“Excellence, this boy yelled at Katerin Stephanovna,” explained the officer. “And he tripped my feet when I came down from the sledge.” Peter’s father swept his cap to the ground in an abject bow. “Pardon, Excellence—I will take the boy away.” “What now!” exclaimed Kirsakoff, with a close look at the bootmaker. “Is this Gorekin? Is this what I put you into the free gang for? to be under the feet of your Governor?” Peter’s father bowed once more. “True, Excellence, I am Peter Pavlovitch Gorekin, the bootmaker.” “Then you should be at your boots and not under my feet!” raged Kirsakoff. “Do I give you the liberty of the settlement to have you in the way with a bloody-nosed youngster when my little daughter comes home?” The Governor turned wrathfully to the commander of the Cossack guard about the sledges. “Take this Gorekin away to the prison!” he commanded. “Excellence, my son!” cried Peter’s father, stricken to his soul by the disaster in the Governor’s order. “Oh, Excellence, I beg—if I go to the prison, what is to become of my son?” “You should have prized your liberty and kept your son out of the way,” said the Governor. “You think nothing of ruining the happiness of my little daughter! So your son must learn his place.——Take them both to the prison!” And Kirsakoff turned away and hurried to the sledge. “What has happened to the poor people?” asked Katerin, her face troubled as she watched Peter and his father. She saw that the boy had been hurt and was crying, and that the soldiers now menaced them. “Do not look at them, little daughter,” said Kirsakoff. “They have disobeyed the rules. Was it cold coming from Irkutsk? And did you bring me many kisses?” The Governor lifted her out of the sledge and smothered her in his arms. At this moment a Cossack interposed himself between the bootmaker and the Governor, and two soldiers closed in on Peter and his father, their bayonets fixed upon their rifles. Gorekin held up his hand in a plea to speak once more to the Governor. The bootmaker had dropped his cap, his face showed the agony of his despair, and the tears streamed down his face. His mouth was open and his lips trembled with the chagrin and horror of what had befallen him. “Excellence! I submit!” he pleaded. “But by the mercy of God, condemn not my son to the prison too!” One of the Cossacks pushed him back violently so that he spun round and staggered blindly in an effort to keep his footing on the slippery snow. Then he turned with a cry and thrust the Cossack aside, to run after the Governor, hands stretched out in supplication. “Mercy for my son!” he called after Kirsakoff. A Cossack’s saber flashed, and Gorekin received its point in the back—once, twice—and with a scream, fell writhing on the snow-packed street before the post-house. Kirsakoff ran with little Katerin in his arms toward the near-by droshky which was awaiting them. The crowd closed in at once about the stricken bootmaker and his son.