Page:The Tsar's Window.djvu/118

 "I am endeavoring to show you that I can sometimes keep my temper."

"You have proved that beyond dispute!" he exclaimed, with a hearty laugh.

"Count Piloff," said I, "will you tell me why there is nothing going on down there?"—indicating the road.

"Because the service in the chapel is not yet over. Patience is a virtue which those who frequent palaces must cultivate."

"Well, as there is nothing to look at outside, perhaps you will be good enough to tell me why you treat me as if I were a child?"

I said this rather frivolously, smiling at him as I awaited his reply. He hesitated for some time; then said,—

"I cannot imagine why I do" (in a musing tone), "unless it is because you seem such a child to me."

I gazed at him in astonishment too deep for utterance. He looked upon me, Dorris Romilly,—who considered herself quite a woman of the world, and was so considered by most of her friends,—as a child! Amazement kept me silent for the moment. I could think of no words strong enough to convince him of his mistake. When I did speak, it was to utter but a feeble protest.

"I am twenty-five, and I feel fifty."

This only made him smile again.

"You are wonderfully like a child sometimes," he said at last; "and the next moment you are a woman."