“Stand up before me and answer.”
The youngster slipped off his chair, stretched himself smartly to his full height in front of his father, and lisped again:
“Yeth, father?”
And he surveyed those sitting at the other tables with a quick, sly look.
“What should be done with the enemies of the Tsar and the Fatherland?” asked Kerbakh.
“They should be destroyed!” answered the boy alertly.
“And afterwards?” continued his father.
The boy quickly repeated the words he had studied:
“And afterwards the foul corpses of the vile enemies of the Fatherland should be thrown on the dunghill.”
Kerbakh and Zherbenev laughed gleefully.