Page:Best Russian Short Stories.djvu/408

124 There was not a single light either on the engine or carriages, and only the shut ash-box threw a dim reddish light on to the rails.

"What is this?" asked I, stepping back.

"Why, we are going in the train. Have you forgotten? We are going in the train," muttered the doctor.

The night was chilly and he was trembling from cold, and as I looked at him I felt the same rapid tickling shiver all over my body.

"D—n you!" I cried loudly. "Just as if you couldn't have taken somebody else."

"Hush! please, hush!" and the doctor caught me by the arm.

Somebody out of the darkness said:

"If you were to fire a volley from all the guns, nobody would stir. They are all asleep. One could go up and bind them all. Just now I passed quite close to the sentry. He looked at me and did not say a word, never stirred. I suppose he was asleep too. It's a wonder he does not fall down."

He who spoke yawned and his clothes rustled, evidently he was stretching himself. I leaned against the side of the carriage, intending to climb up—and was instantly overcome by sleep. Somebody lifted me up from behind and laid me down, while I began pushing him away with my feet, without knowing why, and again I fell asleep, hearing as in a dream fragments of a conversation:

"At the seventh verst."

"Have you forgotten the lanterns?"