“Were they not?” continued the girl, not displeased.

“She said, ‘my child!’”

“Very well!  I am her grandchild.  That was not all, though—­she affectionately recommended you to me, as my cousin.”

“Cousin? your cousin?” repeated Claudius, without contradicting the speaker on his impression that Baboushka’s face had not worn a soft expression, in his eyes.

“It would appear that you do not know yourself as Felix Clemenceau?”

“Clemenceau?” echoed the student, remembering what he had heard in the music-hall.

“Yes; your father was the famous sculptor.”

Was his predilection for art a hereditary trait? the son of a celebrity? then his essays in design were unworthy of his name.  Abashed, inclined to despair, having a glimpse of a tumultuous rabble shouting:  “At last he is here!” before the ruddy guillotine on a raw morning, a pale, prim man between the executioner’s aids, the young Clemenceau listened to the girl, who probably resembled the Lovely Iza, but looked at the dead woman at their feet.

“Yes, we are cousins! that is why I took a fancy to you at the sight.  I knew this time I loved for a good reason.  The band of nature—­the bond of blood—­connected us!  But this is not the place or time to pluck leaves, and compare them, from our genealogical tree.  The major has succeeded in reining in his horse, but, who cares? the old farmhouse stood a siege in the Great Napoleon’s time and could mock at him now.  Leave all—­all these cooling pieces of carrion, and my dear grandma!” she sneered, “and let us hasten to the house where I have friends.”

Like a man in a dream, Claudius, or, better, Felix Clemenceau, since this was his true title, holding the half-emptied revolver by his side, automatically allowed the strange creature to lead him from the battlefield.  He was oppressed by the magnitude of the ruin he left behind:  the peaceful student to whom the pencil and the eraser were alone familiar had handled firearms like “the professor” in a shooting gallery.  And then the assertion—­or revelation—­that he was of kin not only to the old witch, who had perished in shielding him unintentionally in saving her grandchild, but to the latter.  Fair as a sylph but icy-hearted as a woman of five social seasons!  But the son of the guillotined wife-murderer should not be fastidious about those relatives who deigned to recognize him.

The farmhouse was a large stone and brick structure, moss-grown but firm as a castle; at its porch, three men had tranquilly awaited the result of the conflict; most of the episodes had been observed by them.  Two were comfortably clothed like farmer and overseer, and showed a respectful bearing to the third.  This was a man of about thirty years, but looking younger, tall, slender, elegant and proud.  Not yet calm, Clemenceau vaguely recalled the refined, winning, though dissipated visage; this was the gentleman in the Harmonista who had enlightened him unawares on the antecedents of Fraulein von Vieradlers.  He did not notice her companion but his stiffness disappeared as he bowed to her.  Without asking for any explanation on the affray, he said to her: