down her
cheeks, but what she said none heard. Cherry Bim, holding his hat crown
outward across his breast, produced the kind of face which he thought
adequate to the occasion; and, after the party had left the spot, he
stayed behind. He rejoined them after a few minutes, and he was putting
away his pocket-knife as he ran.

"Sorry to keep you, ladies and gents," he said, "but I am a sentimental
man in certain matters. I always have been and always shall be."

"What were you doing?" asked Malcolm, as the car bumped along.

Cherry Bim cleared his throat and seemed embarrassed.

"Well, to tell you the truth," he said. "I made a little cross and stuck
it over his head."

"But----" began Malcolm, and the girl's hand closed his mouth.

"Thank you, Mr. Bim," she said. "It was very, very kind of you."

"Nothing wrong, I hope?" asked Cherry in alarm.

"Nothing wrong at all," said the girl gently.

That cross over the grave of the Jew was to give them a day's respite.
Israel Kensky had left behind him in the place where he fell a fur hat
bearing his name. From the quantity of blood which the pursuers found,
they knew that he must have been mortally wounded, and it was for a
grave by the wayside that the pursuing party searched and found. It was
the cross at his head which deceived them and led them to take the ford
and try along the main road to the south of the river, on the banks of
which Kensky slept his last dreamless sleep.

The danger for the fugitives was evident.

"The most we can hope," said Malinkoff, "is to escape detection for two
days, after which we must abandon the car."

"Which way do you suggest?" asked Malcolm.

"Poland or the Ukraine," replied the general quickly. "The law of the
Moscow Soviet does not run in Little Russia or in Poland. We may get to
Odessa, but obviously we cannot go much farther like this. I have--or
had," he corrected himself, "an estate about seventy versts from here,
and I think I can still depend upon some of my people--if there are any
left alive. The car we must get rid of, but that, I think, will be a
simple matter."

They were now crossing a wide plain, which reminded Malcolm irresistibly
of the steppes of the Ukraine, and apparently had recalled the same
scene to Irene and Malinkoff. There was the same sweep of grass-land,
the same riot of flowers; genista, cornflour and clover dabbled the
green, and dwarf oaks and poverty-stricken birches stood in lonely
patches.