“The enemy?” he repeated with surprise. “The enemy was not there at all! Do you call that the enemy?⁠ ⁠… Wait till the evening, when we go back, and you will see how they will speed us on our way: what a lot of them will pour out from there,” he said, pointing to a thicket that we had passed in the morning. “What is that?” I asked anxiously, interrupting the Captain and pointing to a group of Don Cossacks, who had collected round something not far from us.

A sound of something like a child’s cry came from there, and the words “Stop⁠ ⁠… don’t hack it⁠ ⁠… they’ll see⁠ ⁠… Have you a knife, Evstigneich?⁠ ⁠… Lend a knife⁠ ⁠…”

“They are up to something, the scoundrels⁠ ⁠…” calmly replied the Captain.

But at that moment the young ensign, his bonny face flushed and frightened, came suddenly running from behind a corner, and rushed, waving his arms, towards the Cossacks.