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At this moment Ermolai brought in four bottles of champagne and Thaddeus struck lightly on the piano. "Quickly, madame, the second attempt," said Rouletabille, who was aking hasty notes on his cuff, never ceasing, meanwhile, to watch the convivial group and listening with both ears wide open to Matrena. "The second happened still in Moscow.
Rouletabille did not wish to be seen. He made a sign to Ermolai, who was passing through the garden and who hurried to meet him at the gate. "The Barinia," said the reporter, in a low voice and with his finger to his lips to warn the faithful attendant to caution. In two minutes Matrena Petrovna joined Rouletabille in the lodge.
After the departure of Matrena, Rouletabille turned his attention to the garden. Neither the marshal of the court nor the officers were there any longer. The three men had disappeared. Rouletabille wished to know at once where they had gone. He went rapidly to the gate, named the officers and the marshal to Ermolai, and Ermolai made a sign that they had passed out.
But here, at least, I know what to do in order to feel a little safe, I know that downstairs with Gniagnia and Ermolai we have nothing to fear. No stranger can approach even the basement. The provisions are brought from the lodge by our dvornicks whom we have had sent from my mother's home in the Orel country and who are as devoted to us as bull-dogs.
She went out to caution the servants to a strict watch, armed to the teeth, before the gate all night long, and she crossed the deserted garden. Under the veranda the schwitzar was spreading a mattress for Ermolai. She asked him if he had seen the young Frenchman anywhere, and after the answer, could only say to herself, "Where is he, then?" Where had Rouletabille gone?
In that also she refused aid from anyone. The general clung to his wife's neck during the ascent and laughed like a child. Rouletabille remained in the hallway, watching the garden attentively. Ermolai walked out of the villa and crossed the garden, going to meet a personage in uniform whom the young man recognized immediately as the grand-marshal of the court, who had introduced him to the Tsar.
At ten o'clock that morning Rouletabille went to the Trebassof villa, which had its guard of secret agents again, a double guard, because Koupriane was sure the Nihilists would not delay in avenging Michael's death. Rouletabille was met by Ermolai, who would not allow him to enter.
Ermolai, who had his own haughtiness, dodged Koupriane's fist and replied that he had wished to prevent the young Frenchman, but the reporter had shown him a police-paper on which Koupriane himself had declared in advance that the young Frenchman was to do anything he pleased. Koupriane jumped into his carriage and hurried toward St. Petersburg.
It was such a blow for those upstairs to learn they walked over a mine ready to explode that it evidently had paralyzed their limbs. Happily Ermolai came down almost immediately and said to the "doctors" in his very best domestic manner: "Just a second, messieurs, if you please." He did it still with utter naturalness.
Beside this hat there was a toque that Ermolai had brought in. The old servant had found it in some corner of the garden or the conservatory where he had been. A hat-pin stuck out of that toque also. "Whose toque is that?" asked Rouletabille. "I haven't seen it on the head of anyone here." "It is Natacha's," replied Matrena.