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"Oh, well, let us both accompany him to his chamber," said Natacha, "and I will wish papa good-night. I'm eager for bed myself. We will all make a good night of it. Ermolai and Gniagnia will watch with the schwitzar in the lodge. Things are reasonably arranged now." They all ascended the stairs. Rouletabille did not even go to see the general, but threw himself on his bed.
Matrena Petrovna did as she was told, returned to the house, spoke to the schwitzar, who removed to the lodge with Ermolai, and their mistress closed the outside door. She had closed long before the door of the kitchen stair which allowed the domestics to enter the villa from below. Down there each night the devoted gniagnia and the faithful Ermolai watched in turn.
The general inquired for Natacha, not understanding why she had left him thus during his first venture out. The schwitzar replied that the young mistress had returned to the house and had left again about a quarter of an hour later, taking the way that the party had gone on their promenade, and he had not seen her since.
Can you swear to me that you have not seen, that you have not spoken to Katharina?" The prince looked at Koupriane so insolently that the Prefect turned pale with rage. Ah, if he were able if he only dared! but such men as this were beyond him. Galitch walked past him without a word of answer, and ordered the schwitzar to call him a carriage.
Rouletabille noted that the dvornicks were before the gate and that the schwitzar was at his post, from which he could detect everyone who might enter or leave the villa. Matrena pushed the rolling-chair herself. The general was radiant. He had Natacha at his right and at his left Athanase and Thaddeus. The two orderlies followed, talking with Rouletabille, who had monopolized them.
The schwitzar gathered the general into his great arms and carried him into the veranda. Feodor demanded five minutes' respite before he was taken upstairs to his chamber. Matrena Petrovna had a light luncheon brought at his request. In truth, the good woman trembled with impatience and hardly dared move without consulting Rouletabille's face.
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?
There were umbrellas everywhere, and goloshes. True, it was a day of pouring rain. I was struck by there being no guard with a big revolver in the antechamber. He had a little, timid schwitzar there, who took my umbrella, murmuring 'barine' and bowing over and over again. He conducted me through very ordinary rooms quite unguarded to an average sitting-room of a common kind.
"And the servants? Have any of them been sick? The dvornicks? The schwitzar? In the kitchens? No one sick? No? Go and see; then come and tell me." He returned, saying, "No one sick." Like the marshal, Matrena Petrovna and Feodor Feodorovitch looked at one another, repeating in French, "No one sick! That is strange!"
Even as she thought it, here at her feet, right at her very feet, a shadow of one of the porcelain men moved, stretched itself out, rose to its knees, grasped her skirt and spoke in the voice of Rouletabille. Ah, good! it was Rouletabille. "Himself, dear madame; himself." "Why is Ermolai in the veranda? Send him back to the kitchens and tell the schwitzar to go to bed.
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