第50章

He did me a little service at Bakou last year.A good acquaintance in these times of public trouble.""You are in the oil business now, are you?""Oh, yes, a little of everything for a livelihood.I have a little well down Bakou way, nothing big; and a little house, a very small one for my small business.""What a monopolist Thaddeus is," declared Athanase Georgevitch, hitting him a formidable slap on the thigh with his enormous hand.

"Gounsovski has come himself to keep an eye on Annouchka's debut, eh? Only he goes into Onoto's dressing-room, the rogue.""Oh, he doesn't trouble himself.Do you know who he is to have supper with? With Annouchka, my dears, and we are invited.""How's that?" inquired the jovial councilor.

"It seems Gounsovski influenced the minister to permit Annouchka's performance by declaring he would be responsible for it all.He required from Annouchka solely that she have supper with him on the evening of her debut.""And Annouchka consented?"

"That was the condition, it seems.For that matter, they say that Annouchka and Gounsovski don't.get along so badly together.

Gounsovski has done Annouchka many a good turn.They say he is in love with her.""He has the air of an umbrella merchant," snorted Athanase Georgevitch.

"Have you seen him at close range?" inquired Ivan.

"I have dined at his house, though it is nothing to boast of, on my word.""That is what he said," replied Thaddeus."When he knew we were here together, he said to me: 'Bring him, he is a charming fellow who plies a great fork; and bring that dear man Ivan Petrovitch, and all your friends.'""Oh, I only dined at his house," grumbled Athanase, "because there was a favor he was going to do me.""He does services for everybody, that man," observed Ivan Petrovitch.

"Of course, of course; he ought to," retorted Athanase."What is a chief of Secret Service for if not to do things for everybody?

For everybody, my dear friends, and a little for himself besides.

A chief of Secret Service has to be in with everybody, with everybody and his father, as La Fontaine says (if you know that author), if he wants to hold his place.You know what I mean."Athanase laughed loudly, glad of the chance to show how French he could be in his allusions, and looked at Rouletabille to see if he had been able to catch the tone of the conversation; but Rouletabille was too much occupied in watching a profile wrapped in a mantilla of black lace, in the Spanish fashion, to repay Athanase's performance with a knowing smile.

"You certainly have naive notions.You think a chief of Secret Police should be an ogre," replied the advocate as he nodded here and there to his friends.

"Why, certainly not.He needs to be a sheep in a place like that, a thorough sheep.Gounsovski is soft as a sheep.The time I dined with him he had mutton streaked with fat.He is just like that.Iam sure he is mainly layers of fat.When you shake hands you feel as though you had grabbed a piece of fat.My word! And when he eats he wags his jaw fattishly.His head is like that, too; bald, you know, with a cranium like fresh lard.He speaks softly and looks at you like a kid looking to its mother for a juicy meal.""But - why - it is Natacha!" murmured the lips of the young man.

"Certainly it is Natacha, Natacha herself," exclaimed Ivan Petrovitch, who had used his glasses the better to see whom the young French journalist was looking at."Ah, the dear child!

she has wanted to see Annouchka for a long time.""What, Natacha! So it is.So it is.Natacha! Natacha!" said the others."And with Boris Mourazoff's parents.""But Boris is not there," sniggered Thaddeus Tehitchnikoff.

"Oh, he can't be far away.If he was there we would see Michael Korsakoff too.They keep close on each other's heels.""How has she happened to leave the general? She said she couldn't bear to be away from him.""Except to see Annouchka," replied Ivan."She wanted to see her, and talked so about it when I was there that even Feodor Feodorovitch was rather scandalized at her and Matrena Petrovna reproved her downright rudely.But what a girl wishes the gods bring about.

That's the way."

"That's so, I know," put in Athanase."Ivan Petrovitch is right.

Natacha hasn't been able to hold herself in since she read that Annouchka was going to make her debut at Krestowsky.She said she wasn't going to die without having seen the great artist.""Her father had almost drawn her away from that crowd," affirmed Ivan, "and that was as it should be.She must have fixed up this affair with Boris and his parents.""Yes, Feodor certainly isn't aware that his daughter's idea was to applaud the heroine of Kasan station.She is certainly made of stern stuff, my word," said Athanase.

"Natacha, you must remember, is a student," said Thaddeus, shaking his head; "a true student.They have misfortunes like that now in so many families.I recall, apropos of what Ivan said just now, how today she asked Michael Korsakoff, before me, to let her know where Annouchka would sing.More yet, she said she wished to speak to that artist if it were possible.Michael frowned on that idea, even before me.But Michael couldn't refuse her, any more than the others.He can reach Annouchka easier than anyone else.You remember it was he who rode hard and arrived in time with the pardon for that beautiful witch; she ought not to forget him if she cared for her life.""Anyone who knows Michael Nikolaievitch knows that he did his duty promptly," announced Athanase Georgevitch crisply."But he would not have gone a step further to save Annouchka.Even now he won't compromise his career by being seen at the home of a woman who is never from under the eyes of Gounsovski's agents and who hasn't been nicknamed 'Stool-pigeon' for nothing.""Then why do we go to supper tonight with Annouchka?" asked Ivan.

"That's not the same thing.We are invited by Gounsovski himself.

Don't forget that, if stories concerning it drift about some day, my friends," said Thaddeus.