"Gifts?" she asked, with naïve joy, an innocent flush upon her pretty cheeks. "What kind of gifts?" "Boatfuls of muddy, ragged children for you to wash and dress." The girl laughed and clapped her hands with glee. "Oh, that is capital! Do bring them--the more the better! That is the kind of gift I love." The two men, in their sailor's dress, all wet and muddy, hastened off. "Pushkin," said Zeneida, accompanying him to the adjoining room, "that girl is Heaven-sent to you." "Since when have you believed in heaven?" "Be off with you! You are a goose! What news had you of Ghedimin?" Pushkin shrugged his shoulders. "He is at home quite well. I saw him through the balcony window, but could not speak to him, as he did not open it. He is a good sort; spirited enough, too, when once he is put up to a thing, but with no self-reliance. He is fond of you, and is really anxious about you; but he knows that your palace is on sufficiently high ground to be out of danger, and that you have a host of friends to protect you. He is hospitable, and is generosity itself, and is certain to subscribe hundreds of thousands for the relief of the sufferers; yet he does not offer to take a soul into his own place, for fear of spoiling his carpets and floors; nor does he send out a cup of soup to them, because he has no wife to stand by him and encourage him in it. He is even philanthropic, yet fears to go out in the damp lest he should get rheumatism. He is an incorporated 'idea,' and he knows it." "You are a calumniator! I am convinced that he is ill." "He is certainly not ill unto death, or the Duchess would never have left him behind and gone alone to Peterhof." "Don't be in such a hurry! What of the Czar?" "He is rowing about everywhere in his boat. Jakuskin, come here! You met the Czar; tell us about him." "Oh, bosh!" returned the other, impatiently. "Come, tell. Zeneida likes to hear these things." "I have no secrets from her; she knows me through and through, and that I shrink from nothing. Last night in my boat I twice came upon the Czar; we were but an arm's-length one from another. The torches of his bodyguard lit up his figure. He himself was lifting the weeping, raving people out of their windows--the very attitude for a pistol-shot! I had mine loaded in my pocket. I drew it out, and, to escape temptation, held it under water to prevent its going off." "Do you see, Jakuskin?" exclaimed Zeneida.