He stretched out his hand impulsively. She placed hers in it. He raised it to his lips, bending low as if it had been the lily white hand of the fairest lady in the land, instead of the fat, rough, red hand of an old Irish washer-woman.
"Sure, it's mighty bad taste ye have," said Tim with a sly laugh.
"It's not her hand I'd be kissin'."
"Bad luck to ye! Have ye no manners?" said Nora, jerking away her hand in confusion.
"I thank you with all my heart," said Kalmar, gravely bowing with his hand upon his heart. "And will you now and then look over--overlook--oversee--ah yes, oversee this little girl?"
"Listen to me now," cried Mrs. Fitzpatrick. "Can she clear out thim men from her room?" nodding her head toward Paulina.
"There will be no men in her house."
"Can she kape thim out? She's only a wake craythur anyway."
"Paulina," said her husband.
She came forward and, taking his hand, kissed it, Mrs. Fitzpatrick looking on in disgust.
"This woman asks can you keep the men out of your room," he said in Galician.
"I will keep them out," she said simply.
"Aye, but can she?" said Mrs. Fitzpatrick, to whom her answer had been translated.
"I can kill them in the night," said Paulina, in a voice of quiet but concentrated passion.
"The saints in Hivin be above us! I belave her," said Mrs.
Fitzpatrick, with a new respect for Paulina. "But fer the love o'
Hivin, tell her there is no killin' in this counthry, an' more's the pity when ye see some men that's left to run about."
"She will keep the children safe with her life," said Kalmar. "She had no money before, and she was told I was dead. But it matters not. She is nothing to me. But she will keep my children with her life."
His trust in her, his contempt for her, awakened in Mrs.
Fitzpatrick a kind of hostility toward him, and of pity for the wretched woman whom, while he trusted, he so despised.
"Come an' take an air o' the fire, Paulina," she said not unkindly.
"It's cold forninst the door."
Pauhina, while she understood not the words, caught the meaning of the gesture, but especially of the tone. She drew near, caught the Irish woman's hand in hers and kissed it.
"Hut!" said Mrs. Fitzpatrick, drawing away her hand. "Sit down, will ye?"
The Russian rose to his feet.
"I must now depart. I have still a little work to accomplish.
To-morrow I leave the city. Permit me now to bid my children farewell."
He turned to the girl, who held Paulina's baby asleep in her arms.
"Irma," he said in Russian, "I am going to leave you."
The girl rose, placed the sleeping baby on the bed, and coming to her father's side, stood looking up into his face, her wonderful brown eyes shining with tears she was too brave to shed.
He drew her to him.
"I am going to leave you," he repeated in Russian. "In one year, if all is well, at most in two, I shall return. You know I cannot stay with you, and you know why." He took the miniature from his pocket and opening it, held it before her face. "Your mother gave her life for her country." For some moments he gazed upon the beautiful face in the miniature. "She was a lady, and feared not death. Ah! ah! such a death!" He struggled fiercely with his emotions. "She was willing to die. Should not I? You do not grudge that I should leave you, that I should die, if need be?" An anxious, almost wistful tone crept into his voice.
Bravely the little girl looked up into the dark face.
"I remember my mother," she said; "I would be like her."
"Aha!" cried her father, catching her to his breast, "I judged you rightly. You are her daughter, and you will live worthy of her.
Kalman, come hither. Irma, you will care for your brother. He is young. He is a boy. He will need care. Kalman, heart of my life!"
"He does not understand Russian," said Paulina. "Speak in Galician."
