I I since her father^ death, all at once rose up about Princess Marya with a force she had known nothing of before, and swept her away with them.
Flushed and excited she walked about the room, sending first for Al- patitch, then for Mihail Ivanitch, then for Tihon, then for Dron. Dun- [yasha, the old nurse, and the maids could not tell her how far Made- i moiselle Bourienne’s statements had been correct. Alpatitch was not in the house; he had gone to the police authorities. Mihail Ivanitch, the archi- > tect, came with sleepy eyes on being sent for, but could tell Princess Marya 1 nothing. With the same smile of acquiescence with which he had been ac- 1 customed during the course of fifteen years to meet the old prince’s remarks without committing himself, he now met the princess's ques- ; tions, so that there was no getting any definite answer out of him. The 1 old valet, Tihon. whose wan and sunken face wore the stamp of inconsolable grief, answered ‘Yes, princess,’ to all Princess Marya’s questions, and could scarcely restrain his sobs as he looked at her.
Lastly, the village elder, Dron, came into the room, and bowing low to fhe princess, took up his position near the doorway.
Princess Marya walked up and down the room and stood still facing him.
‘Dronushka,’ she said, seeing in him a staunch friend, the Dronushka who had every year brought back from the fair at Vyazma the same 1 gingerbreads she connected with him,^ and had presented them to her with the same smile, ‘Dronushka, now, after our misfortune,’ . . . she began, and paused, unable to proceed.
‘We are all in God's hands,’ he said, with a sigh.
They were silent.
‘Dronushka, Alpatitch has gone off somewhere, I have no one to turn to. Is it true, as I’m told, that it is impossible for me to go away?’
‘Why shouldn’t you go away, your excellency? You can go,’ said Dron. ‘I have been told there is danger from the enemy. My good friend, I can do nothing, I know nothing about it. I have nobody. I want to set off without fail to-night or to-morrow morning early.’
Dron did not speak. He looked up from under his brows at Princess 'Marya.
‘There are no horses,’ he said. ‘I have told Yakov Alpatitch so already.’ ‘How is that?’ said the princess.
‘It’s all the visitation of the Lord,’ said Dron. ‘Some horses have been I'carried off for the troops, and some are dead; it’s a bad year, it is. If only we don’t die of hunger ourselves, let alone feeding the horses! Here they’ve been three days without a bit of bread. There’s nothing, they have been plundered to the last bit.’
Princess Marya listened attentively to what he said to her.
‘The peasants have been plundered? They have no bread?’ she asked. ‘They are dying of hunger,’ said Dron; ‘no use talking of horses and licarts.’
‘But why didn’t you say so, Dronushka? Can’t they be helped? I'll do everything I can . . .’ It was strange to Princess Marya to think that at
such a moment, when her heart was overflowing with such a sorrow, thei\ could be rich people and poor, and that the rich could possibly not help the poor. She vaguely knew that there was a store of ‘seignorial corn,’ and that it was sometimes given to the peasants. She knew, too, that neither her brother nor her father would refuse the peasants in their need; she was only afraid of making some mistake in the wording of the order for this distribution. She was glad that she had an excuse for doing something in which she could, without scruple, forget her own grief. She began to question Dronushka about the peasants’ needs, and to ask whether there was a ‘seignorial store’ at Bogutcharovo.
‘I suppose we have a store of wheat of my brother’s?’ she asked.
‘The wheat is all untouched,’ Dron declared with pride. 'The prince gave me no orders about selling it.’
‘Give it to the peasants, give them all they need; I give you leave in my brother’s name,’ said Princess Marya.
Dron heaved a deep sigh and made no answer.
‘You distribute the corn among them, if it will be enough for them. Distribute it all. I give you the order in my brother’s name; and tell them, what’s ours is theirs. We would grudge nothing for them. Tell them so.’ . }■
Dron watched the princess intently all the while she was speaking.
‘Discharge me, ma’am, for God’s sake, bid them take the keys from me,’ said he. ‘I have served twenty-three years, and done no wrong; discharge me, for God’s sake.’
Princess Marya had no notion what he wanted of her and why he asked her to discharge him. She answered that she had never doubted his fidelity, and that she was ready to do everything for him and for the peasants.
XI
An hour later Dunyasha came in to the princess with the news that Dron had come, and all the peasants by the princess’s orders were assembled at the granary and desirous of speaking with their mistress.
‘But I did not send for them,’ said Princess Marya. ‘I merely told Dronushka to give them the corn.’
