officer's hut. Martzoff was lying on his back, with his muscular arms, bare to the elbow, thrown over his head, and with the expression on his yellow face of a man who is clenching his teeth in order to keep from shrieking with pain. His whole leg, in its stocking, was thrust outside the coverlet, and it could be seen how he was twitching his toes convulsively inside it.
"Well, how goes it, how do you feel.'*" asked the sister, raising his bald head with her slender, delicate fingers, on one of which Volodya noticed a gold ring, and arranging his pillow. " Here are some of your comrades come to inquire after you.'*
" Badly, of course," he answered, angrily. "Let me alone! it's all right," — the toes in his stocking moved more rapidly than ever. " How do you do t What is your name.-* Excuse me," he said, turning to Kozeltzoff...." Ah, yes, I beg your pardon! one forgets everything here," he said, when the latter had mentioned his name. "You and I lived together," he added, without the slightest expression of pleasure, glancing interrogatively at Volodya.
" This is«TOy brother, who has just arrived from Petersburg to-day."
" Hm! Here I have finished my service," he said, with a frown. ** Ah, how painful it is!... The best thing would be a speedy end."
He drew up his leg, and covered his face with his hands, continuing to move his toes with redoubled swiftness.
"You must leave him," said the sister, in a whisper, while the tears stood in her eyes; " he is in a very bad state."
The brothers had already decided on the north side to go to the fifth bastion; but, on emerging from the Nikolaevsky battery, they seemed to have come to a tacit understanding not to subject themselves to unnecessary danger, and, without discussing the subject, they determined to go their ways separately.
** Only, how are you to find your way, Volodya } " said the elder. " However, Nikolaeff will conduct you to the Korabelnaya, and I will go my way alone, and will be with you to-morrow.
Nothing more was said at this last leave-taking between the 'brothers.