louds resembled waves whose gray crests touched the earth;
they resembled abysses hollowed by the wind between the waves and
nascent billows not yet covered with the green foam of fury.

Gavrilo was oppressed by this dark calm and beauty; he realized that he
desired his master's return. But he did not come! The time passed
slowly, more slowly than crawled the clouds up in the sky. . . And the
length of time augmented the agony of the silence. But just now behind
the wall, the plashing of water was heard, then a rustling, and
something like a whisper. Gavrilo was half dead from fright.

"Hey, there! Are you asleep? Take this! Softly!" said Tchelkache's
hoarse voice.

From the wall descended a solid, square, heavy object. Gavrilo put it
in the boat, then another one like it. Across the wall stretched
Tchelkache's long figure. The oars reappeared mysteriously, then
Gavrilo's bag fell at his feet and Tchelkache out of breath seated
himself at the tiller.

Gavrilo looked at him with a timid and glad smile.

"Are you tired?" said he.

"A little, naturally, simpleton! Row firm, with all your might. You
have a pretty profit, brother! The affair is half done, now there only
remains to pass unseen under the eyes of those devils, and then you'll
receive your money and fly to your Machka. . . You have a Machka, say,
little one?"

"N-no!"

Gavrilo did not spare himself; his breast worked like a bellows and his
arms like steel springs. The water foamed under the boat and the blue
trail that followed in the wake of the stern had become wider. Gavrilo
was bathed in perspiration, but he continued to row with all his
strength. After twice experiencing the fright that he had on this
night, he dreaded a repetition of it and had only one desire: to finish
this accursed task as soon as possible, regain the land, and flee from
this man before he should be killed by him or imprisoned on account of
his misdeeds. He resolved not to speak to him, not to contradict him
in anything, to execute all his commands and if he succeeded in freeing
himself from him unmolested, to sing a Te Deum to Saint Nicholas. An
earnest prayer was on his lips. But he controlled himself, puffed like
a steamboat, and in silence cast furtive glances at Tchelkache.

The other, bending his long, lean body forward, like a bird poising for
flight, gazed ahead into the darkness with his hawk's eyes. Turning
his fierce, aquiline nose from side t