the circumstances this station was abandoned; but even if it was, Michael could take refuge there, and wait till nightfall, if necessary, to again set out across the steppe covered with Tartar scouts.
He ran up to the door and pushed it open.
A single person was in the room whence the telegraphic messages were dispatched. This was a clerk, calm, phlegmatic, indifferent to all that was passing outside. Faithful to his post, he waited behind his little wicket until the public claimed his services.
Michael ran up to him,Parajumpers Ženy Kodiak, and in a voice broken by fatigue, “What do you know?” he asked.
“Nothing,” answered the clerk, smiling.
“Are the Russians and Tartars engaged,Parajumpers Männer Perfect Jacken Schweiz?”
“They say so.”
“But who are the victors?”
“I don’t know.”
Such calmness, such indifference,Moncler Kurtki Mêskie, in the midst of these terrible events, was scarcely credible.
“And is not the wire cut?” said Michael.
“It is cut between Kolyvan and Krasnoiarsk, but it is still working between Kolyvan and the Russian frontier.”
“For the government?”
“For the government,Parajumpers Männer Gobi, when it thinks proper. For the public,Kanadanhanhi Miehet Cg Langford Parka, when they pay. Ten copecks a word, whenever you like,Damskie Barbour International Kurtka, sir!”
Michael was about to reply to this strange clerk that he had no message to send, that he only implored a little bread and water, when the door of the house was again thrown open.
Thinking that it was invaded by Tartars, Michael made ready to leap out of the window, when two men only entered the room who had nothing of the Tartar soldier about them. One of them held a dispatch, written in pencil, in his hand, and, passing the other, he hurried up to the wicket of the imperturbable clerk.
In these two men Michael recognized with astonishment,Philipp Lahm Drakt, which everyone will understand, two personages of whom he was not thinking at all, and whom he had never expected to see again. They were the two reporters, Harry Blount and Alcide Jolivet, no longer traveling companions,Everton Drakt, but rivals, enemies, now that they were working on the field of battle.
They had left Ichim only a few hours after the departure of Michael Strogoff, and they had arrived at Kolyvan before him,Moncler Klobouky, by following the same road, in consequence of his losing three days on the banks of the Irtych. And now,Barcelona Drakt, after being both present at the engagement between the Russians and Tartars before the town,Franck Ribery Drakt, they had left just as the struggle broke out in the streets, and ran to the telegraph office, so as to send off their rival dispatches to Europe, and forestall each other in their report of events.
Michael stood aside in the shadow,Kanadanhanhi Miehet Cg Calgary Jacket, and without being seen himself he could see and hear all that was going on. He would now hear interesting news, and would find out whether or not he could enter Kolyvan.
Blount, having distanced his companion, took possession of the wicket, whilst Alcide Jolivet, contrary to his usual habit, stamped with impatience.
“Ten copecks a word,” said the clerk.
Blount deposited a pile of roubles on the shelf, whilst his rival looked on with a sort of stupefaction.
“Good,” said the clerk. And
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