The day of the trial came. A great van with barred windows rumbled into the prison yard. I was put into it, a sergeant of police took his seat beside me, and the door was fastened outside with a mighty padlock. The gendarme who had been so long my companion in captivity mounted the box; a company of infantry escorted us, and the cortège was finally surrounded by Cossacks on horseback. The Chief of Police led the van, and a commissary of police formed the rearguard. It might have been supposed that at least a dozen robber chiefs, each with his horde of banditti, were being transported through the town. As we passed along the streets this unusual procession aroused the attention of the public, and I saw people crowding to the windows. Meanwhile I chatted quietly with the police-sergeant. It seemed that he had been on duty in Kiëv twenty years before, and knew my family. “Who would have thought that little Deutsch I often used to see would ever come to this!” said he, and began following up old recollections, talking of my father and our house. My thoughts flew back over the years, and scenes of my childhood rose before me. The court was filled with a carefully selected “public,” consisting of officers and their womenfolk, people connected with the law, and other representatives of the official world. The examination of the witnesses produced nothing of any interest. Most of those originally called were either dead or had disappeared, and those few who did attend made inconclusive statements, their memories being vague after the lapse of eight years—some, indeed, refused to answer on that account. The principal witness, Gorinòvitch himself, for some reason did not appear, but his deposition was read. I on my side took little part in the proceedings, and had renounced my right to call witnesses for the defence. But I was moved and excited; the large audience, mostly hostile, that gazed on me worked on my feelings. I sought for a familiar face, but saw nobody I knew except the Public Prosecutor of the Civil Courts, who had conducted my examination in prison.