"What mark can be better than the breast of a foe?" answered Ammalát Bek, riding up, and at ten paces' distance pulling the trigger!... the gun went off: and slowly, without a groan, the colonel sank out of his saddle. His affrighted horse, with expanded nostrils and streaming mane, smelt at his rider, in whose hands the reins that had so lately guided him began to stiffen: and the steed of Ammalát stopped abruptly before the corpse, setting his legs straight before him. Ammalát leaped from his horse, and, resting his arms on his yet smoking gun, looked for several moments steadfastly in the face of the murdered man; as if endeavouring to prove to himself that he feared not that fixed gaze, those fast-dimming eyes—that fast-freezing blood. It would be difficult to understand—'twere impossible to express the thoughts which rolled like a whirlwind through his breast. Saphir Ali rode up at full gallop; and fell on his knees by the colonel—he laid his ear to the dying man's mouth—he breathed not—he felt his heart—it beat not! "He is dead!" cried Saphir Ali in a tone of despair. "Dead! quite dead!"
"So much the better ... My happiness is complete!..." exclaimed Ammalát, as if awakening from a dream.
"Happiness for you—for you, fratricide! If you meet happiness, the world will take to Shaitán instead of Allah."
"Saphir Ali, remember that you are not my judge!" said Ammalát fiercely, as he put his foot into the stirrup: "follow me!"
"May remorse alone accompany you, like your shadow! From this hour I am not your companion."
Pierced to the very bottom of his heart by this reproach from a man to whom he had been from infancy bound by the closest ties, Ammalát uttered not a word, but pointing to his astounded nóukers in the ravine, and perceiving the pursuit begun, dashed into the mountains like an arrow.
The alarm soon spread through the advanced guard of the detachment: the officers, who were in front, and the Don Kazáks, flew to the shot, but they came too late. They could neither prevent the crime nor seize the flying assassin. In five minutes the bloody corpse of the treacherously murdered colonel was surrounded by a crowd of officers and soldiers. Doubt, pity, indignation were written on all their faces. The grenadiers, leaning on their bayonets, shed tears, and sobbed aloud: unflattering drops poured above the brave and much-loved chief.
CHAPTER XIII.
For three days and nights did Ammalát wander about the mountains of Daghestán. As a Mussulman, even in the villages subject to the Russian dominion, he was safe from all pursuit among people for whom robbery and murder are virtues. But could he escape from the consciousness of his own crime? Neither his heart nor his reason could find an excuse for his bloody deed; and the image of Verkhóffsky falling from his horse, presented itself unceasingly before his eyes, though closed. This recollection infuriated him yet more, yet more tortured him. The Asiatic, once turned aside from the right road, travels rapidly over the career of villany. The Khan's command, not to appear before him but with the head of Verkhóffsky, rang in his ears. Without daring to communicate such an intention to his nóukers, and still less relying on their bravery, he resolved upon travelling to Derbénd alone. A darksome and gloomy night had already expanded it ebon wings over the mountains of Caucasus which skirt the sea, when Ammalát passed the ravine which lay behind the fortress of Narín-Káli, which served as a citadel to Derbénd. He mounted to the ruined turret, which once formed the limit to the Caucasian war that had extended through the mountains, and tied his horse at the foot of that hill from which Yermóloff had thundered on Derbénd when but a lieutenant of artillery. Knowing where the Russian officers were buried, he came out upon the upper burial-ground. But how to find the new-made grave of Verkhóffsky in the darkness of the night? Not a star glimmered in the sky: the clouds lay stretched on the hills, the mountain-wind, like a night-bird, lashed the forest with its wing: an involuntary shudder crept over Ammalát, in the midst of the region of the dead, whose repose he dared to interrupt. He listens: the sea murmurs hoarsely against the rocks, tumbling back from them into the deep with a sullen sound. The prolonged "slóushai" of the sentinels floated round the walls of the town, and when it was silent there rose the yell of the jackals; and at last all again was still—every sound mingling and losing itself in the rushing of the wind. How often had he not sat awake on such nights with Verkhóffsky—and where is he now! And who plunged him into the grave! And the murderer was now come to behead the corpse of his former friend—to do sacrilege to his remains—like a grave-robber to plunder the tomb—to dispute with the jackal his prey!
"Human feeling!" cried Ammalát, as he wiped the cold sweat from his forehead, "why visitest thou a heart which has torn itself from humanity? Away, away! Is it for me to fear to take off the head of a dead man, whom I have robbed of life! For him 'twill be no loss—to me a treasure. Dust is insensible!"