Nevertheless, General Kissoff waited until the officer to whom
he had just communicated the dispatch forwarded from Tomsk should give
him permission to withdraw; but the latter still remained silent.
He had taken the telegram, he had read it carefully,
and his visage became even more clouded than before.
Involuntarily he sought the hilt of his sword, and then
passed his hand for an instant before his eyes, as though,
dazzled by the brilliancy of the light, he wished to shade them,
the better to see into the recesses of his own mind.

"We are, then," he continued, after having drawn General Kissoff
aside towards a window, "since yesterday without intelligence
from the Grand Duke?"

"Without any, sire; and it is to be feared that in a short time
dispatches will no longer cross the Siberian frontier."

"But have not the troops of the provinces of Amoor and Irkutsk,
as those also of the Trans-Balkan territory, received orders
to march immediately upon Irkutsk?"

"The orders were transmitted by the last telegram we were able
to send beyond Lake Baikal."

"And the governments of Yeniseisk, Omsk, Semipolatinsk,
and Tobolsk--are we still in direct communication with them
as before the insurrection?"

"Yes, sire; our dispatches have reached them, and we are assured