himself." * * *

Here the General said harshly: "What can you say now to justify
your conduct?"

My judges had listened with interest and even kindness, to the recital
of my acquaintance with the usurper, from the meeting in the snowdrift
to the taking of Belogorsk, where he gave me my life through gratitude.
I was going to continue my defense, by relating frankly my relations
with Marie, and her rescue. But if I spoke of her the Commission would
force her to appear, and her name would become the theme of no very
delicate remarks by the interrogated witnesses. These thoughts so
troubled me that I stammered, and at last was silent.

The judges were prejudiced against me by my evident confusion. The
young Guardsman asked that I should be confronted by my chief accuser.
Some minutes later the clank of iron fetters resounded, and Alexis
entered.

He was pale and thin. His hair, formerly black as a raven's wing, was
turning gray. He repeated his accusation in a weak but decided tone.

According to him, I was Pougatcheff's spy. I heard him to the end
in silence, and rejoiced at one thing: he never pronounced the name
of Marie Mironoff. Was it that his self-love smarted from her
contemptuous rejection of him? or was there in his heart a spark
of that same feeling which made me also silent on that point? This
confirmed me in my resolution, and when asked what I had to answer
to the charges of Alexis, I merely said that I held to my first
declaration, and had nothing more to add.