No More Learning

The presence of Chvabrine and of the crowd around us prevented me from
expressing to him all the feelings which filled my heart.

We parted friends.

Pugatchef saw in the crowd Akoulina Pamphilovna, and amicably threatened
her with his finger, with a meaning wink. Then he seated himself in his
_"kibitka"_ and gave the word to return to Berd. When the horses
started, he leaned out of his carriage and shouted to me--

"Farewell, your lordship; it may be we shall yet meet again! "

We did, indeed, see one another once again; but under what
circumstances!

Pugatchef was gone.

I long watched the steppe over which his _"kibitka"_ was rapidly
gliding.

The crowd dwindled away; Chvabrine disappeared. I went back to the
pope's house, where all was being made ready for our departure. Our
little luggage had been put in the old vehicle of the Commandant. In a
moment the horses were harnessed.

Marya went to bid a last farewell to the tomb of her parents, buried
behind the church.

I wished to escort her there, but she begged me to let her go alone, and
soon came back, weeping quiet tears.

Father Garasim and his wife came to the door to see us off.
We took our
seats, three abreast, inside the "_kibitka_," and Saveliitch again
perched in front.

"Good-bye, Marya Ivanofna, our dear dove; good-bye, Petr' Andrejitch,
our gay goshawk! " the pope's wife cried to us. "A lucky journey to you,
and may God give you abundant happiness! "

We started. At the Commandant's window I saw Chvabrine standing, with a
face of dark hatred.

I did not wish to triumph meanly over a humbled enemy, and looked away
from him.

At last we passed the principal gate, and for ever left Fort Belogorsk.




CHAPTER XIII.

THE ARREST.


Reunited in so marvellous a manner to the young girl who, that very
morning even, had caused me so much unhappy disquiet, I could not
believe in my happiness, and I deemed all that had befallen me a dream.

Marya looked sometimes thoughtfully upon me and sometimes upon the road,
and did not seem either to have recovered her senses. We kept
silence--our hearts were too weary with emotion.

At the end of two hours we had already reached the neighbouring fort,
which also belonged to Pugatchef. We changed horses there.

By the alertness with which we were served and the eager zeal of the
bearded Cossack whom Pugatchef had appointed Commandant, I saw that,
thanks to the talk of the postillion who had driven us, I was taken for
a favourite of the master.