PART IV
7. CHAPTER VII.
(continued)
"You wouldn't believe how you have pained and astonished me,"
cried the prince.
"Very sorry; but in point of fact, you know, it was all nonsense
and would have ended in smoke, as usual--I'm sure of that. Last
year,"--he turned to the old man again,--"Countess K. joined some
Roman Convent abroad. Our people never seem to be able to offer
any resistance so soon as they get into the hands of these--
intriguers--especially abroad."
"That is all thanks to our lassitude, I think," replied the old
man, with authority. "And then their way of preaching; they have
a skilful manner of doing it! And they know how to startle one,
too. I got quite a fright myself in '32, in Vienna, I assure you;
but I didn't cave in to them, I ran away instead, ha, ha!"
"Come, come, I've always heard that you ran away with the
beautiful Countess Levitsky that time--throwing up everything in
order to do it--and not from the Jesuits at all," said Princess
Bielokonski, suddenly.
"Well, yes--but we call it from the Jesuits, you know; it comes
to the same thing," laughed the old fellow, delighted with the
pleasant recollection.
"You seem to be very religious," he continued, kindly, addressing
the prince," which is a thing one meets so seldom nowadays among
young people."
The prince was listening open-mouthed, and still in a condition
of excited agitation. The old man was evidently interested in
him, and anxious to study him more closely.
"Pavlicheff was a man of bright intellect and a good Christian, a
sincere Christian," said the prince, suddenly. "How could he
possibly embrace a faith which is unchristian? Roman Catholicism
is, so to speak, simply the same thing as unchristianity," he
added with flashing eyes, which seemed to take in everybody in
the room.
"Come, that's a little TOO strong, isn't it?" murmured the old
man, glancing at General Epanchin in surprise.
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