Meanwhile our men worked with industry and speed, but not
without a fault or two, for their thoughts were fixed upon the
town and its washhouses and churches. And particularly restless
was Sashok Diatlov, a man whose hair, as flaxen as that of his
brother, seemed to have been boiled in lye. At intervals,
glancing up-river, this well-built, sturdy young fellow would
say softly to his brother:

"It's cracking now, eh?"

And, certainly, the ice had "moved" two nights ago, so that
since yesterday morning the river watchmen had refused to permit
horsed vehicles to cross, and only a few beadlike pedestrians
now were making their way along the marked-out ice paths, while,
as they proceeded, one could hear the water slapping against the
planks as the latter bent under the travellers' weight.

"Yes, it IS cracking," at length Mishuk replied with a hoist
of his ginger eyebrows.

Ossip too scanned the river from under his hand. Then he said to
Mishuk:

"Pah! It is the dry squeak of the planes in your own hand that
you keep hearing, so go on with your work, you son of a beldame.
And as for you, Inspector, do you help me to speed up the men
instead of burying your nose in your notebook."

By this time there remained only two more hours for work, and