the same man, and I then understood why he had shown me mercy. I was
filled with astonishment at the extraordinary connection of events. A
boy's "_touloup_," given to a vagabond, saved my neck from the hangman,
and a drunken frequenter of pothouses besieged forts and shook the
Empire.

"Will you not eat something?" asked Savéliitch, faithful to his old
habits. "There is nothing in the house, it is true; but I shall look
about everywhere, and I will get something ready for you."

Left alone, I began to reflect. What could I do? To stay in the fort,
which was now in the hands of the robber, or to join his band were
courses alike unworthy of an officer. Duty prompted me to go where I
could still be useful to my country in the critical circumstances in
which it was now situated.

But my love urged me no less strongly to stay by Marya Ivánofna, to be
her protector and her champion. Although I foresaw a new and inevitable
change in the state of things, yet I could not help trembling as I
thought of the dangers of her situation.

My reflections were broken by the arrival of a Cossack, who came running
to tell me that the great Tzar summoned me to his presence.

"Where is he?" I asked, hastening to obey.

"In the Commandant's house," replied the Cossack. "After dinner our
father went to the bath; now he is resting. Ah, sir! you can see he is a
person of importance--he deigned at dinner to eat two roast
sucking-pigs; and then he went into the upper part of the vapour-bath,