Ivan had brought with him to Nicolofsky an alert, clever young German doctor, and a gray-haired French priest. It had been his wish, no less than that of Clémence herself, that his wife should enjoy the rites of her own communion; and Henri, who spent much of his leisure in visiting the poor, discovered amongst them an old acquaintance of the family, who seemed exactly suited for the post of domestic chaplain to Madame la Princesse Pojarsky. M. Grandpierre, a relative of the valued and faithful steward of the De Talmonts, was the curé of a country parish in La Vendée when the war broke out. He stoutly exhorted his parishioners to fight for their King; marched with them to the field; ministered to the wounded and shrived the dying, often amidst the rain of Republican bullets. When the cause he loved was lost, he took refuge in Paris; and there, after years of poverty, Henri found him in a garret of the Faubourg St. Antoine. Many sorrows had tamed his fiery spirit; he was now a humble, simple-minded old man, much more likely to be the pupil of Clémence than her teacher. Dr. Krausekopf, a rising young physician from Heidelberg, had been added to the establishment of Prince Pojarsky, because Russian doctors were few and unskilful; and Ivan knew it would be quite useless to introduce a Frenchman in that capacity, at least if he wished the mujiks of Nicolofsky to profit by his skill. With the exception of the priest and the doctor, the household contained only two foreigners, the waiting-woman of Clémence, who was a widow, and her child, a little girl. The next morning, a deputation from the village came to the castle to welcome their lord. Ivan went to meet them in the great hall; but he turned back again, saying to Clémence as he took her hand, “Come, dearest; I want to show my wife to the man who sheltered my helpless childhood at his own peril. The good old starost is there, Clémence; and Pope Nikita, the father of Anna Popovna.”