On an order from Ivan Ogareff the prisoners defiled, one by one, past Marfa, who remained immovable as a statue, and whose face expressed only perfect indifference.
Her son was among the last. When in his turn he passed before his mother, Nadia shut her eyes that she might not see him.
Michael was to all appearance unmoved, but the palm of his hand bled under his nails, which were pressed into them.
Ivan Ogareff was baffled by mother and son.
Sangarre, close to him, said one word, "The knout!""Yes," cried Ogareff, who could no longer restrain himself;"the knout for this wretched old woman--the knout to the death!"A Tartar soldier bearing this terrible instrument of torture approached Marfa. The knout is composed of a certain number of leathern thongs, at the end of which are attached pieces of twisted iron wire.
It is reckoned that a sentence to one hundred and twenty blows of this whip is equivalent to a sentence of death.
Marfa knew it, but she knew also that no torture would make her speak.
She was sacrificing her life.
Marfa, seized by two soldiers, was forced on her knees on the ground. Her dress torn off left her back bare.
A saber was placed before her breast, at a few inches' distance only.
Directly she bent beneath her suffering, her breast would be pierced by the sharp steel.
The Tartar drew himself up. He waited. "Begin!" said Ogareff. The whip whistled in the air.
But before it fell a powerful hand stopped the Tartar's arm.
Michael was there. He had leapt forward at this horrible scene.
If at the relay at Ichim he had restrained himself when Ogareff's whip had struck him, here before his mother, who was about to be struck, he could not do so. Ivan Ogareff had succeeded.
"Michael Strogoff!" cried he. Then advancing, "Ah, the man of Ichim?""Himself!" said Michael. And raising the knout he struck Ogareff a sharp blow across the face. "Blow for blow!" said he.
"Well repaid!" cried a voice concealed by the tumult.
Twenty soldiers threw themselves on Michael, and in another instant he would have been slain.
But Ogareff, who on being struck had uttered a cry of rage and pain, stopped them. "This man is reserved for the Emir's judgment,"said he. "Search him!"
The letter with the imperial arms was found in Michael's bosom;he had not had time to destroy it; it was handed to Ogareff.
The voice which had pronounced the words, "Well repaid!"was that of no other than Alcide Jolivet. "Par-dieu!" said he to Blount, "they are rough, these people.
Acknowledge that we owe our traveling companion a good turn.
Korpanoff or Strogoff is worthy of it. Oh, that was fine retaliation for the little affair at Ichim.""Yes, retaliation truly," replied Blount; "but Strogoff is a dead man.
I suspect that, for his own interest at all events, it would have been better had he not possessed quite so lively a recollection of the event.""And let his mother perish under the knout?""Do you think that either she or his sister will be a bit better off from this outbreak of his?""I do not know or think anything except that I should have done much the same in his position," replied Alcide. "What a scar the Colonel has received! Bah! one must boil over sometimes.
We should have had water in our veins instead of blood had it been incumbent on us to be always and everywhere unmoved to wrath.""A neat little incident for our journals," observed Blount, "if only Ivan Ogareff would let us know the contents of that letter."Ivan Ogareff, when he had stanched the blood which was trickling down his face, had broken the seal. He read and re-read the letter deliberately, as if he was determined to discover everything it contained.
Then having ordered that Michael, carefully bound and guarded, should be carried on to Tomsk with the other prisoners, he took command of the troops at Zabediero, and, amid the deafening noise of drums and trumpets, he marched towards the town where the Emir awaited him.