"How shall I get you out of the house?" said she at last. "I thought
of conducting you down the secret staircase."

"I will go alone," he answered.

Lizaveta arose, took from her drawer a key, handed it to Hermann, and
gave him the necessary instructions. Hermann pressed her cold, inert
hand, kissed her bowed head, and left the room.

He descended the winding staircase, and once more entered the
Countess's bedroom. The dead old lady sat as if petrified, her face
expressed profound tranquillity. Hermann stopped before her, and gazed
long and earnestly at her, as if he wished to convince himself of the
terrible reality. At last he entered the cabinet, felt behind the
tapestry for the door, and then began to descend the dark staircase,
filled with strange emotions. "Down this very staircase," thought he,
"perhaps coming from the very same room, and at this very same hour
sixty years ago, there may have glided, in an embroidered coat, with
his hair dressed _a l'oiseau royal_, and pressing to his heart his
three-cornered hat, some young gallant who has long been mouldering in
the grave, but the heart of his aged mistress has only today ceased to
beat."

At the bottom of the staircase Hermann found a door, which he opened
with a key, and then traversed a corridor which conducted him into the
street.


V