The kibitka drew up in front of the Commandant’s house. The inhabitants had recognized Pougatcheff’s little bell, and came crowding around us. Shvabrin met the impostor at the foot of the steps. He was dressed as a Cossack, and had allowed his beard to grow. The traitor helped Pougatcheff to alight from the kibitka, expressing, in obsequious terms, his joy and zeal. On seeing me, he became confused; but quickly recovering himself, he stretched out his hand to me, saying:
“And are you also one of us? You should have been so long ago!”
I turned away from him and made no reply.
My heart ached when we entered the well-known room, on the wall of which still hung the commission of the late Commandant, as a mournful epitaph of the past. Pougatcheff seated himself upon the same sofa on which Ivan Kouzmitch was accustomed to fall asleep, lulled by the scolding of his wife. Shvabrin himself brought him some brandy. Pougatcheff drank a glass, and said to him, pointing to me:
“Give his lordship a glass.”
Shvabrin approached me with his tray, but I turned away from him a second time. He seemed to have become quite another person. With his usual sagacity, he had certainly perceived that Pougatcheff was dissatisfied with him. He cowered before him, and glanced at me with distrust.
Pougatcheff asked some questions concerning the condition of the fortress, the reports referring to the enemy’s army, and the like. Then suddenly and unexpectedly he said to him:
“Tell me, my friend, who is this young girl that you hold a prisoner here? Show her to me.”
Shvabrin turned as pale as death.
“Czar,” said he, in a trembling voice... “Czar, she is not a prisoner ... she is ill ... she is in bed.”