In sables from Siberia I would dress you and jewels from the Urals, and take you to the opera at Moscow. We would travel in the East, and you are so clever, you would help me in my secret missions. We would decipher riddles and gather secret news. You would fascinate the great ones of the earth, and they would tell you tales of State that would help the great cause. What would you say, _ma petite_? Be my Princess and let me carry you to my castle in the mountains; it is a little savage among the Tartars, but I hope the hummingbird find it in her heart to make her nest there with me some day. Soon I meet you in America and we talk again. * * * * * A. D. TO POLLY _Rome, December._ Your cable telling me of your willingness to announce our engagement was received with inexpressible happiness. I did not realize that making known our secret would bring such a new joy into my life. It almost makes me burst from sheer felicity when people say pleasant things. Dear old Checkers sent me an engagement book because, he wrote, I was engaged! Beaming, round-faced Pan bustled in, with his red fez on one side, and his fingers strung with all his jewelled rings, to talk about you and my wonderful luck. He got as excited as I did, and we both rattled on at the same time. Then we went out to dinner and had a bottle of champagne. Up he got to drink our healths,--can’t you see him?--reciting, “May your joys be as deep as the ocean, Your sorrows as light as its foam!” But poor Charlton! I went in to tell him of our engagement and he gave me the warmest congratulations. He doesn’t seem any better. Indeed, Polly, I doubt if he is ever going to get well. I shall hurry homewards as soon as possible, but I can’t leave him now. Pay no attention to your Aunt’s obstacles, my dear, if they threaten our love for each other, will you? Surely, surely, you will be true. * * * * * PRINCE BORIS TO POLLY _Moscow, December._ Ah, the pleasure to have been with you in Paris! I think about it every night and wish to have you near. You say to me once, write about my country,--Russia, oh my Russia, hail! You think only of bombs and Nihilists in _la Russie_, but we have many good things, museums best in the world, artistes most fine, ballet splendid, and Slavic music, ah, it make the blood stir. When I go to opera, and lover makes love to his lady, then I think of--you. Do you think of Boris walking the streets of Moscow, where roofs are green as malachite and strange domes grow in the sky like vegetables? Learn our history, about Ivan the Terrible, about Peter the Great, and Catherine the great lover. Read, too, our literature, Turgeniev, close to the heart, Pushkin, melancholy poet, and Artzibasheff ironical. No! Me I read them to you some day with a tremble of the voice and then you will surely fall in love with a Muscovite.