His Hour

"I believe one could grow to love them," Tamara said. "I have never had

the feeling that I am among strangers since I have been here."

Then she wondered vaguely why Stephen Strong smiled softly to himself.

By the end of dinner, Gritzko's eyes were blazing, and he suggested

every sort of astonishing way to spend the night. But Princess

Ardácheff, as the doyenne of the party, prudently put her foot down,

and insisted upon bed. For had they not a whole morning of sight-seeing

still to do on the morrow, and then their thirty versts in troikas to

arrive at Milasláv. So the ladies all trouped off to rest.

"Leave your door open into my room, Tamara dear, if you do not mind,"

her godmother said. "I am always nervous in hotels--"

"I trust everything is going quietly," she added to herself, "but one

never can tell."

Next day the whole sky was leaden with unfallen snow. Nothing more

strange and gloomy and barbaric than Moscow looked could have been

imagined, Tamara thought. It brought out the gilt domes and the unusual

colors of things in a lurid way.

Their first visit was to the Church of the Assumption, where the

emperors are crowned. Its great beauty and rich colors pleased the

eye. The totally different arrangement of things from any other sort of

church--the shape and the absence of chairs or seats--the hidden altar

behind the doors of the sanctuary--the numerous pictures and frescoed

walls--all gave it a mysterious, wonderful charm, and here again the

two English were struck by the people's simple faith.

"We would catch every sort of disease kissing those Ikons after filthy

ulcerated beggars," Stephen Strong said to Tamara. "But the belief that

only good can come to them brings only good. The study of these people

makes one less materialistic and full of common sense. One puts more

credence in things occult."

A service was just beginning, it was some high saint's day, and the

beautiful singing, the boys' angel voices and the deep bass of the

priests, unaccompanied by any instruments or organ, impressed Tamara

far more in this old temple than the services had done in any of the

St. Petersburg churches.

A peace fell on her soul, and just as the gipsies' music had been of

the devil, so this seemed to come from heaven itself. She felt calmed

and happier when they came out.

After an early lunch they saw from the hotel windows three troikas

drawn up. Two of them Gritzko's, and one belonging to Prince

Solentzeff Zasiekin, who had also a country place in the neighbourhood.