s teeth chattered. "They are waiting for us to go
down," said Koupraine.

"Very well, let us do it. This thing must end," said Feodor.

"Yes, yes," they all said, for the situation was becoming intolerable;
"enough of this. Go on down. Go on down. God, the Virgin and Saints
Peter and Paul protect us. Let us go."

The whole group, therefore, went to the main staircase, with the
movements of drunken men, fantastic waving of the arms, mouths
speaking all together, saying things no one but themselves understood.
Rouletabille had already hurriedly preceded them, was down the
staircase, had time to throw a glance into the drawing-room, stepped
over Ermolai's huge corpse, entered Natacha's sitting-room and her
chamber, found all these places deserted and bounded back into the
veranda at the moment the others commenced to descend the steps around
Feodor Feodorovitch. The reporter's eyes searched all the dark corners
and had perceived nothing suspicious when, in the veranda, he moved a
chair. A shadow detached itself from it and glided under the staircase.
Rouletabille cried to the group on the stairs.

"They are under the staircase!"

Then Rouletabille confronted a sight that he could never forget all his
life.

At this cry, they all stopped, after an instinctive move to go back.
Feodor Feodorovitch, who was still in Matrena Petrovna's arms, cried:

"Vive le Tsar!"

And then, those whom the reporter half expected to see flee, distracted,
one way and another, or to throw themselves madly from the height of the
steps, abandoning Feodor and Matrena, gathered themselves instead by
a spontaneous movement around the general, like a guard of honor, in
battle, around the flag. Koupriane marched ahead. And they insisted
also upon descending the terrible steps slowly, and sang the Bodje tsara
Krani, the national anthem!

With an overwhelming roar, which shocked earth and sky and the ears of
Rouletabille, the entire house seemed lifted in the air; the staircase
rose amid flame and smoke, and the group which sang the Bodje tsara
Krani disappeared in a horrible apotheosis.

XIV. THE MARSHES

They ascertained the next day that there had been two explosions, almost
simultaneous, one under each staircase. The two Nihilists, when
they felt themselves discovered, and watched by Ermolai, had thrown
themselves silently on him as he turned his back in passing them, and
strangled him with a piece of twine. Then they separated e