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The Boyar Demidof, though not by profession a diplomat, had procured for himself an appointment as Attaché to the Embassy in Paris, in order to be near his daughter as well as his married sister. Vera's presence in St. Petersburg was in the nature of a flying visit. She would return with her mother to Paris in a month or two.

During that period she saw little of Sasha Maximof. He called upon the Demidofs once or twice, but was obviously but little attracted by Vera, whom he treated as a child, and from whom he did not attempt to conceal the fact that he had on hand more than one affaire de cœur and that he thought but little, if anything, of the contract entered into by their respective fathers when both of the principal parties were too young to understand the nature of the proceedings.

Vera began by treating Sasha with much hauteur, desiring to punish him for his indifference; but when it became clear to her that he cared nothing whether she bore herself haughtily or kindly, and was, indeed, very little interested in her, she began, with the inconsistency of human nature, to realise that whether she would have it so or no her interest in him grew, and with it the recognition that the young man was undoubtedly very good-looking and had a certain attractiveness about him. Before Vera returned to Paris Sasha Maximof had quite made up his mind that he was far too good to waste himself upon the commonplace little person his father had seen fit, without consulting his wishes, to select for his partner in life. He intended to do much better. The Countess, his mother, was inclined to agree with him. He consulted her upon the question as to whether a contract of marriage so made was binding or not.

"If both parties desire to annul it," the Countess thought, "surely no one would compel them to hold to it."

"The question is," said Sasha, "will the girl agree to annul it? The match is a good one, from her point of view; I don't suppose there's much harm done yet, in a personal way, I mean, for we have scarcely met and I certainly have not gone out of my way to be in any way attractive to her."

"Go and see the girl and talk it over with her," suggested the Countess, and this advice Sasha presently followed.

He called upon Vera and plunged quickly into the business on hand, though he began somewhat diffidently, for, though in speaking with his mother he had taken for granted that the girl could scarcely have fallen in love with him yet, Sasha, in the secret realms of his inner consciousness, was by no means so assured of the matter; indeed, he was strongly of opinion that no girl could see him and pass entirely unscathed through the ordeal.

Somewhat to his disgust he could detect no sign of regret or disappointment in Vera's attitude; on the contrary, he was not at all sure that she was not as anxious as himself to be relieved from the foolish obligation imposed upon both of them as children.

"I never could understand what was the object of our honoured fathers in making so foolish an arrangement," said Sasha; "my idea is that living down in the wilds as they did, they were so put to it for amusement that they invented this as a pastime; it would be interesting, they thought, to watch our affection bud and blossom and so on; but of course, as you know, my father died and neither my mother nor I ever lived in the country again, while you went to Paris. Of course if we had met constantly, living close to one another, and never seeing any one else, it might have been different."

Vera suddenly burst out laughing at this point.

"You mean that if neither of us had ever met any other young people besides our two selves we might one day have come to like one another? Believe me, Alexander Petrovitch, I am far from being so conceited as to suppose you could ever have learned to admire me. Is this, then, your theory: that if, for instance, a man and a woman were thrown together upon a desert island, they would be bound eventually to fall in love with one another? On the contrary, I should think they would soon be wearied to death by one another's society."

"I did not mean that at all," said Sasha, flushing rather angrily, for it occurred to him that his amour propre was in some way being attacked. "I meant that if we had seen more of one another than we have, it might have been quite a different matter. You might have liked me, which I see is not now the case, and of course I might have fallen in love with you."

"Which also is certainly not the case as any one might perceive," laughed Vera.

"I am not pretending that it is; I could not very well."

"For after all I am a mere child," she said.

"I see you cannot forgive me that expression. Why should it offend you? You are not fully grown up. However, I apologise for using it if you dislike it. Well now, I think I have made my meaning clear; I do not love you—indeed, I may tell you that I have fallen in love elsewhere, for which you can scarcely blame me, since you have never given me the opportunity to lose my heart where our revered parents desired that it should be lost; and of course the same may be said of you; you have had no opportunity of learning to like me."

"For which I certainly ought to be most grateful," said Vera, "under the circumstances. How terrible if one of us had fallen in love and the other not! If it had been I, I must have sacrificed my heart's happiness, for of course I could not well have admitted the pathetic truth. You would have gone away and never known!"

"Well, at any rate, we are fortunately quite agreed upon the subject," replied Sasha, who was not enjoying the conversation and wished it over. "And since we are agreed that the betrothal was a mistake and that we shall both be happier if we annul the agreement and go upon our respective ways in life in pursuit of our respective ideals of happiness, I now suggest to you that the foolish document be torn up."

"By all means," said Vera; "tear it up, if you have it."

"Yes, I have it. I am sorry, Vera, that things should have turned out as they have; neither of us is to blame. As I said before, if we had seen more of one another——"

"It would have been an exceedingly dangerous thing for me, is that what you would imply?" asked Vera, laughing.

The girl looked so handsome as she said the words, her eyes aflame and a heightened colour lending a wonderful charm to her somewhat pallid Russian complexion, that Sasha stared for a moment in surprise before he answered.

"It might have been dangerous for either of us," he said; "for though you are only a child, you are a very pretty one."

Vera curtsied pertly and laughed. "In every way the document is a horribly dangerous thing then," she said; "destroy it by all means, Alexander Petrovitch. You will now have a free hand with the lady whose name you have not mentioned. How relieved she will be to hear that I have given you a certificate of discharge."

"As to that," replied Sasha, flushing, "every one who knows of our betrothal laughs at it. Two persons thus bound, they say, would be sure to loathe one another long before the time came to marry, simply because they are bound."

"But we agreed just now that if we had seen more of one another, each would probably have found the other irresistible," Vera laughed; "let us hold to this pleasant conclusion, it is more flattering to both of us than the other. We will leave it at this, that I might have stood well in your regard, one day, but for the fact that another lady stands better, having supplanted me in time. As for yourself, except for my good fortune in being a mere child, I must, of course, have lost my heart at first sight, this, I understand, being the usual fate of my sex."

"You are pleased to jest, Mademoiselle Vera," said Sasha, uncertain whether to feel elated or angry. "It is time I departed; until the contract is destroyed we are still betrothed; may I kiss your hand?"

"The betrothal ended at the moment of mutual agreement. Farewell, Alexander Petrovitch, and a happy ending to your courtship."

"That girl will grow up into a lovely woman," thought Sasha as he strode away; "but what a little tigress she looked more than once. She is angry with me for wishing to annul the contract."

"I don't see why it should be actually destroyed," he reflected later, fingering the document. "Why not keep it in case of accidents? A year or two hence I may be heart free, and she may be uncommonly handsome—I think the paper may remain for the present."

He put it back in his desk and sat thinking.

"The little devil was laughing at me all along," he said presently; "it was pique, simply pique. She'll be a pretty woman, that's certain!"

As for Vera, she felt forlorn and unhappy. She was not in the least in love, but for better or worse she had been accustomed lifelong to look upon this man as her husband-to-be, and now the air-castle had fallen in ruins. There was a sudden gap, an empty space in her life, and she felt lonely and deserted.

She actually cried over the matter and this did her a world of good. "He's certainly good-looking," was the conclusion she now arrived at; "but, as Constantine said, his vanity is terrible. I don't think I could have borne it!"