When she had sat him down on something soft and dusty, she turned aside and turned up the light in a cerise-shaded lamp.
He made out a velvet fringe, part of a double-breasted frock-coat and a yellowish-gold epaulette in a frame on the wall.
Stretching out her arms to Alexei and breathing heavily from excitement and exertion, she said:
'I have some brandy . . .
Perhaps you should have some? . . .
Brandy?'
He replied:
'Yes, right away . . .'
And collapsed on to his right elbow.
The brandy seemed to help, at least Alexei began to feel he might not die and might survive the pain which was gnawing and cutting into his shoulder.
Kneeling, the woman bandaged his wounded arm, then sidled down to his feet and pulled off his felt boots.
This done she brought him a pillow and a long Japanese robe that smelled faintly of a sweet, long-faded perfume and was embroidered with exotic sprays of flowers.
'Lie down', she said.
Obediently he lay down, she spread the robe over him and then a blanket, and stood beside the narrow ottoman looking in to his face.
He said:
'You . . . you're a remarkable woman.' After a silence: 'I'll lie down for a bit until I get my strength back, then I'll get up and go home . . .
Just put up with me for a little longer.'
Fear and despair came over him.
'What's happened to Elena?
Oh God, and Nikolka.
Why did Nikolka have to die?
He's dead, for sure . . .'
She pointed silently at a little window, covered by a ruched blind with pompoms.
Far away he clearly heard the crack of rifle-fire.
'They'll kill you at once if you try and go now', she said.
'I wouldn't like to drag you into it. ..
They may come suddenly, they'll see a revolver, blood . . . there in my greatcoat pocket . . .' He licked his dry lips.
He was feeling slightly light-headed from the loss of blood and the brandy.
The woman's face looked frightened, then thoughtful.
'No,' she said resolutely, 'no, if they had been going to find you they would already be here by now.
This place is such a labyrinth that no one could find our tracks.
We crossed through three gardens.
But all the same I must clear up at once . . .'
He heard the splash of water, rustle of material, the sound of things being rearranged in closets.
She returned holding his Browning automatic by the butt with two fingers as though it werered hot and asked:
'Is it loaded?'
Pulling out his sound arm from under the blanket, Alexei tested the safety catch and said:
'It won't harm you, but only hold it by the butt.'
She came back again and said in embarrassment:
'Just in case they do come ...
I shall have to take off your breeches . . .
Then you can lie there and I'll say you're my husband and you're sick . . .'
Frowning and grimacing Alexei began to unbutton his breeches.
She walked firmly up to the ottoman and knelt down, then put her hands under the blanket and having pulled off his breeches by the footstraps, folded them up and took them away.
In the short time that she was away he noticed that the apartment was divided into two rooms by an arch.
The ceilings were so low that if a grown man had stood on tiptoe he could have touched the ceiling with his hand.
In the far room beyond the arch it was dark, but the varnished side of an old piano gleamed, there was something else shining and what looked like a flowering cactus.
Nearby the wall was dominated by the portrait of the man in gold epaulettes.
God, the place was so full of antiques, it was like a museum!
The epaulettes in the portrait fascinated him.