Jilin rode on ahead and stopped to wait until the baggage-train should catch him up. He heard the signal-horn sounded; the company had stopped again. Jilin thought, “Why shouldn’t I go on alone without the soldiers? I have a good horse, and if I come across any Tartars I can easily gallop away. I wonder if it would be safe?” As he stood there thinking it over, another officer, by the name of Kostilin, rode up with a rifle and said, “Let us go on alone, Jilin. I’m dreadfully hungry, and the heat’s unbearable. My shirt is wringing wet.” Kostilin was a big man and stout; his face was burning red, and the perspiration poured from his brow. Jilin deliberated for a moment and said, “Is your rifle loaded?” “It is.” “Very well; come along. Only the condition is to be that we don’t part.” And they set off down the road alone. They were riding along the steppe talking together and keeping a sharp look-out from side to side. They could see a long way round them. When they left the steppe they came to a road running down a valley between two hills. And Jilin said, “Let’s go up on that hill and look about; some Tartars might easily spring out from the hills and we shouldn’t see them.” “What’s the use?” Kostilin said. “We’d better go on.” Jilin paid no heed to him. “You wait down here,” he said, “and I’ll just go up and have a look.” And he turned his horse to the left up the hill. Jilin’s horse was a hunter and carried him up the hill as though it had wings. He had bought it for a hundred roubles as a colt, and broken it in himself. When he reached the top of the hill he saw some thirty Tartars a few paces ahead of him. He turned hastily, but the Tartars had seen him and gave chase down the hill, getting their rifles out as they went. Jilin bounded down as fast as the horse’s legs would carry him, crying out to Kostilin, “Get your rifle ready!” And in thought he said to his horse, “Get me out of this, my beauty; don’t stumble, or I’m lost. Once I reach the rifle, they shan’t take me alive!” But Kostilin, instead of waiting when he saw the Tartars, set off full gallop in the direction of the fortress, lashing his horse now on one side, now on the other, and the horse’s switching tail was all that could be seen of him in the clouds of dust. Jilin saw that it was all up with him. The rifle was gone; with a sword alone he could do nothing. He turned his horse in the direction of the convoy, hoping to escape, but six Tartars rushed ahead to cut him off. His horse was a good one, but theirs were better, and they were trying to cross his path. He wanted to turn in another direction, but his horse could not pull up and dashed on straight towards the Tartars. A red-bearded Tartar on a grey horse caught Jilin’s eyes. He was yelling and showing his teeth and pointing his rifle at him. “I know what devils you are!” Jilin thought. “If you take me alive, you’ll put me in a pit and have me flogged. I’ll not be taken alive!”