“Now that’s it, friend:  feed us well, and I swear and promise by my honour, we will never think of harming you—­nor of escaping.”

“I believe, I believe!  I am glad we have arranged without making any noise about it.  What a fine fellow you have become, Ammalat!  Your horse is not a horse, your gun is not a gun:  it is a pleasure to look at you; and this is true.  Let me look at your dagger, my friend.  Surely this is the Koubatchin mark upon the blade.”

“No, the Kizliar mark,” replied Ammalat, quietly unbuckling the dagger-belt from his waist; “and look at the blade.  Wonderful! it cuts a nail in two like a candle.  On this side is the maker’s name; there—­read it yourself:  Aliousta—­Koza—­Nishtshekoi.”  And while he spoke, he twirled the naked blade before the eyes of the greedy Lezghin, who wished to show that he knew how to read, and was decyphering the complicated inscription with some difficulty.  But suddenly the dagger gleamed like lightning....  Ammalat, seizing the opportunity, struck Shermadan with all his might on the head; and so fierce was the blow, that the dagger was stopped by the teeth of the lower jaw.  The corpse fell heavily on the grass.  Keeping my eyes upon Ammalat, I followed his example, and with my pistol shot the robber who was next me, and had hold of my horse’s bridle.  This was to the others a signal for flight; the rascals vanished; for the death of their Ataman dissolved the knot of the leash which bound them together.  Whilst Ammalat, after the oriental fashion, was stripping the dead of their arms, and tying together the reins of the abandoned horses, I lectured him on his dissembling and making a false oath to the robber.  He lifted up his head with astonishment:  “You are a strange man, Colonel!” he replied.  “This rascal has done an infinity of harm to the Russians, by secretly setting fire to their stacks of hay, or seizing and carrying straggling soldiers and wood-cutters into slavery.  Do you know that he would have tyrannized over us—­or even tortured us, to make us write more movingly to our kinsmen, to induce them to pay a larger ransom?”

“It may be so, Ammalat, but to lie or to swear an oath, either in jest or to escape misfortune, is wrong.  Why could we not have thrown ourselves directly at the robbers, and have begun as you finished?”

“No, Colonel, we could not.  If I had not entered into conversation with the Ataman, we should have been riddled with balls at the first movement.  Moreover, I know that pack right well:  they are brave only in the presence of their Ataman, and it was with him it was necessary to begin!”