And this good man I believe did not think so, either.
I learned afterward why he was present on that day. I don't remember any
outward signs; but it seems that, about a month before, my mother became
so unwell that there was a doubt whether she could be made fit to
travel in the time. In this uncertainty the Governor-General in Kiev was
petitioned to grant her a fortnight's extension of stay in her brother's
house. No answer whatever was returned to this prayer, but one day at
dusk the police captain of the district drove up to the house and told
my uncle's valet, who ran out to meet him, that he wanted to speak with
the master in private, at once. Very much impressed (he thought it was
going to be an arrest), the servant, "more dead than alive with fright,"
as he related afterward, smuggled him through the big drawing-room,
which was dark (that room was not lighted every evening), on tiptoe, so
as not to attract the attention of the ladies in the house, and led him
by way of the orangery to my uncle's private apartments.
The policeman, without any preliminaries, thrust a paper into my uncle's
hands.
"There. Pray read this. I have no business to show this paper to you.
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