She lowered her head, and, putting her hands before her face, taking care not to disarrange her hair, she said, in the tones of a child who has just stolen some sweetmeats-- "Forgive me; I will not do it again." "I will only pardon you, my dear Pani," I said to her, "if you will fulfil a certain promise which you were good enough to make to me at Wilmo, at the house of the Princess Katazyna Paç." "What promise?" she asked, raising her head and laughing. "Have you forgotten so soon? You promised me that if we met in Samogitia you would let me see a certain country dance which you said was enchanting." "Oh, the roussalka! I shall be charmed; and the very man I need is here." She ran to a table loaded with music-books, and, turning over one hastily, put it on the piano stand. "Mind, my dear, _allegro presto_," she said, addressing her governess. And she played the prelude herself, without sitting down, to show the time. "Come here, Count Michel! you are too much of a Lithuanian not to be able to dance the roussalka; ... but dance like a peasant, you understand." Madam Dowghiello in vain tried to object. The Count and I insisted. He had his motives, for his part in the dance was extremely agreeable, as we soon saw. The governess, after several attempts, said she thought she could play that kind of waltz, strange though it was; so Mademoiselle Iwinska, after moving some chairs and a table that were in the way, took hold of her partner by the collar of his coat and led him into the centre of the room. "You must know, Professor, that I am a roussalka, at your service." She made a low bow. "A roussalka is a water nymph. There is one in each of the big pools of black water which adorn our forests. Do not go near! The roussalka comes out, lovelier even than I, if that be possible; she carries you to the bottom, where, very likely, she gobbles you up...." "A real siren," I cried. "He," continued Mademoiselle Iwinska, pointing to Count Szémioth, "is a very foolish young fisherman who exposes himself to my clutches, and, to make the pleasure last longer, I fascinate him by dancing round him for a time.... But, alas! to do it properly I want a sarafane.[10] What a pity! You must please excuse this dress, which has neither character nor local colour.... Oh! and I have slippers on. It is quite impossible to dance the roussalka with slippers on ... and heels on them too." She picked up her dress, and, daintily shaking a pretty little foot at the risk of showing her leg, she sent the slipper flying to the end of the drawing-room. The other followed the first, and she stood upon the parquetry floor in her silken stockings. "We are quite ready," she said to the governess. And the dance began.