But the same fate did not await Volodya. He was listening to a tale
which Vasin was in the act of relating to him, when there was a
cry,—“The French are coming!” The blood fled for a moment to Volodya's
heart, and he felt his cheeks turn cold and pale. For one second he
remained motionless, but, on glancing about him, he perceived that
the soldiers were buttoning up their coats with tolerable equanimity,
and crawling out, one after the other. One even, probably Melnikoff,
remarked, in a jesting way:—
“Go out and offer them the bread and salt of hospitality, children!”
Volodya, in company with Vlang, who never separated from him by so much
as a step, crawled out of the bomb-proof, and ran to the battery.
There was no artillery firing whatever in progress on either side. It
was not so much the sight of the soldiers' composure which aroused
his courage as the pitiful and undisguised cowardice of Vlang. “Is
it possible for me to be like him?” he said to himself, and he ran
on gayly up to the breastworks, near which his mortars stood. It was
clearly apparent to him that the French were making straight for him
through an open space, and that masses of them, with their bayonets
glittering in the sun, were moving in the nearest trenches.
One, a short, broad-shouldered fellow, in zouave uniform, and armed
with a sword, ran on in front and leaped the ditch.
“Fire grape-shot!” shouted Volodya, hastening from the banquette;
but the soldiers had already made their preparations without waiting
for his orders, and the metallic sound of the grape-shot which they
discharged shrieked over his head, first from one and then from the
other mortar.
“First! second!” commanded Volodya, running from one mortar to the
other, and utterly oblivious of danger.
On one side, and near at hand, the crash of musketry from our men under
shelter, and anxious cries, were heard.
All at once a startling cry of despair, repeated by several voices, was
heard on the left: “They are surrounding us! They are surrounding us!”
Volodya looked round at this shout. Twenty Frenchmen made their
appearance in the rear. One of them, a handsome man with a black beard,
was in front of all; but, after running up to within ten paces of the
battery, he halted, and fired straight at Volodya, and then ran towards
him once more.
For a second, Volodya stood as though turned to stone, and did not
believe his eyes. When he recovered himself and glanced about him,
there were blue uniforms in front of him on the ramparts; two Frenchmen
were even spiking a cannon not ten paces distant from him.
There was no one near him, with the exception of Melnikoff, who had
been killed by a bullet beside him, and Vlang, who, with a handspike
clutched in his hand, had rushed forwards, with an expression of wrath
on his face, and with eyes lowered.
“Follow me, Vladímir Semyónitch! Follow me!” shouted the desperate
voice of Vlang, as he brandished his handspike over the French, who
were pouring in from the rear. The yunker's ferocious countenance
startled them. He struck the one who was in advance, on the head; the
others involuntarily paused, and Vlang continued to glare about him,
and to shout in despairing accents: “Follow me, Vladímir Semyónitch!
Why do you stand there? Run!” and ran towards the trenches in which lay
our infantry, firing at the French. After leaping into the trench, he
came out again to see what his adored ensign was doing. Something in a
coat was lying prostrate where Volodya had been standing, and the whole
place was filled with Frenchmen, who were firing at our men.