It must have been only the passing of a few seconds and yet it seemed like an interminable passage of time before, as if the Prince was suddenly conscious that there was somebody in the room, he raised his head and looked towards the door.
Standing in the doorway were three men and, as Vida looked at them too, she thought that if she had seen them anywhere she would have suspected they were Secret Agents.
With their sharp features, their thin lips and their suspicious eyes they might, in fact, have stepped out of a caricature.
Without taking his arms from around Vida, the Prince said in Russian as if he was both astonished and angry,
“What the devil do you think you are doing, coming in here?”
As the man who was standing in front of the two others advanced towards the bed, he obviousl
