A few days later came a further communication from the Princess.
"I have puzzled our young man quite effectually, I think, clever as he imagines himself to be.

I wrote him a semi-indignant letter to St.
Petersburg, and said I thought all along he had not really recognized me at the ball, in spite of his protestations at first.

Then I saw how easily he was deluded into the belief that I was some other woman, and so the temptation to cozen him further was irresistible.

Am I not a good actress?
I asked him.

I went on to say, with some show of anger, that a quiet flirtation in the gallery was all very well in its way, but when it came to a young man rushing in a frenzy bare-headed into the street after a respectable married woman who had just got into her carriage and was about to drive away, it was too much altogether, and thus he came into possession of the glove.