where it was so hot that Tarass Kurotchkin himself could not stand it;
he passed the broom to Bikbaieff, and only recovered by dint of cold
water. You must agree; his manners are very majestic, and in the bath,
they say, he showed his marks of Tzar--on one of his breasts a
double-headed eagle as large as a pétak,[58] and on the other his own
face."

I did not think it worth while to contradict the Cossack, and I followed
him into the Commandant's house, trying to imagine beforehand my
interview with Pugatchéf, and to guess how it would end.

The reader will easily believe me when I say that I did not feel wholly
reassured.

It was getting dark when I reached the house of the Commandant.

The gallows, with its victims, stood out black and terrible; the body of
the Commandant's poor wife still lay beneath the porch, close by two
Cossacks, who were on guard.

He who had brought me went in to announce my arrival. He came back
almost directly, and ushered me into the room where, the previous
evening, I had bidden good-bye to Marya Ivánofna.

I saw a strange scene before me. At a table covered with a cloth and
laden with bottles and glasses was seated Pugatchéf, surrounded by ten
Cossack chiefs, in high caps and coloured shirts, heated by wine, with
flushed faces and sparkling eyes. I did not see among them the new
confederates lately sworn in, the traitor Chvabrine and the
"_ouriadnik_."