The other caught his meaning. He smiled as he said, simply, "My friend, you do not know this woman."
"But I know the Trans-Baikal, and the frozen horror of your northern swamps. And I have seen a gang of exiles, in their long, earth-coloured coats, women and men, chained together, living statues of despair, tramping, tramping, and the soldiers with their bayonets fixed——"
"Don't!" said Stefanovitch. But the other went on unheedingly.
"And I have seen your northern forests in winter, shrouded in snow, with an Arctic wind rattling down the pine needles, bending the cedars, and the fir trees making a sound that gives you the shivers. And I have seen the wolves there. They appear to rise out of the ground. Once they chased me for three leagues. We were in a tarantass, and were nearly caught, by Jove! What brutes! Every tooth looked like a dagger. And frequently a poor wretch will escape from a convict station and try to hide himself in these forests——"
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"HE PERCEIVED THAT SHE WAS YET STANDING, GAZING AFTER HIM."
"Will you stop?" cried Stefanovitch, covering his eyes.
"——will endeavour to conceal himself in one of these forests; but either he starves to death or the wolves get him, or perhaps a party of soldiers, say Cossacks, come upon him and take him for a varnak. And I have known one instance in which the man, having resisted authority, was lashed to a tree to wait for the wolves. He succeeded in releasing himself, it is true; and ultimately he escaped from the country, but——"
"Enough, enough!" implored Stefanovitch, as if appalled by some memory that had seared heart and brain.