"It is astounding!" he said gravely at last. "And so that poor child has been drawn into the whirlpool of Russian politics, as her mother was before her,--to perish as she did!"
"Yes, did she--Anne Pendennis--never tell you, or your cousin, her mother's history?"
"Never. I doubt if she knew it herself. She cannot remember her mother at all; only an old nurse who died some years ago. Do you know her mother's history, sir?"
"Partly; I'll tell you all I do know, Mr. Wynn,--confidence for confidence, as you said just now. She was a Polish lady,--the Countess Anna Vassilitzi; I think that was the name, though after her marriage she dropped her title, and was known here in England merely as Mrs. Anthony Pendennis. Her father and brother were Polish noblemen, who, like so many others of their race and rank, had been ruined by Russian aggression; but I believe that, at the time when Anthony met and fell in love with her,--not long before the assassination of the Tzar Alexander the Second,--the brother and sister at least were in considerable favor at the Russian Court; though whether they used their position there for the purpose of furthering the political intrigues in which, as transpired later, they were both involved, I really cannot say. I fear it is very probable.
"I remember well the distress of Mr. and Mrs. Pendennis,--Anthony's parents,--when he wrote and announced his engagement to the young countess. He was their only child, and they had all the old-fashioned English prejudice against 'foreigners' of every description. Still they did not withhold their consent; it would have been useless to do so, for Anthony was of age, and had ample means of his own. He did not bring his wife home, however, after their marriage; they remained in Russia for nearly a year, but at last, soon after the murder of the Tzar, they came to England,--to Pencarrow.
"They did not stay many weeks; but during that period I saw a good deal of them. Anthony and I had always been good friends, though he was several years my junior, and we were of entirely different temperaments; his was, and is, I have no doubt, a restless, romantic disposition. His people ought to have made a soldier or sailor of him, instead of expecting him to settle down to the humdrum life of a country gentleman! While as for his wife--"