After lunch a dismal drizzle set in that presently increased to a steady downpour, which drove Lermontoff to his cabin, and that room being unprovided with either window or electric light, the Prince struck a match to one of the candles newly placed on the washstand.  He pushed the electric button summoning the steward, and, giving him some money, asked if there was such a thing as a piece of stone on board, carried as ballast, or for any other reason.  The steward said he would inquire, and finally returned with a sharpening stone used for the knives in the galley.  Bolting his door, Lermontoff began an experiment, and at once forgot he was a prisoner.  He filled the wash-basin with water, and opening one of the glass-stoppered bottles, took out with the point of his knife a most minute portion of the substance within, which he dissolved in the water with no apparent effect.  Standing the whetstone up on end, he filled the glass syringe, and directed a fine, vaporous spray against the stone.  It dissolved before his eyes as a sand castle on the shore dissolves at the touch of an incoming tide.

“By St. Peter of Russia!” he cried, “I’ve got it at last!  I must write to Katherine about this.”

Summoning the steward again to take away this fluid, and bring him another pailful of fresh water, Lermontoff endeavored to extract some information from the deferential young man.

“Have you ever been in Stockholm?”

“No, Excellency.”

“Or in any of the German ports?”

“No, Excellency.”

“Do you know where we are making for now?”

“No, Excellency.”

“Nor when we shall reach our destination?”

“No, Excellency.”

“You have some prisoners aboard?”

“Three drunken sailors, Excellency.”

“Yes, that’s what the Captain said.  But if it meant death for a sailor to be drunk, the commerce of the world would speedily stop.”

“This is a government steamer, Excellency, and if a sailor here disobeys orders he is guilty of mutiny.  On a merchant vessel they would merely put him in irons.”

“I see.  Now do you want to earn a few gold pieces?”

“Excellency has been very generous to me already,” was the non-committal reply of the steward, whose eyes nevertheless twinkled at the mention of gold.

“Well, here’s enough to make a jingle in your pocket, and here are two letters which you are to try to get delivered when you return to St. Petersburg.”

“Yes, Excellency.”

“You will do your best?”

“Yes, Excellency.”

“Well, if you succeed, I’ll make your fortune when I’m released.”

“Thank you, Excellency.”

That night at dinner the Captain opened a bottle of vodka, and conversed genially on many topics, without touching upon the particular subject of liberty.  He partook sparingly of the stimulant, and, to Lermontoff’s disappointment, it did not in the least loosen his tongue, and thus, still ignorant of his fate, the Prince turned in for the second night aboard the steamer.