“Ilya got the news from Rimsky, an old cigarette-seller,” said Katerin. “What!” exclaimed Slipitsky. “From that old liar? He will say anything for ten kopecks. What does he know about our American? Rimsky has not been here to see him. I tell you, there is something wrong about this—it may be that Rimsky is a spy.” “Ah, yes!” said Michael, frowning thoughtfully. “What if Rimsky is a spy, as you say, and Ilya was fooled about the American’s having come for us? That is what I said from the first!” “But it may be that the American asked Rimsky about us before he came to the hotel at all,” said Katerin. “And perhaps Rimsky gave the news to poor Ilya, and perhaps the news was truth. Then would it not be right?” “I would like to see something that is right if Rimsky has had a hand in it,” grumbled Slipitsky, who was getting more worried as he considered the matter. He was reluctant to ask too many questions, for he supposed there might be angles to the situation which the Kirsakoffs would prefer not to discuss. But Katerin was becoming alarmed by Slipitsky’s doubts. She realized well enough that there had never been any proof beyond Ilya’s word that the American had come seeking them, and that Ilya himself had been dependent upon what Rimsky had said. But she did feel that there was protection of some kind for them in the bare fact that an American was under the same roof with them now, and that Zorogoff might not dare persecute them openly or take them from the hotel. She was determined to appeal to the American, but she wanted time to make her own plans. What she feared now was that Slipitsky, by his suspicions and doubts, would put her father back into his mood of dejection and discouragement. So she laughed gayly and served her father with tea and the cold partridge. “I shall find some way of talking with the American,” she declared to Slipitsky. “You must help me in some plan.” “I can go to him and tell him that I know where the Kirsakoffs may be found,” suggested the Jew. “He will tell me, I think, at once, if he seeks you or not.” “I am not so sure,” said Katerin. “He may not want to discuss a secret with you—he will be suspicious of any person who talks with him about us, if he is trying to find us unbeknownst to others in the city. He might deny that he seeks us, and thus we should be deprived of his help.” “True,” said Slipitsky. “The owl says little but thinks much, so what he knows is his own, which is wisdom. We need not fear the American—I wish there were more of them here. But this old fox of a Rimsky! It would be well to know what he is at.” “No,” said Michael. “You cannot go running to a stranger and saying you know where we are hidden. And we cannot go to him and make ourselves known till we know for sure that he is seeking us. The matter will have to be arranged with more care.”