Natacha ceased singing, but all seemed to be listening to her still - the convivial group on the terrace appeared to be held in charmed attention, and the porcelain statuettes of men on the lawn, according to the mode of the Iles, seemed to lift on their short legs the better to hear pass the sighing harmony of Natacha in the rose nights at the north of the world.

Meanwhile Matrena wandered through the house from cellar to attic, watching over her husband like a dog on guard, ready to bite, to throw itself in the way of danger, to receive the blows, to die for its master — and hunting for Rouletabille, who had disappeared again.

III

THE WATCH

She went out to caution the servants to a strict watch, armed to the teeth, before the gate all night long, and she crossed the deserted garden.  Under the veranda the schwitzar was spreading a mattress for Ermolai.  She asked him if he had seen the young Frenchman anywhere, and after the answer, could only say to herself, “Where is he, then?” Where had Rouletabille gone?  The general, whom she had carried up to his room on her back, without any help, and had helped into bed without assistance, was disturbed by this singular disappearance.  Had someone already carried off “their” Rouletabille?  Their friends were gone and the orderlies had taken leave without being able to say where this boy of a journalist had gone.  But it would be foolish to worry about the disappearance of a Journalist, they had said.  That kind of man — these journalists - came, went, arrived when one least expected them, and quitted their company — even the highest society — without formality.  It was what they called in France “leaving English fashion.”  However, it appeared it was not meant to be impolite.  Perhaps he had gone to telegraph.  A journalist had to keep in touch with the telegraph at all hours.  Poor Matrena Petrovna roamed the solitary garden in tumult of heart.  There was the light in the general’s window on the first floor.  There were lights in the basement from the kitchens.  There was a light on the ground-floor near the sitting-room, from Natacha’s chamber window.  Ah, the night was hard to bear.  And this night the shadows weighed heavier than ever on the valiant breast of Matrena.  As she breathed she felt as though she lifted all the weight of the threatening night.  She examined everything — everything.  All was shut tight, was perfectly secure, and there was no one within excepting people she was absolutely sure of — but whom, all the same, she did not allow to go anywhere in the house excepting where their work called them.  Each in his place.  That made things surer.  She wished each one could remain fixed like the porcelain statues of men out on the lawn.  Even as she thought it, here at her feet, right at her very feet, a shadow of one of the porcelain men moved, stretched itself out, rose to its knees, grasped her skirt and spoke in the voice of Rouletabille.  Ah, good! it was Rouletabille.  “Himself, dear madame; himself.”