y I stay with you?" cried Petya.

"But, just what did the genewal tell you? To weturn at once?" asked
Denisov.

Petya blushed.

"He gave me no instructions. I think I could?" he returned, inquiringly.

"Well, all wight," said Denisov.

And turning to his men he directed a party to go on to the halting place
arranged near the watchman's hut in the forest, and told the officer on
the Kirghiz horse (who performed the duties of an adjutant) to go and
find out where Dolokhov was and whether he would come that evening.
Denisov himself intended going with the esaul and Petya to the edge of
the forest where it reached out to Shamshevo, to have a look at the part
of the French bivouac they were to attack next day.

"Well, old fellow," said he to the peasant guide, "lead us to
Shamshevo."

Denisov, Petya, and the esaul, accompanied by some Cossacks and the
hussar who had the prisoner, rode to the left across a ravine to the
edge of the forest.

CHAPTER V

The rain had stopped, and only the mist was falling and drops from
the trees. Denisov, the esaul, and Petya rode silently, following the
peasant in the knitted cap who, stepping lightly with outturned toes
and moving noiselessly in his bast shoes over the roots and wet leaves,
silently led them to the edge of the forest.

He ascended an incline, stopped, looked about him, and advanced to where
the screen of trees was less dense. On reaching a large oak tree that
had not yet shed its leaves, he stopped and beckoned mysteriously to
them with his hand.

Denisov and Petya rode up to him. From the spot where the peasant was
standing they could see the French. Immediately beyond the forest, on a
downward slope, lay a field of spring rye. To the right, beyond a steep
ravine, was a small village and a landowner's house with a broken roof.
In the village, in the house, in the garden, by the well, by the pond,
over all the rising ground, and all along the road uphill from the
bridge leading to the village, not more than five hundred yards
away, crowds of men could be seen through the shimmering mist. Their
un-Russian shouting at their horses which were straining uphill with the
carts, and their calls to one another, could be clearly heard.

"Bwing the prisoner here," said Denisov in a low voice, not taking his
eyes off the French.

A Cossack dismounted, lifted the boy down, and took him to Denisov.
Pointing to the French troops, Denisov asked him what these and