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"The police never have been able to prevent what was bound to happen. But, speaking of this Priemkof, it remains between us, eh? Between just us?" "Yes, we must tell you now," Gounsovski slipped in softly, "that it will be much better not to let Koupriane know that you got the information from me. Because then, you understand, he would not believe you; or, rather, he would not believe me.
"Here is the datcha, anyway. In the name of heaven, tell your driver to stop the horses here. If the 'doctors' are already there it is we who shall have killed the general." "You are right." Koupriane moderated his excitement and that of his driver and horses, and the carriage stopped noiselessly, not far from the datcha. Ermolai came toward them. "Priemkof?" faltered Koupriane.
From another corner, Rouletabille kept his eyes fixed on Natacha who ignored him. Ah, that girl, sphinx to them all! Even to him who thought a while ago that he could read things invisible to other vulgar men in her features, in her eyes! The impassive face of that girl whose father they had tried to assassinate only a few hours before and who had just pressed the hand of Priemkof, the assassin!
If we wish not to lose it, then we must arrive easily and calmly, like friends who know the general is out of danger." "Our only chance is to arrive before the bogus doctors. Either they aren't there, or it already is all over. Priemkof must have been surprised at the affair of the poisoning, but he has seized the opportunity; fortunately he couldn't find his accomplices immediately."
The coachman bent above them, arms out, as though he would spring into the ether. Ah, the beautiful night, the lovely, peaceful night beside the Neva, marred by the wild gallop of these maddened horses! "Priemkof! Priemkof! One of Gounsovski's men! I should have suspected him," railed Koupriane after Rouletabille's explanations. "But now, shall we arrive in time?"
And, while you were dining down there and while Priemkof was on guard at the datcha, that annoying affair Madame Gounsovski has spoken about happened." Rouletabille had not sat down, in spite of Madame Gounsovski's insistences.
"Watch the Bay of Lachtka, and come to tell me to-morrow if you will believe in her always," replied Gounsovski, confidentially, with a horrid sort of laugh that made the reporter hurry down the stairs. And now here was Priemkof to look after! Priemkof after Matiew!
"Koupriane, our dear Koupriane," interrupted Gounsovski, slightly troubled at hearing his wife pronounce Annouchka's name, "Koupriane ought to be able to understand that this time Priemkof must bring things off, or he is definitely ruined." "Priemkof knows it well enough," replied Madame as she re-filled the glasses, "but Koupriane doesn't know it; that is all we can tell you. Is it enough?
But a Priemkof, playing both branches of the police, had a good chance of living a long time, and a Gounsovski would die tranquilly in his bed with all the solaces of religion.
"There is something simpler still to imagine than the culpability of Natacha. It is that Priemkof schemed to pour the poison into the flask of vodka, saying to himself that if the poison didn't succeed at least it would make the occasion for introducing his dynamite into the house in the pockets of the 'doctors' that they would go to find."
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