“Nonsense!” she expostulated. “You are superstitious, too, and so is ‘Polo.’ Now you know you are, ‘Polo’ dear, and there was a white moth as long as that”--she extended her rounded arm to its full extent--“bothering about my dressing-room half an hour ago. It nearly committed suicide by falling into the bath I’d just quitted, and after flitting and winging and flopping round the lights, flew away by the crack of the door into Piotr’s room. He was asleep already, and I had to adopt the hunting methods of the last of the Mohicans to retrieve the ghostly beast, and bear him, struggling like a demon, to the balcony, out in the gloaming. Stupid little soul! He wouldn’t depart, although I blew on him and swung my _peignoir_ sleeves in his face. There he hovered defiantly, as if saying, ‘I’ll get at the boy whether you like it or not.’ Brrrrrrrr--rrrrr--! It made me feel cold all down my back.” “My dear mother,” Pavlo exclaimed, raising his nose from his salad, “surely a _brave-des-braves_ like you cannot be scared by a poor, innocent butterfly?” “A poor, innocent butterfly!” mocked Tatiana. “You make me laugh! _Vieux grognard_ though I may be, I don’t like white moths with three or four or five--I didn’t count--but they were there--black bars across their wings. You don’t remember, I suppose, that those are unshriven souls wandering sorrowfully about in hope to find a holy priest to bless them; and truly if I were to hear that something untoward has happened to somebody, I wouldn’t be a bit astonished.” Salvières stared at his wife. “Tatiana,” he chided, half laughingly, “how can you? Moreover, I rather fancy your way of blessing unshriven souls. To flap your sleeves in their faces is scarcely courteous under the circumstances.” “Good Lord! Jean, please don’t make fun! I feel queer, I tell you; and if you will only hurry with your dessert and coffee--and of course your _Kümmel_--dear me, you _are_ slow feeders!--we can go into the garden and send all evil forebodings to the moon. As she is a cloud-devourer, she can doubtless make shift to swallow them, too.” “Into the garden?” both men said at once. “It is too cool there for you in your evening gown.” “Well, then, ‘Polo,’ ring for Marie to get me a fur-lined _pelisse_--a long one down to the feet--with straps, if possible, to button beneath my heels, and a hood attached. Remember the hood! I had no idea I was so delicate; however, since you both think so-- But wait, Marie must be dining; I don’t want you to disturb her.” Salvières and Pavlo were laughing, and the lad was in the act of going to fetch a scarf himself when a footman carrying a telegram entered. “For Monsieur le Duc,” he said. Tatiana sat down abruptly on the nearest chair, her face suddenly white. Pavlo stopped short, looking at her concernedly, and Salvières quickly tore open the message.