Pauline had no great liking for the coarse burly Benningsen, but was compelled by parity of political interests to keep on friendly terms with him. Far different was the case with Baranoff: him she loathed, as every pure woman was bound to loathe the ex-lover of the dissolute Catharine. It always cost Pauline an effort to treat him with ordinary civility. “Aha, Baroness!” cried Benningsen. “What is this you’ve been doing? Rescuing in broad daylight a prisoner of the Czar, and whisking him into the Embassy. By Heaven, you’re a bold one!” “And you’re not,” replied Pauline, whose habit it was to speak her mind freely to the General, who was accustomed to speak freely to her. “I marked you, running from the face of Paul, putting life before honour.” “Faith, my dear!” said he with a grin, and not a whit abashed by her reproach, “honour, when lost, may be recovered; one’s life, never.” “You come with news, I understand?” “Unpleasant news,” returned Baranoff, affecting a mournful air, in reality secretly delighted, as knowing that the tidings would alarm her. “Unpleasant news I regret to——” “Hold! the Baroness must pay toll for our tidings. Toll,” added Benningsen, significantly. “You know what I want.” “I do, but unfortunately the knout is not here, but at the Citadel. The Count will be but too pleased to accommodate you.” The jest was a true one. Nothing would have pleased Baranoff more than to see Benningsen tied up to the knouting-post. Baranoff gloried in the fact that it was he, and he alone, that had persuaded Paul to make war with England. Benningsen was sneeringly confident that the Count would be the first to sign a peace as soon as ever the British fleet appeared in Finland waters. “Toll!” repeated Benningsen. “A bottle of—what shall it be? Who was it that said, ‘Port for boys, claret for men, brandy for heroes’?” “Louis, a bottle of port for the General,” said Pauline sweetly. “Ach! but you’re down on me to-night,” grinned Benningsen. However, the bottle when brought, was labelled cognac. “A corkscrew? No,” said Benningsen, staying the hand of the servitor. And drawing his sabre, with one stroke he cut clean through the neck of the bottle, sending the glass fragments flying to the other end of the salon. “That’s the way we do it in camp.” The liqueur being poured out and watered to taste, Baranoff ventured to drink to the fair Pauline. “You are guilty of treason,” said she. “You know that Little Paul claims the first toast.” “O, damn Little Paul!” cried Benningsen savagely, and speaking with a recklessness that led Pauline to wonder whether he had not been taking brandy at other places besides the Embassy. “Little! Humph, that’s true, but what there is of him is quite enough! Damn the powers that be! Here’s to the powers that will be, eh?” he added, raising his glass with a significant wink at Pauline, who tried by a warning frown to check the license of his tongue. “Your tidings?” she asked.