little by little, however, as the poor old woman recovered something of health and strength, his heart went out toward her. telling her only certain incidents of his life, he gradually brought the narrative back to the period, twenty years before, immediately after their mother's death, and at last revealed himself to his sister, after making her promise secrecy as to his true name. thus matters went on for nearly two years.
the broken-down old woman lived in his rooms in something like comfort, and took pleasure in dusting and arranging his things. one day, when she was tidying the sitting room, her brother was startled by a sudden exclamation, almost a cry, which broke from his sister's lips.
"oh, heaven, it is she!" she cried, her eyes fixed on a page of the photograph album she had been dusting. "brother, come here; for heaven's sake, who is this?"
"baroness von doring," curtly answered kallash, glancing quickly at the photograph. "what do you find interesting in her?"
"it is either she or her double! do you know who she looks like?"
"lord only knows! herself, perhaps!"
"no, she has a double! i am sure of it! do you remember, at mother's, my maid natasha?"
"natasha?" the count considered, knitting his brows in the effort to recollect.
"yes, natasha, my maid. a tall, fair girl. a thick tress of chestnut hair. she had such beautiful hair! and her lips had just the same proud expression. her eyes were piercing and intelligent, her brows were clearly marked and joined together—in a word, the very original of this photograph!"
"ah," slowly and quietly commented the count, pressing his hand to his brow. "exactly. now i remember! yes, it is a striking likeness."
"but look closely," cried the old woman excitedly; "it is the living image of natasha! of course she is more matured, completely developed. how old is the baroness?"
"she must be approaching forty. but she doesn't look her age; you would imagine her to be about thirty-two from her appearance.
"there! and natasha would be just forty by now!"
"the ages correspond," answered her brother.
"yes." princess anna sighed sadly. "twenty-two years have passed since then. but if i met her face to face i think i would recognize her at once. tell me, who is she?"
"the baroness? how shall i tell you? she has been abroad for twenty years, and for the last two years she has lived here. in society she says she is a foreigner, but with me she is franker, and i know that she speaks russian perfectly. she declares that her husband is somewhere in germany, and that she lives here with her brother."
"who is the 'brother'?" asked the old princess curiously.
"the deuce knows! he is also a bit shady. oh, yes! sergei
kovroff knows him; he told me something about their history; he
came here with a forged passport, under the name of vladislav
karozitch, but his real name is kasimir bodlevski."
"kasimir bodlevski," muttered the old woman, knitting her brows. "was he not once a lithographer or an engraver, or something of the sort?"
"i think he was. i think kovroff said something about it. he is a fine engraver still."
"he was? well, there you are!" and princess anna rose quickly from her seat. "it is she—it is natasha! she used to tell me she had a sweetheart, a polish hero, bodlevski. and i think his name was kasimir. she often got my permission to slip out to visit him; she said he worked for a lithographer, and always begged me to persuade mother to liberate her from serfdom, so that she could marry him."
this unexpected discovery meant much to kallash. circumstances, hitherto slight and isolated, suddenly gained a new meaning, and were lit up in a way that made him almost certain of the truth. he now remembered that kovroff had once told him of his first acquaintance with bodlevski, when he came on the pole at the cave, arranging for a false passport; he remembered that natasha had disappeared immediately before the death of the elder princess chechevinski, and he also remembered how, returning from the cemetery, he had been cruelly disappointed in his expectations when he had found in the strong box a sum very much smaller than he had always counted on, and with some foundation; and before him, with almost complete certainty, appeared the conclusion that the maid's disappearance was connected with the theft of his mother's money, and especially of the securities in his sister's name, and that all this was nothing but the doing of natasha and her companion bodlevski.
"very good! perhaps this information will come in handy!" he said to himself, thinking over his future measures and plans. "let us see—let us feel our way—perhaps it is really so! but i must go carefully and keep on my guard, and the whole thing is in my hands, dear baroness! we will spin a thread from you before all is over."
