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BY ORDER OF THE CZAR. 269

Ferrari's devotion to the Brotherhood of which we have already heard had nobler springs than Anna's, who had but one dominant passion of revenge. They had both found their companionship a comfort in its way, because they could both make allowances for each other. Ferrari's memory for Anna's once happy home and its desolation, was as fresh as if he had seen her lover beaten to death and the lashes of the knout falling on her own fair flesh only yesterday. They were companions in adversity and plots of vengeance ; in a desire, also, to help their people ; but there the union of mind and hope and thought ended, it had nothing to do with love, nor had Anna shown the least sign of the revival of woman's tender feelings since she left the Russian hospital until she met Philip Forsyth ; her marriage to Count Stravensky being a political mar- riage, solemnized, as we know, on the death-bed of the rebel count.

" He saw you ? " said Ferrari.

" Yes, I think so," she replied.

" Did he know you were coming to Venice ? "

" No."

" You knew he was coming ? "

" Yes."

" You have no secret from me in this, eh ? "

" None," said Anna.

" You traveled with him from London to Dover ? '"

" Have I not said so ? "

"He loves you, eh?"

" I think he does, in a mad boyish fashion that belongs rather to your Italian country than to England."

" And you ? "

" Ah, Ferrari, I thought I was a heroine. I thought the woman in me was dead and gone ; it is not. Do you not think this English youth is like what our dear young rabbi