Michael Strogoff, by a desperate effort, had gone. He did not see his old mother, who had fallen back almost inanimate upon a bench. But when the postmaster hastened to assist her, the aged woman raised herself. Suddenly a thought occurred to her. She denied by her son! It was not possible. As for being herself deceived, and taking another for him, equally impossible. It was certainly her son whom she had just seen; and if he had not recognized her it was because he would not, it was because he ought not, it was because he had some cogent reasons for acting thus! And then, her mother’s feelings arising within her, she had only one thought--“Can I, unwittingly, have ruined him?” “I am mad,” she said to her interrogators. “My eyes have deceived me! This young man is not my child. He had not his voice. Let us think no more of it; if we do I shall end by finding him everywhere.” Less than ten minutes afterwards a Tartar officer appeared in the posting-house. “Marfa Strogoff?” he asked. “It is I,” replied the old woman, in a tone so calm, and with a face so tranquil, that those who had witnessed the meeting with her son would not have known her. “Come,” said the officer. Marfa Strogoff, with firm step, followed the Tartar. Some moments afterwards she found herself in the chief square in the presence of Ivan Ogareff, to whom all the details of this scene had been immediately reported. Ogareff, suspecting the truth, interrogated the old Siberian woman. “Thy name?” he asked in a rough voice. “Marfa Strogoff.” “Thou hast a son?” “Yes.” “He is a courier of the Czar?” “Yes.” “Where is he?” “At Moscow.” “Thou hast no news of him?” “No news.” “Since how long?” “Since two months.” “Who, then, was that young man whom thou didst call thy son a few moments ago at the posting-house?” “A young Siberian whom I took for him,” replied Marfa Strogoff. “This is the tenth man in whom I have thought I recognized my son since the town has been so full of strangers. I think I see him everywhere.” “So this young man was not Michael Strogoff?” “It was not Michael Strogoff.” “Dost thou know, old woman, that I can torture thee until thou avowest the truth?” “I have spoken the truth, and torture will not cause me to alter my words in any way.” “This Siberian was not Michael Strogoff?” asked a second time Ivan Ogareff. “No, it was not he,” replied a second time Marfa Strogoff. “Do you think that for anything in the world I would deny a son whom God has given me?”