With a touch of ceremony, the Count ushered Sofia through the closet door into the study.
“Ooo,” she said as she emerged on the other side. “Is this your secret room?”
“It is our secret room,” the Count replied.
Sofia nodded gravely to show that she understood.
But then children understand the purpose of secret rooms better than they understand the purpose of congresses, courtrooms, and banks.
Somewhat shyly, Sofia pointed at the painting.
“Is that your sister?”
“Yes. Helena.”
“I like peaches too.” She ran a hand along the coffee table. “Is this where your grandma had tea?”
“Exactly.”
Sofia nodded gravely again.
“I am ready for the game.”
“All right then. Here’s how we play. You will go back into the bedroom and count to two hundred. I shall remain in order to hide this within the boundaries of the study.” Then, as if from thin air, the Count produced the silver thimble that Marina had given him. “Sofia, you do know how to count to two hundred?”
“No,” she admitted. “But I can count to one hundred twice.”
“Well done.”
Sofia exited through the closet, pulling the door shut behind her.
The Count glanced about the room in search of an appropriate spot—one that would prove reasonably challenging for the child without taking unfair advantage of her age. After a few minutes of consideration, he approached the little bookcase and carefully placed the thimble on top of Anna Karenina; then he took a seat.
At the count of two hundred, the closet door opened a crack.
“Are you ready?” she asked.
“Indeed, I am.”
When Sofia came in, the Count expected her to scamper about the room willy-nilly, looking every which way. Instead, she remained in the doorway and quietly, almost unsettlingly, studied the room from quadrant to quadrant. Upper left, lower left, upper right, lower right. Then without a word, she walked straight to the bookcase and picked the thimble off the top of Tolstoy. This had occurred in less time than it would have taken for the Count to count to one hundred once.
“Well done,” said the Count, not meaning it. “Let’s play again.”
Sofia handed the Count the thimble. But as soon as she left the room, the Count chastised himself for not having considered his next hiding place before initiating the second round. Now he had only two hundred seconds to find a suitable spot. As if to unnerve him further, Sofia began counting so loudly that he could hear her through the closed closet door.
“Twenty-one, twenty-two, twenty-three . . .”
Suddenly it was the Count who was scampering about willy-nilly and looking every which way—discarding this spot for being too easy and that spot for being too hard. In the end, he tucked the thimble under the handle of the Ambassador—on the other side of the room from the bookcase.
When Sofia returned, she followed the same procedure as before. Although, as if anticipating the Count’s petty little trick, this time she began her survey in the corner opposite from where she had found the thimble in the first round. It took her all of twenty seconds to pluck it from its hiding place.
Clearly, the Count had underestimated his adversary. But by placing the thimble in such low locations, he had been playing to Sofia’s natural strengths. In the next round, he would take advantage of her limitations by hiding it six or seven feet off the ground.
“Again?” he said with the smile of a fox.
“It’s your turn.”
“What’s that?”
“It is your turn to look, and my turn to hide.”
“No, you see, in this game I always do the hiding and you always do the hunting.”
Sofia studied the Count as her mother would have.
“If you always do the hiding and I always do the hunting, then it wouldn’t be a game at all.”
The Count frowned at the indisputability of this point of view. And when she held out her hand, he dutifully placed the thimble in her palm. As if this turnabout weren’t enough, when he reached for the doorknob, she tugged at his sleeve.
“Uncle Alexander, you won’t peek, will you?”
Won’t peek? The Count had a mind to say a word or two about the integrity of the Rostovs. Instead, he composed himself.
“No, Sofia. I will not peek.”
“You promise . . . ?”
. . .
“I promise.”
The Count went out into the bedroom muttering something about his word being his bond and never having cheated at cards or welched on a wager, and then he began to count. As he proceeded past 150, he could hear Sofia moving around the