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allpowerful name of the Emperor.
"Forward, my swallows!" cried the iemschik, seizing one horse, while Michael
did the same to the other.
Thus urged, the horses began to struggle onward. They could no longer rear,
and the middle horse not being hampered by the others, could keep in the
center of the road. It was with the greatest difficulty that either man or
beasts could stand against the wind, and for every three steps they took in
advance, they lost one, and even two, by being forced backwards. They slipped,
they fell, they got up again. The vehicle ran a great risk of being smashed.
If the hood had not been securely fastened, it would have been blown away long
before.
Michael Strogoff and the iemschik took more than two hours in getting up this
bit of road, only half a verst in length, so directly exposed was it to the
lashing of the storm. The danger was not only from the wind which battered
against the travelers, but from the avalanche of stones and broken trunks
which were hurtling through the air.
Suddenly, during a flash of lightning, one of these masses was seen crashing
and rolling down the mountain towards the tarantass. The iemschik uttered a
cry.
Michael Strogoff
CHAPTER X A STORM IN THE URAL MOUNTAINS
49
Michael Strogoff in vain brought his whip down on the team, they refused to
move.
A few feet farther on, and the mass would pass behind them! Michael saw the
tarantass struck, his companion crushed; he saw there was no time to drag her
from the vehicle.
Then, possessed in this hour of peril with superhuman strength, he threw
himself behind it, and planting his feet on the ground, by main force placed
it out of danger.
The enormous mass as it passed grazed his chest, taking away his breath as
though it had been a cannonball, then crushing to powder the flints on the
road, it bounded into the abyss below.
"Oh, brother!" cried Nadia, who had seen it all by the light of the flashes.
"Nadia!" replied Michael, "fear nothing!"
"It is not on my own account that I fear!"
"God is with us, sister!"
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"With me truly, brother, since He has sent thee in my way!" murmured the young
girl.
The impetus the tarantass had received was not to be lost, and the tired
horses once more moved forward.
Dragged, so to speak, by Michael and the iemschik, they toiled on towards a
narrow pass, lying north and south, where they would be protected from the
direct sweep of the tempest. At one end a huge rock jutted out, round the
summit of which whirled an eddy. Behind the shelter of the rock there was a
comparative calm; yet once within the circumference of the cyclone, neither
man nor beast could resist its power.
Indeed, some firs which towered above this protection were in a trice shorn of
their tops, as though a gigantic scythe had swept across them. The storm was
now at its height. The lightning filled the defile, and the thunderclaps had
become one continued peal. The ground, struck by the concussion, trembled as
though the whole Ural chain was shaken to its foundations.
Happily, the tarantass could be so placed that the storm might strike it
obliquely. But the countercurrents, directed towards it by the slope, could
not be so well avoided, and so violent were they that every instant it seemed
as though it would be dashed to pieces.
Nadia was obliged to leave her seat, and Michael, by the light of one of the
lanterns, discovered an excavation bearing the marks of a miner's pick, where
the young girl could rest in safety until they could once more start.
Just thenit was one o'clock in the morningthe rain began to fall in torrents,
and this in addition to the wind and lightning, made the storm truly
frightful. To continue the journey at present was utterly impossible.
Besides, having reached this pass, they had only to descend the slopes of the
Ural Mountains, and to descend now, with the road torn up by a thousand
mountain torrents, in these eddies of wind and rain, was utter madness.
"To wait is indeed serious," said Michael, "but it must certainly be done, to
avoid still longer detentions. The very violence of the storm makes me hope
that it will not last long. About three o'clock the day will begin to break,
and the descent, which we cannot risk in the dark, we shall be able, if not
with ease, at least without such danger, to attempt after sunrise."
Michael Strogoff
CHAPTER X A STORM IN THE URAL MOUNTAINS
50
"Let us wait, brother," replied Nadia; "but if you delay, let it not be to
spare me fatigue or danger."
"Nadia, I know that you are ready to brave everything, but, in exposing both
of us, I risk more than my life, more than yours, I am not fulfilling my task,
that duty which before everything else I must accomplish."
"A duty!" murmured Nadia.
Just then a bright flash lit up the sky; a loud clap followed. The air was
filled with sulphurous suffocating vapor, and a clump of huge pines, struck by
the electric fluid, scarcely twenty feet from the tarantass, flared up like a
gigantic torch.
The iemschik was struck to the ground by a countershock, but, regaining his
feet, found himself happily unhurt.
Just as the last growlings of the thunder were lost in the recesses of the
mountain, Michael felt Nadia's hand pressing his, and he heard her whisper
these words in his ear: "Cries, brother! Listen!"
CHAPTER XI TRAVELERS IN DISTRESS
DURING the momentary lull which followed, shouts could be distinctly heard
from farther on, at no great distance from the tarantass. It was an earnest
appeal, evidently from some traveler in distress.
Michael listened attentively. The iemschik also listened, but shook his head,
as though it was impossible to help.
"They are travelers calling for aid," cried Nadia.
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"They can expect nothing," replied the iemschik.
"Why not?" cried Michael. "Ought not we do for them what they would for us
under similar circumstances?"
"Surely you will not risk the carriage and horses!"
"I will go on foot," replied Michael, interrupting the iemschik.
"I will go, too, brother," said the young girl.
"No, remain here, Nadia. The iemschik will stay with you. I do not wish to
leave him alone."
"I will stay," replied Nadia.
"Whatever happens, do not leave this spot."
"You will find me where I now am."
Michael pressed her hand, and, turning the corner of the slope, disappeared in
the darkness.
"Your brother is wrong," said the iemschik.
"He is right," replied Nadia simply.
Michael Strogoff
CHAPTER XI TRAVELERS IN DISTRESS
51
Meanwhile Strogoff strode rapidly on. If he was in a great hurry to aid the
travelers, he was also very anxious to know who it was that had not been
hindered from starting by the storm; for he had no doubt that the cries came
from the telga, which had so long preceded him.
The rain had stopped, but the storm was raging with redoubled fury. The
shouts, borne on the air, became more distinct. Nothing was to be seen of the
pass in which Nadia remained. The road wound along, and the squalls, checked
by the corners, formed eddies highly dangerous, to pass which, without being
taken off his legs, Michael had to use his utmost strength.
He soon perceived that the travelers whose shouts he had heard were at no
great distance. Even then, on account of the darkness, Michael could not see
them, yet he heard distinctly their words.
This is what he heard, and what caused him some surprise: "Are you coming
back, blockhead?"
"You shall have a taste of the knout at the next stage."
"Do you hear, you devil's postillion! Hullo! Below!"
"This is how a carriage takes you in this country!"
"Yes, this is what you call a telga!"
"Oh, that abominable driver! He goes on and does not appear to have discovered
that he has left us behind!"
"To deceive me, too! Me, an honorable Englishman! I will make a complaint at
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