"You darling. You are doing it beautifully!" he presently said, and then more softly, "I had no idea how pretty your friend is! and how soundly she sleeps! Do you think I might kiss her, Tantine? I have always wanted to, only she is of such a severity I have been too frightened. May I, Tantine?" And his voice sounded coaxing and sweet, and Tamara felt sure he was caressing the Princess' hair with his free hand, for that lady kept murmuring.
"Tais toi!--Gritzko--have done! How can I bind your arm if you conduct yourself so! Not a moment of stillness! Truly what a naughty child--keep still!" Then she spoke more severely to him in Russian, and he laughed while he answered, and then presently the bandage was done, and standing on tip-toe he looked full at Tamara.
"And you think I must not kiss her? Oh! you are a most cruel Tantine! She is sound asleep and would never know, and it would be just one of the things which could cool my fever and help my arm."
But the Princess interposed, sternly, and getting really annoyed with him; he was forced to go. But first he kissed her hand and thanked her and purred affection and gratitude with his astonishing charm, and the Princess' voice grew more and more mollified as she said: "There--there--what a boy! Gritzko, dear child, begone!"
And all this while, with her long eyelashes resting upon her cheek, Tamara apparently slept peacefully on.
But when the door was safely shut and bolted, the Princess addressed her.
"You are not really asleep, Tamara, I suppose," she said. "You have heard? Is he not difficult. What is one to do with him? I can never remain angry long. Those caresses! Mon Dieu! I wish you would love each other and marry and go and live at Milasláv, and then we others might have a little peace and calm!"
"Marry him," and Tamara raised herself in bed. "One might as well marry a panther in a jungle, it would be quite as safe!" she said.
But the Princess shook her head. "There you are altogether wrong," she replied. "Once there were no continuous obstacles to his will, he would be gentle and adoring, he would be as tender and thoughtful as he is to me when I am ill."
Then into Tamara's brain there rushed visions of the unutterable pleasure this tenderness would mean, and she said: