"Like others we are on intimate terms with," laughs the Cossack.
"Look there, if you please!" And half jokingly, half disgustedly, he points to a black swarm of roaches hurrying like a wagon train from behind the stove and making for a crack in the floor near the open door.
"They are emigrating, the vermin," exclaims the colonel; "upon my soul, they are."
"Because they are hungry," says the Cossack, with a grin.
"But the Jews. The Jews, those——" curses the colonel.
"Just as black and just as hungry—but good patriots."
The colonel lifts his head, gazes thoughtfully for a while into the flickering flame of the slowly melting candle. Then he begins to laugh.
"Why didn't I think of it before? Why didn't I think of it before? Ah, Little Brother, what asses we have been!"
The Cossack's eyes snap. He, too, has a plan which in all this orgy of bloodthirstiness appeals to him with an even bloodier zest.