“Sir, will you permit me to thank you for what you have said in defence of Russia—­my country?”

The English was excellent; almost without foreign accent.  Piers stood up, and held out his hand, which was cordially grasped.  He looked into a face readily recognizable as that of a Little Russian; a rather attractive face, with fine, dreamy eyes and a mouth expressive of quick sensibility; above the good forehead, waving chestnut hair.

“You have travelled in Russia?” pursued the stranger.

“I lived at Odessa for some years, and I have seen something of other parts.”

“You speak the language?”

Piers offered proof of this attainment, by replying in a few Russian sentences.  His new acquaintance was delighted, again shook hands, and began to talk in his native tongue.  They exchanged personal information.  The Russian said that his name was Korolevitch; that he had an estate in the Government of Poltava, where he busied himself with farming, but that for two or three months of each year he travelled.  Last winter he had spent in the United States; he was now visiting the great English seaports, merely for the interest of the thing.  Otway felt how much less impressive was the account he had to give of himself, but his new friend talked with such perfect simplicity, so entirely as a good-humoured man of the world, that any feeling of subordination was impossible.

“Poltava I know pretty well,” he said gaily.  “I’ve been more than once at the July fair, buying wool.  At Kharkoff too, on the same business.”

They conversed for a couple of hours, at first amusing themselves with the rhetoric and arguments of the red-necked man.  Korolevitch was a devoted student of poetry, and discovered not without surprise the Englishman’s familiarity with that branch of Russian literature.  He heard with great interest the few words Otway let fall about his father, who had known so many Russian exiles.  In short, they got along together admirably, and, on parting for the night, promised each other to meet again in London some ten days hence.

When he had entered his bedroom, and turned the key in the lock, Piers stood musing over this event.  Of a sudden there came into his mind the inexplicable impulse which brought him to this hotel, rather than to that recommended by the Liverpool acquaintance.  An odd incident, indeed.  It helped a superstitious tendency of Otway’s mind, the disposition he had, spite of obstacle and misfortune, to believe that destiny was his friend.

CHAPTER XXX