rate of two versts an hour, when Michael, springing to his feet, bent his gaze up the river.
Several boats, aided by oars as well as by the current, were coming swiftly down upon them.
Michael's brow contracted, and a cry escaped him.
"What is the matter?" asked the girl.
But before Michael had time to reply one of the boatmen exclaimed in an accent of terror:
"The Tartars! the Tartars!"
There were indeed boats full of soldiers, and in a few minutes they must reach the ferryboat, it being too heavily laden to escape from them.
The terrified boatmen uttered exclamations of despair and dropped their poles.
"Courage, my friends!" cried Michael; "courage! Fifty roubles for you if we reach the right bank before the boats overtake us."
Incited by these words, the boatmen again worked manfully but it soon become evident that they could not escape the Tartars.
It was scarcely probable that they would pass without attacking them. On the contrary, there was everything to be feared from robbers such as these.
"Do not be afraid, Nadia," said Michael; "but be ready for anything."
"I am ready," replied Nadia.
"Even to leap into the water when I tell you?"
"Whenever you tell me."
"Have confidence in me, Nadia."
"I have, indeed!"
The Tartar boats were now only a hundred feet distant. They carried a detachment of Bokharian soldiers, on their way to reconnoiter around Omsk.
The ferryboat was still two lengths from the shore. The boatmen redoubled their efforts. Michael himself seized a pole and wielded it with superhuman strength. If he could land the tarantass and horses, and dash off with them, there was some chance of escaping the Tartars, who were not mounted.
But all their efforts were in vain. "Saryn na kitchou!" shouted the soldiers from the first boat.
Michael recognized the Tartar war-cry, which is usually
