between the nuns and the
soldiers, as the latter attempted to separate the ex-Empress and the
young Grand Duchesses from the sisters.

"What's all that trouble about!" cried the officer commanding. "Drive
back those nuns, I tell you! They're Germans, too! They're Sascha's
new Deaconesses! Kick 'em out of the way!"

Then the novice, who had cried out in fear when the Red infantry first
entered the chapel, forced her way out into the file formed by the
Empress and her daughters.

"There's a frightful mistake!" she cried, laying one hand on the arm
of a young girl dressed, like the others, as a Sister of Mercy. "This
woman is Miss Dumont, my American companion! Release her! =I= am the
Grand Duchess Marie!"

The girl, whose arm had been seized, looked at the young novice over
her shoulder in a dazed way; then, suddenly her lovely face flushed
scarlet; tears sprang to her eyes; and she said to the infuriated
officer:

"It is not true, Captain! I am the Grand Duchess Marie. She is trying
to save me!"

"What the devil is all this row!" roared the officer, who now came
tramping and storming among the prisoners, switching his sword to and
fro with ferocious impatience.

The little Sister of Mercy, frightened but resolute, pointed at the
novice, who still clutched her by the arm: "It is not true what she
tells you," she repeated. "I am the Grand Duchess Marie, and this
novice is my American companion, Miss Dumont, who loves me devotedly
and who now attempts to sacrifice herself in my place----"

"I _am_ the Grand Duchess Marie!" interrupted the novice excitedly.
"This young girl dressed like a Sister of Mercy is only my American
companion----"

"Damnation!" yelled the officer. "I'll take you both, then!" But the
girl in the Sister of Mercy's garb turned and violently pushed the
novice from her so that she stumbled and fell on her knees among the
nuns.

Then, confronting the officer: "You Bolshevik dog," she said
contemptuously, "don't you even know the daughter of your dead Emperor
when you see her!" And she struck him across the face with her prayer
book.

As he recoiled from the blow a soldier shouted: "There's your proof!
There's your insolent Romanoff for you! To hell with the whole litter!
Shoot them!" Instantly a savage roar from the Reds filled that dim
place; a soldier violently pushed the young Tzesarevitch into the file
behind the Empress and held him there; the Grand Duchess Olga was
flung bodily after