On reaching the square, I stopped for a moment and looked at the gibbet, then, bowing my head before it, I quitted the fortress and took the road to Orenburg, accompanied by Savelitch, who had not left my side.
I was walking on, occupied with my reflections, when suddenly I heard behind me the trampling of horses’ feet. Looking round, I saw, galloping out of the fortress, a Cossack, holding a Bashkir horse by the rein and making signs to me from afar. I stopped and soon recognized our orderly. Galloping up to us, he dismounted from his own horse, and giving me the rein of the other, said:
“Your lordship! our father sends you a horse, and a pelisse from his own shoulders.” (To the saddle was attached a sheepskin pelisse.) “Moreover,” continued the orderly with some hesitation, “he sends you—half-a-rouble—but I have lost it on the road; be generous and pardon me.”
Savelitch eyed him askance and growled out:
“You lost it on the road! What is that chinking in your pocket, then, you shameless rascal!”
“What is that chinking in my pocket?” replied the orderly, without being in the least confused. “God be with you, old man! It is a horse’s bit, and not half-a-rouble.”
“Very well,” said I, putting an end to the dispute. “Give my thanks to him who sent you; and as you go back, try and find the lost half-rouble and keep it for drink-money.”
“Many thanks, your lordship,” replied he, turning his horse round; “I will pray to God for you without ceasing.” With these words he galloped back again, holding one hand to his pocket, and in about a minute he was hidden from sight.
I put on the pelisse and mounted the horse, taking Savelitch up behind me.
“Now do you see, my lord,” said the old man, “that I did not give the petition to the rascal in vain? The robber felt ashamed of himself. Although this lean-looking Bashkir jade and this sheepskin pelisse are not worth half of what the rascals stole from us, and what you chose to give him yourself, they may yet be of some use to us; from a vicious dog, even a tuft of hair.”