me out,” she returned, wriggling in his strong grasp. “I will—I will!”
With a twist she wrenched herself free and went into the dimly lighted room.
Almost immediately she gave a mocking laugh.
“Paul!” she said.
XIII
Unmasked
For a moment there was silence in the hovel, broken only by the wail of the dying man in the corner. Paul and Catrina faced each other—she white and suddenly breathless, he half frowning. But he did not meet her eyes.
“Paul,” she said again, with a lingering touch on the name. The sound of her voice, a rough sort of tenderness in her angry tone, made Steinmetz smile in his grim way, as a man may smile when in pain.
“Paul, what did you do this for? Why are you here? Oh, why are you in this wretched place?”
“Because you sent for me,” he answered quietly. “Come, let us go out. I have finished here. That man will die. There is nothing more to be done for him. You must not stay in here.”
She gave a short laugh as she followed him. He had to stoop low to pass through the doorway. Then he turned and held out his hand, for fear she should trip over the high threshold. She nodded her thanks, but refused the proffered assistance.
Steinmetz lingered behind to give some last instructions, leaving Paul and Catrina to walk on down the narrow street alone. The moon was just rising—a great yellow moon such as only Russia knows—the land of the silver night.
“How long have you been doing this?” asked Catrina suddenly. She did not look toward him, but straight in front of her.
“For some years now,” he replied simply.
He lingered. He was waiting for Steinmetz, who always rose to such emergencies, who understood secrets and how to secure them when they seemed already lost. He did not quite understand what was to be done with Catrina—how she was to be silenced. She had found him out with such startling rapidity that he felt disposed to admit her right to dictate her own terms. On a straight road this man was fearless and quick, but he had no taste or capacity for crooked ways.
Catrina walked on in silence. She was not looking at the matter from his point of view at all.
“Of course,” she said at length, “of course, Paul, I admire you for it immensely. It is just like you to go and do the thing quietly and say nothing about it; but—oh, you must go away from here. I—I—it is too horrible to think of your running such risks. Rather let them all die like flies than that. You mustn’t do it. You mustn’t.”
She spoke in English hurriedly, with a little break in her voice which he did not understand.
“With ordinary precautions the risk is very small,” he said practically.
“Yes. But do you take ordinary precautions? Are you sure you are all right now?”
She stopped. They were quite alone in the one silent street of the stricken village. She looked up into
