Page:In the name of a woman (1900).djvu/82

 "Freedom as the English love it," she answered, in a tone that vibrated with enthusiasm, her eyes flashing and her cheeks colouring. "The freedom that we true Bulgarians read and dream of, crave and would die for," she added, her voice deep and low with feeling.

A long pause followed, in which my thoughts were busy. Had the Princess Christina inspired this feeling, and was this strange girl an agent in pressing me to join such a movement? My heart beat fast at the thought.

"Is that a cause you would serve, Count?" she asked.

"These are strange things to hear from those whom I find all gathered under the wings of the Russian Eagle!" I said cautiously.

"There may be stranger yet to hear," she returned sharply.

"The Prince who is on your throne is no friend of Russia."

"The Prince has never gained the confidence of true Bulgarians. The men he keeps about him are patriots in nothing but name; and he has neither the wit to winnow the false from the true, nor the courage to set the false at defiance."

"You would play for a big stake?"

"And make our lives the counters. Is not that enough?" The retort was given with a show of bitterness. "You English are cold and calculating."

"We are cautious, certainly."

"Yet you should hate the Russians."

"No one has accused us of loving them."

She made another pause before replying:

"Perhaps I have been too rash and have surprised you; but we thought from what Michel told me of