Katerin stood up suddenly, and tested the fire in the samovar. She seemed agitated, and Peter assumed that she suffered with indignation at hearing his sufferings at the hands of the Governor. Then she turned to him swiftly. “What will you do—when you find the old—Kirsakoff?” she demanded. “I shall kill him,” said Peter simply, and was aware of a quivering hand upon the back of his chair. He turned and looked at Wassili. The _moujik’s_ eyes were shining like a cat’s before a fire, and there was the look of murder in his face. “Kill him!” cried Michael. “But he did not kill your father!” Peter was startled for an instant by the old man’s horror, and Katerin’s face revealed the fact that she had never dreamed that the American officer was bent on murder—she seemed actually to be in terror of him. Peter suffered a moment of abashment, and gulped down what was left of the tea in his glass. He understood that these people did not yet fully appreciate how wantonly his father had been killed, nor how little provocation there was for the killing. He was determined to convince them of the justice of his designs. “My father and I,” he began anew, “lived in a little hut down the Sofistkaya—it is there yet—I can see it from the windows of my room. An old man lives in it now, a queer old patriarch, who sells cigarettes——” “That is Rimsky!” exclaimed Wassili to Katerin. She nodded, and looked at him so that she checked him. “Yes, Rimsky,” said Peter. “That is his name. That is where I lived with my father, and where he taught me the almanacs. We were happy, for we had a samovar, and the ladies of the Street of the Dames came to us often. They gave me cakes, and my father money. Of course, I know now that he was an underground to the prison—he carried messages back and forth between wives and their husbands in the prison.” “Yes, they had many ways of getting news in and out in the old days,” said Michael, with a smile. “But go on with your story, my friend.” Peter struck a match to light a fresh cigarette, and the flame showed his face to be flushed by his emotions. “The year of which I speak,” resumed Peter, “the almanacs from Moscow were late. The mail-sledges came in from Irkutsk one morning. I ran down to the post-house to learn if the almanacs had come. There were Excellencies in the sledge. As I remember, the Governor’s daughter—Katerin was her name, I think, and——” “Yes, yes,” cried Katerin, striking her hands together. “Katerin Stephanovna! She was the Governor’s daughter—I have heard of her! It is said now that she is dead!” and Katerin turned to her father, as if to verify what she had said. “It has been said that she is dead this long time,” assented Michael. “Some say that Zorogoff——” He checked himself. Peter continued with his tale, warmed to it again by the evident interest of his listeners.