A girl had crossed the river in front of him at a smart pace.  She now slackened her speed so much as to allow him to pass her.  Karl Steinmetz noticed the action.  He noticed most things—­this dull German.  Presently she passed him again.  She dropped her umbrella, and before picking it up described a circle with it—­a manoeuvre remarkably like a signal.  Then she turned abruptly and looked into his face, displaying a pleasing little round physiognomy with a smiling mouth and exaggeratedly grave eyes.  It was a face of all too common a type in these days of cheap educational literature—­the face of a womanly woman engaged in unwomanly work.

Then she came back.

Steinmetz raised his hat in his most fatherly way.

“My dear young lady,” he said in Russian, “if my personal appearance has made so profound an impression as my vanity prompts me to believe, would it not be decorous of you to conceal your feelings beneath a maiden modesty?  If, on the other hand, the signals you have been making to me are of profound political importance, let me assure you that I am no Nihilist.”

“Then,” said the girl, beginning to walk by his side, “what are you?”

“What you see—­a stout middle-aged man in easy circumstances, happily placed in social obscurity.  Which means that I have few enemies and fewer friends.”

The girl looked as if she would like to laugh, had such exercise been in keeping with a professional etiquette.

“Your name is Karl Steinmetz,” she said gravely.

“That is the name by which I am known to a large staff of creditors,” replied he.

“If you will go to No. 4, Passage Kazan, at the back of the cathedral, second-floor back room on the left at the top of the stairs, and go straight into the room, you will find a friend who wishes to see you,” she said, as one repeating a lesson by rote.

“And who are you, my dear young lady!”

“I—­I am no one.  I am only a paid agent.”

“Ah!”

They walked on in silence a few paces.  The bells of St. Isaac’s Church suddenly burst out into a wild carillon, as is their way, effectually preventing further conversation for a few moments.

“Will you go?” asked the girl, when the sound had broken off as suddenly as it had commenced.

“Probably.  I am curious and not nervous—­except of damp sheets.  My anonymous friend does not expect me to stay all night, I presume.  Did he—­or is it a she, my fatal beauty?—­did it not name an hour?”

“Between now and seven o’clock.”

“Thank you.”

“God be with you!” said the girl, suddenly wheeling round and walking away.

Without looking after her Steinmetz walked on, gradually increasing his pace.  In a few minutes he reached the large house standing within iron gates at the upper end of the English quay, the house of Prince Pavlo Howard Alexis.

He found Paul alone in his study.  In a few words he explained the situation.