But, though none of Count Larinski's friends was able to appear at Cormeilles, one of Samuel Brohl's old acquaintances came to the party.
On entering the drawing-room, he saw an old, ugly, sharp-faced woman, talking in a corner with Camille Langis. It was Princess Gulof. It seemed to him as if the four walls of the room were rocking to and fro, and that the floor was slipping from under his feet like the deck of a ship in a wild storm. By a great effort of will, he recovered himself.
"Never mind, Samuel Brohl," he said to himself. "Let us see the game through. After all she is very shortsighted, and you may have changed in the last four years."
Antoinette presented him to the Princess, who examined him with her little, blinking eyes, and smiled on him kindly and calmly.
"What luck! What amazing luck!" he thought. "She is now as blind as an owl. If only I can escape from talking to her, I'm safe."
Unfortunately, Antoinette asked him to take the Princess in to dinner. He offered her his arm, and led her to the table, in absolute silence. She, too, did not speak; but when they sat down, she began to talk gaily to the priest of the parish, who was sitting on her right. Her sight was so bad that she had to bend over her wineglasses to find the one she wanted. Seeing this, Samuel Brohl recovered his self-confidence.
"She can't have recognised me," he thought; "my voice, my accent, my bearing, everything has changed. Poland has entered into my blood. I am no longer Samuel, I am Larinski."
Boldly entering into the general conversation, he related with a melancholy grace a story of the Polish insurrection, shaking his lion-like mane of hair, and speaking with tears in his voice. It was impossible to be more of a Larinski than he was at that moment. When he finished, a murmur of admiration ran round the table.
"Although we are mortal enemies, Count," said the Princess Gulof, "allow me to congratulate you. I hear you have won the hand of Mlle. Moriaz."
"Mortal enemies?" he said, in a low, troubled voice. "Why are we mortal enemies; my dear Princess?"
"Because I am a Russian and you are a Pole," she replied. "But we shall not have time to quarrel. I am leaving for London at seven o'clock to-morrow morning. What is the date of your wedding?"