not ask
for it. The revolutionaries ordered him to bid his family farewell.
He raised his wife, his children, clasped them, bade them be of good
courage, then said he was ready. They took him into the street. They
stood him against a wall. His wife and children watched from a window.
A volley sounded. They descended to secure the body, pierced with
twenty-five bullets."

"That was exactly the number of wounds that were made on the body of
little Jacques Zloriksky," came in the even tones of Natacha.

"Oh, you, you always find an excuse," grumbled the general. "Poor
Boichlikoff did his duty, as I did mine.

"Yes, papa, you acted like a soldier. That is what the revolutionaries
ought not to forget. But have no fears for us, papa; because if they
kill you we will all die with you."

"And gayly too," declared Athanase Georgevitch.

"They should come this evening. We are in form!"

Upon which Athanase filled the glasses again.

"None the less, permit me to say," ventured the timber-merchant,
Thaddeus Tchnitchnikof, timidly, "permit me to say that this Boichlikoff
was very imprudent."

"Yes, indeed, very gravely imprudent," agreed Rouletabille. "When a man
has had twenty-five good bullets shot into the body of a child, he ought
certainly to keep his home well guarded if he wishes to dine in peace."

He stammered a little toward the end of this, because it occurred to him
that it was a little inconsistent to express such opinions, seeing what
he had done with the guard over the general.

"Ah," cried Athanase Georgevitch, in a stage-struck voice, "Ah, it was
not imprudence! It was contempt of death! Yes, it was contempt of death
that killed him! Even as the contempt of death keeps us, at this moment,
in perfect health. To you, ladies and gentlemen! Do you know anything
lovelier, grander, in the world than contempt of death? Gaze on Feodor
Feodorovitch and answer me. Superb! My word, superb! To you all! The
revolutionaries who are not of the police are of the same mind regarding
our heroes. They may curse the tchinownicks who execute the terrible
orders given them by those higher up, but those who are not of the
police (there are some, I believe)--these surely recognize that men like
the Chief of the Surete our dead friend, are brave."

"Certainly," endorsed the general. "Counting all things, they need more
heroism for a promenade in a salon than a soldier on a battle-field."

"I have met some of these men," contin