He laid the pen aside, and sat leaning his broad head upon the palm of his hand, his two elbows on the table.  Paul never moved.  Steinmetz waited.  His own life had been no great success.  He had had much to bear, and he had borne it.  He was wondering heavily whether any of it had been as bad as what Paul was bearing now while he looked out of the window with his hands in his pockets, saying nothing.

At length Paul moved.  He turned, and, coming toward the table, laid his hand on Steinmetz’s broad shoulder.

“Are you sure of it?” he asked, in a voice that did not sound like his own at all—­a hollow voice like that of an old man.

“Quite; I have it from Stepan Lanovitch—­from the princess herself.”

They remained thus for a moment.  Then Paul withdrew his hand and walked slowly to the window.

“Tell me,” he said, “how she did it.”

Steinmetz was playing with the quill pen again.  It is singular how at great moments we perform trivial acts, think trivial thoughts.  He dipped the pen in the ink, and made a pattern on the blotting-pad with dots.

“It was an organized plan between husband and wife,” he said.  “Bamborough turned up at Thors and asked for a night’s lodging, on the strength of a very small acquaintance.  He stole the papers from Stepan’s study and took them to Tver, where his wife was waiting for them.  She took them on to Paris and sold them to Vassili.  Bamborough began his journey eastward, knowing presumably that he could not escape by the western frontier, but lost his way on the steppe.  You remember the man whom we picked up between here and Tver, with his face all cut to pieces?—­he had been dragged by the stirrup.  That was Sydney Bamborough.  The good God had hit back quickly.”

“How long have you known this?” asked Paul, in a queer voice.

“I saw it suddenly in the princess’s face, one day in Petersburg—­a sort of revelation.  I read it there, and she saw me reading.  I should have liked to keep it from you, for your sake as well as for hers.  Our daily life is made possible only by the fact that we know so little of our neighbors.  There are many things of which we are better ignorant right up to the end.  This might have been one of them.  But De Chauxville found it out, and it is better that I should tell you than he.”

Paul did not look around.  The wolf-hound was still barking at its own echo—­a favorite pastime of those who make a great local stir in the world.

“Of course,” said Paul, after a long pause, “I have been a great fool.  I know that.  But—­”

He turned and looked at Steinmetz with haggard eyes.

“But I would rather go on being a fool than suspect any one of a deception like this.”

Steinmetz was still making patterns on the blotting-pad.

“It is difficult for us men,” he said slowly, “to look at these things from a woman’s point of view.  They hold a different sense of honor from ours—­especially if they are beautiful.  And the fault is ours—­especially toward the beautiful ones.  There may have been temptations of which we are ignorant.”