“It is not for me,” said Pauline, “to dictate your course of action, but in view of the recent attempt upon your life, you will do well to remain in hiding here, for a few days at least, until we learn what is best to be done. In the meantime you must look upon the castle and the isle as your own.” A proposal that found a warm seconder in Wilfrid, who foresaw the facilities it would afford him for pushing his suit with the Princess. So it was settled that she should stay at Runö. Now, although Marie’s companions were three in number, it was to Wilfrid principally that her remarks were addressed, and Pauline and the doctor, well pleased to have it so, presently withdrew to another part of the room, and had a little _tête-à-tête_ on their own account. “Our plan promises to work smoothly,” said Beauvais. “She favours him as much in the new state as in the old.” “Yes, but how long can we keep her here in concealment? She has now been absent from the palace for more than a day. By this time the Czar’s agents must be swarming everywhere on the look-out for her. Not a spot, not a house, in and around St. Petersburg will remain unvisited.” “We must keep them from visiting Runö,” said Beauvais. “How can it be done?” “Very easily. Will not Count Baranoff and his brother Loris, Chief of the Secret Police, have the direction of this affair? And have we not in our possession a letter containing matter enough to hang them ten times over? We must go at once to St. Petersburg and make this compact with them, that unless they are prepared to do our bidding we shall reveal their guilt to the Czar. And our bidding is that they instruct their subordinates to let this island alone. We need not shrink from stating the reason. Has it not been Baranoff’s aim to make yonder pair fall in love with each other? What are we doing but pursuing the same plan, though for a different reason? Freed from the intrusion of police agents Runö thus becomes a sacred asylum, an enchanted garden, in which our two wards may make love to their hearts’ content without the knowledge of the Court.” “And the end of it all?” “When her love is sufficiently strong she will be willing to fly with him from Russia. Cronstadt harbour is distant by water but eighteen miles. A swift boat and a dark night, and they are on board a vessel bound for England.” “But should we in the meantime be detected in our plot by Alexander——” “What then? Will he be very much vexed when we are supplying him with the pretext he wants?” Pauline sighed.