He left the room and went up to the observatory.
Mashinka was not asleep. She had heard every word.
With almost superhuman strength she had fought down the terror that rose within her, and was able to appear asleep even while the dagger was pointed at her heart by the hand of the man whom she now knew in all his infamy.
She sprang from the bed as soon as the sound of Feodor's footsteps had died away, rushed to the little room where the two sleeping boys lay clasping each other's hands, and called them.
"Wake, children, wake!" she cried in despair; "prepare yourselves for death—it is close at hand!"
She then hastily told them all she had heard.
"And you are to be made to fight each other to death before your fathers' eyes!" she exclaimed as she concluded.
Alexander and Paul tremblingly embraced each other. It was not the thought of death that made them tremble, but the thought that their fathers should hate each other so.
"Oh! if you could but fly from here!" cried Mashinka.