I 5 4 BY ORDER OF THE CZAR.
Dick, telling his wife and Philip how he had met the Coun- tess Stravensky, " I was struck with her appearance ; so sad yet so beautiful ; and thought of the face in the sketch. She was attended by an Italian Jew, one Andrea Ferrari, who is said to be her private secretary ; he seems to be both footman and secretary, man-of-all-work to her ; a curious, wiry, active, though watchful little chap, just the sort of person one could imagine as the agent of a revolu- tionary conspiracy ; a firm, thin mouth, shaggy eyebrows, a low but compact forehead, black hair with streaks of white in it, all nerves and muscles, and with two ferret-like eyes deep set in his head. And somehow it was not only, the countess' appearance that brought the woman of the opera to my mind, but Ferrari ; for he seemed to me, at once, to belong to the situation, and I added him mentally to the Siberian group. Very odd all this ; but life is odd, eh? Don't pass that sherry, Philip, it is the purest Amontillado and it positively helps the soup ; ask Agnes."
Mrs. Chetwynd was Agnes, and she at once endorsed her husband's recommendation of the sherry. Philip allowed his glass to be filled, but made no reply to Dick's remark, by the way, dropped in really for the purpose of helping Philip to take the subject of the woman of the opera as nearly like ordinary conversation as possible.
" But she is a Russian countess ? " said Philip.
" Yes, that's the trouble I mean that is the difficulty about getting her to sit. Her secretary handed me a spe- cial note of introduction, from an old friend of mine con- nected with continental journalism, and I made a point of talking to her and to him. She made a romantic marriage, it seems, in Moscow, to the dying Count Stravensky one of the most devoted of the Czar's nobles, whose patriotism had been greatly tried, who had indeed suffered persecu- tion at the hands of the Czar, and still remained faithful , and as if to make up for the dead man, the Czar has since
BY ORDER OF THE CZAR. 15$
