I saw in the white snow a huge grave, wide, deep.  I shall see it to my last minute.  Two vans had already stopped near the hole.  Each van held thirteen corpses.  The vans were dumped into the trench and the soldiers commenced to sort the bodies into rows of six.  I watched for my son.  At last I recognized him in a body that half hung over the edge of the trench.  Horrors of suffering were stamped in the expression of his face.  I threw myself beside him.  I said that I was his father.  They let me embrace him a last time and count his wounds.  He had fourteen.  Someone had stolen the gold chain that had hung about his neck and held the picture of his mother, who died the year before.  I whispered into his ear, I swore to avenge him.  Forty-eight hours later I had placed myself at the disposition of the Revolutionary Committee.  A week had not passed before Touman, whom, it seems, I resemble and who was one of the Secret Service agents in Kiew, was assassinated in the train that was taking him to St. Petersburg.  The assassination was kept a secret.  I received all his papers and I took his place with you.  I was doomed beforehand and I asked nothing better, so long as I might last until after the execution of Trebassof.  Ah, how I longed to kill him with my own hands!  But another had already been assigned the duty and my role was to help him.  And do you suppose I am going to tell you the name of that other?  Never!  And if you discover that other, as you have discovered me, another will come, and another, and another, until Trebassof has paid for his crimes.  That is all I have to say to you, Koupriane.  As for you, my little fellow,” added he, turning to Rouletabille, “I wouldn’t give much for your bones.  Neither of you will last long.  That is my consolation.”

Koupriane had not interrupted the man.  He looked at him in silence, sadly.

“You know, my poor man, you will be hanged now?” he said.

“No,” growled Rouletabille.  “Monsieur Koupriane, I’ll bet you my purse that he will not be hanged.”

“And why not?” demanded the Chief of rolice, while, upon a sign from him, they took away the false Touman.

“Because it is I who denounced him.”

“What a reason!  And what would you like me to do?”

“Guard him for me; for me alone, do you understand?”

“In exchange for what?”

“In exchange for the life of General Trebassof, if I must put it that way.”

“Eh?  The life of General Trebassof!  You speak as if it belonged to you, as if you could dispose of it.”

Rouletabille laid his hand on Koupriane’s arm.

“Perhaps that’s so,” said he.

“Would you like me to tell you one thing, Monsieur Rouletabille?  It is that General Trebassof’s life, after what has just escaped the lips of this Touman, who is not Touman, isn’t worth any more than — than yours if you remain here.  Since you are disposed not to do anything more in this affair, take the train, monsieur, take the train, and go.”