'Malyshev? Yes, it's Colonel Malyshev.' Alexei at last recognised the man.

The colonel no longer had a moustache. Instead, there was a bluish, clean-shaven strip across his upper lip.

Spreading his arms wide, Malyshev gathered up sheets of paper from the floor and rammed them into the stove.

'What's happened? Is it all over?' Alexei asked dully.

'Yes', was the colonel's laconic reply. He jumped up, ran over to a desk, carefully looked it over, pulled out the drawers one by one and banged them shut, bent down again, picked up the last heap of documents from the floor and shoved them into the stove. Only then did he turn to Alexei Turbin and added in an ironically calm voice: 'We've done our bit - and now that's that!' He reached into an inside pocket, hurriedly pulled out a wallet, checked the documents in it, tore up a few of them criss-cross and threw them on the fire. As he did so Alexei stared at him. He no longer bore any resemblance to Colonel Malyshev. The man facing Alexei was simply a rather fat student, an amateur actor with slightly puffy red lips.

'Doctor - you're not still wearing your shoulder-straps?' Malyshev pointed at Alexei's shoulders. 'Take them off at once. What are you doing here? Where have you come from? Don't you know what's happened?'

'I'm late, sir, I'm afraid . . .' Alexei began.

Malyshev gave a cheerful smile. Then the smile suddenly vanished from his face, he shook his head anxiously and apologetically and said:

'Oh God, of course - it's my fault ... I told you to report at this time. . . . Obviously you stayed at home all day and haven't heard . . . Well, no time to go into all that. There's only one thing for you to do now - remove your shoulder-straps, get out of here and hide.'

'What's happened? For God's sake tell me what's happened?'

'What's happened?' Malyshev echoed his question with ironical jocularity. 'What's happened is that Petlyura's in the City. He's reached Pechorsk and may even be on the Kreshchatik now for all I know. The City's taken.' Suddenly Malyshev ground his teeth, squinted furiously and began unexpectedly to talk like the old Malyshev, not at all like an amateur actor. 'Headquarters betrayed us. We should have given up and run this morning. Fortunately I

had some reliable friends at headquarters and I found out the true state of affairs last night, so was able to disband the mortar regiment in time. This is no time for reflection, doctor-take off your badges!'

'. . . but over there, at the museum, they don't know all this and they still think. . . .'

Malyshev's face darkened.

'None of my business', he retorted bitterly. 'Not my affair. Nothing concerns me any longer. I was there a short while ago and I shouted myself hoarse warning them and begging them to disperse. I can't do any more. I've saved all my own men, and prevented them from being slaughtered. I saved them from a shameful end!' Malyshev suddenly began shouting hysterically. Obviously his control over some powerful and heavily-suppressed emotion had snapped and he could no longer restrain himself. 'Generals - huh!' He clenched his fists and made threatening gestures. His face had turned purple.

Just then a machine-gun began to chatter at the end of the street and the bullets seemed to be hitting the large house next door.

Malyshev stopped short, and was silent.

'This is it, doctor. Goodbye. Run for your life! Only not out on to the street. Go out there, by the back door, and then through the back yards. That way's still safe. And hurry.'

Malyshev shook the appalled Alexei Turbin by the hand, turned sharply about and ran off through the dark opening behind a partition. The machine-gun outside stopped firing and the shop was silent except for the crackling of paper in the stove. Although he suddenly felt very lonely, and despite Malyshev's urgent warnings, Alexei found himself walking slowly and with a curious languor towards the door. He rattled the handle, let fall the latch and returned to the stove. He acted slowly, his limbs oddly unwilling, his mind numb and muddled. The fire was dying down, the flames in the mouth of the stove sinking to a dull red glow and the shop suddenly grew much darker. In the graying, flickering shadows the shelves on the walls seemed to be gently moving up and down. As he stared around them Alexei noticed dully that

Madame Anjou's establishment still smelled of perfume. Faintly and softly, but it could still be smelled.

The thoughts in Alexei's mind fused into a formless jumble and for some time he gazed completely senselessly towards the place where the newly-shaven colonel had disappeared. Then, helped by the silence, his tangled thinking began slowly to unravel. The most important strand emerged clearly: Petlyura was here. 'Peturra, Peturra', Alexei repeated softly to himself and smiled, not knowing why. He walked over to a mirror on the wall, dimmed by a film of dust like a sheet of fine taffeta.

The paper had all burned out and the last little red tongue of flame danced to and fro for a while, then expired at the bottom of the stove. It was now almost quite dark.

'Petlyura, it's crazy. . . . Fact is, this country's completely ruined now', muttered Alexei in the twilit shop. Then, coming to his senses: 'Why am I standing around like this and dreaming? Suppose they start breaking into this place?'

He jumped into action, as Malyshev had done before leaving and began tearing off his shoulder-straps. The threads gave a little crackling sound as they ripped away and he was left holding two silver-braided rectangles from his tunic and two green ones from his greatcoat. Alexei looked at them, turned them over in his hands, was about to stuff them into his pocket as souvenirs but thought better of it as being too dangerous, and decided to burn them. There was no lack of combustible material, even though Malyshev had burned all the documents. Alexei scooped up a whole sheaf of silk clippings from the floor, pushed them into the stove and lit them. Once more weird shapes began flickering around the walls and the floor, and for a while longer Madame Anjou's premises brightened fitfully. In the flames the silver rectangles curled, broke out in bubbles, scorched and then turned to ash . . .

The next most urgent problem now arose in Alexei's mind -what should he do about the door? Should he leave the latch down, or should he open it? Suppose one of the volunteers, like Alexei himself, ran here and then found it shut and there was nowhere to

shelter? He unfastened the latch. Then came another searing thought: his doctor's identity card. He searched one pocket, then another - no trace of it. Hell, of course. He had left it at home. What a disgrace. Suppose he were stopped and caught. He was wearing a gray army greatcoat. If they questioned him and he said he was a doctor, how could he prove it? Damn his own carelessness.

'Hurry' whispered a voice inside him.

Without stopping to reflect any longer Alexei rushed to the back of the shop by the way Malyshev had gone, through a narrow door into a dim passage, and from there out by the back door into a yard.