Neforis, meanwhile, did not return at once to her husband but went to find Paula.  This business must be settled on all sides and at once.  If she could have believed that her victory would give the invalid unqualified pleasure she would have hastened to him with the good news, for she knew no higher joy than to procure him a moment’s happiness; but the Mukaukas had agreed to her choice very reluctantly.  Katharina seemed to him too small and childish for his noble son, whose mental superiority had been revealed to him unmistakably and undeniably, in many long discussions since his return, to the delight of his father’s heart.  “The water-wagtail,” though he wished her every happiness, did not satisfy him for Orion.  To him, the father, Paula would have been a well-beloved daughter-in-law, and he had often found pleasure in picturing her by Orion’s side.  But she was a Melchite; he knew too how ill-affected his wife was towards her, so he kept his wish locked in his own breast in order not to vex the faithful companion who lived, thought, and felt for him alone; and Dame Neforis knew or guessed all this, and said to herself that it would cost him his night’s rest if he were to be told at once what a concession Orion had made.

With Paula it was different.  The sooner she learnt that she had nothing to expect from their son, the better for her.

That very morning she and Orion had greeted each other like a couple of lovers and just now they had parted like a promised bride and bridegroom.  She would not again be witness to such vexatious doings; so she went to the young girl’s room and confided to her with much satisfaction the happy prospects her son had promised them,—­only Paula must say nothing about it till the day after to-morrow.

The moment she entered the room Paula inferred from her beaming expression that she had something to say unpleasant to herself, so she preserved due composure.  Her face wore a look of unmoved indifference while she submitted to the overflow of a too-happy mother’s heart; and she wished the betrothed couple joy:  but she did so with a smile that infuriated Neforis.

She was not on the whole spiteful; but face to face with this girl, her nature was transformed, and she rather liked the idea of showing her, once more in her life, that in her place humility would beseem her.  All this she said to herself as she quitted Paula’s room; but perhaps this woman, who had much that was good in her, might have felt some ruth, if in the course of the next few hours she could but have looked into the heart of the orphan entrusted to her protection.  Only once did Paula sob aloud; then she indignantly dried her tears, and sat for a long time gazing at the floor, shaking her pretty head again and again as though something unheard-of and incredible had befallen her.

At last, with a bitter sigh, she went to bed; and while she vainly strove for sleep, and for strength to pray and be silently resigned, Time seemed to her a wild-beast chase, Fate a relentless hunter, and the quarry he was pursuing was herself.