It was only by the snorting and occasional stamping of the horses harnessed to them that we could tell where the limbers and ammunition wagons stood in the impenetrable darkness; and only the fiery dots of the linstocks showed where the guns were. “God be with us!” With these words came the clanging sound of the first gun moving, then the noise of the ammunition wagon⁠—and the platoon started. We all took off our caps and crossed ourselves. Having occupied the interval between the infantry companies, the platoon stopped and waited a quarter of an hour for the whole column to collect and for the commander to appear.

“One of our men is missing, Nicholas Petrovich.” With these words a black figure approached me, whom I only knew by the voice to be the gun-sergeant of the platoon, Maksimov.

“Who is it?”

“Velenchuk is missing. He was there all the time they were harnessing⁠—I saw him myself⁠—but now he’s gone.”