ath which wound in an eccentric fashion through the moor, sometimes
diving into ravines, and sometimes emerging into clear sunshine. Here
and there stumps of trees bearing the fresh marks of an axe, and black
abandoned fire-places whose ashes had not yet been quite blown away,
showed that men had worked and rested here. The wanderer also thought he
often heard human voices, but when he held his breath to listen, he
always found it had been the deceptive cry of a bird.

The day came to an end, the golden radiance of the sun setting behind
the distant hills grew pale, and the first stars glimmered in the dusky
sky. Ivan strode valiantly forwards through the white rising mists out
of which single branches of trees projecting, beckoned to him like long
lean arms, till he reached a copse with dry mossy ground which seemed
admirably adapted to furnish him with a sleeping-place for the night. He
collected a bundle of twigs together and struck a light.

But in the act of raising his hand he stopped. What was that? Was there
not a sound from the wood like a child's crying? For a moment a cold
thrill passed through him; half-forgotten ghost-stories occurred to him,
but he was too intimately familiar with the life of the forest to be
seriously alarmed. After a short pause the crying began again.

"Hullo! Who is there? Is there any one?" Ivan shouted as loud as he
could. His voice aroused the sleeping wood; squirrels rustled among the
branches, and startled birds flapped their wings. Then everything was
again perfectly silent, nor could the sound of crying be heard any more.
Ivan again turned into the path.

"It must be a woman or a child," he thought, "and quite close too."

He peered with keen eyes through the darkness and moved noiselessly
forward, in order not to frighten the weeper. Now he heard the sound of
sobbing more distinctly; it was a child. But how had a child got here?
The moon had risen and threw an uncertain light on the path; in a ditch
by the side of it lay something white--it was the skeleton of a horse
which had been devoured by wolves. Near it was rustling some creature
which moved off at the convict's approach, first crawling and then at
full speed.

Ivan went on and asked in a lower voice, "Who is there?"

A low sob was the only answer, "Oh, I am frightened. Mother! Mother!"

The moon now showed distinctly a little clearing in the wood. At the
edge of it lay a woman's figure stretched out at full lengt