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Pierre Troubetskoi had long known my father, who had been an attache in Russia. He was Valerie's knightly suitor. And he fell into the estates which now burden me with wealth, while absent upon the Czar's secret affairs.
Where the Russian violets and Volhynian forget-me-nots bloom around her tomb, where you will see her name carved in the memorials of a princely line as 'Valerie, Princess Troubetskoi. There, I will tell you the whole story." An April rain of loving tears silenced the girl's voice, as she looked out of the carriage window, and saw Major Hardwicke riding after them.
He included the two Princesses Troubetskoi, the Countess Leon, the Countess Nariskine, the Aguados, the Rothschilds, the Doudeauvilles, the Castries, and he decided that there should be none but pretty women in the front seats of the open boxes. And he counted upon piling up a fine little surplus, since the revenues of the box-office were in his hands for the first three nights.
My life belonged to Poland, my soul to art, but my heart was a sealed temple of love, a temple where Valerie, the beloved, the secretly worshiped, sat alone on her throne. "One day a woman, radiant in youth, and reflecting Valerie's own beauty, was brought to the chateau by Troubetskoi, who had journeyed on to Vienna. It was Alixe Delavigne, the woman whom I saw last with you.
The Pole buried his face in his thinned hands, and then brokenly resumed: "The old story the only one you know. She was about my own age; Troubetskoi was nearly always away; perhaps he thought to trap all my traitorous circle through me, or else he was in the secret service of the hungry Russian eagle.
I do not ask you to believe this, but by the God of Heaven, it is my warrant for forcing myself to the side of my dead sister's child. She shall yet have every acre and every rouble that Pierre Troubetskoi would have given to this child whom you hide. My sister died with her empty arms stretched to Heaven, imploring God for her child. And now, what terms will you make with me.
"Two years later, I learned from a fellow refugee that Pierre Troubetskoi had been killed by accident in a great forest battle. And to Alixe Delavigne, all the wealth which would have been Valerie's was left by the lion-hearted man who awoke too late to the early doom of his beloved.
For nearly a year I was kept vibrating between the points of danger to us, my personal headquarters being at the Chateau of Jitomir. And there I lived out my brief heart-life, for there I met Valerie Troubetskoi. No one seemed to know where Pierre had found her, but later I learned her story from her own lips. "That is, all of the story of a woman's heart-life which is ever unveiled to any man!
There were a few political salons. The Countess de R. received every evening but only men no women were ever asked. The wives rather demurred at first, but the men went all the same as one saw every one there and heard all the latest political gossip. Another hostess was the Princess Lize Troubetskoi.
You shall never even see her face, you she-devil!" cried the infuriated old man, nearing the defiant woman. "You were the go-between for your worthless sister and that Russian cur, Troubetskoi!" "You lie! Hugh Fraser, you lie!" cried Berthe, in a ringing voice. "You crushed the flower that Fate had drifted within your reach! You turned her into the streets of London to starve!
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