At that moment Molozov with Trenchard, Nikitin and Semyonov, entered. I have said earlier in this book that only upon one occasion have I seen Molozov utterly overcome, a defeated man. This was the occasion to which I refer. He stood there in the doorway, under a vulgar bevy of gilt and crimson cupids, his face dull paste in colour, his hands hanging like lead; he looked at us without seeing us. Semyonov said something to him: "Why, of course," I heard him reply, "we've got to get out as quickly as we can.... That's all." He came over towards us and we were all, except Marie Ivanovna, desperately frightened. She cried to him: "Well, what's the truth? How bad is it?" He didn't turn to her but answered to us all. "It's abominable--everywhere." I know that then the great feeling of us all was that we must escape from the horrible place in some way. This beastly town of O---- (once cursed by us for its gentle placidity) was responsible for the whole disaster; it was as though we said to ourselves, "If we had not been here this would not have happened." We all stood up as though we felt that we must leave at once, and while we stood thus there was a report that shook the floor so that we rocked on our feet, brought a shower of dust and whitewash from the walls, cracked the one remaining pane of glass and drove two mice scattering with terror wildly across the floor. The noise had been terrific. Our very hearts stood still. The Austrians were here then.... This was the end.... "It's the bridge," Semyonov said quietly, and of course ironically. "We've blown it up. There'll be the other in a moment." There was--a second shock brought down more dust and a large scale of gilt wood from one of the cornices. We waited then for our orders, looking down from the windows on to what seemed a perfect babel of disorder and confusion. "We must be at X---- to-night," Molozov told us. "The Staff is on its way already. We should be moving in half an hour." We made our preparations.