And so he had brought them safely to Sarátof⁠—little dog, coffins and all. The women, though Poles, were harmless agreeable women, and they did nothing wrong. But here in the Pokróvsky suburb, towards evening, passing by the tarantass, he noticed that the little dog jumped inside and whined and wagged its tail, and he thought he heard someone’s voice coming from under the seat of the tarantass. One of the Polish women⁠—the old one⁠—grew frightened on seeing the dog in the tarantass, and caught it and carried it away.

“There’s something wrong there,” thought the Cossack, and remained on the lookout. When the young Polish woman came out in the night to the tarantass, he pretended to be asleep, and distinctly heard a man’s voice coming from the box. Early in the morning he went to the police to let them know that the Polish women entrusted to his care were not travelling honestly, but were carrying, instead of coffins, a live man in their box.