Michael was there. He had leapt forward at this horrible scene. If at the relay at Ishim he had restrained himself when Ogareff’s whip had struck him, here before his mother, who was about to be struck, he could not master himself.
Ivan Ogareff had succeeded.
“Michael Strogoff!” cried he.
Then advancing,
“Ah, the man of Ishim?”
“Himself!” said Michael.
And raising the knout he struck Ogareff a sharp blow across the face.
“Blow for blow!” said he.
“Well repaid!” cried a voice, happily concealed by the tumult.
Twenty soldiers threw themselves on Michael, and in another instant he would have been slain.
But Ogareff, who on being struck had uttered a cry of rage and pain, stopped them.
“This man is reserved for the Emir’s judgment,” said he. “Search him!”
The letter with the imperial arms was found in Michael’s bosom; he had not had time to destroy it; it was handed to Ogareff.
The voice which had pronounced the words, “Well repaid!” was that of no other than Alcide Jolivet. His companion and he staying at the camp of Zabediero were present at the scene.
“Pardieu!” said he to Blount, “they are rough folk, these Northern people. Acknowledge that we owe our traveling companion a good turn. Korpanoff or Strogoff is worthy of it. Oh, that was fine retaliation for the little affair at Ishim.”
“Yes, retaliation truly,” replied Blount; “but Strogoff is a dead man. I suspect that, for his own interest at all events, it would have been better had he not possessed quite so lively a recollection of the event.”
“And let his mother perish under the knout?”
“Do you think that either she or his sister will be a bit better off from this outbreak of his?”
“I do not know or think anything except that I should have done much the same in his position,” replied Alcide. “What a scar the Colonel has received! Bah! one must boil over sometimes. We should have had water in our veins instead of blood had it been incumbent on us to be always and everywhere unmoved to wrath.”
“A neat little incident for our journals,” observed Blount, “if only Ivan Ogareff would let us know the contents of that letter.”
Ivan Ogareff, when he had stanched the blood which was trickling down his face, had broken the seal. He read and reread the letter deliberately, as if he was determined to discover everything it contained.
Then having ordered that Michael, carefully bound and guarded, should be carried on to Tomsk with the other prisoners, he took command of the troops at Zabediero, and, amid the deafening noise of drums and trumpets, he marched towards the town where the Emir awaited him.
IV
The Triumphal Entry
Tomsk, founded in 1604, nearly in the heart of the Siberian provinces, is one of the most important towns in Asiatic Russia. Tobolsk, situated above the sixtieth parallel; Irkutsk, built beyond the hundredth meridian—have seen Tomsk increase at their expense.
And yet Tomsk, as has been said, is not the capital of this important province. It is at Omsk that the Governor-General of the province and the official world reside. But Tomsk is the most considerable town of that territory, bounded by the Altai mountains, a range which extends to the Chinese frontier of the Khalkhas country. Down the slopes of these mountains to the valley of the Tom, platina, gold, silver, copper, and auriferous-lead succeed each other. The country being rich, the town is so likewise, for it is in the center of fruitful mines. In the luxury of its houses, its arrangements, and its equipages, it might rival the greatest European capitals. It is a city of millionaires, enriched by the spade and pickax, and though it has not the honor of being the residence of the Czar’s representative, it can boast of including in the first rank of its notables the chief of the merchants of the town, the principal grantees of the imperial government’s mines.
Formerly Tomsk was thought to be at the end of the world. It was a long journey for those who wished to go there. Now it is a mere walk where the road is not trampled over by the feet of invaders. Soon, even a railway will be constructed which will unite it with Perm, by crossing the Urals.
Is Tomsk a pretty town? It must be confessed that travelers are not agreed on this point.
Madame de Bourboulon, who stopped there a few days during her journey from Shanghai to Moscow, calls it an unpicturesque locality. According to her, it is but an insignificant town, with old houses of stone and brick, narrow streets—differing much from those which are usually found in great Siberian cities—dirty quarters, crowded chiefly with Tartars, and in which are swarms of quiet drunkards, “whose drunkenness even is apathetic as with all the nations of the North.”
The traveler Henry Russel-Killough is positive in his admiration of Tomsk. Is this because he saw in midwinter, under its snowy mantle, the town which Madame de Bourboulon only visited during the summer? It is possible, and confirms the opinion that certain cold countries can only be appreciated in the cold season, as certain hot countries in the hot season.
However this may be, Mr. Russel-Killough says positively that Tomsk is not only the prettiest town in Siberia, but is one of the prettiest town in the world; its houses adorned with columns and peristyles, its wooden side-paths, its wide and regular streets, and its fifteen magnificent churches reelected in the waters of the Tom, larger than any river in France.
The truth is something between these two opinions. Tomsk, which contains twenty-five thousand inhabitants, is picturesquely built on a long hill, the slope of which is somewhat steep.
But even the prettiest town in the world would become ugly when occupied by invaders.
Who would wish to admire it then? Defended by a few battalions of foot Cossacks, who resided permanently there, it had not been able to resist the attack of the Emir’s columns. A part of the population, of Tartar origin, had given
