“Not particularly,” answered Paul.

The girl raised her face.  There was a painful smile twisting her lips.  The moonlight fell upon her; the deep shadows beneath the eyes made her face wear a grin.  Some have seen such a grin on the face of a drowning man—­a sight not to be forgotten.

“Where does she live?” asked Catrina.  She was unaware of the thought of murder that was in her own heart.  Nevertheless, the desire—­indefinite, shapeless—­was there to kill this woman, who was tall and beautiful, whom Paul Alexis loved.

It must be remembered in extenuation that Catrina Lanovitch had lived nearly all her life in the province of Tver.  She was not modern at all.  Deprived of the advantages of our enlightened society press, without the benefit of our decadent fictional literature, she had lamentably narrow views of life.  She was without that deep philosophy which teaches you, mademoiselle, who read this guileless tale, that nothing matters very much; that love is but a passing amusement, the plaything of an hour; that if Tom is faithless, Dick is equally amusing; while Harry’s taste in gloves and compliments is worthy of some consideration.  That these things be true—­that at all events the modern young lady thinks them true—­is a matter of no doubt whatever.  Has not the modern lady novelist told us so?  And is not the modern lady novelist notable for her close observation of human nature, her impartial judgment of human motives, her sublime truth of delineation when she sits down to describe the thing she calls a man?  By a close study of the refined feminine literature of the day the modern young lady acquires not only the knowledge of some startling social delinquencies—­retailed, not as if they were quite the exception, but as if they were quite the correct thing—­but also she will learn that she is human.  She will realize how utterly absurd it is to attempt to be any thing else.  If persons in books, she will reflect, are not high-minded or pure-minded, or even clean-minded, it is useless for an ordinary person out of a book to attempt to be any of these.

This is the lesson of some new writers, and Catrina Lanovitch had, fortunately enough, lacked the opportunity of learning it.

She only knew that she loved Paul, and that what she wanted was Paul’s love to go with her all through her life.  She was not self-analytical, nor subtle, nor given to thinking about her own thoughts.  Perhaps she was old-fashioned enough to be romantic.  If this be so, we must bear with her romance, remembering that, at all events, romance serves to elevate, while realism tends undoubtedly toward deterioration.