rd the porch. Rostopchin, coming out there
with quick angry steps, looked hastily around as if seeking someone.

"Where is he?" he inquired. And as he spoke he saw a young man coming
round the corner of the house between two dragoons. He had a long thin
neck, and his head, that had been half shaved, was again covered by
short hair. This young man was dressed in a threadbare blue cloth coat
lined with fox fur, that had once been smart, and dirty hempen convict
trousers, over which were pulled his thin, dirty, trodden-down boots.
On his thin, weak legs were heavy chains which hampered his irresolute
movements.

"Ah!" said Rostopchin, hurriedly turning away his eyes from the young
man in the fur-lined coat and pointing to the bottom step of the porch.
"Put him there."

The young man in his clattering chains stepped clumsily to the spot
indicated, holding away with one finger the coat collar which chafed
his neck, turned his long neck twice this way and that, sighed, and
submissively folded before him his thin hands, unused to work.

For several seconds while the young man was taking his place on the step
the silence continued. Only among the back rows of the people, who were
all pressing toward the one spot, could sighs, groans, and the shuffling
of feet be heard.

While waiting for the young man to take his place on the step Rostopchin
stood frowning and rubbing his face with his hand.

"Lads!" said he, with a metallic ring in his voice. "This man,
Vereshchagin, is the scoundrel by whose doing Moscow is perishing."

The young man in the fur-lined coat, stooping a little, stood in a
submissive attitude, his fingers clasped before him. His emaciated young
face, disfigured by the half-shaven head, hung down hopelessly. At
the count's first words he raised it slowly and looked up at him as if
wishing to say something or at least to meet his eye. But Rostopchin did
not look at him. A vein in the young man's long thin neck swelled like a
cord and went blue behind the ear, and suddenly his face flushed.

All eyes were fixed on him. He looked at the crowd, and rendered more
hopeful by the expression he read on the faces there, he smiled sadly
and timidly, and lowering his head shifted his feet on the step.

"He has betrayed his Tsar and his country, he has gone over to
Bonaparte. He alone of all the Russians has disgraced the Russian name,
he has caused Moscow to perish," said Rostopchin in a sharp, even voice,
but sudd