“Yes, of course; but—­”

“But what?”

“You can never go back to Russia,” said Etta slowly, feeling her ground, as it were.

“Oh, yes, I can.  I was just coming to that.  I want to go back this winter.  There is so much to be done.  And I want you to come with me.”

“No, Paul.  No, no!  I couldn’t do that!” cried Etta, with a ring of horror in her voice, strangely out of keeping with her peaceful and luxurious surroundings.

“Why not?” asked the man who had never known fear.

“Oh, I should be afraid.  I couldn’t.  I hate Russia!”

“But you don’t know it.”

“No,” answered Etta, turning away and busying herself with her long silken train.  “No, of course not.  Only Petersburg, I mean.  But I have heard what it is.  So cold and dismal and miserable.  I feel the cold so horribly.  I wanted to go to the Riviera this winter.  I really think, Paul, you are asking me too much.”

“I am only asking a proof that you care for me.”

Etta gave a little laugh—­a nervous laugh with no mirth in it.

“A proof!  But that is so bourgeois and unnecessary.  Haven’t you proof enough, since I am your wife?”

Paul looked at her without any sign of yielding.  His attitude, his whole being, was expressive of that immovability of purpose which had hitherto been concealed from her by his quiet manner.  Steinmetz knew of the mental barrier within this Anglo-Russian soul, against which prayer and argument were alike unavailing.  The German had run against it once or twice in the course of their joint labors, and had invariably given way at once.

Etta looked at him.  The color was coming back to her face in patches.  There was something unsteady in her eyes—­something suggesting that for the first time in her life she was daunted by a man.  It was not Paul’s speech, but his silence that alarmed her.  She felt that trivial arguments, small feminine reasons, were without weight.

“Now that you are married,” she said, “I do not think you have any right to risk your life and your position for a fad.”

“I have done it with impunity for the last two or three years,” he answered.  “With ordinary precautions the risk is small.  I have begun the thing now; I must go on with it.”

“But the country is not safe for us—­for you.”

“Oh, yes, it is,” answered Paul.  “As safe as ever it has been.”

Etta paused.  She turned round and looked into the fire.  He could not see her face.

“Then the Ch—­Charity League is forgotten?” she said.

“No,” answered her husband quietly.  “It will not be forgotten until we have found out who sold us to the Government.”

Etta’s lips moved in a singular way.  She drew them in and held them with her teeth.  For a moment her beautiful face wore a hunted expression of fear.

“What will you gain by that?” she asked evenly.