“Yes, to hold,” they answered.
“Then how could you leave them?” I fired back.
There was silence.
“That would be treason to Free Russia!” I continued.
The men bowed their heads in shame. Nobody spoke.
“Then why did you kill him?” I cried out bitterly. “What did he want you to do but hold the trenches?”
“He wanted to shoot us!” several sullen voices replied.
“He never said anything of the sort. What he wanted to say was to explain that the General did not threaten you either, but remarked that in other circumstances your action would be punished by shooting. No sooner did Colonel Belonogov mention the word “shoot” than you threw yourself upon him without even giving the man a chance to finish what he was saying.”
“That was not what we understood. We thought he threatened to shoot us,” the men weakly defended themselves.
At this point the orderlies and friends of the murdered Colonel rushed up. They raised such a cry of grief when they saw the mutilated corpse that all speech was silenced. They cursed and wept and threatened the mob, although they were few and the crowd numbered thousands.