I am alone! Soldiers! soldiers! I am alone, alone--" The sun was rising over the sea.
The bodies were placed in a box.

Then they were taken away.

With stretched necks, with bulging eyes, with blue, swollen tongues, looking like some unknown, terrible flowers between the lips, which were covered with bloody foam--the bodies were hurried back along the same road by which they had come--alive.

And the spring snow was just as soft and fresh; the spring air was just as strong and fragrant.

And on the snow lay Sergey's black rubber-shoe, wet, trampled under foot.
Thus did men greet the rising sun.
THE END.