It seemed to him as though some one had stolen past under the window... He listened... Not a sound. Only a grasshopper shrilled behind the oven, from time to time, and a mouse was gnawing somewhere, and his own breath was audible. All was still in the empty room, dimly illuminated by the yellow rays of a tiny glass shrine-lamp, which he had found time to suspend and light in front of a small holy picture in the corner... He lowered his head; and now again he seemed to hear the gate squeaking .... then the wattled hedge crackled faintly.... He could not endure it, leaped to his feet, opened the door into the next room, and called in a low tone: "Feódor, hey, Feódor!"--No one answered him.... He went out into the anteroom and nearly fell prone, as he stumbled over Feódor, who was sprawling on the floor. The labourer stirred, growling in his sleep; he shook him. "Who 's there? What 's wanted?"--Feódor was beginning.... "What art thou yelling for? Hold thy tongue!"--articulated Naúm in a whisper.--"The idea of your sleeping, you damned brutes! Hast thou not heard anything?" "No,"--replied the man.... "Why?" "And where are the others sleeping?" "The others are sleeping where they were ordered to.... But has anything happened?..." "Silence!--Follow me." Naúm softly opened the door leading from the anteroom into the yard.... Out of doors everything was very dark;... it was possible to make out the sheds with their pillars only because they stood out still more densely black in the midst of the black mist.... "Sha'n't I light a lantern?"--said Feódor in a low voice. But Naúm waved his hand and held his breath.... At first he could hear nothing except those nocturnal sounds which one can almost always hear in inhabited places: a horse was munching oats, a pig grunted once faintly in its sleep, a man was snoring somewhere; but suddenly there reached his ear a suspicious sort of noise, proceeding from the extreme end of the yard, close to the fence.... It seemed as though some one was moving about, and breathing or blowing.... Naúm looked over Feódor's shoulder, and, cautiously descending the steps, walked in the direction of the sound.... A couple of times he halted, and listened, then continued to creep stealthily onward.... Suddenly he gave a start.... Ten paces from him, in the dense gloom, a point of light suddenly glimmered brightly: it was a red-hot coal, and beside the coal there showed itself for a brief instant the front part of some one's face, with lips puffed out.... Swiftly and silently Naúm darted at the light, as a cat darts at a mouse.... Hastily rising from the ground, a long body rushed to meet him, and almost knocked him from his feet, almost slipped through his hands, but he clung to it with all his might.... "Feódor! Andréi! Petrúshka!"--he shouted, at the top of his lungs;--"come here quick, quick! I 've caught a thief, an incendiary!"